Pope Francis has approved a miracle needed to make Cardinal John Henry Newman, an Anglican convert, a saint.
Pope Benedict XVI beatified Newman during a visit to Britain in 2010. The London-born Newman, who died in 1890, was praised by Benedict as a model for ecumenism. Newman renounced his academic career at Oxford University to convert to Catholicism in 1845, convinced that the truth he sought could no longer be found in the Church of England.
The Vatican on Wednesday also said that Francis had approved the "heroic virtues of God's servant" Cardinal Jozsef Mindszenty, the Hungarian churchman who suffered a long imprisonment for being a foe of Communism. The recognition of such virtues is a step toward possible sainthood. Mindszenty died in Vienna, Austria, in 1975.
FILE - In this Sept. 19, 2010 file photo, Pope Benedict XVI conducts a beatification mass at Cofton Park in Birmingham. The Vatican announced Wednesday, Feb. 13, 2019 that Pope Francis has approved a miracle needed to make Cardinal John Henry Newman, an Anglican convert, a saint, nine years after Benedict XVI beatified Newman during a visit to Britain in 2010. (AP PhotoMatt Dunham, file)
FILE - This Oct. 31, 1956 black and white file photo shows Hungarian Cardinal Jozsef Mindszenty, freed after more than seven years in a communist jail, in his Budapest residence. The Vatican announced on Wednesday, Feb. 13, 2019 that Francis, a day earlier, had OK’d the “heroic virtues of God’s servant”Cardinal Mindszenty, the Hungarian churchman who suffered a long imprisonment for being a foe of Communism, the recognition of such virtues is a step toward possible sainthood. .(AP PhotoWalter Lindlar, file)