Two more Ugandans on way to sainthood
Oct 20, 2002
VATICAN CITY, Sunday - Pope John Paul, who has already set records for creating saints, put six more people on the road to Roman Catholic sainthood on Sunday during a solemn ceremony in St Peter’s Square
VATICAN CITY, Sunday - Pope John Paul, who has already set records for creating saints, put six more people on the road to Roman Catholic sainthood on Sunday during a solemn ceremony in St Peter’s Square.
The six new “blesseds†of the Church included two Ugandans, three Italians and a French woman.
All lived in the 19th or 20th centuries.
The Catholic Church has 22 Ugandans on the list of saints.
The Pope, now in the 25th year of his papacy, has already beatified or canonised more people than all of his predecessors combined.
Including those from Sunday’s ceremony, he has now beatified 1,303 people and also made 465 saints. Beatification is the last step before sainthood.
Africans and Indians sang, danced and played music during the ceremony, attended by tens of thousands of people under a clear sky in the square before Christendom’s largest church.
The Ugandans beatified were Daudi Okello and Jildo Irwa, both of who where killed in northern Uganda in 1918.
Both were teenagers of the Acholi tribe who had been converted to Christianity by missionaries at the start of the 20th century and worked as religion teachers.
The two boys were killed in the village of Paimol by men with spears after refusing to stop teaching Christianity to the local population.
Vice-President Specioza Kazibwe led a high-powered delegation from Uganda which included six ministers, bishops and people from the northern Archdiocese of Gulu.
Another person beatified on Sunday was Helene Marie Philippine de Chappotin de Neuville, a French woman who worked in India in the 19th century and later founded an order of missionary nuns.
Also beatified was Andrea Giacinto Longhin, an Italian bishop who died in 1936.
The others were Marcantonio Durando, an Italian priest who founded an order of nuns in the 19th century, and Liduina Meneguzzi, a 20th century Italian nun.
The Ugandans were beatified as martyrs who were killed in hatred of the faith.
The other four were beatified because sick people who had prayed to them for help were later healed in a medically inexplicable way.
Reuters
The six new “blesseds†of the Church included two Ugandans, three Italians and a French woman.
All lived in the 19th or 20th centuries.
The Catholic Church has 22 Ugandans on the list of saints.
The Pope, now in the 25th year of his papacy, has already beatified or canonised more people than all of his predecessors combined.
Including those from Sunday’s ceremony, he has now beatified 1,303 people and also made 465 saints. Beatification is the last step before sainthood.
Africans and Indians sang, danced and played music during the ceremony, attended by tens of thousands of people under a clear sky in the square before Christendom’s largest church.
The Ugandans beatified were Daudi Okello and Jildo Irwa, both of who where killed in northern Uganda in 1918.
Both were teenagers of the Acholi tribe who had been converted to Christianity by missionaries at the start of the 20th century and worked as religion teachers.
The two boys were killed in the village of Paimol by men with spears after refusing to stop teaching Christianity to the local population.
Vice-President Specioza Kazibwe led a high-powered delegation from Uganda which included six ministers, bishops and people from the northern Archdiocese of Gulu.
Another person beatified on Sunday was Helene Marie Philippine de Chappotin de Neuville, a French woman who worked in India in the 19th century and later founded an order of missionary nuns.
Also beatified was Andrea Giacinto Longhin, an Italian bishop who died in 1936.
The others were Marcantonio Durando, an Italian priest who founded an order of nuns in the 19th century, and Liduina Meneguzzi, a 20th century Italian nun.
The Ugandans were beatified as martyrs who were killed in hatred of the faith.
The other four were beatified because sick people who had prayed to them for help were later healed in a medically inexplicable way.
Reuters