INDEPTH: CATHOLICISM IN CANADA
Canadian Saints
CBC News Online | October 2, 2003
In early 1999, less than two years after Mother Teresa's death, Pope John Paul II waived the normal five-year waiting period and allowed the opening of her canonization cause. On October 19, 2003, three days after the 25th anniversary of John Paul's papacy, and a mere six years after Mother Teresa's death, the Roman Catholic Church will beatify her in Rome.
John Paul has recognized the healing of a non-Christian Indian woman in 2002 as the miracle necessary for beatification. The Pope will have to credit her with one more miracle before her canonization.
The difference between Blessed Teresa of Calcutta and Saint Teresa of Calcutta is that beatification restricts her worship to a localized area. The edict permits rather than prescribes members of a region to venerate a person. Sainthood brings universal recognition from all members of the church.
Canadian Saints
The Catholic Church recognizes 10 Canadian saints. Eight of them - canonized by Pius XII in 1930 - were Jesuits whom the Church considered martyrs during the settlement of New France. The others - beatified as confessors - were recognized during the papacy of Pope John Paul.
St. Isaac Jogues
St. Antoine Daniel
St. Jean de Brébeuf
St. Gabriel Lalemant
St. Charles Garnier
St. Noël Chabanel
St. René Goupil
St. Jean de La Lande
The group of eight Jesuit martyrs died between 1642 and 1649. They were all missionaries to New France whose objective was to evangelize First Nations communities. All of them were executed at various times throughout a war between the Iroquois and Huron nations. Pius XI canonized them collectively as the North American martyrs in 1930.
St. Margeurite Bourgeoys
St. Margeurite led the Congregation of Notre Dame for 26 years through the wilderness of New France to the settlement of what is now Montreal. She succeeded in convincing the bishop that her Congregation should remain an active teaching order – one of the first of its kind – rather than being joined to a cloistered order of Ursulines. Pope John Paul canonized her in 1982.
St. Marguerite d'Youville
Born at Varennes, Que., St. Marguerite married Francois D'Youville in 1722 and became a widow eight years later. After raising her three children, she founded the Grey Nuns and was appointed director of the General Hospital in Montreal. Since her death, the Grey Nuns have established schools, hospitals and orphanages throughout Canada, the U.S., Africa and South America. She was canonized by Pope John Paul in 1990.
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The road to sainthood
Servants of God: A person whose canonization cause has officially begun.
Venerables: People the Pope agrees had lives that were lived in heroic virtue.
Blesseds: People to whom the Church attributes one miracle, and after the Rite of Beatification.
Saints: Blesseds who are credited with a second miracle, and after the Rite of Canonization.
Candidates for canonization
Martyrs: Those beatified by the Roman Catholic Church after dying for their faith in Christ.
Confessors: People who died peacefully after a life of heroic virtue.
The Vatican has different beatification procedures for martyrs and confessors or virgins.
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