Man claiming to be Christ kills monk at Spanish monastery

MADRID: A 76-year-old monk died on Monday after being attacked by a man shouting “I am Jesus Christ” in a monastery in southeastern Spain, the religious order said.

Two others were injured in the rampage on Saturday morning on the Santo Espiritu del Monte monastery in the hills above Gilet, a village 30-kms north of Valencia. The middle-aged man broke into the cloister while the brothers were having their breakfast and attacked three of them with a blunt object, the Franciscan order to which the monastery belongs said in a press release.

He was driven away by Brother Angel Ramon, who immediately alerted the authorities, the statement added. One of the wounded was admitted to hospital “in a critical condition” and succumbed to his injuries on Monday afternoon, a religious official told AFP, expressing deep “sadness”.