Posted on 01/16/2015 2:25:55 PM PST by marshmallow
WASHINGTON (CNS) -- Surprising even the people who have been promoting the sainthood cause of Blessed Junipero Serra, Pope Francis announced Jan. 15 that in September, he hopes to canonize the 18th-century Spanish Franciscan who founded a string of missions across Mexico and California.
Blessed Serra is credited with directly founding nine missions in California, one in Baja California in Mexico and with reinvigorating established missions in Mexico. Friars under his tutelage founded many others across California, in territory that was then part of New Spain.
The vice postulator for Blessed Serra's sainthood cause, Franciscan Father John Vaughn, told Catholic News Service he was taken completely by surprise by the pope's announcement. Even among the friars at Mission Santa Barbara, where he lives, "I was the last to know," he said.
The announcement came when Pope Francis, aboard a flight from Sri Lanka to the Philippines, explained to reporters his decision to canonize St. Joseph Vaz, a 17th- and 18th-century missionary to Sri Lanka, bypassing the usual process, including verification of a second miracle attributed to the saint's intercession. Pope Francis said St. Joseph was among great evangelists whom he planned to canonize without such preliminaries, in an effort to celebrate the practice of evangelization.
(Excerpt) Read more at catholicnews.com ...
Me too. It waters down the meaning of the word.
I'd think it diminishes the meaning of sainthood affirming a verified remarkable relationship with their spiritual nature. Besides that, it puts the whole concept of miracles into question.
JMHO
**A 1986 report by the Diocese of Monterey, California, defended Blessed Serra, saying his reputation had been attacked “without proof or documentation.”**
BTTT!
How about walking the entire distance from Lower California to what is now San Francisco with a bum leg? Additionally founding numerous missions along the way, converting many.
Cemetery plots alongside the basilica of Carmel Mission in Carmel, Calif., are seen in this 2008 file photo. The remains of Blessed Junipero Serra, a Spanish Franciscan missionary who died in 1784, are entombed in the basilica. Pope Francis said Jan. 15 that the friar will be canonized this year. (CNS/Gregory A. Shemitz)
Return to the Gospel!
Raise up saints, dear Lord!
Blessed Junipero Serra, pray for us.
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