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Agence France-Presse

Associated Press

Slain Salvadoran archbishop Oscar Romero and Pope Paul VI, Catholic giants who sparked controversy during their lifetimes, joined the church’s highest rank Sunday with an elevation to sainthood.
Pope Francis wore a blood-stained rope belt which belonged to Romero, who was murdered at the altar, as he lead the ceremony in front of tens of thousands of pilgrims from across the world.
The pontiff also used a chalice and pastoral staff belonging to Paul VI in a canonisation being seen as a reminder of Francis’s call for “a poor church for the poor”.
Both men have been hailed by Francis for their courage in turbulent times and their dedication to social justice and the downtrodden.
Think you’ve got what it takes to be canonised? Here’s five steps to becoming a saint
“We declare and define Paul VI and Oscar Arnulfo Romero Galdamez … to be saints,” Francis said, before the crowds broke into wild applause.
The men’s giant portraits were unfurled on Saint Peter’s Basilica along with those of five other new saints, including an orphaned youth and a German nun.
Romero stood up for peasant rights in the face of a right-wing backlash which painted him as a radical supporter of “liberation” theology in his small, impoverished central American nation.
On March 24, 1980, the man dubbed the “voice of those without voice” was shot in the heart, killed by a single bullet as he prepared communion at the start of a bloody civil war which claimed some 75,000 lives.

Relics of each new saint were carried to the altar – part of a bone for Romero and the shirt Paul VI was wearing when he was stabbed in an assassination attempt at Manila airport in 1970.
In his homily, Francis called Paul a “prophet of a church turned outwards” to care for the faraway poor. He said Romero gave up his security and life to “be close to the poor and his people.”
And he warned that those who don’t follow their example to leave behind everything, including their wealth, risk never truly finding God.
“Wealth is dangerous and – says Jesus – even makes one’s salvation difficult,” Francis said.
“The love of money is the root of all evils,” he said. “We see this where money is at the centre, there is no room for God or for man.”
Overnight hundreds of pilgrims from across Central America celebrated the impending canonisation in El Salvador’s capital.
The visitors, many in clothes printed with Romero’s face, gathered in front of his tomb, in the crypt of San Salvador’s central cathedral, and at the Hospital of Divine Providence chapel, where he was assassinated.
“We are arriving here to honour the memory of Monsignor Romero, who took his faith to the point of giving his life for what he believed was right,” said Francisco Navarro, a 51-year-old Honduran, at the chapel along with some 30 of his compatriots.
Too soon to be a saint? Some ask if Vatican should be more cautious
“Since before he was killed, he defeated his killers by forgiving them. Because he knew they were going to kill him,” added university professor Julia Lainez.
For a long time, efforts to recognise Romero met with heavy opposition from conservative Catholics and the Salvadoran right, who saw veiled Marxism in his sermons.

“I received threats,” Archbishop Vincenzo Paglia, the man tasked with guiding the canonisation process, told the Jesuit weekly America.
But Francis – the first Latin American pope – beatified Romero as a “martyr” in 2015 to popular acclaim.
Paul VI – who encouraged Romero in his struggle – was the first head of the Roman Catholic Church to attempt to reform the Vatican’s powerful and unruly Curia, a challenge Francis also decided to take on.
He was also famously the first to reject the papal trappings of luxury, setting aside the traditional tiara – a jewel-encrusted, three-tiered, conical crown – shortly after his election in 1963 and donating its value to the poor.

It was a gesture echoed by Francis, who renounced the papal apartment and gold cross.
The softly-spoken Giovanni Battista Montini was elected pope in 1963 in a difficult period for the church, which lost many believers as populist rebellions swept across the West.
He completed the reforms of the Second Vatican Council and was the first pilgrim pope, crossing continents on his trips to meet the faithful.
At his beatification mass, Francis had hailed him a “brave Christian”.
But he was also hampered by a reputation for being weak and overly cautious.
He is most famous for reaffirming the church’s ban on contraception – despite the fact that his own advisory commission voted overwhelming to lift the prohibition.
The decision enraged many Catholics at a time of sexual freedoms, with women demanding the right to use the birth control pill.
Agence France-Presse and Associated Press


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Catholic Church

Murdered archbishop, Pope Paul VI raised to sainthood by Vatican

Slain Salvadoran archbishop Oscar Romero and Pope Paul VI joined the church’s highest rank Sunday with an elevation to sainthood. Photo: Reuters

epa07092230 (FILE) - Pope Paul VI, in Rome, Italy, undated, reissued 14 October 2018. Pope Francis on 14 October 2018 elevated to sainthood Pope Paul VI, who died in 1978. EPA-EFE/ANSA

epa07092231 (FILE) - Salvadoran archbishop Oscar Romero in San Salvador, El Salvador, 1979 (reissued 14 October 2018). Pope Francis on 14 October 2018 elevated to sainthood Salvadorian Archbishop Oscar Romero, slain in 1980. EPA-EFE/EFE

A general view of a mass for a canonization ceremony of Pope Paul VI and the martyred Salvadoran Archbishop Oscar Romero in St Peter's Square at the Vatican, on October 14, 2018. - Pope Francis canonizes two of the most important and contested figures of the 20th-century Catholic Church, declaring Pope Paul VI and the martyred Salvadoran Archbishop Oscar Romero as models of saintliness for the faithful today. (Photo by Filippo MONTEFORTE / AFP)

Too soon to be a saint? Some ask if Vatican should be more cautious

Pope John Paul II was canonised in a modern record of nine years after his death in 2005. File photo: AFP

(FILES) In this file photo taken on January 05, 1964 Pope Paul VI leaves the Basilica of the Annunciation in Nazareth after celebrating a mass, during his visit to the Holy Land, the first visit ever of a Pope to Jordan, Israel, Jerusalem and the Palestinian territories. - Pope Francis on October 14, 2018 will elevate to sainthood Pope Paul VI. (Photo by STRINGER / EPU FILES / AFP)

FILE - This undated file photo shows Archbishop Oscar Arnulfo Romero, who was gunned down while giving Mass in a San Salvador church on March 24, 1980. Pope Francis will canonize two of the most important and contested figures of the 20th-century Catholic Church, declaring Pope Paul VI and the martyred Salvadoran Archbishop Oscar Romero as models of saintliness for the faithful today. Sunday's ceremony is likely to be emotional for Francis, since he was greatly influenced by both men and privately told confidantes he wanted them made saints during his papacy. (AP Photo, File)

News

World

Romero was killed at altar by right-wing death squad in Salvador; Paul VI was a shy, often tormented and indecisive man


Slain Salvadoran archbishop Oscar Romero and Pope Paul VI, Catholic giants who sparked controversy during their lifetimes, joined the church’s highest rank Sunday with an elevation to sainthood.


Pope Francis

Murdered archbishop, Pope Paul VI raised to sainthood by Vatican

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Romero was killed at altar by right-wing death squad in Salvador; Paul VI was a shy, often tormented and indecisive man

Romero was killed at altar by right-wing death squad in Salvador; Paul VI was a shy, often tormented and indecisive man