2023-10-25 05:01:00
From Rome
During the audience that Pope Francis granted this Tuesday to Cardinal Marcello Smeraro, Prefect of the Dicastery for the Causes of Saints, the Pontiff authorized the promulgation of the decree on the new miracle attributed to the Argentine blessed María Antonia de San José, also known as Mama Antula, the Vatican press office reported. This means that Mama Antula (Quechua diminutive of Mother Antonia, the language she spoke), whose original name was Antonia de Paz y Figueroa, can be consecrated a saint, given that the second miracle attributed to her was recognized as such by the Dicastery for the Causes of Saints, the highest authority on this matter within the Vatican.
Mama Antula was born in Villa Silípica, today the province of Santiago del Estero, in 1730. Argentina did not exist then but the so-called Viceroyalty of the Río de la Plata controlled by Spain. At the age of 15 she took her vows and dedicated herself to prayer and the apostolate.
In 1760, she gathered a group of young women and they dedicated themselves to practicing charity and collaborating with the Jesuits. They were consecrated laywomen. Mama Antula visited several cities of the Viceroyalty, where she carried her messages and her spiritual exercises. She was walking barefoot. It took weeks for her to arrive but she did it.
After the expulsion of the Jesuits from the Viceroyalty and from Spain in 1767 by decision of King Carlos III, she went from city to city through the poor regions of northeastern Argentina promoting spiritual exercises as the Jesuits with whom she had always collaborated did.
In Buenos Aires he tried to create a center for spiritual exercises but people from high society and the viceroy of the time opposed him. Finally, on the outskirts of the city, he managed to found what is today called Santa Casa de Ejercicios Espirituales, located on the current 1190 Independencia Street. Mama Antula died in 1799. Her remains are found in the Church of Our Lady of Mercy in Buenos Aires. Aires.
Canonization process
The Dicastery for the Causes of Saints has the obligation to study the cases of possible saints proposed by bishoprics or other Catholic organizations. And verifying his history and his actions, establish at first if he has the qualities to be declared Venerable, which means that he meets the conditions to begin a canonization process. Mama Antula was declared Venerable in 1929 by Pope Pius XI.
The first step of the cause of canonization itself is for the Dicastery for the Causes of Saints to approve his heroic virtues, that is, his qualities as an outstanding Catholic and he can be called “Servant of God.” This was recognized for Mama Antula only on July 2, 2010. The decree was signed by Pope Benedict XVI.
The second step in the canonization process is the demonstration that a miracle attributed to her is confirmed after having done studies with scientists who cannot provide any scientific explanation for the miracle. Mama Antula’s first miracle, performed in 1904 when she cured a nun of cholecystitis (inflammation of the gallbladder), was recognized by the Vatican in 2016 and shortly after she was consecrated blessed in the city of Santiago del Estero by Cardinal Angelo Amato , prefect at that time of the Congregation (today Dicastery) for the Causes of Saints.
The third and final step in the canonization process is the verification of a second miracle, always by scientists and experts. In the case of Mama Antula, it was the cure in 2018, without scientific explanations, of a man from Santa Fe who had suffered a stroke (Crebro Vascular Accident) and to whom the doctors at the Santa Fe hospital where he was admitted had given little time to life. His family had implored Mama Antula for his healing. The patient had an unexpected recovery without scientific explanations. In 2019, the canonization cause was reopened, which concluded with the decree signed today by Pope Francis.
According to some journalistic sources, not yet officially confirmed by the Vatican, the canonization ceremony would take place in early 2024 in St. Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican.
Saints, Blessed, Servants of God and candidates
Mama Antula will thus be added to the list of four saints that Argentina currently has, among them the Priest Brochero of Córdoba and the Italian doctor who worked in Patagonia, Artemide Zatti, both canonized by Pope Francis.
There are 15 Argentine blesseds, 8 of which were proclaimed by Pope Francis. Among them the Mapuche Ceferino Namuncurá and Bishop Enrique Angelelli, murdered by the dictatorship in a prepared car “accident” in 1976. The Servants of God are 54 among whom the African slave known as Negro Manuel stands out.
But there are also requests from Catholic and other organizations to begin the process of canonization of 37 candidates, among them the two French nuns, murdered by the Argentine dictatorship in 1977, Alice Domon and Leonie Duquet, and Carlos Mugica, a member of the Movement of Priests for the Third World and village priest murdered in 1974 by the right-wing paramilitary group Triple A.
#Argentina #Santa #Mama #Antula #Pope #canonize #Blessed #María #Antonia #Paz #Figueroa