Wednesday, March 19, 2014

Canonization of Saints: Limits to the Papal Office?

Chiesa: Vatican Diary / In a few months, six new saints canonized outside the rules

Can the pope, though, propose someone for veneration by the Church Universal without proper consultation and discernment from the bishops of other churches? If there is no cultus, how can this be possible? (How is the current procedure different from what was followed in the first millenium, when Latin saints, e.g. St. Gregory the Great and St. Benedict, were recognized by the Byzantine churches?)

I would guess that the official pronouncement makes a reference to the entire Church, rather than to the Latin churches, but is this proper? Can we understand the canonizations done by the bishop of Rome, either directly or mediately through other Latin bishops acting in his name, as being done through his role as Western "patriarch" rather than as pope, despite any official statements to the contrary?