The service to beatify Józef and Wiktoria Ulma and their seven children is set to be held on Sunday in the town of Markowa, southeastern Poland, where they were killed in March 1944 for saving Jews.
The event will be attended by over 30,000 including top officials, 80 bishops, 1,000 priests, the country's chief rabbi and an Israeli delegation.
The beatification event on Sunday will be officiated by Cardinal Marcello Semeraro, the Prefect of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints, acting as Pope Francis’ representative, church officials said.
Pope Francis is not scheduled to attend the ceremony.
In the autumn of 1942, a Jewish family of eight from the town of Łańcut came to Markowa to find shelter. When they asked the Ulmas to hide them, the couple agreed.
Over a year later, the Jews’ presence on the family's farm was discovered. In the spring of 1944, German police, under the command of Eilert Dieken, shot the hiding Jews to death and murdered the entire Ulma family, Józef, Wiktoria, who was seven months pregnant, and their six children, Stanisława, aged 8, Barbara, 7, Władysław, 6, Franciszek, 4, Antoni, 3, and Maria, 2.
The pope in December approved a decree recognising the martyrdom of the family of Józef and Wiktoria Ulma, the Catholic Church said.
Vatican media have noted that it is the first time that an entire family will be honoured together in this manner.
In a rare move, the Ulmas' newborn seventh child will also earn the title of "blessed". The child is eligible for beatification through the concept of "baptism of blood", having been born "at the time of the mother's martyrdom", according to the Vatican's department for saints.
In 1995, the Yad Vashem Remembrance Institute in Jerusalem recognised Józef Ulma and his wife as Righteous Among the Nations.
The Ulma Family Museum, dedicated to those who saved Jews during the Holocaust, opened in Markowa in 2016.
(mo)
Source: PAP, Reuters, AFP