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The Catholic Church is one step closer to canonising a surfing saint. Pope Francis recognised the heroic virtue of Brazil’s “Surfer Angel” Guido Schäffer in a decree issued by the Congregation for the Causes of Saints on May 24. Schäffer was a seminarian, a doctor, and a surfer who drowned while surfing in 2009 off the coast of Rio de Janeiro at the age of 34, before he could fulfil his desire of being ordained to the priesthood.
Born in Brazil on May 22, 1974, Schäffer grew up near the sandy beaches of Rio’s Copacabana neighbourhood. His father was a physician and his mother was very active in a charismatic renewal movement in their Catholic parish, Nossa Senhora de Copacabana, and instilled in him a love of Scripture and prayer.
While on a retreat, Schäffer was moved by a line in the Bible: “Do not turn your face away from any of the poor, so that God’s face will not be turned away from you” . He asked for God’s forgiveness and prayed: “Jesus, help me to care for the poor.” “He used to pray with and for each of them, always inviting them to receive the sacraments as a source of grace and communion with God,” she said.
St John Paul II’s visit to Rio de Janeiro in 1997 and Schäffer’s pilgrimage to Europe for the beatification of Brazil’s protomartyrs in 2000 also played a decisive role in his life-changing decision to leave his profession as a doctor and leave his girlfriend to respond to a call to enter the priesthood.
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