Italian newspapers have been rife with reports of alleged miracles attributed to Pope John Paul II, fueling speculation he may soon be put on the path to sainthood.
Vatican rules, though, are clear: For a miracle to be considered in the saint-making process, it has to have occurred after John Paul's death. So far, all the reports stem from inexplicable cures that occurred while John Paul was very much alive.
But that hasn't stopped the frenzy surrounding popular calls for John Paul to be put on the fast-track to sainthood, spurred by the spontaneous chants of "Santo, Santo" that erupted during his funeral Friday.
Archbishop Edward Nowak, secretary in the Congregation for the Causes of Saints, added to the speculation Monday after he was quoted as saying a decision on starting the saint-making process could come as early as October, when bishops from around the world meet in Rome.
Nowak, like John Paul a Pole, stressed that historians and theologians would still have to gather all the necessary documentation to start a case for beatifying John Paul, the first step in the process.
But he said such work, which usually takes years if not centuries, could be completed in a mere six months.
As for miracles, Nowak concurred all the letters the Vatican had received so far of supposed miraculous cures wouldn't count toward John Paul's saintliness.
"But since you only need one for beatification and one for canonization, if there are so many of these 'signs' that you hear about, it shouldn't be difficult to have new ones," he told the newspaper Corriere della Sera.
Some of the old "miracles" have been given prominent play in Italian newspapers, including the case of an unidentified American Jewish millionaire afflicted with a brain tumor who attended Mass with John Paul in 1998 at the pontiff's summer retreat in Castelgandolfo, outside Rome.
Marco Tosatti, correspondent for the Turin daily La Stampa, said the case had been described to him in 2002 by John Paul's longtime private secretary, Archbishop Stanislaw Dziwisz.
La Stampa said some weeks after the audience, Dziwisz was told "that the tumor had completely disappeared in the span of a few hours."
Another case is that of Jose Heron Badillo, who was 4 when John Paul visited his hometown of Zacatecas, Mexico in 1990. The boy, who suffered from leukemia, was selected to hold a dove as part of the airport ceremonies to welcome John Paul.
"The pope told him, let the dove fly! Then (the pope) hugged him and kissed him on his forehead," recalled Mexican Cardinal Javier Lozano Barragan in an interview published by Corriere della Sera over the weekend.
The cardinal, who headed the Vatican office on health care issues under John Paul, said there was no medical explanation for the boy's subsequent recovery. "They only gave him days to live," he told the newspaper.
The diocese of Zacatecas has gathered documentation on the case and will send it to the Vatican if a beatification process is started, the newspaper said.
Another inexplicable cure was announced over the weekend by Cardinal Francesco Marchisano during his homily at a Mass of mourning for John Paul. Marchisano told the faithful he had lost the ability to speak after undergoing throat surgery.
"The pope touched the part of the throat where I was operated on, saying that he would pray to the Lord for me," he told the faithful. "After some time, I was able to speak regularly."
He didn't claim to have been miraculously cured, but Italian newspapers are including it as evidence of the many cases of inexplicable cures attributed to the pope.
Vatican procedures in place for some 500 years require one miracle for someone to be beatified and a second to be canonized. There has been speculation that a new pope might do away with those procedures and simply declare John Paul a saint based on popular acclaim.
