Pope Beatifies Mother Teresa

[Dinner]

Correct me if I'm wrong but aren't saints supposed to have commited miricles and not just good works? Maybe I'm cunfused on the matter though.

[Immortal Wombat]

The second miracle was her face appearing in a Danish pastry in (IIRC) Spain.

[Static Universe]

Originally posted by ixnay
I read the title as "Pope Beautifies Mother Teresa" and was all "How the hell can he beautify her? She's been a corpse for 6 years!"

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by Immortal Wombat
The second miracle was her face appearing in a Danish pastry in (IIRC) Spain.

There are decidedly many miracles happening in Spain, I mean hallucinations divine apparitions happening to Spaniards

[reds4ever]

Originally posted by Oerdin
Correct me if I'm wrong but aren't saints supposed to have commited miricles and not just good works? Maybe I'm cunfused on the matter though.

then that makes two of us! read above!

[MRT144]

anything passes as a miracle for a sickly catholic church in need of boosting.

[GePap]

She was beatified, NOT canonized. She needed only one miracle for this step. What they did do was remove the 5 year waiting period after ones death to look for that first mirace. Thye Church actually is very stricty in how they interpret miracles.

[Rufus T. Firefly]

Originally posted by GePap
She was beatified, NOT canonized. She needed only one miracle for this step. What they did do was remove the 5 year waiting period after ones death to look for that first mirace. Thye Church actually is very stricty in how they interpret miracles.

Let's be clear about the Church and "strictness." Under the current pope, the granting of sainthood has become a kind of PR ploy, used to bolster the image of the Church worldwide (and especially in the Third World, where the potential for growth is greatest). John Paul II has, in his 25 years on the throne, canonized more saints that all the Popes in the previous 400 years before his reign combined. Now, I suppose it's possible that more miracles occured between 1978 and 2003 than occurred between 1578-1978, but we'll actually never know, because JP2 also abolished the office of Devil's Advocate -- the guy whose job it was to argue against an individual's sainthood, thus helping assure that only the truly worthy were canonized.

The Pope is doling out Sainthood the way the Queen doles out knighthoods, and for similar reasons. Do not be surprised when Ringo Starr -- the Catholic Beatle, IIRC -- is beatified.

And, Shi: this may be Catholic-bashing, but it's coming from a fellow Catholic.

[Shi Huangdi]

Rufus: I actually agree with you that this Pope has been far too liberal in how doles out sainthood, and there have been a few "saints" that I would strongly object to being raised to level of beatification/canonization, and I feel this Pope has given new credence to theose theologians who feel canonizations are not infallible. It does seem going quite a bit far when people try savaging people like Mother Teresa, who I am sure would be canonized no matter who holds the Chair of Peter.

[Static Universe]

Originally posted by Rufus T. Firefly

The Pope is doling out Sainthood the way the Queen doles out knighthoods, and for similar reasons. Do not be surprised when Ringo Starr -- the Catholic Beatle, IIRC -- is beatified.

Well, if Ringo's music career doesn't count as a miracle, I don't know what does.

[Rufus T. Firefly]

Originally posted by Shi Huangdi
Rufus: I actually agree with you that this Pope has been far too liberal in how doles out sainthood, and there have been a few "saints" that I would strongly object to being raised to level of beatification/canonization, and I feel this Pope has given new credence to theose theologians who feel canonizations are not infallible. It does seem going quite a bit far when people try savaging people like Mother Teresa, who I am sure would be canonized no matter who holds the Chair of Peter.

Yes, but the problem is that in his zeal for good PR, Il Papa has diluted the very meaning of sainthood; in some very real way it's he who has dragged Mother Teresa down, by debasing the company she's meant to keep -- and made hatchet jobs like Hitchins' far more acceptable than they might be otherwise.

[Shi Huangdi]

Originally posted by Rufus T. Firefly


Yes, but the problem is that in his zeal for good PR, Il Papa has diluted the very meaning of sainthood; in some very real way it's he who has dragged Mother Teresa down, by debasing the company she's meant to keep -- and made hatchet jobs like Hitchins' far more acceptable than they might be otherwise.

No, I don't see that as being the case. Non-Catholics such as Hitchens can complain all they want, but it won't affect internal Church matters, I really don't see Catholics as being less inclined to seek the intercession of the Saints because of JP2's papacy.

[Ben Kenobi]

Shi:

Why does she need to be canonised? As a believer isn't she already a saint?

[Alexander's Horse]

Originally posted by Rufus T. Firefly


Let's be clear about the Church and "strictness." Under the current pope, the granting of sainthood has become a kind of PR ploy

I'm not sure about that

VATICAN CITY—Concerned handlers for Pope John Paul II announced Monday that, in recent weeks, the 78-year-old Catholic leader has "just been blessing everything in sight."

"We are, of course, very concerned for His Holiness' mental condition," said chief papal physician Giuseppe Clementi, standing by the pope's bedside, surrounded by dozens of newly consecrated pill bottles, urine-specimen cups and orthopedic slippers. "Pretty much anything you hold up in front of his face these days, he blesses."

Vatican handlers said they first noticed signs of papal deterioration on Jan. 26, as he deplaned at St. Louis' Lambert International Airport upon his arrival in the U.S. After descending the airplane staircase and kissing the runway, as is papal tradition, the pope broke free of his handlers and blessed a luggage cart, a podium, a Life photographer's camera, the plane's left-side landing gear, three TWA flight attendants, and two of the Swiss Guard who were attempting to release his grip on the landing struts and subdue him. Upon realizing that he was being physically restrained, the pope worked his papal-signet-ring-bearing right hand free and blessed the entire aircraft, which now resides in its own special five-story grotto under St. Peter's Basilica.

The pope's blessing rampage also necessitated the construction a 40,000-square-foot reliquary for the storage of thousands of now-holy items. Housed in the structure are such hallowed objects as the Blessed Vacuum Cleaner Of St. Matthew, the Consecrated Ball Of Crumpled-Up Paper, and the Sacred Zagnut Bar Of Christ, which the pope discovered and blessed during his recent U.S. visit.

The only artifacts not stored in the reliquary are those of medical necessity, which have been left in the pope's room. These include the Most Holy Intravenous Saline Drip, Maria The Day Nurse Of The Blessed Virgin, and the Electroencephalogram and Electrocardiogram Of St. Peter and St. Paul.


"That which the Vicar of Christ has sanctified becomes a holy object and must be used for no other purpose," Clementi said. "Therefore, it is unthinkable to commit the mortal sin of sacrilege by, for instance, either restraining the pope from the consecration of his strained beets or emptying the bedpans once he has filled and blessed them."

Though concerned about the pope's erratic behavior, Vatican staffers did not admit to a loss of morale.

"The pope's condition may be somewhat disconcerting to those of us charged with his care, but it is no doubt God's will," said papal drool-bib acolyte Thomassini Moretti, a nine-year veteran of Vatican spoon-feedings. "I have seen many mysterious things in the service of the Lamb of God, and I must trust that my wristwatch, lunch sack and right leg have become holy artifacts as part of some divine plan that I was not meant to comprehend."

Moretti said he first noticed changes in the pope in May 1996, when he held a much-publicized public baptism of pigeons and stray dogs in Rome's Trevi Fountain. Later that year, he made headlines again when he announced the excommunication of Big Boy and released a controversial papal bull condemning "picnic apes."

[Static Universe]