Now the thousands of pages of documents are ready for the next phase in Greeley’s cause for canonization, or sainthood, which will take place in Rome. She was the first person ever entombed in the cathedral, where her bones were placed in a red, wooden box for viewing before they were sealed and moved to a corner of the sanctuary so her followers can more easily bring her their prayers. Officials from the Archdiocese of Denver traveled to Hannibal, Missouri, where they scoured Census and land records to discover who once owned Greeley and her mother, and to find out where she lived when, at age 5, one of Greeley’s eyes was destroyed by a snap of a whip as her mother was being beaten.Īnd in another step on the path to sainthood, they exhumed Greeley’s remains from Mount Olivet Cemetery in Wheat Ridge and moved her bones to the Cathedral Basilica of the Immaculate Conception in Denver last year. “People have been asking Greeley to pray for them for years,” said Uebbing, who, as vice postulator for Greeley’s cause, will personally carry the box of documents to the Vatican as required.Ī church court heard the testimony of 25 witnesses, including some who said they were healed after praying to Greeley. Saints are people who’ve gone to heaven and are closer to God, which can make their prayers more effective, according to the church. The goal is to determine whether she is a saint “best as we can know this side of heaven,” said David Uebbing, chancellor of the archdiocese. There are no African-American saints in the Roman Catholic Church, though there are black saints from other nations.įor the past year and a half, the Archdiocese of Denver has gathered testimonials, historical records and newspaper clippings to document Greeley’s virtues. But more significantly, Greeley, who died 100 years ago, is one of five African-Americans whose causes for canonization are now under consideration. If Pope Francis agrees, a black woman who risked her own safety to help the poor after she was freed from slavery would become the first saint presented by a Colorado diocese. A box bound in crimson ribbon and sealed with red wax soon will depart for the Vatican, carrying 7,500 pages of documents describing how Catholics still pray to a former slave who brought coal and food to poor Denver families in the cover of night.

What is a catholic saint