Beatification

Beatification an act by which, in the Romish Church, the pope declares a person blessed after death. It is to be distinguished from canonization (q.v.), in. which the pope professes to determine authoritatively on the state of the person canonized; but when he beatifies he only gives permission that religious honors not proceeding so far as worship should be paid to the deceased. The day of their office cannot be made a festival of obligation. Before the time of Pope Alexander VII beatification was performed in the church of his order if the person to be beatified was a monk; and in the case of others, in the church of their country, if there was one at Rome. Alexander, however, ordered that the ceremony should in future be always in the basilica of the Vatican; and the first so solemnized was the beatification of Francis de Sales, January 8, 1662. At present the custom is not to demand the beatification of any one until fifty years after his death. See Lambertini (afterward Benedict XIV), De Servorum Dei Beatficatione et Beatorum Canonisatione, lib. 1, cap. 24, 39. — Farrar, Eccl. Dict. s.v.; Christ. Examiner, Jan. 1855, art. 7.