August 19, 2004
AFTER BLESSED ROBERT, MAYBE BLESSED JACQUES
Vatican resists drive to canonise EU founder (Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, The Telegraph, August 19th, 2004)
A campaign to sanctify the European Union through the beatification of its founding father, Robert Schuman, has run into stiff resistance from the Vatican and now appears likely to fail.For 14 years investigators under the diocese of Metz have combed through the life of the French statesman to determine whether he merits the title "Blessed Robert", the first step to sainthood.
The drive for his beatification and eventual canonisation was launched by a private group in Metz, the St Benoit Institute, but has acquired powerful backers, including President Jacques Chirac.[...]
The inquiry failed to find any evidence of miraculous healings or visions - a sine qua non for beatification.
A sealed chest containing 66 stacks of documents has now been shipped to Rome for a final decision by the Congregation for the Causes of Saints.
Schuman supporters lobbied hard for a favourable interpretation of the rules, arguing that Franco-German reconciliation in the bitter aftermath of the Second World War was itself miraculous. So far, the Pope has responded coolly.
Whether the issue is sainthood, abortion, celibacy, the ordination of women or many others, it is striking how so many secularists are anxious to engage Christianity, especially the Catholic Church, in debate over it’s internal beliefs and rules. One would have thought non-belief would have left them supremely indifferent. But, for some reason, many atheists just can’t leave God alone.
Posted by Peter Burnet at August 19, 2004 9:37 AMWe need a Saint Bob. It would bring order and balance to the Force. Bobs are inherently stable and dependable folk.
Posted by: Robert Duquette at August 19, 2004 10:37 AMBlessed Robert:
Stable and dependable? I would have qualified this Bob just for survivng on eggs and lettuce. The last word in self-flagellation.
Posted by: Peter B at August 19, 2004 11:22 AMI don't know, "the St Benoit Institute" doesn't sound awfully secular to me.
In fact, it sounds downright Catholic.
The secularists I know would happily leave religion alone, if only religionists would return the favor.
Posted by: Jeff Guinn at August 19, 2004 12:11 PMBlessed Jeff:
Yeah, you guys just mind your own tolerant secularist business until some wide-eyed zealot tries to put a Christmas tree up or say a prayer. Then it's a call to arms.
Posted by: Peter B at August 19, 2004 12:26 PMThe pope is anxious to canonize Stepanic, whose miraculous deed was burying hundreds of Christians (but not Catholics) alive.
If that's the standard, it's hard to imagine who among us does not qualify
Posted by: Harry Eagar at August 19, 2004 1:33 PMJeff: You know better: So does the Paulist center. I could found something called The Center for the Advancement of Rational Atheism (insofar as that isn't inherently oxymoronic), and still have as its driving goal the forced conversion (to whatever faith) of atheists everywhere.
Posted by: Chris at August 19, 2004 2:13 PMSchuman was a Christian, the founder of a CHRISTIAN DEMOCRATIC PARTY.
'Democratic' disqualifies him for sainthood and, in fact, he would have been denied a Christian burial had he had the misfortune to have died in 1948.
So where do secularists come in?
Whatever his moral state, it had to be better than that of the degenerates judging it.
Posted by: Harry Eagar at August 20, 2004 12:11 AMChris:
Is is undoubtedly true that St Benoit Institute does not have a secular ring to it.
That is all I said--do you know that it isn't sectarian?
Peter:
A great many of your intolerant "secularists" are Jews (among others) who don't care to see tax money spent on displays of what, to them, is sacreligious.
Posted by: Jeff Guinn at August 20, 2004 7:26 AM