Pope Francis recently declared Sister Maria Laura Mainetti, the superior of the Sisters of the Cross religious order, to have died as a martyr after she was slain by three teenage girls in a Satanic sacrifice.

According to Agenzia Fide, Pope Francis declared Sister Maria to be a martyr for the Catholic faith after she was lured into a park by three teenage girls who beat and stabbed her to death. Sister Maria, 60, who dedicated her life to working with children, young people and families, was known to her killers to whom she taught catechism.

According to the Catholic News Agency, the murder took place on the evening of June 6, 2000, when Sister Maria was led into a park by the girls who pretended to need counseling after a rape. Sister was made to kneel while the girls shouted abuses at her and began to beat her with a brick and push her head into a wall. They took turns stabbing her, each girl stabbing her six times in order to form the number 666. The actual number of Sister’s stab wounds was 19 rather than the intended 18, which “ruined the ritual” according to the girls.

Throughout the attack, Sister Maria was heard asking God to forgive the girls with her last words being, “Lord, forgive them.”

For those who knew the gentle sister, this was not hard to believe. She was particularly sensitive to the plight of young people and once wrote, “…[Y]oung people are poor ... Yes, because they are often disoriented, uprooted, plagiarized, they suffocate an unspoken cry of life ... I feel the urge to accompany them and ask Jesus to help them, because they have no points of reference.”

The three girls, Ambra Gianasso, Milena De Giambattista and Veronica Pietrobelli, ranging in age from 16 to 17 years of age, were later convicted of the murder and received sentences from eight to twelve years. Not only had they been spotted together with Sister Maria on June 6, but a clump of hair belonging to one of the girls was found in Sister’s clenched hand. Police also intercepted phone calls in which two of the girls discussed the killing. None of the teens had any prior history of violence or crime and came from middle-class families. They later admitted that their target was the pastor of the parish but they felt he would be more difficult to handle.

The girls have since been freed from prison and have all started families in various cities in Italy.

This crime is just one of many warning signs about the rise in popularity of Satanism among young people, many of whom grew up without any strong religious foundation during at time when the occult was becoming increasingly popularized in literature and entertainment. This has resulted in presenting young people with a grossly inaccurate idea of Satan and Satanism.

For example, in this article appearing in Huck Magazine, Misty Tyres, 32, who is a barber by trade, claims Satanism is a way to achieve success both personally and professionally.

“I credit [Satanism] for a lot of the successes in my life. It’s always encouraging you to push yourself.”

Misty first heard of Satanism as a teenager, but didn’t officially join the Church of Satan until she turned 27, after discovering a book called The Satanic Witch by its founder, Anton Szandor LaVey. LaVey's "church" does not believe in the existence of the devil but believes Satan is a pre-Christian life principal worth emulating.

“The way it talked about how you see yourself – it doesn’t matter if you’re, say, a slightly larger woman,” she says with a laugh. “It’s about using that to your advantage. It’s about figuring out how you can best present yourself, how you can feel more confident and work things in your favor.”

The same article quoted another young man, 26-year-old Wyatt Fleming, who became involved in Satanism at the age of 18 and says it played a pivotal role in his life. “It’s inspired me to visualize who I want to be,” he says. “I’ve upgraded my style, packed on muscle, written books, succeeded in military training and learned better how to network, make friends and meet new lovers.”

He encourages young people to let Satanism help them to find their way through these uncertain times.

“They could do a lot of good for themselves to embrace a religion that’s about developing your abilities and self-awareness to live life on your own terms… and replacing traditional religion with something other than mass-market consumerism and shoddy, vague, spiritual beliefs.”

These young people are naively dancing on the edge of total disaster and we can only pray that someone, like a Sister Maria, will come along to warn them away from the dangerous path they are following.

On June 19 of this year, Pope Francis recognized Sister Maria’s martyrdom, saying that she was killed out of “hatred for the faith” and authorized Cardinal Angelo Becciu, prefect for the Causes of Saints, to look into a decree for her beatification.

Sister Maria Laura, please pray for our young people, many of whom are being lured into occultism under false pretenses, that they may be warned about the hidden dangers and return to the protection of the God Who loves them.

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