Vatican City, Dec 19, 2009 / 09:42 am
Blessed Mary MacKillop will soon enter the Canon of Catholic Saints. Saturday morning at the Vatican a second miracle was officially attributed to her, authorized in a decree signed by Pope Benedict XVI.
Mary Helen MacKillop will become Saint Mary of the Cross, Australia's first saint, reported the Sydney Morning Herald this week, which quoted a Vatican source from within the Congregation for the Causes of Saints as saying that her canonization will probably take place next Autumn at St. Peter's Basilica in Rome.
The decree signed by Benedict XVI today attributes a miracle to the intercession of the nun who lived from 1842 to 1909. Both the first miracle that led to her beatification in 1995 and this, the second, were cases in which individuals were cured of cancer.
In her life, MacKillop founded and directed the Congregation of the Sisters of St. Joseph of the Sacred Heart, who devoted themselves to offering education all over Australia.