JP-II beatification
may be announced tomorrow
VATICAN CITY, Jan. 13 (Reuters) - Former Pope John Paul II will move a step closer to sainthood this week when his successor Pope Benedict approves the case for his beatification, Vatican sources said on Wednesday.
In "a few days", the Vatican's Prefect for the Causes of Saints, Cardinal Angelo Amato, is expected to present Benedict with the evidence that John Paul performed a miracle and should be beatified, one source said.
[One report says Cardinal Amato's audience with the Pope will take place tomorrow.]
At that point Benedict is expected to approve the recommendation and set a date for the ceremony. It is less than six years since the death of the Polish pontiff.
One miracle is needed for beatification, while two are required for sainthood.
On Tuesday a Vatican commission of cardinals and bishops, members of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints, approved medical and theological evidence that John Paul had miraculously cured a nun with Parkinson's disease, paving the way for the beatification request to be presented.
The initial phases of a canonisation cause can usually take decades or, in some cases, hundreds of years. However in May 2005, a month after his death, Benedict put John Paul on the fast track by dispensing with Church rules that normally impose a five-year waiting period after a candidate's death before the procedure begins.
Crowds at John Paul's funeral on April 8, 2005 chanted "santo subito" ("make him a saint now").
His 27-year papacy, which began in 1978, was one of the most historic and tumultuous of modern times.
During his pontificate communism collapsed across eastern Europe, including in his native Poland. John Paul, the first non-Italian pope in 450 years, was seriously wounded in a 1981 assassination attempt.
Sister Marie Simon-Pierre, a 47-year-old French nun diagnosed with Parkinson's disease, from which Pope John Paul himself suffered, said it inexplicably disappeared two months after his death after she and her fellow nuns prayed to him.
Meanwhile, CNS and Rome Reports have the following addendum:
January 13, 2011 = According to the French news agency I Media, work is underway to prepare a chapel on the ground floor of St. Peter's Basilica to house the remains of John Paul II after he is beatified. At present, he is buried in a crypt of the Vatican Grottoes.
Left, Benedict XVI praying at his predcessor's tomb on Nov. 2, 2010; right, the St. Sebastian chapel today.
The site is reportedly the Chapel of St. Sebatian, to the left of the Pieta chapel near the entrance to the Basilica.
With great care and absolute discretion, Vatican workers are gradually removing the tiles and decorations of this chapel, in order to prepare a new area that will house the tomb of the future blessed John Paul II. The transfer of the body is expected before late October, after the possible beatification. a picture taken today showed the chapel closed off by a heavy drape.
The chapel takes its name from the giant mosaic of St. Sebastian that constitutes its altarpiece, executed in 1736 after a 1631 painting of the saint by Domechino. The problem is what will they do with Blessed Innocent XI (1676-1689), who has been the saint venerated below the altar all this time?
It's strange, but even John Paul II's beatification is meeting with resistance from some orthodox Catholics who think the church is rushing to judgment. The objection is not just from those who think that the late Pope's friendship with the disgraced Legionaries founder Fr. Marcial Maciel may result in an embarassing backlash for the Church down the line, but also from those who think that a Pope should not be beatified or canonized by his immediate successor. Why not, though, if the candidate Pope passes all the tests set by the Church? Besides, the reigning Pope has no input at all into the entire testing and verification process, wisely perhaps, in order not to introduce his own personal biases into it.
Benedict XVI waived the five-year waiting period after the candidate's death to begin the beatification process for his successor, who had set the precedent himself by waiving it for Mother Teresa of Calcutta. But after that waiver, B16 has since allowed the process to run its course normally - without undue haste, as far as anyone can tell. Even a doubt about the beatification miracle expressed by one of the medical experts consulted by the Vatican was given due course, and other experts were called in to test his challenge.
Benedict XVI was never known to be an impatient man, much less an imprudent one. He would be the very first to sense and know if anything he did in connection with the beatification and eventual canonization of John Paul II was questionable or vulnerable to future challenges. He has been similarly prudent - but not indecisive - about the cause for the beatification of Pius XII. In this, as in Assisi-3, Benedict XVI deserves our trust, at the very least.
[Modificato da TERESA BENEDETTA 14/01/2011 00:36]