Blessed Honorat Koźmiński

Born in 1829 in Biała Podlaska, Wacław Koźmiński lost his faith as a student, was imprisoned for political reasons, and found God again during a serious illness in prison. He became a Capuchin friar, taking the name Honorat, and was ordained in 1852. When the Russian authorities shut down religious houses after the 1863 uprising, he spent long days in the confessional and founded many congregations whose members lived without habits so they could serve the poor quietly. He died in Nowe Miasto nad Pilicą on December 16, 1916, and was beatified by Pope John Paul II in 1988.

Franciscans remember him on December 16, the anniversary of his death. Many of the congregations he started still serve in Poland and abroad.