LINARES: Where Saint Pedro Poveda was born and raised

In 1874, the year Pedro Poveda was born, Linares was an important urban city because of its lead mines in full production, a fact that attracted immigrants in search of jobs. There were also some individuals who accumulated great fortunes. In addition to the social differences, this city included diverse political parties and cultural trends.

The Poveda family belonged to a well-educated middle class. They were sensitive to the social problems and had friends among the poor and the rich. José, the head of the household, was a Chemist in a Mining company, and the mother took care of the house and of their five boys.

Pedro Poveda was born on December 3rd, 1874,  at the house on  Bermejal Square, number 3.
All the family, especially the Castroverdes, celebrated the event. The sister of the maternal grandfather, Ana Maria, left her home to assist the young mother. Being in her fifties and without children, she welcomed the child as if he were her grandson. Just after the birth of the baby, she offered him to the Virgin Mary, in front of the painting of the Immaculate Conception that presided the household oratory.  She prayed to God that the child may be a good Christian or, if otherwise, that He would take him to heaven. It is Pedro Poveda himself who, narrating the story of the painting, gives this account:

“My mother recalls that (…) when Our Lord brought me to this world, a holy woman, although she is not canonized, Mrs Ana María Castroverde Gómez, a widow, sister of my maternal grandfather, took me in her arms as soon as I was born, and presented me to the Immaculate Conception, asking her to bless me and to make me a good Christian or otherwise to take my life before I could see the light”.

The parents of the child committed themselves to giving him a Christian education.

Pedro Poveda was taken to be baptized by another woman of the family, Mrs María de la Cabeza Gómez, married to D.José Poveda Montes, cousin of Poveda’s father. He was a young veterinary, wealthy and fervent patriot who soon was going to be the head of the Republican Democratic Progressive Party. This married couple had five children, all educated in the Christian principles. The father sent his children to study in Madrid, at the “Institución Libre de Enseñanza”.  ( Free Teaching Institute). It was the wife of this man who acted as Godmother for the son of her cousins, at the christening that took place at the Church of Santa María, on December 10th, seven days after his birth. The priest Fr. Antonio Monted administered the Sacrament of baptism and gave the child the names of Pedro, and those of his two grandfathers, José Luis and Francis Xavier.

On April 5th 1874, in the Parish church of Santa María, the Bishop of Jaen, Msgr. Antolín Monescillo, administered the Sacrament of Confirmation to the children of Linares. This time, his parents took Pedro Poveda, only three months old, to receive the sacrament. The Municipal Judge of the city, Mr. Martín Arboledas,  acted as Godfather in the confirmation.

The young Pedro, who lived his childhood in the warm family atmosphere that included grandparents, uncles, cousins, etc., soon showed his attraction towards the priesthood. He tells us about the ornaments and liturgical clothes that his aunts, lovingly, made for him to “celebrate Mass”. Nevertheless, his father didn’t agree immediately with his desire, because he preferred him to consolidate that vocation. Finally, he permitted him to enter the Seminary of Jaen, when he was fifteen, under the condition that he should, at the same time, finish his high school studies. He did so, and on 1893, he obtained the high school diploma.

To start training to be a priest “was the greatest joy they could give me. I dreamt of the Seminary and spent my life making plans for it”, he wrote later on. During his years in the Seminary, he tried to fulfil his duties with perfection and to practice charity towards the poor.

The economic difficulties of his family, caused by the long rheumatic illness of his father, obliged him to apply for a scholarship, which was granted to him by the new Bishop of the Diocese for the Seminary of Guadix (Granada), where he moved in 1884.

Some years later, when he was a canon at the Shrine of Covadonga, Poveda returned to Linares, on March 10th, 1912. There, with the help of his cousin Antonia López Arista, he opened a new Academy,  “Academia de Santa Teresa”. 

Encarnación González wrote about this in an article published in 1999 in the “Boletin del Instituto de Estudios Giennenses, Nº 172,  and pointed out that “ on the 14 April, 1912, the “Academia” opened a Teresian school to offer Sunday catechetical lessons to the poor children, in the midst of the national controversy about the catechism in the schools. The “Academia” in Linares was outstanding in the intellectual and feminist fields”.

INFO-IT
Data: Encarnación González, Pedro Poveda, una vida desde Dios para Nosotros
Flavio Paz Velásquez, Raices Linarenses (Cuadernos Biográficos Pedro Poveda)

Updates: 21/04/2007