Fr Ragheed Ganni The Vatican has given permission for the opening of the sainthood cause of an Iraqi priest who studied in the Irish College at Rome and spent several summers working at Lough Derg.
Chaldean Fr Ragheed Ganni, was killed by armed gunmen after celebrating Mass in Mosul on June 3, 2007, along with three deacons, including his cousin Deacon Basman Yousef Daud. The deacons had been accompanying Fr Ganni because of increasing threats against him by militants. After shooting the men, the militants booby-trapped their car with explosives to prevent others from safely recovering the bodies.
Irish saints
Fr Ganni, who was born in Mosul in 1972 and studied in Rome between 1996 and 2003, is depicted alongside such Irish saints as Patrick, Brigid, Columbanus, and Oliver Plunkett in the apse of the college chapel at the Irish College in Rome. Last year Irish priests who knew him from his time in the college and at Lough Derg welcomed Pope Francis’ decision to celebrate a Mass for modern martyrs while wearing a stole that had belonged to Fr Ganni.
The Congregation for Saints’ Causes gave the ‘nihil obstat’ (‘no objection’) on May 14, allowing a diocesan bishop to open a local inquiry into the sanctity of all four murdered clerics.
The Eparchy of St Thomas the Apostle of Detroit will be handling the process because of conditions facing the church in Mosul.