On Sunday, Pope Leo XIV canonised Venezuelans José Gregorio Hernández, a lay doctor, and Carmen Rendiles, a nun, the first saints of Venezuela, in a ceremony in St. Peter’s Square before tens of thousands of faithful.
Along with Hernández (1864-1919) and Rendiles (1903-1977), he also canonised Ignacio Choukrallah Maloyan, Armenian Catholic Archbishop of Mardin, Turkey; Peter To Rot, a layman from Papua New Guinea; Italian nuns Vincenza Maria Poloni, founder of the Institute of the Sisters of Mercy of Verona, and Maria Troncatti, of the Congregation of the Daughters of Mary Help of Christians; and Bartolo Longo, also an Italian layman.
At the ceremony, as is traditional, the prefect of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints read the biographies of the two blessed and asked that their names be inscribed in the book of saints. After the Latin formula of canonisation read by the Pope, loud applause was heard in St. Peter’s Square.
Pope Leo XIV presides over a Mass on the day of the canonisation of seven new saints in St. Peter’s Square, Vatican City, on 19 October 2025.
About 55,000 people gathered in the square for the canonisation Mass, according to local authorities.
Among those in attendance, there was a large presence of Venezuelans, who stood out for the large number of flags of their country and T-shirts with images of the new saints.
Saint José Gregorio Hernández, known as the ‘doctor of the poor,’ was born on 26 October 1864 in Isnotú, a small town in the western state of Trujillo, and was raised by a modest family with strong religious values.
An image shows portraits of the new saints (from left to right): José Gregorio Hernández, Carmen Rendiles Martínez, Peter To Rot and Ignatius Maloyan hanging in St. Peter’s Basilica during a Mass for the canonisation of seven new saints in St. Peter’s Square, Vatican City, on 19 October 2025.
In Venezuela, he has been venerated for more than a century, and his canonisation has for years been one of the few points of agreement between Chavistas and opponents amid political polarisation.
During his lifetime, he was much loved for his dedication to the poor and his tireless work as a doctor, and he is remembered for his great charity and humility.
Hernández moved to Caracas at the age of 13 to continue his studies and graduated as a doctor from the Central University of Venezuela (UCV) in 1888.
He died on 19 June 1919, run over by one of the few vehicles circulating in Caracas.
He was beatified on 30 April 2021 after Pope Francis recognised the miracle of the recovery of Yaxury Solórzano Ortega, a girl who was shot in the head and whom doctors had given up for lost.
Although the Vatican has only recognised this miracle, in Venezuela Hernández Cisneros is credited with ‘thousands’ of favours, which is why the local Church began the process for his canonisation in 1949, and he was declared a servant of God in 1972.
Saint Carmen Rendiles, for her part, was born on 11 August 1903 in Caracas as the third of nine siblings. From a young age, she showed a deep religious vocation, which was rejected by several communities due to her disability, as she was missing almost her entire left arm.
In 1927, she entered the Congregation of the Servants of Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament, and in 1965, with the support of the Venezuelan episcopate, she achieved independence from the congregation and founded a new religious institute, of which she was the first superior general.
Throughout her life, she devoted herself to education, founding schools for low-income girls, and promoted important social works, always committed to teaching catechesis and serving those most in need.
In 1974, she suffered a traffic accident that left her with a broken leg, and despite her physical limitations, she continued to work, moving around on crutches and in a wheelchair until she finally passed away on 9 May 1977.
The nun was beatified by Pope Francis on 16 June 2018, after a miracle attributed to her intercession in the healing of a Venezuelan doctor in July 2003 was approved, and in March 2021, the second miracle that allowed for her canonisation was approved: the ‘miraculous healing’ of a woman in 2015.
