Word of the Week: Canonisation
An Orthodox Patristic Understanding
“God is wondrous in His saints” (Psalm 67:35 LXX)
The term “canonisation,” commonly used in Western Christianity, especially in the Roman Catholic Church, to denote a formal, juridical act of declaring someone a saint, must be approached with great caution and nuance within the Orthodox tradition. The Orthodox Church neither understands nor practices “canonisation” in the legalistic or forensic manner that developed in the post-Scholastic West. Rather, she speaks of glorification (dóksa, δόξα) and recognition (anagnṓrisis, ἀναγνώρισις) of holiness already manifest among the faithful. This is not a process of making someone a saint, but of affirming through prayerful discernment and ecclesial consensus that someone has already become a saint by grace, by their union with Christ, and by the fruit of the Holy Spirit borne in their life and even after death.
The Nature of Holiness and the Ecclesial Act of Recognition
In Orthodox theology, sainthood is not an award granted by ecclesiastical authority, but a reality revealed through divine grace and discerned within the life of the Church. The saints are not exalted because of moral excellence alone, but because they have become vessels of divine life, theōmenoi (θεωμένοι), deified persons through synergy with God. According to St. Gregory Palamas, *“the saints are those who, having been purified by the commandments, illumined by the Spirit, and perfected by grace, partake of divine glory.”*¹
Thus, what is commonly referred to as “canonisation” does not, in fact, exist in the Orthodox Church. Rather, in the Orthodox context, it is more properly understood as Glorification—a solemn, ecclesial, and liturgical affirmation that a person already participates in the life of the glorified Body of Christ, the Church Triumphant. This is not an act of granting sainthood, but one of acknowledging and confirming it. The decision, typically made by a Holy Synod of bishops, does not create sainthood; it responds to the presence of that sanctity, already witnessed by the people of God—laos tou Theou (λαὸς τοῦ Θεοῦ)—through miracles, incorrupt relics, widespread veneration, or enduring spiritual influence.
As Fr. Georges Florovsky reminds us, *“The Church does not ‘make saints.’ She only recognizes them and proclaims them.”*² The faithful often venerate holy men and women long before formal recognition occurs. In this sense, the glorification is a liturgical and pastoral act, confirming what has already been manifested in the consciousness of the Church and verified through signs of divine affirmation.
From Popular Veneration to Liturgical Recognition
The Orthodox Church remains deeply hesitant to impose artificial processes or bureaucratic criteria on what is fundamentally a spiritual phenomenon. There is no universal checklist or centralized office for sainthood. Rather, the process of glorification begins from below (kato), from the heart of the believing people. Local veneration—when discerned as genuine, untainted by sensationalism, heretical teachings, or self-interest—may gradually expand and attract the attention of local hierarchs. The bishop then investigates the life and witness of the person in question.
The formal liturgical glorification includes several key elements:
The composition and approval of a proper Service (akolouthia, ἀκολουθία),
The inclusion of the saint’s name in the Synaxarion and liturgical commemorations,
The writing of a Life (bios, βίος) grounded in truth and Orthodox dogmatic criteria,
The authorization for public veneration, icons, and the building of chapels or churches in the saint’s honor.
This entire process is performed with the utmost reverence, caution, and spiritual discernment. As Archimandrite Sophrony (Sakharov) notes, *“The Church treads with great fear when approaching the recognition of saints, for she knows she is approaching the fire of divine holiness.”*³
The Spiritual Significance of Glorification
From a Patristic standpoint, glorification does not concern the individual saint alone; it is an event for the whole Church. It testifies to the continuation of Pentecost in the life of the Church—the Spirit still sanctifies, still raises the dead to life, still grants gifts of healing, discernment, and divine love. As the Apostle says, “You are our letter, written in our hearts, known and read by all people; you are a letter of Christ, delivered by us, written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God” (2 Corinthians 3:2–3).
To proclaim someone a saint is to affirm that the divine energies (energeiai) of God have been fully received in that person, and that through them, the Church is edified, purified, and encouraged to continue her path toward theosis. St. Symeon the New Theologian affirms that the saints are living gospels: *“The saints, by becoming the dwelling place of the Holy Spirit, become themselves Scripture, for the Word of God is written in their hearts.”*⁴
Caution Against Formalism and Secularization
The Orthodox Church must always guard against the temptation to formalize or politicize the glorification of saints. Glorification is not about satisfying contemporary ideologies, public opinion, or canonical careerism. Rather, it is a humble recognition of what God has already done. The sanctity of a person cannot be proven by documents, nor can the holiness of their relics be decided by administrative fiat. When the Church functions rightly, she resists pressures to canonize the famous, the popular, or the convenient. Instead, she listens to the hesychia (ἡσυχία)—the silence of grace—and to the voices of the holy.
This is why the Orthodox Church sometimes delays for decades, even centuries, before glorifying individuals whose holiness was apparent. Such a delay is not a denial of sanctity, but a means of preserving the Church’s witness from error or haste.
Conclusion: To Glorify Is to Recognize the Work of God
The Orthodox understanding of the glorification of saints is deeply relational and ontological. It is not a declaration about the person, but a recognition that the person has become wholly transparent to God’s uncreated energies, and thereby now stands in the midst of the Ecclesia as a liturgical and existential witness to divine life.
As Vladimir Lossky rightly affirms, *“The saints are not isolated examples of moral success, but rather the very embodiment of ecclesial life, of the Church’s life in Christ.”*⁵ Their glorification is the Church’s act of doxology—a giving of glory to the one who glorifies: the Triune God.
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¹ St. Gregory Palamas, Triads in Defense of the Holy Hesychasts, II.3.39.
² Georges Florovsky, Collected Works, Vol. 3: Creation and Redemption (Belmont, MA: Nordland, 1976), 124.
³ Archimandrite Sophrony, On Prayer, trans. Rosemary Edmonds (Essex: Stavropegic Monastery of St John the Baptist, 1996), 143.
⁴ St. Symeon the New Theologian, The Discourses, XIV.
⁵ Vladimir Lossky, The Mystical Theology of the Eastern Church (Crestwood, NY: SVS Press, 1997), 196.
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