Josif Papamihali

Josif Papamihali (23 September 1912 – 26 October 1948), was an Albanian Catholic priest of the Byzantine rite.

Life
Born in Elbasan on September 23, 1912, Papamihali studied Philosophy and Theology in the "Collegio Greco" in Rome, near the Angelicum, where he was ordained a priest on 1 December 1935 by the Italo-Albanian bishop of Lungro and the bishop of the Byzantine rite who ordered Albanians of Sicily.

Papamihali returned to Albania in 1936 and served as a parishioner in Elbasan, Korçë, Berat, Lushnje, and Pogradec. Beginning in 1944, he was in charge of the Mission of the Greco-Catholic Church of Albania.

He was arrested by the communist authorities in Korçë on 31 October 1946 and was later convicted as an enemy of the state. On 5 August 1947, Papamihali was sentenced by the courts to 5 years imprisonment and forced labor and was transferred to Korçë and later Maliq where he died. He was buried alive in a marsh where he had fallen from exhaustion on 26 October 1948.

He was beatified in Shkodër along with thirty-seven other fellow Albanian martyrs on 5 November 2016.