Catholic churches attacked across Spain in August, including Sagrada Família

August was a particularly prolific month for church vandalism in Spain. In what the Observatory for Religious Freedom, a Spanish non-profit civil group, called “Black August”, seven attacks on Catholic churches were reported.

The attacks took place across the country, beginning on 11 August at Santa Catalina in Rute, in the southern province of Córdoba. Black paint was poured over the church steps just days before the annual celebration of the Assumption. The feast is of particular importance locally, as the town's patron is the Virgen del Carmen.

Valencia saw a particularly grievous attack just one day later, on 12 August, when a person entered the parish of San Martín during Eucharistic adoration and smashed the monstrance containing the consecrated Host. The distressed faithful then carried the Eucharist to the Cathedral for safekeeping. The attacker, who was known to the parish priest, is believed to suffer from mental illness and not have acted out of anti-Catholic hatred.

Just two days later, on 14 August, at Valencia Cathedral—where the recovered Host had been taken—a man violently attacked the sacristan and parishioners during Mass.

Other attacks were recorded throughout the month, with the final incident taking place at the historic Basílica de la Sagrada Família in Barcelona. Members of the activist group Futuro Vegetal (Vegetable Future) threw coloured dye at the building before being arrested by police. The group claim that nearly 70% of this year’s summer wildfires were caused by livestock farming, and accused the government of being “complicit” in the environmental damage affecting the Spanish countryside.

The activists were not imprisoned, instead receiving a €600 fine, which they have asked their supporters to pay.

Construction of the historic basilica began in 1882 under the Spanish architect Francisco de Paula del Villar. A year later, he abandoned the project and the Catalan architect Antoni Gaudí took over. Gaudí devoted much of his career to the basilica, and by 1915 he was working on it exclusively. Despite his brilliance and commitment, Gaudí died in 1926 with less than a quarter of the church completed.

The Spanish Civil War delayed construction further. Barcelona, as an epicentre of revolutionary violence, saw parts of Gaudí's workshop and plans destroyed, and the crypt set on fire in 1936. Work resumed in the 1950s. On 7 November 2010, Pope Benedict XVI consecrated the church and proclaimed it a minor basilica.

Next year, 100 years after Gaudí’s death, is the proposed date for completion of the main structure, with 2035 estimated for finalisation of the façade and surrounding elements.

While Spain remains a majority-Catholic country—with more than a thousand men training for the priesthood—the nation has a chequered past with the Faith. During the Spanish Civil War (1936–1939), an estimated 6,800 Catholic clergy and religious were killed. Though the attacks in August are alarming and indicative of increasing hostility towards the Church, they remain far less severe than the Civil War years, when thousands of churches were burned—including over a thousand sacred buildings in the Diocese of Valencia alone.

‍