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VATICAN CITY =E2=80=94 On a sunny afternoon this week, St. = Peter=E2=80=99s Square was abuzz=20 with life. Crowds lined up at the metal detectors. Tourists snapped = photos. A=20 workman was spraying down the travertine steps to the basilica. And = inside, red=20 cloth screens cordoned off a side chapel that will soon draw as many = visitors as=20 Michelangelo=E2=80=99s Piet=C3=A0 nearby.
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Beatification Stirs Excitement and =
Dissension
By RACHEL DONADIO
Published: April 28, 2011
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Alessandro Bianchi/Reuters
This week, a poster was put up in St. Peter's Square = of Pope=20 John Paul II, who is to be beatified on Sunday.
Starting Sunday, that chapel is where the entombed remains of
The beatification is widely seen as a way not just to honor John Paul = but to=20 energize the Roman=20 Catholic Church. Yet, like John Paul=E2=80=99s 26-year papacy = itself, it has become=20 intensely polarizing.
For one thing, Benedict waived the traditional five-year wait and = began the=20 process weeks after John Paul=E2=80=99s death, and critics across the = Catholic spectrum=20 have questioned the alacrity. Others say that the sex abuse crisis that = emerged=20 under John Paul is grounds against sainthood. On Saturday, at least one = victims=E2=80=99=20 group plans a worldwide protest.
Defenders, however, say beatification is simply the formal seal of = approval=20 for=20 a wildly popular pope who helped bring down Communism and whom many=20 Catholics, especially in his native Poland, already consider a saint. = Hundreds=20 of thousands are expected in Rome, the biggest crowds since 2005, when = cries of=20 =E2=80=9CSanto subito!=E2=80=9D or =E2=80=9CSainthood now,=E2=80=9D = erupted at his funeral Mass.
=E2=80=9CThis beatification is different because this pope is = different. He=E2=80=99s a man=20 with a role in history, not just in church history,=E2=80=9D said Andrea = Riccardi, the=20 founder of the Community of Sant=E2=80=99Egidio, a liberal Catholic = group and a=20 biographer of John Paul who testified in his favor in the beatification = process.=20 =E2=80=9CThe seal of sainthood doesn=E2=80=99t close the debate on = history,=E2=80=9D he added. =E2=80=9CIn a=20 certain sense, for many Catholics he=E2=80=99s already a saint, even = without=20 beatification and, let=E2=80=99s be honest, even without a = miracle.=E2=80=9D
Saint-making is intensely political. The impulse must arise from the=20 faithful, but ultimately most saints=E2=80=99 causes are championed by = religious groups=20 with the organizational skills, and fund-raising, to keep their causes = alive. As=20 Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger and head of the Vatican=E2=80=99s doctrinal = watchdog, Pope=20 Benedict in 1989 criticized=20 this tendency, saying there had been too many beatifications of = marginal=20 figures.
But John Paul was an avid saint-maker who loosened the rules to make = the=20 process easier. He beatified more than 1,300 people and canonized 482 = saints.=20 Since 2005, Benedict has beatified 790 people and canonized 34 saints. =
For John Paul to be beatified, a Vatican committee had to rule that = he had=20 performed a miracle. (To advance to sainthood, he needs an additional = miracle.)=20 In the proceedings, doctors and experts testified that a French nun had = been=20 miraculously cured from Parkinson=E2=80=99s disease after praying to = John Paul. Their=20 testimony was then notarized, and the committee certified the miracle. =
To Vatican watchers, John Paul=E2=80=99s beatification is a snapshot = of the Catholic=20 Church in 2011 =E2=80=94 mingling deep faith and dense bureaucracy, = grass-roots devotion=20 and top-down power politics, the medieval and the contemporary.
Those who cannot make the journey to Rome can
In many ways, the beatification underscores how Benedict, a bookish = yet never=20 predictable pope whose papacy has been racked by crises and is = intellectually=20 focused on Europe, still derives much of his light and heat from his = telegenic,=20 globe-trotting predecessor.
But it also shows how dark clouds still hang over John Paul=E2=80=99s = papacy, not=20 least the sex abuse crisis and his close ties to t= he Rev.=20 Marcial Maciel Degollado, the Mexican founder of the wealthy and = powerful=20 religious order Legionaries of Christ. Father Maciel, a charismatic = leader=20 hailed by John Paul as a model of dynamic priesthood, was later found to = have=20 fathered several children and abused seminarians. Last year, Benedict = took the=20 step of pla= cing the=20 entire order under Vatican receivership.
But during John Paul=E2=80=99s papacy, Vatican officials blocked an = investigation of=20 Father Maciel, and the pope publicly honored him in 2004 even after = seminarians=20 had come forward with allegations of abuse. Father Maciel was = particularly close=20 to John Paul=E2=80=99s longtime personal secretary, Cardinal Stanislaw = Dziwisz, now the=20 archbishop of Krakow, who has championed the beatification.
Critics say that in beatifying John Paul, the Vatican is trying to = close the=20 history books before they have been fully opened.
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