Biography
Andrés Solá Molist
About Andrés Solá Molist
Andrés Solá Molist grew up in a farming family in Catalonia, Spain. After hearing a Claretian missionary preach, he entered the congregation’s school at Vic. Solá was ordained in Segovia in 1922 and spent another year preparing for preaching ministry at Aranda de Duero. He arrived in Mexico in 1923.
His first work included teaching in the Claretian school at Toluca and preaching. He later joined the community at León, where his ministry brought him into contact with Catholics whose access to priests was becoming increasingly restricted.
Solá also served for a time at Axtla in San Luis Potosí. Letters to his parents described his preaching in the towns around León. When restrictions on foreign clergy threatened his work, the sisters Josefina and Jovita Alba sheltered him in their home.
He continued hearing confessions, baptizing, celebrating marriages and bringing Communion to sick people. In 1927, his local superior sent him to Mexico City. He returned to León with permission from the provincial superior.
A letter to his friend and fellow Claretian Pau Aguadé shows that Solá had considered the possibility of martyrdom before his arrest. Writing in February 1927, he expressed a desire that his death, should it come, might serve the Church in Mexico. This letter is quoted in the later account by Claretian superior general Josep Maria Abella.
On April 23, Solá received a warning that an arrest warrant had been issued. He remained at the house and was arrested the following day. When questioned, he acknowledged that he was a priest.
He was shot with the diocesan priest José Trinidad Rangel and the layman Leonardo Pérez on April 25, 1927. According to Claretian accounts, Solá remained alive for several hours after his companions had died. The three are remembered as the Martyrs of San Joaquín.
The Catholic Church recognized their deaths as martyrdom in 2004. They were beatified at a ceremony in Guadalajara on November 20, 2005.
Guadalajara includes Solá in the November 20 memorial of Blessed Anacleto González Flores and companions.
Preparing his congregation for Solá’s beatification in 2005, Abella urged its communities to study his life and renew their commitment to missionary service. His appeal connected remembrance of Solá with the formation of future missionaries.
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