In an audience with the prefect of the Congregation for the Causes of Saints on January 22, Pope Francis approved a decree on a miracle attributed to the intercession of Venerable Maria Teresa Casini (1864-1937), clearing the way for her beatification.

In 2008, the Diocese of Youngstown, Ohio, reported that it was investigating whether the healing of a boy from a coma was a miracle attributable to the intercession of Mother Casini, who founded the Oblate Sisters of the Sacred Heart.

The Pontiff also approved decrees on the martyrdom of 22 members of the faithful, clearing the way for their beatification as well. Sister Fidelia Angelats and her two companions were slain during the Spanish cινιℓ ωαr in 1936; Father Pio Heredia Zubia and his 17 companions, all of them Trappists, were killed during the same war in 1936. Benedict Daswa, a South African layman, was slain in 1990 by a mob after he objected to indigenous practices related to witchcraft.

Finally, the Pope approved decrees on the heroic virtues of seven servants of God, who may now be honored with the title “venerable”:


•Father Ladislao Bukowinski (1904-74), a Ukrainian priest who died in Kazakhstan;
•Father Aloysius Schwartz (1930-92), a priest who was born and ordained in Washington, DC, and who ministered in South Korea and the Philippines, founding the Sisters of Mary of Banneux and the Brothers of Christ;
•Sister Cointa Jáuregui Osés (1875-1954), a nun of the Compañía de María Nuestra Señora (Company of Mary Our Lady);
•Teresa Gardi (1769-1837), a laywoman and Franciscan tertiary in Imola, Italy
•Luigi Trelles y Noguerol (1819-91), a Spanish layman who founded an apostolate devoted to nighttime Eucharistic adoration;
•Satoko Kitahara (1929-58), a Japanese laywoman and convert who ministered to street children following World War II; and
•Virginia Blanco Tardío (1916-90), a Bolivian laywoman active in catechesis and work with the poor

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