Pope Benedict XVI canonized seven new saints on Sunday.
In his homily, the pope praised each of the seven new saints as examples for the entire church. They “lived their lives in total consecration to God and in generous service to their brothers,” the pope said.
The canonization coincided with the Synod of Bishops on trying to revive Christianity in places where it’s fallen by the wayside.
Several of the new saints were missionaries, making clear the pope hopes their example will be relevant today as the Catholic Church tries to hold onto its faithful.
One of the new saints was Pedro Calungsod, a Filipino teenager who helped Jesuit priests convert natives in Guam in the 17th century but was killed by spear-wielding villagers opposed to the missionaries’ efforts to baptize their children.
Rome’s sizeable Filipino expat community came out in droves for the Mass, the Associated Press reported.
Another new saint is Native American Kateri Tekakwitha, known as “Lily of the Mohawks,” who for centuries has been a symbol of hope for the long-oppressed American Indians.
About 80,000 faithful from various countries, including American Indians, who gathered on the square outside St. Peter’s Basilica, which was decked with portraits of those being canonized.
The other new saints include a French missionary to Madagascar, a German migrant to the United States who took care of lepers and a Spanish nun who campaigned for women’s rights.
The Agence France Presse quoted Vatican watchers as saying the choice of the saints was linked to the Catholic Church’s efforts to highlight the need for a “new evangelisation” as church pews empty in Europe and the United States.
Another figure from North America who became a saint was German-born Franciscan nun Maria Anna Cope, who was born in 1838 and became known as the “Mother Marianne of Molokai” because she looked after lepers on the island of Molokai in the Hawaii archipelago.
A French Jesuit, Jacques Berthieu, who was executed in 1896 in Madagascar by rebels from the Menalamba movement, was also canonized.
The missionary refused to renounce his faith and is considered the first saint of Madagascar, where he lived for 21 years.
A German lay woman, Maria Schaeffer, who was from the pope’s German home state of Bavaria, was also rewarded by the pope.
Schaeffer, who died in 1925, was badly burnt after falling into boiling water and spent the rest of her life bedridden. She is credited with spreading the word of God in local villages.
An Italian priest, Giovanni Battista Piamarta, who in the late 19th century devoted his life to helping young people during the industrial revolution and founded a religious congregation, was also canonized.
The seventh new saint, Spanish nun Maria del Carmen, also founded a congregation and worked to better the lot of poor women in the 19th century, defending their social rights and helping their children’s education.
The new canonisations bring to 44 the number of saints named by the pope since the start of his pontificate in 2005.
Catholic saints have to have two miracles to their names, which must be certified by the Vatican in a years-long procedure.
Sources
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News category: World.
