Unità documentaria 0604 - Card. Giuseppe Beran

ii

The black and white photograph is a death memento of Cardinal Josef Beran, Archbishop of Prague who died while in Rome. Cardinal Beran was a Czech Roman Catholic prelate who served as the Archbishop of Prague from 1946 until his death. Beran was imprisoned in the Dachau concentration camp during World War II after the Nazis had targeted him for "subversive and dangerous" behavior where he almost died in 1943 due to disease. He was freed in 1945 upon Allied liberation and Pope Pius XII nominated him to head the Prague archdiocese. But the introduction of the Communist regime saw him imprisoned and placed under house arrest. He was released in 1963, on condition that he could not perform his episcopal duties and he was later exiled to Rome in 1965 as part of a coordinated deal between the Church and Government. His cause for canonization opened in 1998 and he became titled as a Servant of God.

• maltese