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THE SAINTS PORTAL

Showcased saint-related content

St Bridget of Sweden pictured with a halo. In Christian iconography, saints may also be depicted with wreaths, palm branches, and white lilies.
St Bridget of Sweden pictured with a halo. In Christian iconography, saints may also be depicted with wreaths, palm branches, and white lilies.

In religious belief, a saint is a person who is recognized as having an exceptional degree of holiness, likeness, or closeness to God. However, the use of the term saint depends on the context and denomination. In Catholic, Eastern Orthodox, Anglican, Oriental Orthodox, and Lutheran doctrine, all of their faithful deceased in Heaven are considered to be saints, but some are considered worthy of greater honor or emulation. Official ecclesiastical recognition, and consequently a public cult of veneration, is conferred on some denominational saints through the process of canonization in the Catholic Church or glorification in the Eastern Orthodox Church after their approval.

While the English word saint originated in Christianity, historians of religion tend to use the appellation "in a more general way to refer to the state of special holiness that many religions attribute to certain people", referring to the Jewish tzadik, the Islamic walī, the Hindu rishi or Sikh Bhagat and guru, the Shintoist kami, the Taoist shengren, and the Buddhist arhat or bodhisattva also as saints. Depending on the religion, saints are recognized either by official ecclesiastical declaration, as in the Catholic faith, or by popular acclamation (see folk saint). (Full article...)

Selected biography

Bede, also Saint Bede, the Venerable Bede, (c. 672 or 673May 25, 735), was a Benedictine monk at the Northumbrian monastery of Saint Peter at Monkwearmouth, today part of Sunderland, and of its companion monastery, Saint Paul's, in modern Jarrow (see Wearmouth-Jarrow), both in the English county of Durham (now Tyne and Wear). He is well known as an author and scholar known as "The father of English history".

The most important and best known of his works is the Historia ecclesiastica gentis Anglorum, giving in five books and 400 pages the history of England, ecclesiastical and political, from the time of Caesar to the date of its completion (731). Pilgrims were claiming miracles at Bede's grave only fifty years after his death. His body was transferred to Durham Cathedral in the mid-11th century and to its present location in the Galilee Chapel there in 1370.

His scholarship and importance to the Church were recognised in 1899 when he was declared by the Roman Catholic Church to be the first English Doctor of the Church as St Bede The Venerable. He is also the only Englishman in Dante's Paradise (Paradiso' X.130), mentioned among theologians and doctors of the church.

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Augustine Fangi

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The Saints Wikiproject aims primarily at standardizing the articles about people venerated by some Christians as saints or the blessed and ensuring quality articles. If there is an interest in including saints from religions other than Christianity, please propose those changes on our talk page.

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    Cabinet Card of Sojourner Truth - Collection of the National Museum of African American History and Culture
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    Jan van Eyck - Kardinal Niccolò Albergati - Google Art Project
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    Jan van Eyck - Portrait of Cardinal Niccolò Albergati - Google Art Project
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    San Giovanni Evangelista (Parma) - Dome
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    Sir Anthony Van Dyck - Charles I (1600-49) - Google Art Project
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    Sojourner Truth, 1870 (cropped, restored)
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    William Holman Hunt - The Finding of the Saviour in the Temple - Google Art Project

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