The sainthood cause for a La Crosse diocese priest has taken a step forward in Rome. Bishop Battersby announced that the Theological Congress of the Vatican's Dicastery for the Causes of Saints completed its review of the cause for Father Joseph Walijewski, and its nine theologians voted unanimously in favor.
The review centered on a lengthy study of Father Joe's life, built from sworn testimony given in La Crosse, along with his letters and writings. The study argues he lived faith, hope and love to a heroic degree, and the theologians found nothing that called that claim into question.
The favorable vote now goes to the cardinals and bishops who are members of the Dicastery, and then to the Pope. If the Pope approves a decree of heroic virtue, Father Joe would be declared Venerable, a stage before possible beatification.
Father Joe was born in Grand Rapids, Michigan, on March 15, 1924, and was ordained for the Diocese of La Crosse on April 16, 1950. He went to Bolivia in 1956, where he founded a parish in Santa Cruz, and later served in Peru, including the Villa El Salvador area outside Lima.
In Peru he bought land in Lurin in 1986 to establish Casa Hogar Juan Pablo II, a home for children modeled on Boys Town. He died in Lima on April 11, 2006, from pneumonia and acute leukemia, and his cause is now championed by the Father Joseph Walijewski Legacy Guild.
