05-30-2018, 01:13 AM
(05-29-2018, 10:33 PM)Vulgate Wrote: One more point, as noted by the Catholic encyclopedia.
The infallible formula for the canonization itself is to simply declare the person a “Saint.”
Consider: everyone in heaven is a Saint, but not everyone in heaven should be canonized because of what they did in their lives. That is the point. The canonization prayer only infallibly declares a person is a Saint – nothing beyond that.
So, taken at face value, that’s the only thing infallible in a canonization. My Grandma could certainly be a Saint in heaven, and she could potentially enact a miracle for me, but that doesn’t mean she practiced heroic virtue, that she is safe for emulation, and of course that she should be formally canonized.
The definition I just posted says otherwise.