Wisconsin priest passes three of four steps to become Saint

Pope Francis announced on Thursday that Father Solanus Casey, a member of the Capuchin Franciscan Order of St. Joseph in Detroit and one of the co-founders of the city’s Capuchin Soup Kitchen, has passed the rigorous test assigned to the process of Sainthood, by being elevated from Venerable to Blessed by the Roman Catholic Church.

Beatification is the third step of a four step process to be named a Saint.

Father Solanus Casey was born in Oak Grove, Wisconsin and lived at the St. Francis of Assisi Monastery in Milwaukee, where he was ordained as a priest in 1904.

Because of Fr. Solanus Casey’s holiness, Pope John Paul II declared him Venerable in 1995.