Aloysius Stepinac

Aloysius Viktor Stepinac was the Croatian Catholic Archbishop of Zagreb from 1937 until his death in 1960, including the genocidal rule of the Ustae over the Axis puppet state the Independent State of Croatia from 1941 to 1945 during World War II. He was tried by the communist Yugoslav government after the war and convicted of treason and collaboration with the Ustae regime. He served his 16year sentence first in prison, then confined to his home village of Krai. He was made a cardinal in 1953. In 1998 he was declared a martyr and beatified by Pope John Paul II. His record during World War II and his subsequent martyrdom and beatification remain controversial.

Stepinac was born in the village of Brezari in the parish of Krai in the AustroHungarian Kingdom of CroatiaSlavonia onMay 1898, to the rich viticulturalist Josip Stepinac and his second wife Barbara . He was the fifth of nine children, and he had three more siblings from his fathers first marriage. His mother, a devout Roman Catholic, prayed constantly that he would enter the priesthood. The family moved to Krai in 1906, and Stepinac attended primary school there, then attended high school in Zagreb from 1909 to 1915, boarding at the Archdiocese of Zagreb orphanage. This was followed by study at the lyce of the archdiocese, as he was seriously considering taking holy orders, having sent in his application to the seminary at the age of 16.

Source: Wikipedia