Mother Mary Lange’s cause for sainthood moves forward, Archbishop Lori says

Vatican officials are moving ahead with the cause for sainthood for Mother Mary Lange, Baltimore Archbishop William E. Lori said Thursday in Rome.

If canonized, Mother Lange, the founder of the Oblate Sisters of Providence, would be become the first black American saint. Mother Lange immigrated to Baltimore in the early 19th century and opened a school for black children in her small Fells Point home.

Eventually, Mother Lange founded the Oblate Sisters – the first religious order for women of African descent in the U.S. – and would operate what would later become St. Frances Academy. Lange and the Oblate sisters provided Catholic education to black children in Baltimore despite the prevailing racism of the time.

Archbishop Lori is in Rome this week with fellow bishops from the surrounding region for the “ad limina” meetings, where bishops present detailed reports on their dioceses to Pope Francis and other Vatican officials. While meeting with Vatican officials, Archbishop Lori received an update on Mother Mary Lange’s cause for sainthood, which began in 1991.

A video report from Archbishop Lori follows. Story continues below.

“I’m happy to say her cause is moving along,” Archbishop Lori said. “The position paper on her life of heroic virtue is nearly complete, and I think we should be all praying very hard that Mother Mary Lange’s cause will advance and that one day she will be canonized a saint.”

Xaverian Brother Reginald Cruz has recently completed writing his “positio,” a document arguing for Mother Lange’s sainthood. Once published, the Congregation for the Causes of the Saints will evaluate the document, and if approved the “positio” will be forwarded to the pope, who could grant Mother Lange the title of “venerable.” After the approval of the “positio,” church scholars will then have to document two confirmed miracles attributed to her intercession.

Archbishop Lori called Mother Lange “a person who was in every way a pioneer” who “stood head and shoulders above the racism of her era.”

The Archdiocese of Baltimore plans to open a new school named for Mother Lange in September 2021. The school – the first new Catholic K-8 school in the city in 60 years – will serve about 500 students from across Baltimore.

For more coverage of the bishops’ meeting with the pope in Rome, click here.

Email Tim Swift at tswift@catholicreview.org

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