These saints lived so long ago they fade almost into legends. But just imagine 1000, 2000 years from now if people still remembered our names and wrote about us? Apart from the saints how few get to share this Glory? It is true the only failure in life is not to have been a saint.
Though I understand and agree wholeheartedly with the point your making , we must always still pray for others even if it means a deathbed conversion! [Thinking of the Little Flower] Around 1887, in Paris, a man named Henri Pranzini brutally murdered his lover, her 12-year-old daughter, and their housekeeper. The case shocked all of Europe. Pranzini was sentenced to death, but he refused every attempt by priests to visit him, declaring he wanted nothing to do with God. In Lisieux, however, a young Thérèse heard of the case. God stirred her heart with mercy for this man, and she began to pray intensely for his conversion. For two months, she offered prayers and sacrifices, but news reports insisted he remained hardened and refused all priestly counsel. Then, on the day of his execution, something extraordinary happened. Before the guillotine fell, Pranzini suddenly asked the priest present for a crucifix and kissed it three times. For Thérèse, this was the sign she had begged for: her “first son” had turned back to God at the very last moment.
WOW! What an inspiring story! It proves that we must never give up on the resistant soul for whom we have been interceding!
I am less impressed with him becoming a saint than the Faith of the Church in recognising he is a saint. It would have been so easy for them to walk past him and not accept this. Some very holy Church people were open to seeing this. Wonderful. A great tribute to Catholic France. It reminds me of Claude Newman.
