Pope John Paul II To Become a Saint

The popular late pontiff will be beatified in Rome on May 1.

It’s a miracle, literally. Pope Benedict XVI declared Friday that a French nun’s sudden recovery from Parkinson’s disease was due to the miraculous intercession of Pope John Paul II, paving the way for the late pope to become a saint later this year. Sister Marie-Simon-Pierre says she woke up feeling reborn two months after John Paul’s death, and the disease that had incapacitated her was gone. The verification of a miracle is one of the qualifications necessary for beatification. Benedict has put John Paul on the fast track to sainthood, waiving the traditional five-year period that usually separates a prominent Catholic’s death and the beatification process. At John Paul’s funeral in 2005, mourners chanted “Santo Subito,” or “sainthood immediately.”