A home-grown saint – it’s gold, gold, gold for Australia

February 22, 2010

by Barney Zwartz

For 40 years Garry McLean has longed for an Australian saint. Growing up, he was taught about Joan of Arc and St Patrick of Ireland and found them inspirational, but he wanted an Australian saint, a model to whom he could feel closer.

Now 54 and manager of the Mary MacKillop Heritage Centre in East Melbourne, he is overwhelmed that, as of Friday night, the Blessed Mary is Saint Mary. For the order she founded, the Sisters of St Joseph of the Sacred Heart, the wait has been even longer. Their quest began in 1925, 16 years after she died, and has taken 85 years.

But amid the rejoicing, it’s hard to escape the conclusion that the canonisation of saints is something of an odd business. The Roman Catholic Church lists more than 10,000 saints, some better known than others. Pope John Paul II canonised more — 476 of them — in his 27-year pontificate than any pope in the previous 500 years.

I’m not suggesting it was entirely cynical, but the Pope knew it was good business for the local churches. It encouraged the faithful and renewed interest in the church among many lapsed or non-Catholics, not to mention bringing pilgrims, money and a rise in the numbers wanting to be a priest or join a religious order. A win, win, win and win situation. But some Catholics thought the currency of sainthood was devalued.

No one has suggested the canonisation of Mary MacKillop is in this category — and nor do I — though many of those benefits may flow to the Australian church. A bit of Catholic triumphalism at the announcement would have been entirely understandable but in fact reaction has been rather muted. Of course the real party will come with the actual canonisation in Rome on October 17.

What does seem a little odd is the rampant nationalism that has accompanied it. Look, for example, at what Prime Minister Kevin Rudd said: ”This is a great honour for Australia. I offer a heartfelt expression of appreciation to the wider Catholic community.” It’s not an honour for Australia, it’s religious recognition of a great woman. And the wider Catholic community didn’t have a lot to do with it.

But of course Rudd’s take fits a secular paradigm with which Australians are quite comfortable. One might be forgiven for thinking the good news came from Vancouver’s Winter Olympics: a little battler surmounts the odds and grabs gold, gold, gold for Australia.

It’s as though Australia is suddenly ”on the map” in church terms. But for most Australians, including most Catholics, life will continue exactly as before, apart from a small glow. There is also some confusion about what a saint is. Church creeds talk of the ”communion of saints”, which is all believers around the world and through history. The new Saint Mary of the Cross belongs to a second category, canonised saints, who are inspirational heroes and heroines for Christians to emulate. Such a saint is someone who is declared by the church to be in heaven. The church does not create saints, it ”recognises” them.

Because it is the Vatican that does the recognising, saints tend to fit a rather precise model that happens, not entirely coincidentally, to buttress Rome’s institutional view of the church. Nearly all saints after the early church are clerical — Popes, bishops, priests, monks or nuns. There aren’t many lay saints, and these are almost entirely martyrs who died for their faith, or to protect their chastity or in obedience to some other important teaching.

These saints are venerated, and are believed to intercede in prayer for the living. A great deal of superstition has arisen around them during the church’s history but the church is categorical that they are not to be worshipped.

Protestants do not canonise saints, professing the sainthood of all believers. The apostle Paul addressed the ordinary believers to whom he wrote his epistles as saints. Anglicans have created only one saint — the rather unsaintly King Charles I — on the grounds that he was martyred, but he is not widely venerated.

But back to Mary MacKillop. Within the Australian Catholic church, there is genuine delight on behalf of her order. As Bob Dixon, the national pastoral projects officer, put it: ”It’s due recognition of their founder, and due recognition to them for the work they have done in schools and parishes for more than a century.”

Melbourne Archbishop Denis Hart called her ”a woman of great holiness, a great educator, an advocate for the poor and a visionary of Christianity. … The nuns were loved by the people because they shared their poverty and their battles. She and her sisters have always been very close to the people.”

Slightly mischievously, I asked Archbishop Hart whether the fact that Saint Mary of the Cross had been temporarily excommunicated should encourage today’s Catholic dissidents. He laughed and evaded it neatly: ”It’s very important for us all to keep our hope in what God can do.”

But I can’t help feeling it would be a good thing if more dissidents were recognised.

http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/blogs/the-religious-write/a- homegrown-saint–its-gold-gold-gold-for-australia/20100222-oonz.html

And just one of the 145+ comments on that Blog:

I have met some of these women who are members of MacKillop’s order. They are some of the most decent and pragmatic people I have ever met, (and quite funny and cheeky) and do work in some very difficult environments. Very different from the image I had of Nuns. Oh, and when I queried the monotheistic issue regarding praying to Saints, it was all explained quite clearly that the Saint is not being asked to assist, but to intercede and ask “The Boss” to assist. While many of us might not believe in the sorts of “religious miracles” mentioned, the power of positive thinking has been recognised in helping some people overcome illness. Simply dismissing someone’s faith (aka positive thinking) would be shortsighted.

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