Popes Sainting Popes
The Vatican has announced that the late Popes, John Paul II (died 2005) and John XXIII (died 1963), will be made saints. This means, according to papal teaching, that they will then pass from purgatory into heaven and be among the saints to whom Roman Catholics can pray.
Rome requires that, in order to make a saint, a dead person must have at least two miracles attributed to him or her posthumously. John Paul II has two supposed miracles attributed to him but, in the case of John XXIII, the present Pope has waived the requirement for a second miracle. Even some Roman Catholic commentators have argued that saint-making is a profitable business for the Church of Rome. In any case it greatly pleases the Roman Catholic laity – especially if the new saint is from their own country. In the case of John Paul II, even at his funeral the people were calling for him to be made a saint immediately.
However, more discerning Catholics have their reservations, especially when it comes to the sainting of popes by other popes. Garry Wills, a Roman Catholic historian and scholar in America, describes the decision to canonise John XXIII along with John Paul II as an “ablutionary pairing” – meaning that, just as in 2000 Pope John Paul II beatified John XXIII along with Pius IX (“to take the sting out of Pius IX’s promotion”), so John XXIII is being canonised by the present Pope at the same time as John Paul II, who “is still subject to deep criticism” on account of the paedophile scandal in the Church. “John XXIII is the feel-good pope in a time of turmoil”, explains Wills, “even though he is being used to sanction the turmoil caused by John Paul II.”
More serious is the fact that Roman Catholics continue to be duped about the existence of purgatory and that only very few people can be saints (and only after they die). They are also being confirmed in their delusion that their saints can hear their prayers and help them.
How wilfully blind is Rome to the Scripture fact that a sinner becomes a saint as soon as he becomes a born-again believer. Should he die at the time of conversion, he goes immediately to heaven as perfectly holy. In an instant he is “absent from the body . . . present with the Lord” (2 Cor 5:8). Genuine saints have, in numerous cases, died at the hands of the Church of Rome. “And I saw the woman drunken with the blood of the saints, and with the blood of the martyrs of Jesus” (Rev 17:6).
As for Rome’s teaching that we may commune with the dead – it flies in the face of Scripture prohibitions against such practices. In any case, how futile, as well as wicked, it is to pray to saints for help or to intercede for us. Indeed, it is nothing less than idolatrous. The saints in heaven can neither hear nor help. “To which of the saints wilt thou turn?” (Job 5:1). NMR