Making Saints
Zahn, Gordon C.
MAKING SAINTS How the Catholic Church Determines Who Becomes a Saint, Who Doesn't, and Why Kenneth L. Woodward Simon and Schuster, $21.95,483 pp. Garden C. Zahn Canonization is a notoriously...
...Not all, one assumes not even most, would meet today's more stringent tests...
...and there is reason to hope many others will after reading it...
...The earliest saints were "canonized" by popular acceptance...
...Just how difficult canonization can be is made clear in Newsweek senior writer Kenneth L. Woodward's detailed description and analysis of the procedures and processes employed by the "saint-makers," the congregation for the Causes of Saints, in Rome...
...whose very claim to recognition may lie in a daring practice of heroic sanctity deemed "controversial" or too likely to "rock the boat" and offend the establishment, whether secular or ecclesiastical...
...There are other problems...
...Nor should one overlook obstacles presented by internal ecclesiastical rivalries or controversies that delay or even block progress...
...Given what seems to have been his virtually "open" access to congregation personnel and documentary evidence, anyone harboring ambitions for becoming a viable candidate (a lack of humility that in itself would probably be disqualifying) is advised to study this book well...
...Thus, Woodward notes, of the 393 people canonized between the years 1000 and 1987, the laity provided 76 and only 20 of them were women...
...or whose past thoughts and writings might not have been in exact conformity to contemporary definitions of orthodoxy - such candidates are likely to be at an almost insurmountable disadvantage...
...even so, one is left with the suspicion that the successful causes are not always or necessarily the most deserving...
...Since 1588, with the founding of the congregation, selection has been formalized and the more recent attribution of papal infallibility to the results of its work (but not extending, strangely enough, to the miracles or other claims upon which the decisions may have been based) has complicated the task...
...In a time of great spiritual need for Christian models to meet the challenges of war, poverty, and all the other social evils with which we must contend, new standards of selection may be in order...
...Garden C. Zahn Canonization is a notoriously difficult obstacle course whose logic and procedures are sometimes as dubious as they are arcane...
...Here, too, the bureaucratization of sanctity (at least its recognition) virtually assures continuity of established standards...
...A remedy he recommends would put greater emphasis on beatification to favor imitation and veneration of the blessed on a more local or regional scale...
...It is well known the extent to which the intimidating costs involved (first in promoting the case and then in arranging for the actual canonization ceremonies) can load the dice in favor of religious orders, diocesan structures, and (less often today, perhaps, than in the past) positions of wealth and secular power...
...Jos6 Marid Escriva1 de Balaguer, the founder of Opus Dei, demonstrates in shocking detail...
...Making Saints is no exercise in ecclesiastical muckraking...
...How appropriate, for instance, is any attempt to subject the Holy Spirit's special gifts and graces of heroic virtue to the rigidities of bureaucratic classifications and formulations...
...Obvious and not at all surprising to the sociologist...
...One obvious result, of course, is a disparity favoring members of religious communities, especially founders and foundresses, over other individual, especially lay, candidacies...
...Saints, a treasure of the church, do indeed matter...
...Not least of its virtues are the profound and sometimes troubling questions it raises in the reader's mind...
...The continuing proliferation of new canonizations presents problems, not least the loss of the universal familiarity and appeal for those who make the grade...
...Insider favoritism can play too decisive a role as Woodward's account of the tremendous push behind the cause of Msgr...
...In addition, the fact that almost all were of the single state leads him to observe that the failure to beatify or canonize anyone for being an exemplary Christian spouse makes it obvious "that a holy marriage alone is not enough to ensure a successful cause...
...Yet how else could it be done...
...Religious communities can usually meet those costs and more easily provide the continued promotional efforts success may require...
...This book makes it amply clear he does...
...Nevertheless, they did what saints are supposed to do, providing both an inspirational model to guide others to spiritual perfection and eternal salvation and intercessionary channels for divine assistance in times of need...
...The pending causes of Pius IX, Pius XII, and, to some extent, John Henry Newman, testify to this...
...Prospective candidates whose supporters cannot marshal the funds and organization needed for advancement of their cause...
...He welcomes the congregation's broadened basis for judging sanctity in the historical context, the diminished emphasis upon miracles, and the departure from the older forms of adversarial inquiry...
...Excessively prudential concerns about political impact or a potential weakening of accepted "orthodoxy" of practices or beliefs can jeopardize otherwise compelling cases (Archbishop Oscar Romero and Franz Jaegerstaetter providing two contemporary examples...
...To say this, of course, is not to question the validity of the causes that do succeed...
...In some respects the original system may have been better and more in keeping with Jesus' own reluctance to assign positions of special prestige or priority in heaven during his own lifetime...
...But who, today," Woodward asks, "cares about saints...
...Recent changes in the approach to and conduct of investigation from the strictly legalistic/theological to a more historical mode of inquiry (with the function of the "devil's advocate" abandoned in the shuffle) are significant improvements...
...Woodward believes saints "matter" and he is concerned over what seems to be a tragic decline in thenrelevance and importance to the church and its members...
Vol. 117 • November 1990 • No. 19
