BASIC R.C.BELIEF

Heroic servants of God who have died and are in Heaven. Many have been canonized by the Church and are given the inferior veneration of dulia . There are patron saints for almost every country, vocation, and situation. Because her house was flown by angels to Italy, Our Lady of Loreto was proclaimed Patroness of aviators. He levitated while praying, so St. Joseph of Cupertino is the patron saint of astronauts.

Roman Catholic theologians have theorized as to how a saint hears us, as they are not omnipresent. One idea is that the saint's spirit moves about the world at the speed of light. Another is that God hears the prayer and delegates it to a saint to take care of.

Butler's unofficial LIVES OF THE SAINTS (1956) contains 2,565 saints.

Problems about the authenticity of data about St. Christopher and St. Philomena, whose cult was authorized by Gregory XVI in 1837, caused both to be demoted - although devotion to them is still authorized.

Pope Pius XII proclaimed St. Clare of Assisi Heavenly Patroness of television. This great saint lay gravely ill on Christmas Eve, 1252. Unable to attend Mass she was granted by God the miraculous vision of Mass together with the sound of prayers and music in the Basilica of St. Francis some distance away.

From Cistercian Abbey magazine, page 17, "legend-encrusted Patrick and half-mythical Brigid."

Council of Trent, Session 25. "Those persons think impiously who deny that the saints, who enjoy eternal happiness in Heaven, are to be invoked; who assert that they do not pray for men; who declare that by asking them to pray for each of us in particular in idolatry, repugnant to the Word of God, and opposed to the honor of the one mediator of God and men, Christ Jesus."

The Halberd of St. Jude, advertised by California Astrology Assn, Box 80, N. Hollywood, CA 91603. "Patron Saint of Impossible Dreams, Lost Causes and the Desperate. For centuries people have called upon St. Jude as a last resort. Perhaps this is your time to let the miracle of The Halberd help you."

From THE CATHOLIC ENCYCLOPEDIA. "In 1802 an ancient tomb was found. Inscription was reconstructed and bones accepted as those of a virgin martyr in the 3rd century. Don Francesco de Lucia, parish priest, put the relics in a place of honor and wrote the life of St. Philomena based on dubious visions and imagination. She was canonized in 1855." (Editor's Note-She was demoted in 1961.)

POST VATICAN II

From EXPRESSIONS OF THE CATHOLIC FAITH, Kevin Johnson, Imp: Charles Grahmann, Bishop of Dallas, p. 81. "Once a saint, always a saint; but you might not have a universal commemoration any more.

From THE CODE OF CANON LAW (1983), Canon 1186: "To foster the sanctification of the people of God the Church recommends to the particular and filial veneration of the Christian faithful to Blessed Mary ever Virgin, the Mother of God , whom Christ established as the Mother of the human race; it also promotes true and authentic devotion to the other saints by whose example the Christian faithful are edified and through whose intercession they are sustained."

From Wilmington, Delaware NEWS JOURNAL 4/20/91, "The makers of `St. Joseph: The Underground Real Estate Agent' package, which consists of a small plastic statue of the saint in tote bag and a burial instruction book, say they are quite serious about their product.

"The idea of asking St. Joe to intervene in the sale of their home is not a new concept. Plenty of Delawareans, who have been burying plastic statues of the saint for years, swear by the practice. And if done in the right spirit, the church does not really object.

"After digging a six-inch hole near the `For Sale' sign, the homeowner should place St. Joe in the ground head first, with his feet toward heaven.

"Then, according to the guide, the seller should say the following words:

"`Oh, St. Joseph, guardian of household needs, we know that you don't like to be buried upside down in the ground, but the sooner escrow closes, the sooner we will dig you up and put you in a place of honor in our new home.'"

DICTIONARY OF SAINTS contains very complimentary stories of thousands of "saints." Some were, to say the least, quite unusual.

In this category is St. Christina the Astonishing. She died when she was 21, but revived during her funeral Mass and soared to the roof of the church. She said she had been to hell, purgatory and heaven. She lived for 50 more years praying for the "Holy Souls." She could not tolerate the odor of human beings and resorted to extraordinary means to avoid them. Among these were climbing trees, soaring to the rafters of churches and hiding in ovens. The writer tells us she was thought insane by many but venerated by others.

Other Christinas have interesting lives as well. Christina of Bolsena was miraculously saved from drowning when her father threw her into Lake Bolsena with a rock around her neck. She then survived five days in a furnace, but the writer admits these incidents are probably all legendary.

For Christina of Tyre: a fire lighted under her got out of control and burned hundreds to death. When her tongue was cut out of her mouth she spoke more clearly than ever. She picked up her tongue and threw it at the judge, and he lost the sight in one eye. She was thrown into the sea and was baptized by Christ. She was returned to land by the Archangel Michael. After all that we are told "it is doubtful if she ever existed."

CHRISTIAN COMMENT

The word is from the Greek hagios which means sacred, morally blameless, consecrated. From I Corinthians 1:2; 6:1-2; etc. it is plain this means all Christians. There is no way the scripture could be twisted to teach the Roman Catholic concept, which has opened the way for both serious and ridiculous types of veneration of saints.

St. Expedite was named by a New Orleans church because the Italian word for "rush" was stamped on his container, which bore no other identification. He is still on the altar of Our Lady of Guadalupe Church and, when questioned about him, the priest said, "The Sicilians used to revere him." Butler's LIVES OF THE SAINTS gives a similar story, but the recipients of the saint were a group of French nuns.

CATHOLIC JOURNALS

From THE SIGN, January 1959. "Q: I have read that St. Gemma's letters to her spiritual director at Rome were transported and delivered by her guardian angel. Is this true or not? A: There is no good reason to doubt the preternatural mail service by St. Gemma's personal guardian angel."

From CATHOLIC DIGEST, 8/80. "The Church accordingly has room for those...who please God by invoking St. Anthony to keep their letters safe in the mail and St. Jude for desperate cases because, having a name so like that of Judas, he has been less frequently asked to intercede for petitioners than have the other saints and is less likely to be `busy.'"

From THE CATHOLIC VOICE, Oakland, CA "The Making of a Saint by Fr. Francis X. Murphy. Saints today are a maligned lot. Frequently they are selected by a strange reason; honored in a bizarre way. Joan of Arc was canonized to confront political rumpus in twentieth century France; Thomas Aquinas to vindicate a thirteenth century philosophical system and Pius X to justify a Roman clique's theological alignment.

"Such considerations had nothing to do with the holiness of these individuals.

"Joan's sanctity was based on her obedience to the voices of the Spirit. In the end they got her burned at the stake. Aquinas' virtue was instinct in his invariable gentleness amid the vastness of his learning and Pius X's holiness flowed from his simplicity and concern as pastor of souls.

"In each case the devil's advocate had plenty of ammunition with which to challenge the allegations of sanctity - Joan's unfeminine garb and military behavior; the repudiation of Aquinas' writings by the bishops of Paris and Oxford, and the heresy hunt that accompanied Pius's condemnation of modernists.

"Pressure groups like the French hierarchy, the Dominican order or the Roman Curia put their weight behind the `propaganda' to have their Joan, their Thomas or their Pius declared a saint."

From LIGUORIAN, Jan., 1982. "Gerard Majella- the Pro-Life Saint."

RELIGIOUS JOURNALS

From November 1986 newsletter, Mexican Gospel Mission. "According to local legend, Franciscan friars were passing through Magdalena de Kino, Sonora centuries ago with a statue of St. Francis loaded on a burro. When the burro got to the middle of the town, it refused to go on, convincing the friars that the statue clearly had `chosen' to remain in Magdalena.

"That's why they built a church here, and that is why, each October 4, the feast day of St. Francis of Assisi, Magdalena stages an enormously popular festival that transforms this town of 14,000 people, as one resident put it, `from a chameleon to an elephant.'

"It may also be the reason why so many pilgrims who come here October 4 attribute magical powers to the statue of St. Francis that reclines in wooden silence in a chapel of the Church of Santa Maria Magdalena. It seems to make no difference to the faithful that the statue they are venerating is a different St. Francis (St. Francis Xavier), one whose feast day is not celebrated until December 3."

SECULAR JOURNALS

From DENVER POST 7/200/86. "A SAINT FOR ALL SEASONS. Sore throat got you down? Pray to St. Blaise. Did you lose your car keys? St. Anthony of Padua can help.

"If you're a gravedigger, St. Abbot or St. Anthony are your saints in an emergency. If you want to make some home brew call on St. Augustine of Hippo, St. Luke or St. Nicholas of Myra. Should you be possessed by demons, St. Bruno or St. Denis are standing by.

"No matter what your ailment, your profession or problem, there is a Roman Catholic saint to whom you can turn. And if you forget which saint is for what, pray to St. Rita, St. Jude or St. Gregory. They're in charge of `desperate situations.'

"St. Apollonia was said to have her teeth broken by pincers in the hands of her persecutors. Predictably, she is the saint for dentists."

From NORTH PLATTE TELEGRAPH, 1/5/91. "POPE HAS AMBITIOUS LIST OF SAINTS-TO-BE by William Scobie, London Observor Society. "ROME. Pope John Paul II has resolved on an ambitious saint-making program to rally the faithful everywhere and harvest new converts to the Roman Catholic church.

"Brushing aside the doubts of his advisers, ignoring the protests of Jews, Moslems and non-Christians alike, he has drafted as list of men and women whose future canonization is designed to inspire a fresh world-wide missionary crusade.

"The opening move is a Christmas gift to Canada's fervent French community: the canonization of Marie d'Youville, an 18th century Mother Teresa who founded a nursing order, the Grey Sisters, in Quebec.

"Soon to follow is a mixed bag of wonder-workers (it needs two miracles to make a saint), ranging from a Latin American martyr to a brace of English cardinals to a Spanish queen.

"John Paul's sagacity in these decisions is widely recognized.

"`The Holy Father,' said a member of the Curia, which reports on such affairs, `sees a duty in finding exemplars for a proselytizing church which, we hope, will raise its global membership to the one billion mark in the next decade or so.'

"The most startling candidate for sainthood is Queen Isabella of Spain, who launched Columbus on his discovery of the New World, thus opening a vast mission field for Christianity.

"This has run into heavy fire from Moslems and Jews. They have reminded the Vatican, which is `studying the proposal,' that under `Isabel la Catolica' thousands were expelled from Spain and others tortured or burned at the stake for their beliefs.

"But the Vatican regards her contribution to spreading Catholicism in the Americas as `immense.'

"No less worrying is the choice of Edith Stein, a Jewish intellectual who died in the Nazi death camps as a Catholic nun, Sister Teresa Benedicta, a convert who asked God to accept her life in atonement `for the unbelief of the Jews.'

"She has already been beatified, despite bitter protests from many Jews who feel the pope is trying to cash in on the Holocaust. (She has now been canonized.)

"An effort is also being made to shift the image of the church toward the center ground. High on the pope's short-list is reformist Salvadoran Archbishop Oscar Romero, murdered in his church in San Salvador in 1980 by right-wing extremists.

"In America, the prime candidate is Dorothy Day, writer, feminist and radical social reformer who, as a convert from Marxism, helped turn her church's attention to peace and justice issues and worked as a nurse in the slums."