Essay: The Process of Declaring Saints: Some Thoughts

I am following on from my blog post yesterday on the postponing of the beatification of the Venerable Archbishop Fulton Sheen. In the last day or so we have had more revelations which, if true, are very disturbing and lead us to look on developments in another light. I still hold to what I said yesterday: for now, prudence. I will not comment further on the new revelations, charity and justice forbid me from doing so until they have been proven. However, I would like to reflect on some issues that have arisen in the last couple of days on social media, issues I have been considering for some time. Those of you who follow me on Twitter will have seen me address these issues earlier today.

Whenever the issue of the Causes of Saints comes up for discussion, it always brings out opinions about how the Process is conducted, how it should be conducted and if it should be conducted at all - that we should hold off on beatifications and canonisations for a period of time because we have had too many Saints recently. Coupled with these views we have certain Saints and Beati mentioned by name whom orthodox Catholics insist are fake saints, that the miracles worked through them are not real miracles, and that the whole Process is corrupt because it let these people through, or they were raised up too soon.

The first response I want to offer to these opinions is to remind all of us that the Church does not make Saints, she merely conducts a process which formally confirms what God has done. It is God who raises up Saints - He is the one who led the individual along the path of sanctification in life and has admitted them to the beatific vision, giving them the mission of intercession for souls now walking 'the pilgrim path'. Through signs, God inspires the Church and the faithful to see in this individual the power of holiness at work and so asks the Church to initiate the earthly process which we call a Cause. These initial signs are the fama and a spontaneous devotion to the individual - this is the work of the Holy Spirit in the midst of the faithful. In obedience to her God, the Church and her pastors begin the formal process, carry out a rigorous examination and then seek a definitive sign, a miracle.

What we need to remember is that in initiating the formal Process, the Church is acting in obedience to God - to seek to do His will with regard to the glorification of His faithful servant. Realising that, we cannot speak of moratoriums or subjecting beatifications and canonisations to a quota system - that is to place a limit on God's work and subject His will to ours. The Spirit moves where He will, we must not say to God: thus far and no further. If He seeks to be generous in granting the Church Saints, we cannot be standing outside the vineyard complaining about that generosity (cf. Matt 20: 1-16).  

One objection I hear to the raising up of Saints is that the calendar cannot take any more - it is too full. So, the number of the elect is to be limited to the number of days in a year? I understand where this argument is coming from, it sees Saints as those who are to be commemorated in the liturgy, and appropriately, so they are. However, Saints are not destined to be mere ornaments in the liturgy; while they do have an important role to play in the liturgy, they are models for the Christian life, Christians raised up from all walks of life to inspire and guide us. As such, they occupy space in the liturgy and also in the lives of Christians. The Church, as she commemorates the Saints, establishes feasts and memorias on the General Calendar and on local calendars so the liturgy does not become overcrowded, but she cannot place a limit on those God raises up to fit them in - the Saints cannot be confined to a calendar. 

Some are saying we should wait, leave opening a Cause for fifty or a hundred years, like the good old days. For one thing, if we look at the history of the early Church, we see that there was no such thing as waiting for a century. Many of our early Saints were canonised either by acclamation or by the pope not long after their death. In returning to a shorter period after the death of the individual, five years, the contemporary Church is more in line with the Church's original practice. That period is a fallow time to see if the initial veneration after the death of the person is authentic and does not fade. It also allows the Church, once the Cause has started, to examine the witnesses to a person's life as many may still be alive - this means the Church does not have to rely totally on publications and records which may not preserve everything about the person. The Cause may take years depending on the work that has to be done. Some Causes proceed quickly for various reasons - a shorter life, few writings, little or no controversy. However, the length of the Process for each individual should depend on how long it takes to conduct a thorough investigation be it a decade or a century. That said, there is an important element which decides the moment of glorification - the miracle; more on that later.

This brings us to an interesting point concerning what a Saint is. In the minds of some, Saints are ethereal figures, men and women blessed by a singular grace from the moment of their birth, performing miracles from the cradle and levitating through life to die in a odour of sanctity and assume into heaven. Either that, or dreadful sinners who had a major conversion and then worked miracles and levitating through life, etc. Many of the older hagiographies are written according to this formula, and not only is this view of sainthood unrealistic for the most part, it deprives the faithful of the very ministry God intends the Saints to have in the Church.

The vast majority of the Saints were ordinary men and women like us - there was nothing supernaturally extraordinary about them. Some of them were miracle workers in life, but they may well have been more like our most recent miracle worker in life, Pope St John Paul II, than the transfigured entities preserved in the pages of the hagiographies. Some of them were dramatic without doubt, like St Joseph of Cupertino and St Pio, others not so, more hidden. The reality of sainthood for most is a faithful living of the Gospel in life to the point of a complete transformation. In this way of life, we see how we as Christians are called to live: this is God's mission for the Saints - they are examples and models. 

When we look at a Saint we may indeed look in awe, but if that Saint is presented as an alien creature, possessed of singular supernatural attributes, then it becomes almost impossible to imitate them; some Christians will conclude that they have not been given the singular graces the Saints have been given. This leads to an abyss between us and the Saints, and if we are honest, we have to recognise that some are glad that abyss exists, it takes the heat off them to become saints themselves and allows them embrace mediocrity as the ordinary means of Christian living. This ignores the challenge the Saints present to us - the real challenge of imitating them as they imitated Christ (cf. 1 Cor 11:1). There are also those who prefer that abyss because they deem it necessary to preserve the majesty of God; as the Saints now share in that majesty, then they too must somehow be different and unapproachable. I believe the mystery of the Incarnation knocks that idea on its head - God in His Majesty saw fit to become one of us in Jesus, so too the majesty of God is revealed in His Saints and with it, not the inaccessibility of that majesty, but its dwelling among us and seeking to establish itself in us. Only in our encounter with God in His majesty, can we be raised from sinful human beings to the redeemed. Remember, St John in his Gospel presents Jesus in His majesty on the cross (John 19:17-19).

One of the complaints I hear concerns the Process - that it is not fit for purpose; that the Devil's Advocate should be restored. I have heard some say that all those canonised or beatified under this system are not valid and so they reject them. The Process has indeed changed. Pope St John Paul II in his Apostolic Constitution, Divinus perfectionis magister and its occupying Normae, has laid down the legislation which governs the current process, and it is complex and rigorous. The office of an individual Devil's Advocate is gone, but the critical examination fulfilled by that office continues throughout the Process. The major development was the change from investigating a Cause as a trial to an historical investigation. Instead of two sides hammering out the reputation of a candidate in a court and whoever has the best arguments wins, now experts examine every detail of a candidate's life and come to a conclusion before God as to the whether than person lived a life of authentic and heroic virtue. That is a better process than a legal trial. 

Miracles are an important part of the Process, they are the means by which God confirms that an individual is in Heaven and is to be raised up. The criteria for an authentic, acceptable miracle is threefold: instantaneous, complete and lasting, as well as being inexplicable. It has to be proven and accepted by medical experts. Quite apart from the investigation of a miracle, the Church must bear in mind that this occurrence is a manifestation of the will of God in time. When a miracle is given, God may not just be saying, raise this person up, but also, raise them up now. This explains why some Causes wait for years for a miracle - God is biding His time, the moment of kairos has yet to come. With others, miracles come very quickly - this may well reveal that the time has come. The Church must listen to this and she usually does. 

This brings me to a final point, one which may seem apt given recent developments. As it is God who makes Saints, the pastors of the Church must humbly submit to His will. This means ideology must have no part in the Process - what is happening here transcends ideology, it is the work of God, the manifestation of the New Jerusalem which has no space for the limited ideas of man and woman - the wisdom of holiness transcends earthly theory. If pastors get in the way of the Process for ideological reasons, and I do not mean those who for honest reasons critique and may even place obstacles in the way as a means of investigation and testing, then that is a serious intervention, a direct affront to the will of God. Given human nature, we may not like a particular individual, personalities clash and holiness cannot prevent that; we can have difficulties with those proposed for canonisation - I know this from personal experience having lived with a future Blessed, but we cannot let that get in the way. If a Saint challenges us, we must not try to prevent their glorification because it makes us feel better, or to frustrate a certain constituency of the faithful. That would be infidelity and unworthy of a Christian and most unworthy of a pastor. God will respond to it.

When I was researching for my book on St Thomas Becket, I noticed that his canonisation was greeted with surprise and even horror by many of those who knew him. They were taken aback at the miracles they saw performed at this tomb. Many had opposed him in life, fought with him, even tried to destroy him; some believed he brought his death on himself, it could not have been a martyrdom in their eyes. Yet, God spoke: Thomas was indeed a Saint, his life of virtue, hard won to be sure, had passed them by; but God saw it and approved it. Many of those who opposed Thomas in life were clerics, bishops; yet, when they saw God working through a man they had opposed, they submitted to His will, they had to, they could not argue with the marvellous works of God.

So too today: we should not argue with the marvellous works of God, rather we should celebrate them and give thanks. Pastors, above all, must rejoice in the Saints, they prove that the Gospel can be lived and so confirm their preaching of the Word, even if they make them feel uncomfortable - that discomfort is in itself a moment of grace. The Saints are among the greatest assets bishops and priests have in their ministry, and the more the better. To complain about the number being raised up, to speak of moratoriums and quotas, to refuse to accept the validity of those raised up, is peevish; it fails to understand the work of the Holy Spirit in our midst and the invitation He offers to each one of us to embrace holiness ourselves. We too are called to be Saints, all of us, and yes, in God's plan some of us, perhaps even many of us, may well be destined to be formally canonised. We must cooperate with God so He may do as He wills.

Thankfully, the ordinary faithful love their Saints. I see this as a manifestation of the sensus fidelium, and it plays an important part in the Process - in the initial stages of discernment the Church seeks it and sees it as a sign from God. Pastors must also accept it and respect it. We must never forget that it was the ordinary faithful who kept the orthodox faith during the Arian crisis when many of the pastors had fallen into heresy. That should serve as a warning to pastors who try to confound the progress of a Cause for ideological reasons: God will respond.

I know we live in difficult times, in dark times. However, the presence and glorification of Saints is light for us - individual lamps that light up our lives, manifestations of the light of Heaven even here on earth, of Christ the Light of the World who enlightens His faithful. They are the friends of God who can lead us into a deeper friendship with Him. They are the marvellous works of God and instead of being a source of division and conflict, and endless arguments on social media, they should unite us in joy, hope and determination to join them in Heaven by imitating them on earth.