Pedro Poveda

Pedro Poveda Castroverde (1874-1936), Spanish priest and educationalist, founder of the Teresian Association, was born in Linares in the Andalusian province of Jaén, Southern Spain. He began his educational work in Guadix, near Granada. Later, he was appointed a Canon of the Basilica of Covadonga in Asturias, in the North. In 1911, he founded his first "Academies and Pedagogical Centers,” initiating a movement for educational renewal which extended throughout Spain and other countries. This was the beginning of the Teresian Association, a lay association with the mission of bringing the "good news” of education and culture to society, and a focus on the involvement of women in public education and professional life in the early twentieth century. After an intensely active life of commitment to his educational and apostolic calling, Pedro Poveda was taken prisoner at his Madrid home on July 27, 1936, soon after the outbreak of the Spanish civil war. On the following morning, he was martyred. He was beatified in Rome on October 10, 1993, and canonized in Madrid on May 4, 2003 by Pope John Paul II.