On the evening of Saturday, October 17, 2026, Father Patricio Alfredo Sánchez Molinari stood at the altar of Nuestra Señora del Perpetuo Socorro church in Guayaquil, Ecuador, and spoke to his congregation about the shortness of human life. He told those present that one day everyone gathered there would also die, and that time spent on lesser things often lacks the meaning of time given to God, to family, and to the people closest to us. The Mᴀss was being livestreamed on Facebook from the priest’s own account, as he regularly did, allowing people beyond the walls of the church on José Mascote and Calicuchima streets to follow the service. Around the twenty-seventh minute of the broadcast, while he faced the congregation, a heavy wooden crucifix mounted on the wall behind the altar came loose. It fell forward and struck him. Parishioners immediately cried out for an ambulance.

The stream ended shortly afterward. Emergency responders arrived, but Father Sánchez Molinari died from the impact. He was fifty-two years old. The Archdiocese of Guayaquil, in a statement signed by Cardinal Luis Cabrera Herrera, announced that the Redemptorist priest and parish priest of Perpetuo Socorro in the Centro vicariate had departed to the Father’s House. The official notice did not detail the circumstances. Those details emerged through the livestream footage that circulated widely and through reports from Ecuadorian media. Father Sánchez Molinari had been ordained on October 15, 2005, and the day before his death the archdiocese had noted another year of his priestly service.

Born on November 6, 1973, in Cuenca, he made his religious profession with the Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer on August 15, 2000. He had served in Loja, Durán, Vinces (where he was a pioneer of the Redemptorist mission at San Lorenzo), Manta, and finally Guayaquil. Those who knew him described a simple, calm, and fraternal priest who was close to young people, attentive to the sick, and devoted to Eucharistic adoration in the spirit of St. Alphonsus Liguori. In the days that followed, his body was taken from Guayaquil to Cuenca for burial according to his wish to rest in his native city.

Family members asked that the cause of the cross’s detachment be investigated, noting the coincidence of the timing during Mᴀss. National Police preliminarily classified the death as accidental resulting from impact by a heavy object. The Archdiocese indicated that technical inspections of churches under its jurisdiction were underway and that a specialist report on the Perpetuo Socorro incident was expected. The footage and the priest’s final public words about mortality drew international attention from outlets including The New York Times, CNN, and others, which confirmed the sequence of events through the livestream and the archdiocese’s confirmation of death. The Redemptorist congregation issued its own statement of sorrow, recalling his ministry and his union with Christ in the Eucharist until the final moment at the altar.