The Pope has overhauled a centuries-old procedure on how people can become saints.

Until now, it required martyrdom, living a life of heroic values or having a clear saintly reputation.

But the pontiff has issued a decree which adds a new path.

Image: Achieving sainthood can take decades

It applies to people who live good Christian lives and do something to save others that they know will result in a certain, quick death.

However, candidates will still have to have two miracles attributed to them.


The Vatican pointed to Polish priest Maximilian Kolbe as an example.

Kolbe was being held at Auschwitz, the Nazi death camp, in 1941, when he offered to take the place of a fellow prisoner due to be killed.

The priest was given the lethal injection instead, administered in collective punishment for a prison escape.

His sainthood cause began in 1955 and he was given the honour in 1982.

Image: Pope Benedict XVI visited the cell where Maximilian Kolbe died

The Catholic Church posthumously confers beatification, and later sainthood, on its most holy followers.

Its beneficiaries are believed to intermediate with God to perform miracles.