Shtjefën Kurti

Shtjefën Kurti
Dom Shtjefën Kurti
Religion	Roman Catholic
Personal
Nationality	Albanian
Born	(1898-12-24)24 December 1898 Ferizoviç, now Ferizaj, Kosovo Vilayet, Ottoman Empire (modern Ferizaj, Kosovo)
Died	20 October 1971(1971-10-20) (aged 72) Fushë, Albania

Shtjefën Kurti (December 24, 1898, Ferizoviç, now Ferizaj – October 20, 1971, Fushë) was an Albanian Catholic priest. On April 26, 2016, Pope Francis approved the martyrdom of Kurti and 37 other Albanian Catholics, paving the way to their beatification.

Shtjefen Kurti studied in Albania, Graz, Feldkirch, Innsbruck and Rome. Kurti was ordained a priest in Rome on 13 May 1924.

Father Kurti was a parish priest in Skopje and Novoselo near Gjakova from 1921 to 1929, in what was then the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes (today Macedonia and Kosovo). After the murder of fellow Albanian priest Shtjefën Gjeçovi, Kurti fled to Albania and then moved on to Romania. He wrote a memorandum to the League of Nations regarding the persecution of Catholic Albanians in Kosovo (May 5, 1930). He would move on to serve as a priest in Shna Prendja (Krujë), Gurës, and Tirana.

Kurti was arrested for the first time in Tirana on 28 October 1946 and imprisoned, at first in Tirana, then later in Burrel. He was sentenced to death, but his sentence was changed to 20 years' imprisonment and he was set free on 2 May 1963, after serving 17 years. Twice during the 1960s, Father Kurti suffered psychological torture, including simulated executions, during the second of which he was forced to dig a grave he was made to believe would be his own. After his release, he continued his ministry in Tirana, Juba, and Gurës. In 1967, after he prevented thugs from destroying his church, he was arrested by state security and sentenced to 16 years of forced labor.