Miguel Léibar Garay

Miguel Léibar Garay (17 February 1885 – 28 July 1936) was a Spanish priest, educator, and sportsperson, who founded Pilar FC, the school football team of Colegio del Pilar in 1911. After dying as a martyr in the Spanish Civil War, he was beatified in Rome in 2007. The families of the valley were deeply Catholic and very close to the Marianists, so many of their children entered the Marianist Postulancy of Eskoriatza, such as Léibar in 1898, at the age of 13, where he received a solid formation for four years, standing out for his simplicity, family spirit, and strong religious convictions. On 24 March 1903, he took his first religious vows at the Society of María en Vitoria, and then returned to Eskoriatza to continue his formation for two years.

Career as a priest and educator

In July 1912, Léibar entered the seminary of Fribourg, Switzerland, where he not only studied theology, but also was ordained a priest on 1 August 1915. When he returned to Spain, he was assigned as a chaplain and teacher of primary and secondary education at the colleges of Cádiz (1915–22), Madrid (1922–23), and Vitoria (1923–25), as well as a director of the Marianist schools in Jerez de la Frontera and San Sebastián (1930).