Q: How Many Saints & Blessed Are There?

A: Seven thousand.

From the Vatican Information Service:

NEW ROMAN MARTYROLOGY LISTS 7,000 SAINTS AND BLESSEDS

VATICAN CITY, JAN 4, 2005(VIS)

– In Rome at the beginning of last

month, the second edition of the Roman Martyrology was presented. The new

Martyrology is an updated list not, as the name might suggest, of martyrs, but

of all the saints and blesseds venerated by the Church.

The latest edition of the Martyrology was presented during

an event promoted by the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of

the Sacraments to commemorate the conciliar constitution on liturgical reform "Sacrosanctum

Concilium", promulgated on December

4, 1963.

The new edition contains certain differences with respect to

the earlier edition, which was published in 2001 and was the first since

Vatican Council II. A number of typographical errors have been corrected and

the 117 people canonized or beatified between 2001 and 2004 have been added. Moreover,

many saints, mostly Italian-Greek monks, whose names have not thus far been

listed in the Martyrology but who are effectively much venerated, especially in

southern of
Italy,

have also been included.

The updated Martyrology contains 7,000 saints and blesseds

currently venerated by the Church, and whose cult is officially recognized and

proposed to the faithful as models worthy of imitation.

Author: Jimmy Akin

Jimmy was born in Texas, grew up nominally Protestant, but at age 20 experienced a profound conversion to Christ. Planning on becoming a Protestant seminary professor, he started an intensive study of the Bible. But the more he immersed himself in Scripture the more he found to support the Catholic faith, and in 1992 he entered the Catholic Church. His conversion story, "A Triumph and a Tragedy," is published in Surprised by Truth. Besides being an author, Jimmy is the Senior Apologist at Catholic Answers, a contributing editor to Catholic Answers Magazine, and a weekly guest on "Catholic Answers Live."

10 thoughts on “Q: How Many Saints & Blessed Are There?”

  1. These are just the one’s recognized. I am quite sure there are more saints in the history of the world than 7000, otherwise we truly are a massa damnata…

  3. The difference between a blessed and a saint is that the first can only be honored only in certain regions, while the latter is allowed to be venerated all over the world.

    “5. For the beatification of a confessor a miracle attributed to the Servant of God, verified after his death, is necessary. The required miracle must be proven through the appropriate canonical investigation, following a procedure analogous to that for heroic virtues. This one too is concluded with the relative decree. Once the two decrees are promulgated (regarding the heroic virtues and the miracle) the Holy Father decides on beatification, which is the concession of public worship, limited to a particular sphere. With beatification the candidate receives the title of Blessed.

    6. For canonization another miracle is needed, attributed to the intercession of the Blessed and having occurred after his beatification. The methods for ascertainment of the affirmed miracle are the same as those followed for beatification. Canonization is understood as the concession of public worship in the Universal Church. Pontifical infallibility is involved. With canonization, the Blessed acquires the title of Saint.”

    http://www.catholic-forum.com/saints/sjs00003.htm

  4. The 7000 number only includes those Saints and Blesseds recognized as such by the Latin Church.

    For the full number of “official” saints we have to consult all the “Martyrologies” of each of the other 22 autonomous ritual Churches of the Catholic communion.

  5. After this I had a vision of a great multitude, which no one could count, from every nation, race, people, and tongue. They stood before the throne and before the Lamb, wearing white robes and holding palm branches in their hands. They cried out in a loud voice: “Salvation comes from our God, who is seated on the throne, and from the Lamb.”

  7. As an aside to this — in 1999, the Ministry with Persons with Disabilities (MPD) for my diocese organized a pilgrimage to St. Patrick’s Church in Columbus, Ohio, where there is a small shrine in honor of Blessed Margaret of Castello. Bl. Margaret was blind, lame, and a hunchback, and was abandoned by her parents after the miracle they selfishly sought for her at a friar’s tomb didn’t happen.

    The pilgrimage was my idea, but I had practically nothing to do with the actual planning. There is also a shrine to Bl. Margaret in Louisville, Kentucky, and that was the one I first suggested after reading about it on the Net. But the MPD director learned about the one in Columbus, which was closer.

  8. I am going through confimation and wanted to pick a blessed for my confimation name. I was told that I could not; it had to be a saint. Is there any documentation that I could use to make them see that it is ok to pick a blesseds name?

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