Miracle Decree in the Cause of Nimatullah Al-Hardini (December 20, 2003)

Disciplinary status: Church discipline
Evidence type: Historical account
GuideThe papal authorization and promulgated decree are formal acts in the discipline of a cause of saints; the named date, person, status, and archival wording are historical and juridical facts, not a new dogma or the later beatification or canonization ceremony.
Contents

Miracle Decree in the Cause of Nimatullah Al-Hardini (December 20, 2003) is the official record of the formal promulgation in the pope's presence of a decree on December 20, 2003 concerning a miracle attributed to the intercession of Nimatullah Al-Hardini. It is an affirmative act in a cause of saints, not merely a report of an unusual recovery.[1]

Authorization and exact scope

On December 20, 2003, the official Holy See record documents a formally promulgated miracle decree concerning a miracle attributed to the intercession of Nimatullah Al-Hardini. It records Beato as the canonical-status wording used at the time. The archive describes the intercessor as “al secolo Giuseppe Kassab, Sacerdote professo dell’Ordine Libanese Maronita.”[1]

This record establishes a formally promulgated miracle decree in the cause. It does not by itself record the later celebration of canonization, and the act date must not be silently replaced with the date of a later ceremony. The cited Holy See bulletin or annual Dicastery page is the controlling source for the act catalogued here.[1][2]

Place in the cause

Because the intercessor was recorded as Blessed on that date, the decree belongs to the cause's preparation for canonization; it is not itself the later canonization ceremony. A miracle decree concerns a particular alleged divine intervention attributed to the candidate's intercession; it is distinct from the decree on heroic virtues or martyrdom and from the pope's final liturgical act of beatification or canonization.[1][3]

In the canonical process, witnesses, documents, and any medical evidence are gathered and examined through distinct competences before the theological and cardinalatial stages reach the pope. The formal promulgation in the pope's presence is a positive act within the cause, while the constitution governing causes reserves beatification and canonization themselves to the Roman Pontiff.[2][3]

Evidence and doctrinal limits

The public annual archive does not name a cure beneficiary, diagnosis, treatment, or cure date for this record. Those fields therefore remain unstated instead of being borrowed from an unverified devotional retelling or treating a missing clinical narrative as though no investigation occurred. Fuller evidence belongs only when a competent source for this particular cause supplies it.[1][2]

A decree concerning a miracle is an authoritative judgment about a contingent event in a canonization cause; it is not a new dogma and does not add a private message to the Deposit of Faith. Miracles are signs of God's action. When one is attributed to a holy person's intercession, the intercessor remains a creature whose prayer depends wholly upon Christ's unique mediation and divine power.[3][4]

References

  1. 1.[1.2][1.3][1.4][1.5]Dicastery for the Causes of Saints: decrees authorized in 2003 — The official annual record of the December 20, 2003 authorization concerning Nimatullah Al-Hardini.
  2. 2.[2.2][2.3]Holy See Press Office: daily bulletin archive — The official monthly and daily bulletin archive used to enumerate decree acts from 2000 through 2012.
  3. 3.[3.2][3.3]John Paul II, Divinus Perfectionis Magister — The apostolic constitution governing episcopal inquiries and the Roman examination of causes of beatification and canonization.
  4. 4.Congregation for the Causes of Saints, Sanctorum Mater — The instruction governing diocesan or eparchial inquiries in causes of saints and the gathering of evidence.