The Catholic Church may one day recognize two children killed in last month’s tragic Minneapolis church shooting as “new martyrs,” according to Vatican experts.
Harper Moyski, age 10, and Fletcher Merkel, age 8, were shot and killed while attending a school Mass at Annunciation Catholic Church on August 27. The tragedy has led many faithful to ask whether these children could be considered martyrs, killed “in hatred of the faith.”
Archbishop Fabio Fabene, president of the Vatican’s Commission of New Martyrs — Witnesses of the Faith, confirmed that the possibility is being examined. “If the diocese or other local ecclesial entities present these figures to us as witnesses of the faith, we will examine them and see if we can include them in the list,” he said, according to Catholic News Agency (CNA).
The commission was created in 2023 by Pope Francis under the Dicastery for the Causes of Saints. Its mission is to compile an archive of Christians, Catholic and non-Catholic, who were killed in the new millennium. Archbishop Fabene emphasized that inclusion on the list is not the same as formal canonization or beatification: “They are two totally distinct things” (CNA).
Andrea Riccardi, commission vice president and founder of the Community of Sant’Egidio, explained the deeper purpose of the effort. “The work of the commission is ‘to preserve stories and names in the heart of the Church, so that their memory is not lost,’” he said. Riccardi added that being listed as a “new martyr” does not confer sainthood but serves as a way to honor their sacrifice.
As of September 2025, the commission’s catalog includes 1,640 Christians who were killed in circumstances of persecution or hatred around the world. “The heart of this work is memory,” Riccardi said. “As St. John Paul II said, the names of those who died for their faith should not be lost” (CNA).
This discussion about Harper and Fletcher came during a Vatican press conference presenting an upcoming ecumenical prayer service that Pope Leo XIV will lead on September 14 at the Basilica of St. Paul Outside the Walls. The service will commemorate 21st-century martyrs and witnesses of the faith on the Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross, a day that also marks the pope’s 70th birthday.
As Catholics reflect on this tragedy, the Church invites the faithful to pray for Harper and Fletcher’s souls, for their grieving families, and for an end to violence. Their memory, and the possibility of their recognition as witnesses of faith, challenges us to remember the cost of Christian discipleship even in our own time.
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