Article content

By using a special decree that allows long-venerated Christians to bypass the usual channels to sainthood, Pope Francis on Thursday declared a pair of 17th century church figures to be Canada’s two newest saints.

“Two new saints in Quebec; the joy is evident in our hearts and on our faces,” Gérald Cyprien Lacroix, Archbishop of Quebec, told a press conference.

We apologize, but this video has failed to load.

tap here to see other videos from our team. Try refreshing your browser, or Catholic Church fast-tracks two early Quebec figures for sainthood Back to video

In a statement, the Canadian Conference of Catholic Bishops thanked Pope Francis for “this great gift to the Church in Canada.”

The canonized Canadians are Marie de l’Incarnation, an early New France settler often credited as the “spiritual mother” of the Canadian church and Francois de Laval, the first bishop of Quebec. Both are the first saints with direct ties to Quebec City.

They were canonized by way of “equivalent canonization,” a method of sainthood-by-decree that eschews the need for officially verified miracles or the other standard Vatican checks for saintly eligibility.