Topic
The Saints
Who the saints are, how the Church recognizes them, and why Catholics ask for their prayers.
Questions about the saints
All in Q&AWhy do Catholics pray to Mary?
Catholics do not worship Mary; they ask her to pray for them, just as Christians ask one another for prayers. Because she is the Mother of Jesus and is alive in Christ, her intercession is powerful — as at Cana, where Jesus worked his first miracle at her request.
Why do Catholics pray to saints?
Catholics ask the saints to pray for them for the same reason Christians ask friends to pray for them. Those who have died in Christ are alive with God, united to us in one Body, and Scripture shows them offering the prayers of believers before God's throne.
How does someone become a saint?
Everyone in heaven is a saint. "Canonized" saints are those the Church formally declares to be in heaven and worthy of public veneration, after a careful investigation of their life and, normally, two miracles attributed to their intercession. The steps are Servant of God, Venerable, Blessed, and Saint.
Why are there so many religious orders? Can anybody join?
Each order exists for its own purpose — the Franciscans' love for the poor, the Dominicans' preaching, the Benedictines' monastic life. Only priests who belong to an order are consecrated religious, but secular priests, permanent deacons and lay people can join an order's third order as tertiaries.
Why do Matthew and Mark list Thaddeus, but Luke another Judas?
Because they are the same man. The Thaddeus of Matthew 10:3 and Mark 3:18 is the Judas of Luke 6:16. He probably went by a second name to avoid confusion with Judas Iscariot.
What happened to confirmation names?
The custom is still used. Taking a saint's name at confirmation gave the confirmand a heavenly patron and helped him rely on the communion of saints. Some dioceses now encourage the older tradition of keeping one's baptismal name, to link the two sacraments of initiation.
Where does our information about Saints Anne and Joachim come from?
Their names come from the Protoevangelium of James, a second-century apocryphal Christian writing about Mary's childhood. It is not Scripture, but as an early Christian history it may preserve accurate information about the family of Mary and Joseph.
Could the Catholic Church canonize a non-Catholic?
In theory, yes, since canonization is simply an official acknowledgment that someone is in heaven. But so far the Church has canonized only her own members, because one purpose of canonization is to hold up a model of Catholic holiness.
Is there a patron saint for discernment?
One possibility is St. Ignatius of Loyola, whose Spiritual Exercises were written to help people discern rightly. Ignatius taught that we should be ready to submit our own judgment to the Church's.
Does the Church teach it is better to die than to be raped?
No. The Catechism says rape can wound a victim's "moral integrity," meaning wholeness — not that the victim sins. The perpetrator, not the victim, has sinned, because morality lies in the act of the will. Saints like Maria Goretti are honored for resisting, but that does not imply others were sinful. Victims must be treated with profound compassion.
Why isn't Noah called a saint?
Formal canonization developed centuries after the Church began, so Old and New Testament saints — even the Virgin Mary — were never formally canonized. Noah is among the Old Testament righteous generally considered to be in heaven, and Hebrews 11 lists him among the heroes of faith.
Is there a patron saint of dieters?
No saint has been officially designated, but you may choose one whose life fits and ask for prayers: St. Martha (patron of dietitians), St. Raphael ("God heals"), St. Thomas Aquinas (believed to have been a large man), St. Catherine of Siena (who at times lived on the Eucharist alone), or St. Anthony of Padua (patron of the starving).
What is the difference between saints and blesseds?
They are stages in the Church's process. Beatification usually requires one attested miracle and permits veneration by the local church. Canonization usually requires two, permits veneration by the universal Church, and is a definitive, infallible statement that the saint is in heaven.
Are Adam and Eve in heaven?
Christian tradition generally recognizes that Adam and Eve are in heaven. Their memorial has been celebrated in the Church on December 24.
When Aquinas likened his work to straw, was that a retraction?
No. After a revelation at Mass in 1273, Aquinas stopped writing, saying all he had written seemed like straw compared with what he had seen. No one has understood this as a retraction: Leo XIII promoted Thomism, and Aquinas was named a Doctor of the Church.
How do we know St. Anne was Mary's mother, since the Bible doesn't mention her?
From sources outside the Bible. The earliest known record of her name is the Protoevangelium of James, from the second century.
Is St. Christopher still a saint?
Yes. His feast is no longer on the universal calendar, but he is still recognized as a saint. He was an early martyr about whom little is known; like many early saints he was acclaimed, not formally canonized, and his feast may still be kept locally.
In light of Matthew 11:11, who is greater — Mary or John the Baptist?
Read in context, Matthew 11:11 is not a ranking of John above Mary. Just before it, Jesus calls John a prophet and more than a prophet (Matthew 11:9): he is proclaiming John the greatest of the prophets — the Precursor.
Did Fulton Sheen support Vatican II?
Yes. In his autobiography Treasure in Clay, Sheen devoted a chapter to the Council and called Gaudium et Spes "brilliant." He saw the turmoil after the Council as the kind of opposition that always follows an outpouring of the Holy Spirit.
Why is St. Anthony invoked for finding lost items?
Because of a popular story: a brother friar stole a commentary Anthony had written; Anthony prayed, and the thief, frightened by a sudden storm he took as God's wrath, returned it. Whether the story is true or a pious legend, we don't know for certain.
How can Eastern Orthodoxy have saints if it has no pope?
The pope doesn't make saints; he officially recognizes them through canonization. Everyone who dies in God's friendship becomes a saint, and Orthodox Christians can die in God's friendship. Their recognition of saints resembles the early Church's acclamation, but the Catholic Church does not currently recognize those individuals as saints, though it hopes for their salvation.
Did Fulton Sheen take a permissive stand on contraception?
No. There is no substantive evidence he rejected the Church's teaching; he defended it before and after Humanae Vitae. In his 1969 interview with David Frost he called it "the law," while expressing sympathy for those who struggle, and his books Three to Get Married and The World's First Love firmly oppose contraception.
What did St. John of the Cross mean by detachment from people?
He wanted us to love God more than anyone else — not instead of anyone else. We must detach ourselves from loving the creature more than the Creator.
Why did the Church ban the Divine Mercy devotion from 1959 to 1978?
Faulty translations from the Polish made St. Faustina's writings appear doctrinally suspect, so the Holy See suppressed the devotion for about twenty years. Once the translations were corrected, the ban was lifted — largely through the work of the Archbishop of Krakow, who became John Paul II that same year.
Do the dead who have no Masses said for them miss out on graces?
No. All the dead are prayed for at every Mass — Eucharistic Prayer IV, for instance, prays for all the departed. God is just and merciful; no one goes wanting for his mercy.
What is the difference between talking to a saint and talking to a ghost?
The Church forbids occult methods of summoning the dead — Ouija boards, séances, mediums — and attempts to manipulate the supernatural for forbidden power or knowledge. Praying to a saint conjures nothing; it honors God's friend and asks for prayer.
Should Catholics venerate saints canonized by Eastern Orthodox churches?
Catholics may admire their witness and learn from apparently holy people of other traditions, but should not give them the public honor reserved to saints canonized by the Catholic Church. Papal canonization infallibly declares a person in heaven; we have no such certainty about those "canonized" elsewhere.
Why pray to angels?
Angels are spiritual beings with free will and intellects far beyond ours. The holy angels dwell in heaven and so are saints. God uses them as messengers, guardians and helpers to us, as Raphael's words in Tobit show.
Are there any rules governing relics?
Keep them for veneration or give them away, but never sell them: canon law absolutely forbids selling sacred relics. Relics of great significance, or greatly honored by the people, may not be alienated or permanently transferred without the Holy See's permission.
Is Dorothy Day considered saintly because of her support for Fidel Castro?
Of course not. Holy people are admired for their holiness, not their politics. Dorothy Day, a convert who founded the Catholic Worker movement, cared above all for the poor and marginalized, rejected the "free love" revolution, and stayed loyal to the Church. She is a Servant of God.