The Venerable

The Venerable is used as a style or epithet in several Christian churches. It is also the common English-language translation of a number of Buddhist titles, and is used as a word of praise in some cases.

In the Latin Church of the Catholic Church, after a deceased Catholic has been declared a Servant of God by a bishop and proposed for beatification by the Pope, such a servant of God may next be declared venerable ("heroic in virtue") during the investigation and process leading to possible canonization as a saint. Before a person is considered to be venerable, that person must be declared as such by a proclamation, approved by the Pope, of having lived a life that was "heroic in virtue", the virtues being the theological virtues of faith, hope, and charity and the cardinal virtues of prudence, justice, fortitude, and temperance. The next steps are beatification, from which point the person is referred to as The Blessed, and finally canonization, from which point he is referred to as Saint. For example, Popes Pius XII and John Paul II were both declared venerable by Pope Benedict XVI in December 2009 and John Paul II was declared saint in 2014.

Other examples are Bishop Fulton J. Sheen, Princess Louise of France, Francis Libermann, and Don Juan de Palafox y Mendoza, seventeenth-century bishop of Puebla, Mexico.

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