The Cardinals have given their favorable advice for the recognition of a miracle, due to the intercession of Paul VI, confirmed Andrea Tornielli on February 6, 2018 — a cure that we wrote about last December 23.
However, the decision to promulgate the Decree ad hoc of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints and of the Canonization belongs to Pope Francis, whose magisterium is engaged in a Canonization. And at least fifteen days can pass between the Cardinals’ vote and the papal approval.
If the Pope gives his green light, Blessed Paul VI could be canonized on the 50th anniversary of his encyclical “Humanae Vitae,” on human life, of July 25, 1968, perhaps during the Synod of Young People (October 3-28, 2018).
Pope Francis beatified Paul VI (1897-1978), on October 19, 2014, at the end of the first Synod of Bishops on the Family.
Paul VI’s prayer obtained the cure – “inexplicable according to the present state of science,” as reported by the “Voice of the People,” weekly of the diocese of Brescia, Italy, on December 22, 2017, which headlined:” “It Will Be the Year of Paul VI Saint” and ”Paul VI Saint: Good News.”
Last December 13, the theologians of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints approved the recognition of the “miracle,” of which the Medical Commission had given earlier favourable advice. The Cardinals must pronounce themselves. This having been done, nothing remains other than Pope Francis’ decision.
The cure, which happened in 2014, concerns Amanda, a little girl of the region of Verona, Italy, who before her birth, survived a risk of abortion. She was three-years-old last Christmas.
Her mother, Vanna Pironato, 35, already mother of a small, five-year-old boy, was in her 13th week of pregnancy when she had to be hospitalized, due to a risk of abortion after the premature rupture of the placenta. However, as the situation didn’t improve, the doctors advised a “therapeutic abortion.” Vanna and her husband, Albert, decided to continue the pregnancy.
A friend then suggested that they entrust the child to the prayer of Paul VI, who was going to be beatified, just after a miracle that saved the life of a foetus.
The couple decided to go on pilgrimage to the Shrine of Graces to pray to Pope Montini, who loved that Shrine and who celebrated his first Mass there. Then they invoked his prayer every day. The mother continued with the regular medical check-ups and therapies, but the loss of the amniotic fluid continued.
Around 4:00 am on December 25, 2014, Vanna Pironato was hospitalized with signs of imminent labour. About two hours later, she gave birth to her little daughter, at the 26th week of pregnancy. The premature baby was in intensive care for two days and, four months later, she left the hospital in good health.
For Paul VI’s Beatification, the miracle accepted was the inexplicable cure of a child in the mother’s womb in California, 18 years earlier. The infant was threatened with death or serious malformations, which led the doctors to advise abortion.
However, asking for Pope Paul VI’s prayer, the young mother decided to continue her pregnancy. She waited until her son was 15 to talk about the miracle – a miracle that recalls Paul VI’s commitment to life.
After a meeting with the members of the diocese of Brescia on June 22, 2013, Pope Francis paid tribute to the “great Pope” Paul VI, who lived “passionately” his love of Christ, love of the Church and love of man.”
Francis confided that Paul VI’s addresses were for him “a spiritual force”: “they have done me much good in life . . . I go back to them unceasingly, because it does me good to hear these words of Paul VI today.”
He has gone several times to recollect himself before Paul VI’s tomb, in the “Vatican Grottoes,” under St. Peter’s Basilica.
On December 20, 2012, Pope Benedict XVI approved the Decree recognizing that Paul VI lived the Christian and human virtues “heroically.”
