The seven martyred monks from his community were beatified on Dec. 8, 2018, along with 12 other Christians killed during the Algerian civil war in the 1990s. Schumacher was present at their beatification at the Shrine of Our Lady of the Holy Cross in Oran.
The Tibhirine monks’ story was also dramatized in the 2010 French film Of Gods and Men, which won the Grand Prix at the Cannes Film Festival.
Pope Francis greeted Schumacher and kissed his hand during his apostolic visit to Morocco in March 2019.
Schumacher was born in Lorraine, France in 1924. After Germany took de facto control of Alsace-Lorraine during World War II, he was enlisted by force into the Wehrmacht, but was never sent to the front due to a medical diagnosis of tuberculosis.
He joined a seminary run by the Marist fathers after the war and was ordained a priest in 1953. A few years later he joined a Trappist monastery in Brittany, France.
Schumacher was sent to Algeria to join the Tibhirine abbey in 1964 at the request of the Archbishop of Algiers. He had been part of the community for 30 years when his brothers were martyred.
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