Pope canonizes Brazil's first native saint

(May 12, 2007) Pope Benedict XVI on Friday canonized Brazil's first native-born saint, an 18th-century Franciscan friar renowned for his charity to the poor and his legacy of miraculous healings. At an outdoor Mass May 11 in Sao Paolo, the Pope read a decree proclaiming sainthood for Father Antonio Galvao, popularly known as Frei Galvao, drawing cheers and applause from hundreds of thousands of people who gathered at Sao Paulo's Campo de Marte Airport for the liturgy.
As the saint's relics were brought in procession to the altar, the crowd sang and waved banners and flags in the sunshine. In the front row, wearing bright blue habits, were Conceptionist nuns, whose order used St. Galvao as a spiritual adviser in the late 1700s.
In his homily, which the Pope read in Portuguese, the Pope summarized the charism of Frei Galvao. The Franciscan charism, lived out in the spirit of the Gospel, the Pope said, has borne significant fruits through Frei Galvao’s witness as an ardent adorer of the Eucharist, as a prudent and wise guide of the souls who sought his counsel, and as a man with a great devotion to the Immaculate Conception of Mary, whose “son and perpetual servant” he considered himself to be. He said St. Galvao, who died in 1822, was a model of Christian charity and service in Brazil, especially toward the poor and sick. “People from all over the country went to Frei Galvao, who offered a fatherly welcome to everyone," the Pope said.
The Pope said St. Galvao reminded people above all of the importance of God in their lives. That has significance for those seeking social progress and justice today, he said. "Will the men and women of this world be able to find peace if they are not aware of the need to be reconciled with God, with their neighbor and with themselves?" the Pope asked.
He said St. Galvao's devotion to Mary and his commitment to purity and virtue are also exemplary in a modern age "so full of hedonism." "The world needs transparent lives, clear souls, pure minds that refuse to be perceived as mere objects of pleasure. It is necessary to oppose those elements of the media that ridicule the sanctity of marriage and virginity before marriage," the Pope said. The Pope said that today Mary remains "the best defence against the evils that afflict modern life." He encouraged Marian devotion, saying: "There is no fruit of grace in the history of salvation that does not have as its necessary instrument the mediation of Our Lady."
In conclusion, the Pope said that the saints of our times are true reformers. Only from the saints, only from God does true revolution come - the definitive way to change the world. He therefore invited all to be holy, saying holiness is not only possible but also necessary for every person.
The Pope did not mention a unique and popular form of devotion begun by St. Galvao, in which people seeking cures are given tiny rice-paper pills inscribed with a prayer, which they swallow. At the Mass of canonization were present Sandra Grossi de Almeida, 37, and her son Enzo, 7. She is one of two Brazilian women certified by the Vatican as divinely inspired miracles worked through the intercession of Frei Galvao. She had a uterine malformation that should have made it impossible for her to carry a child for more than four months, but after taking the pills, she gave birth Enzo. The Pope embraced them soon after declaring Frei Galvao a saint.