I have heard more than one person say what the late Fr Filomeno Soares said to me, that once you got the Fr Joseph Vaz bug, you are hooked for life. What binds followers of now St Joseph Vaz is his riveting story.
I read his story by Fr S G Perera, SJ in 1978. My sister who had followed me to California brought up the subject of why such a great saint had not yet been canonized. Up to that time my acquaintance with St Joseph Vaz was through anecdotes and hearsay surrounded by regret that he had been passed over for sainthood. My father had visited Kandy and said that he had not been canonized probably because his gravesite and remains had never been found. My aunt recounted that my parents’ marriage match was due to a Novena she made to the then Ven Joseph Vaz.
What transformed folk hearsay into a lifelong passion for St Joseph Vaz and led to the founding of the Joseph Naik Vaz Institute was this biography by Perera. I was riveted by the historical detail and documentation that he gave to this unique story of spiritual witness and courageous defence of religious freedom for Catholics in Sri Lanka. Perera convinced me that Fr Vaz has all the marks of a truly great Saint.
In 1978, I flew to Goa to investigate the state of the process of Beatification. I found out that there was a stalemate about the Cause. Volumes of miracles had been submitted but now a “Positio Historico” or summary or original historical documents had to be submitted. When I returned to Berkeley, California, a small group of us decided to publicize the life and work of Fr Joseph Vaz.
We registered our group as the non-profit organization, Joseph Naik Vaz Institute, in the State of California. We immediately sent a Petition to the Sacred Congregation of the Saints requesting their interest and action to expedite this Cause that had faced such historical difficulties such as persecution, annulment of the first miracles submitted after his death, suppression of his Oratorian congregation by the Portuguese government leading to its extinction and further difficulties.
In 1999, we heard that there would be great celebrations in Rome for the 2000th Anniversary of the birth of Christianity. The Pope announced that many new Saints, especially Martyrs, would be canonized for the Grand Jubilee. We sent a petition to the Pope for the Canonization of Joseph Vaz. We discovered that there was a canonical category of Martyrs that had lived and died under persecution but were not actually killed. We petitioned the Pope to consider Joseph Vaz in this class of Martyrs and to canonize him without the final miracle as was being done for many other Martyrs for the Grand Jubilee.
Enter George Pinto into the life of the Joseph Naik Vaz Institute. He immediately organized a trip to Rome to take our Petition in 2000. We met Cardinal Simon Pimenta who personally took our petition to the Pope. We met with the Prefect of the Sacred Congregation for the Saints, Cardinal Saraiva Martins. He said that it was agreed that Bl Joseph Vaz could be considered a martyr but that it was up to the Pope to waive the final miracle. He said that one of the cardinals in the consistory of cardinals who voted on our petition objected to it on the grounds that if one Indian candidate was given an exception, then other Indian Causes would ask for an exception.
Early in 2014, it was announced that Pope Francis was in favour of the canonization of Bl Joseph Vaz. Our Institute sponsored a monthly Mass for this intention. In August, 2014, it appeared that the miracle did not receive a unanimous vote of the committee of doctors. The Pope still wished to canonize Bl Vaz on the strength of the strong devotion and general evidence of miracles attributed to him for three centuries. The Postulator, Fr Thomas Klosterkamp OMI, was asked to write a Positio to show the evidence. He wrote about the tremendous devotion to Bl Joseph Vaz. He submitted evidence of seven very great miracles and about 34 significant favours. However, Cardinal Amato, the Prefect, informed Fr Klosterkamp that in order for this canonization as a universal saint to be approved, he needed to prove that there was worldwide devotion to him.
At that point, Fr Klosterkamp had received our April 2014 Petition to Pope Francis. He wrote about our work for the past 36 years to promote interest and devotion to St Joseph Vaz and printed our last two petitions to Pope Benedict XVI and Pope Francis in the Positio for the Canonization. He also told us that he has 24 Causes to investigate and present to the Sacred Congregation for the Causes of the Saints. He said that the Cause of Bl Joseph Vaz had the most devotion of any of these candidates for the sainthood.
He also told us that there is no other candidate who has a group like ours, independently based in a country outside the geographical area where he or she was born, lived and worked. Finally, the work of the Joseph Naik Vaz Institute to bring worldwide attention to St Joseph Vaz has been validated and recognized by the Vatican in the official Positio.
(The writer is President andFounder of the Joseph Naik Vaz
Institute, California, USA)
