Juan Antonio Pérez Mayo
Who they were
Giovanni Antonio Pérez Mayo was born on 18 November 1907 at Santa Marina del Rey (León, diocese of Astorga) to a practising Catholic family; nicknamed "Tarsicio" as a boy for his early Eucharistic devotion, he entered the Missionary Oblates of Mary Immaculate, professed in 1927, studied philosophy and theology in Rome and was ordained priest on 26 June 1932. From 1935 he taught philosophy at the Oblate scholasticate of Pozuelo de Alarcón, near Madrid.
When anti-clerical militia stormed the Pozuelo convent on 22 July 1936, at the start of the Spanish Civil War, the whole community was arrested. At dawn on 24 July 1936 he was taken with six Oblate students and a layman to Casa de Campo, near Madrid, and shot without trial, aged twenty-nine. He was beatified in Madrid on 17 December 2011.
The miracles
As a martyr he was raised to the altars without a miracle.
Why that counted as sanctity
Oblate priest and philosophy professor shot with his students at Casa de Campo during the Spanish Civil War, 24 July 1936; beatified 2011.
The cause
Juan Antonio Pérez Mayo has been beatified; the cause continues. Favours received, and offers of help, go to the postulation, the office that carries the cause forward: Oblates of Mary Immaculate postulation: the Spanish martyrs, including Juan Antonio Perez Mayo.
- Santi, beati e testimoni (santiebeati.it) - Beato Giovanni Antonio Perez Mayo, by Enrico Quiri
- Wikidata Q1710354 — dates, feast day and identifiers (CC0)
Checked against the sources listed on 22 September 2026. Corrections welcome.