Pope Benedict's Notes about the Catholic Saints

Saints Are Part of the Present and Future of the Church

VATICAN CITY, 19 DEC 2009 (VIS) - At midday today the Pope received members, consultors, postulators and officials of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints for the fortieth anniversary of that dicastery.

Saints, said the Pope in his address, "are not representatives of the past; rather, they form part of the present and future of the Church and society. ... The lives of these extraordinary believers, who come from every region of the earth", are characterized by "their relationship with the Lord, ... and by an intense dialogue with Him". The lives of the saints likewise reveal "a continuous search for evangelical perfection, the rejection of mediocrity and a tendency towards total adherence to Christ".

"The principal stages in the Church's recognition of sanctity - beatification and canonization - are united by a coherent bond. ... The gradual approach to the 'fullness of light' emerges in a unique way in the passage" from one stage to the other, said the Pope.

The passage from beatification to canonization "involves events of great religious and cultural significance, in which invocation in the liturgy, popular devotion, imitation of virtues, historical and theological study, and attention to the 'signs from on high' come together and mutually enrich one another. ... The truth is that the witness of the saints highlights ever new aspects of the evangelical message, and makes them known".

The Pope then reiterated some words pronounced in the opening address by Archbishop Angelo Amato S.D.B., prefect of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints, affirming that "in the process of recognizing saintliness there emerges a spiritual and pastoral richness which involves the entire Christian community. Sanctity - in other words, the transfiguration of people and of human reality in the image of the risen Christ - represents the final goal in the plan of divine salvation".