What it takes to become a saint?
The first story in Giovanni Boccaccio's Decameron tells about a certain Ciappelletto, a villain that eventually became venerated as a saint. Boccaccio illustrates his character by saying: "Ask him along to a murder or to any such felony and he'd never say no - he'd be off with you, eager as could be; many's time he'd step forward himself to deliver the fatal blow. There was no one like him for cursing and swearing and taking the Lord's name in vain." In a word, Boccaccio portrays him as a totally unsympathetic person, who was eager to gluttony, drinking and sexual pleasures, who moreover scoffed at the church and sacraments and had no noble sentiments whatsoever.
A character like that was suffering a terminal illness while staying at the house two Florentine brothers (who were practising usury). The two brothers did not feel sorry for him, but they were worried about how to get him buried. They knew that Ciappelletto was such a sinner that no church would accept his body, and he would be dumped in a ditch like a dog, an incident that would indeed harm the brothers' business. Aware of this situation, Ciappelletto designed the last cunning plot of his. He asked to bring a holiest friar at his deathbed so that he could confess his sins. Hearing his confession, the friar was persuaded that he was an exceedingly pious person and asked whether he would receive burial in the friar's convent. Ciappelletto assented to the suggestion, and the friar considered it as a honor for the convent. The feigned confession of the villain results to that he becomes venerated as a saint. Many miracles are recorded to take place because of his intercessions.
No doubt that the moral of the story is aimed against ecclesiastical practices and the cult of saints. Boccaccio makes one of his characters (Pamphilo, who tells the story) to ponder God's goodness towards us, for "He looks at the purity of our faith and hears our prayers even when we choose one of His enemies to our mediator, mistaking him for a friend of God." These seemingly pious words scarcely conceal the ridicule at the idea of sanctity.
In spite of his mockery of sainthood, Boccaccio makes the core of sainthood visible. Thomas Merton once said: "If I ever become a saint - and I will - it is because of other people's prayers, those who want me to pray for them, even though they are better persons than I am." A saint is one whom others consider as a saint.
We protestants have lost the saints and, accordingly, the possibility of becoming a saint. The cult of saints was refuted in the Reformation mainly because it implied a two-class view of being a Christian, where saints represented the perfect ones, while those who live an ordinary life with a family and business remained spiritually dependent of the merits of the perfect. This view was to be banished, but the ability to see holiness in another person should never be lost.
I am quite sure that the best biographies of the saints (e.g. Bonaventure's Life of St Francis) pretend not to be historical accounts. Rather, they relate how a saint's personhood affected those that encountered him/her. The encounter may have been physical or happened through vision or memory. To recognize someone as a saint is a pivotal thing in being a Christian. It needs neither an official process of canonization nor blameless manners. After all, justification of a sinner is the example given by God about how canonization should take place: "Sinners are not loved because they are beautiful, but they are beautiful because they are loved."
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