Sainthood In Omaha

By The Associated Press

March 3, 2012

Omaha, Neb. - A Roman Catholic priest whose efforts to help troubled Omaha youth were made famous by Spencer Tracy's Academy Award-winning portrayal of him in the 1938 movie "Boys Town" has been nominated for sainthood.

Archbishop George Lucas posted an announcement on the doors of St. Cecilia Cathedral Monday saying the Omaha Archdiocese had begun the process of seeking sainthood for the Rev. Edward Flanagan. 

"We are humbled and overjoyed," said Steven Wolf, president of the Father Flanagan League, which as long sought sainthood for Flanagan.  "We see this as response to the Holy Spirit that is moving through an international groundswell of devotion that, as best we can measure at this time, includes devotion to Father Flanagan by the faithful in nine countries and 36 states here in the U.S."

Father Edward Flanagan, center, surrounded by his charges in 1942.

The Irish-born Flanagan, who died of a heart attack in 1948 at age 61 while visiting Germany, founded the Boys Town orphanage in a downtown Omaha home in 1917.  Boys Town moved to is current west Omaha location several years later and today serves as a center for troubled area youth while running campuses and programs for thousands of other boys and girls across the country.  The organization also operates an Omaha research hospital and a national resource and training center, and it has a publishing arm, Boys Town Press.

Lucas said the archdiocese will open a cause for sainthood on March 17, which is St. Patrick's Day, at Flanagan's grave site on the Boys town grounds.  On that day, Flanagan will be named a "servant of God" and a group of tribunal members will be assembled to review Flanagan's life work.  According to U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, the church then requires three more steps for a candidate to become a saint: veneration, beatification and canonization.

Omaha Archbishop George Lucas, at St. Cecilia Cathedral in Omaha with a framed notice opening the cause for the beatification and canonization of Boys Town founder Father Edward Flanagan.

In the first step, the title of "venerable" is given to someone who has died and been recognized by the pope as having lived heroic virtues.  To be beatified, one miracle must be attributed to the candidate.  Canonization requires a second miracle, although the pope might waive some of these requirements.

The Father Flanagan League has gathered testimony from six people in its quest to prove to the Vatican that Flanagan is responsible for several miracles, all involving the curing of illnesses.  Among those who testified is a woman from Italy who says she was cured of what should have been a fatal brain aneurysm after praying for Flanagan's help. Wolf said.  Another woman from Omaha says prayers to Flanagan cured her of advanced breast cancer.

Wolf noted that the six cases are yet to be proved with medical documentation, but the group hopes the Vatican will find miracles occurred in at least two of the cases.

What is certain is that the road to sainthood will be a long one.

"Usually, it's a pretty slow process," the Rev. Thomas J. Reese, a senior fellow at the Woodstock Theological Center at Georgetown university, said of attaining sainthood. "Except for some recent ones like Mother Teresa and John Paul II, we're talking 20 years before some of these people get through the process.