BÉTHENCOURT, PEDRO de SAN JOSÉ de, venerable. – Franciscan tertiary, founder of the Bethlehemites suppressed by the Cortes in 1820, born at Vilaflor (Tenerife, Canary Islands) on 21 March 1626, died at Guatemala on 25 April 1667. Descended from Giovanni di Béthencourt, the famous French conqueror, he worked as a shepherd until the age of twenty-four; having gone to the New World, he devoted himself to charity and to the education of children, founding a grand hospital-school complex that he called Bethlehem, the cradle of the Order. Austere, yet simple and cheerful, he was rich in charisms. Clement XIV declared his heroic virtues in 1771.
BIBL.: [Giuseppe della Madre di Dio], Storia della vita, virtù, doni e grazie del venerabile servo di Dio p. fr. Pietro di S. Giuseppe B., Rome 1739 (based on the proceedings). Mario Colpo