Pope John Paul II To Be Beatified May 1
Posted January 14, 2011 8:08 am.
This article is more than 5 years old.
Pope John Paul II, known as “the people’s pope” and the most well-travelled pontiff ever, will be beatified in a ceremony on May. 1, the Vatican announced Friday.
A French nun’s recovery from Parkinson’s disease, an ailment John Paul also suffered from, was declared a miracle and was the last step required for beatification. Another miracle must be confirmed to have John Paul to reach sainthood.
At the May 1st ceremony, John Paul will receive the title “blessed” and can be venerated publicly.
Followers chanted “Santo Subito” (sainthood immediately) at John Paul’s funeral in 2005 and Pope Benedict XVI immediately began an investigation into the late pontiff’s life, waiving the five-year waiting period that normally precedes the sainthood process.
Sister Marie Simon-Pierre claims she was cured of Parkinson’s, which rendered her virtually unable to walk, drive or write, after she and her fellow nuns of the Congregation of Little Sisters of Catholic Maternity Wards prayed to John Paul.
Questions about the validity of the nun’s diagnosis were put to rest by Vatican-appointed doctors who studied the case and concluded her cure had no medical explanation.
The May 1st ceremony is expected to draw hundreds of thousands of pilgrims and is expected to boost morale within a church hit hard by widespread child sexual abuse scandals.
Born Karol Wojtyla in Wadowice, Poland in 1920, John Paul was the youngest pope in more than a century and the first non-Italian in more than 400 years. He was elected pope in 1978 and died in his Vatican apartment on April 2, 2005 at the age of 84.
With files from the Associated Press.
