(Death, Heaven, Purgatory, Hell)
Rite of Christian Initiation for Adults
|
|
Vatican editor: Pope
a 'martyr' for 1981 shooting
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
VATICAN CITY -- The editor of the Vatican
newspaper said yesterday that Pope John Paul II was a "martyr" even though he
survived a 1981 assassination attempt -- the latest official comment suggesting
a speedy path to sainthood for the late pontiff.
Mario Agnes, editor-in-chief of the official
Vatican daily L'Osservatore Romano, told an annual pro-Catholic political
meeting that the stones in St. Peter's Square where John Paul's blood was shed
should be preserved because it was the blood of "an authentic martyred pope."
Ever since Pope Benedict XVI announced May 13
that he was putting John Paul on the fast track for possible sainthood,
questions have arisen about whether he could be declared a martyr. Doing so
would remove the need for the Vatican to confirm that a miracle attributed to
his intercession had occurred after his April 2 death for him to be beatified.
The Vatican would still need to confirm a
miracle occurred after his beatification for John Paul to be declared a saint.
Church officials had initially rejected
outright any suggestion that the 1981 assassination attempt could be the basis
for a martyrdom declaration since John Paul lived for 24 years after it. They
also noted that other candidates for beatification and sainthood also had
suffered ordinary illnesses at the end of their lives but weren't declared
martyrs.
However, top officials are no longer dismissing
the idea. Cardinal Jose Saraiva Martins, prefect of the Congregation for the
Causes of Saints, said last month it was up to groups of theological experts to
decide if the May 13, 1981, attempt on John Paul's life in St. Peter's Square --
as well as his long, public suffering before he died -- warranted a declaration
of martyrdom.
"These stones of St. Peter's Square where a bit
of John Paul II's blood fell may be merited, and certainly merit being preserved
as a historic document, because there fell the blood of an authentic martyred
pope, hit in the full of his physical vitality, victim of an attack," Agnes was
quoted as saying by the ANSA and Apcom news agencies.
"The fact that he didn't die doesn't mean he
wasn't a martyr," Agnes said.