Father Solanus Casey, O.F.M.
Priest... mystic... Saint?

The oldest of 16 children of an Irish-American family. A former lumberjack, a prison guard, and a streetcar motorman. Could Barney Casey be the first native-born American man to be canonized a Saint?

When Father Solanus Casey died in Detroit in 1957, all he left after 86 years on this earth were a small crucifix, an old pair of sandals, several religious pictures, a wooden statue of St. Anthony, some dog-eared religious books, a knot of heavily darned socks and a framed, 40-year-old picture of his family.

Because he ranked only in the lower half of his class, his teachers recommended that his priestly office be severely restricted. He could say mass but was not permitted to expound from the pulpit on dogma. He was not allowed to hear confessions except under emergency circumstances.

Father Solanus began promoting a prayer group, the Seraphic Mass Association, in which all members had access to the prayers of the entire group. He offered to help those in distress to fill out the prayer group's application card and in doing so he would listen to their problems.

Unexpectedly quick recoveries and remarkable solutions to their problems shocked and delighted the petitioners and the word spread. Father Solanus suddenly found himself very busy and his superior, Father Provincial Benno Aichinger, directed him to keep a record of these "special favors."

He filled seven notebooks with more than 6,000 requests for help from petitioners. And to some 700 of these he recorded reported cures from cancer, leukemia, tuberculosis, diphtheria, arthritis, blindness, and other maladies. These brief postscripts also report conversions of fallen-away churchgoers and favorable resolutions of domestic and business problems.

During his final illness, he remarked, "I'm offering my suffering that all might be one. If only I could see the conversion of the whole world." His last conscious act was sitting up in bed and saying, "I give my soul to Jesus Christ." He died at the age of 86 on July 31, 1957 at the same day and hour of his First Holy Mass 53 years earlier.

Did you notice that Father Casey prayed for the conversion of the world... and not it's convergence? I have a funny feeling that if Barney Casey were to attempt to gain entrance in your average American seminary present day, he's be found disqualified for being to "rigid" and "unopen to the 'Spirit' of Vatican II".

The official site of the Cause of Venerable Solanus Casey