Saints, or holy persons, are known in many religions. The primitive Church
looked to the great figures of the OT for inspiration
(Heb 11:4-12:1). A common name for the followers of Jesus was the
"saints" (Acts 9:13,32,41; Rom 16:2); they were set apart
and gifted by God. In the early centuries there was a cult or veneration
of martyrs, often with a Eucharistic celebration on the anniversary
of their deaths, especially at the place of their death or burial.
Then other outstandingly holy persons were venerated. The Catholic
and Eastern Churches uses words like "venerate" or "honour"
about the saints. Worship, and especially "adoration" belongs
only to God. The generic name for such honour is "cult."
Many Christians give special honour to St. Mary, the Virgin Mother
of God. But this is not worship; Mary remains always a creature.
RECOGNISING SAINTS
In the beginning saints became known by "the voice of
the people" (vox populi). That means that the local Church
recognised their holiness and began to venerate them. This is
the way we get all the early saints, for example St. Wilfrid
(d. 709), St. Brigid (d. ca. 525) or Pope St. Leo the Great (d.
461). The fame of some saints spread outside their own area,
so that St. Martin of Tours (d. 397) was venerated throughout
Europe. During the first millennium it was the bishops who controlled
such veneration in their own local Church.
In time it would be Rome which canonized; the first attested
case was St. Ulrich of Augsburg canonised by Pope John XV in
993. Within two hundred years veneration of saints without the
approval of Rome was forbidden. However, before the 12th century
and frequently until the 17th century, local bishops beatified
persons for veneration in their own diocese. Since then beatification
usually takes place in the presence of the pope: it is a formal
presentation to him of the servant of God to him; the pope does
not state definitively that the blessed person is in heaven.
Beatification is usually followed by cultus only in a particular
country, diocese, church or religious family.
The painstaking and complex process leading to canonization has
been gradually established in the Church from the Middle Ages.
Before a person is canonised or declared Blessed today, there
is an exhaustive process which examines the life, the writings
of the person. Some miracle, usually of healing, is also required.
The practice of having saints is not confined to the Roman Catholic
Church. There are thousands of saints in the Christian Churches
of the East. Many of these became venerated as saints in a local
Church. In recent centuries synods of Eastern bishops have declared
people to be saints. In the Anglican Communion some Churches
and service books give a special place to holy people, and commemorate
them each year, for example, William Law (d. 1761) on 9 April;
George Herbert (d. 1633) on 27 February; Edward Pusey (d. 1882)
on 18 September.
THE SAINTS IN OUR LIVES
There are three attitudes to the saints in Christian Churches.
All will give praise and thanks to God for the lives of those
who have showed Christian discipleship at an exemplary level.
Again, the Churches generally have little difficulty either in
encouraging people to imitate the virtues of the saints. With
some modern Catholic theologians like K. Rahner and Hans Urs
von Balthasar, we can see them as creators of new styles of Christianity,
or new living commentators on the gospel of Jesus. One has only
to think of the ascetics in the desert, of the profound restating
of Christian principles of Francis of Assisi or of the heroic
ordinariness of St. Thérèse of Lisieux.
Thirdly there is the more difficult issue of veneration. Here
the Church of Rome and the Churches of the East part company
with the Churches of the Reform. We have seen that all will praise
God for the saints; it is a different matter to pay honour to
them. However, all veneration of saints is ultimately worship
of God who is the source of their goodness. Even when we invoke
the saints, we are declaring our creaturely sinfulness and asking
them to intercede for us with God. We do not receive anything
from the saints themselves; it is God who blesses us. He is pleased,
however, that we delight in those who are his friends and who
have been supremely faithful.
There can be the danger of abuse in devotion to the saints. But
there is a medieval saying that abuse does not outlaw use-just
because alcohol or motorcars can be abused is not a reason for
forbidding these. However, where there is a danger of misuse,
people need to be alert to what might be hazardous. A Christian
life that would focus only on the saints would be very skewed.
We need to be attentive to the Word of God, to worship with our
Church community, to engage in acts of love, to be loving and
kind. It is only within such a context that devotion to the saints
has a place and meaning in the Christian life.
Devotion to the saints is not obligatory for Catholics. It is
an enrichment of the faith, a celebration of the Communion of
Saints, the great family of God united on earth and beyond the
grave. In the same way, many Catholics and Orthodox Christians
will have their own favourite patrons, saints with whom they
feel some bond or empathy. In the same way groups of people feel
a relationship with a saint whom they choose as a patron. Thus
we have patrons of countries, e.g. Sts. George, Margaret and
Patrick in these islands. Trades have patrons too, often based
on some incident in the life of the saint, e.g. St. Mary Magdalene
for hairdressers; St. Blaise for those who have throat illness;
St. Joseph for carpenters.
Throughout our lives we can change in our relationship with the
saints: we can "go off "a saint for a while and perhaps
later return, or find another heavenly figure with whom we feel
some special empathy. In future issues various people will write
about their own friends in heaven and share about their relationship.
[Christopher O'Donnell, a Carmelite priest,
is associate professor of spirituality at the Milltown Institute,
Dublin.]
