Founder of conservative Catholic group elevated to sainthood

VATICAN CITY -- Drawing one of the Vatican's largest-ever crowds, Pope John Paul II Sunday bestowed the honor of sainthood on the controversial founder of Opus Dei, a conservative Catholic organization whose rigorous defense of Church teaching has won the pontiff's favor.

More than 300,000 people turned out for Josemaria Escriva de Balaguer's canonization, overflowing from St. Peter's Square.

Sainthood for the Spanish priest who founded the group in 1928 came just 27 years after his death -- one of the shortest waiting times in the Vatican's history.

Many of those at the canonization came from Latin America, where Opus Dei has a strong foothold and where the Vatican is concerned about Catholics defecting to evangelical sects.

Making the pilgrimage from Fairfax Station, Va., was Austin Schmitt, an Opus Dei member who is deputy director of the Federal Maritime Commission in Washington, D.C.

"Today will help me to go back home and live the message of the saint to sanctify ordinary life," said Schmitt.

Criticism swirled around Escriva's figure in the years leading up to his 1992 beatification, the last formal step before sainthood. Saying they were unsure, two of the nine Vatian officials who ruled on Escriva's merits did not vote in favor of beatification.

Opus Dei's reputation for elitism started during the 1939-75 Spanish dictatorship of Gen. Francisco Franco. Many of the technocrats in his later governments belonged to the organization.

Many Vatican observers Sunday remarked upon the extreme composure and orderliness of the huge crowd, a sharp contrast to the deafening shouts of joy and jockeying for good views at the last previous big sainthood ceremony in St. Peter's Square, that of Italian monk Padre Pio in June.

In addition to honoring Escriva and Padre Pio, the ailing, 82-year-old John Paul is seen by many as determined to raise to sainthood another one of his favorite figures, Mother Teresa.