Saint Constantine, really?

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BlueKumul

BlueKumul

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I’m not sure if this is the right place to ask this, but I see no “saints” category.

Why was Constantine canonized if he killed people and run an authoritarian dictatorship? I’ve also heard St Nicholas was demoted since there are no solid proofs that he existed at all. Well, Nicholas seems to have been way better person than Constantine.
 
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How can he have “been a better person” if he didn’t exist?
 
He is mainly (only?) venerated in certain Eastern Churches. Emperor St. Justinian (see my avatar-icon) is also venerated…Nov 14.
 
BlueKumul said:
I’m not sure if this is the right place to ask this, but I see no “saints” category.

Why was Constantine canonized if he killed people and run an authoritarian dictatorship? I’ve also heard St Nicholas was demoted since there are no solid proofs that he existed at all. Well, Nicholas seems to have been way better person than Constantine.
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There was no canonization process prior to AD 993.
 
BlueKumul said:
I’ve also heard St Nicholas was demoted since there are no solid proofs that he existed at all.
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Not sure where you heard this, but if you mean St. Nicholas of Myra (aka Santa Claus), the 3rd/ 4th century bishop, there’s no question he existed and most of his remains are even in one known grave, which is unusual for saints of his era. Scholars dispute the accounts of various events in his life, but not his existence. Also he hasn’t been demoted as far as I know; his feast is still on the Roman calendar on December 6.

Did you maybe confuse him with a different saint? St. Christopher is usually the male saint whose existence is doubted.
 
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If the Church disqualified people from sainthood based on past sins we would only have one or two. OP’s question ignores the possibility of repentance and redemption. That’s what this whole Christianity thing is all about.
 
With respect to Constantine, I would first note we have at least a half dozen past threads in the forum asking the same question.

It’s my understanding that Constantine was baptized on his deathbed, which would have absolved his sins provided he repented. There are also other Catholic saints who committed murders and such during their lives before repenting and receiving absolution.
 
BlueKumul said:
I’m not sure if this is the right place to ask this, but I see no “saints” category.

Why was Constantine canonized if he killed people and run an authoritarian dictatorship? I’ve also heard St Nicholas was demoted since there are no solid proofs that he existed at all. Well, Nicholas seems to have been way better person than Constantine.
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Constantine the first was baptized at the end of his life, just before his death in 337 A.D… If his baptism was honestly received then it may be that he did not sin mortally before his moment of death.

Catechism of the Catholic Church
1263 By Baptism all sins are forgiven, original sin and all personal sins, as well as all punishment for sin.66 In those who have been reborn nothing remains that would impede their entry into the Kingdom of God, neither Adam’s sin, nor personal sin, nor the consequences of sin, the gravest of which is separation from God.

66 Cf. Council of Florence (1439): DS 1316.

1861 … However, although we can judge that an act is in itself a grave offense, we must entrust judgment of persons to the justice and mercy of God.
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BlueKumul said:
Why was Constantine canonized if he killed people and run an authoritarian dictatorship?
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Do you regard the Council of Nicea as an important and significant event in Church history? If you do, you have Constantine to thank for it. If he hadn’t pressured the bishops into attending, it would never have happened.
 
Equipollent canonization has the same force.
BlueKumul said:
Why was Constantine canonized if he killed people and run an authoritarian dictatorship?
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For his good deeds for the Church (legalizing the faith, Councils) and his baptism. He was saved. Moreover no one had these ideas of a “authoritarian dictatorship” like what he did being some super grand evil act, he was an emperor simple as that. We venerate many kings and rulers
 
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avemariagratiaplena said:
Equipollent canonization has the same force.
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BlueKumul:
Why was Constantine canonized if he killed people and run an authoritarian dictatorship?
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For his good deeds for the Church (legalizing the faith, Councils) and his baptism. He was saved. Moreover no one had these ideas of a “authoritarian dictatorship” like what he did being some super grand evil act, he was an emperor simple as that. We venerate many kings and rulers
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As far as I know he is not recognised as a saint by the Latin Church.
 
Hi there @BlueKumul

St. Constantine made a radical change for our Christian lives. He helped Christianity to grow. All saints were at least sinful.
 
avemariagratiaplena said:
Equipollent canonization has the same force.
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To my knowledge, Constantine was never equipollently canonized, so this is irrelevant.
Equipollent canonization requires an act of the Pope, e.g. the Latin Church Bishop of Rome, and only about 20 people have ever been equipollently canonized since the Church began the process in the 1500s.
Constantine is not a saint of the Latin Church and is not on the list of equipollent canonizations.
 
Because Constantine fulfilled the prophecy that the Great Whore’s allies would turn on her.
 
I google it and google says he’s not a Roman Cat saint, he’s an Eastern Catholic saint. Thank you! I really thought that he’s considered a saint in our rite.
 
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Nope, nothing of the kind. In the 1968 Roman calendar revision, he and about 40 other saints had their feasts changed to Optional Memorials on the universal calendar. A demotion of a saint’s feast, or even the removal of his or her feast entirely from the calendar (which didn’t happen to St. Nicholas but has happened to dozens of other saints, probably hundreds if you count all the local calendars) does not constitute de-canonization. There are thousands of canonized saints who aren’t on the Universal calendar at all.

Furthermore, I’ve read that in 2016, the Italian national calendar boosted him back to Memorial for Italy.

His feast for the Eastern churches never changed. From a saint perspective, he’s traditionally been more venerated in the East, to the point where I have heard that after Mother Mary, he is the saint with the most churches named after him.

There is a discussion of calendar revisions on this page.

 
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