How to become a saint: holiness in an ordinary life

You become a saint by letting God make you holy, one ordinary day at a time: praying, receiving the sacraments, doing your daily work well and loving the people in front of you. The Church teaches that every Christian is called to holiness, not only priests and religious sisters (CCC 2013). That includes you, as you are today. Canonization, the Church's official declaration that someone is in heaven, is a separate thing that comes after death.

Can anyone become a saint?

Yes. The Catechism puts it plainly: "All Christians in any state or walk of life are called to the fullness of Christian life and to the perfection of charity" (CCC 2013). The Second Vatican Council gave a whole chapter of Lumen Gentium, its document on the Church, to this "universal call to holiness."

It isn't a new idea. Jesus told ordinary crowds, "You, therefore, must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect" (Matthew 5:48). St Paul wrote to a young church of tradespeople and families: "this is the will of God, your sanctification" (1 Thessalonians 4:3).

In the Church's language, a saint is anyone who is with God in heaven. Most of them will never have a feast day or a statue. On All Saints' Day, 1 November, the Church celebrates all of them, the famous and the unknown. That second group is the one most of us are aiming for, and it's a very good one to be in.

What does holiness actually mean?

Holiness is love. The Catechism calls it "the perfection of charity": loving God with everything you have, and loving your neighbor as yourself. It isn't a personality type, a level of emotion, or never making mistakes.

Holiness is God's work in you, by his grace, more than a self-improvement project. Your part is to keep saying yes to him and to keep getting up when you fall. Saints aren't people who never sinned. They're people who kept coming back.

How do you become a saint?

There's no secret method. The saints became holy through the same ordinary means the Church offers everyone.

Prayer

Holiness grows out of friendship with God, and friendship needs time together. A few minutes every day, kept faithfully, does more than an hour once a month. If you're not sure where to begin, start with how to pray as a Catholic.

The sacraments

The Eucharist is the center: Sunday Mass, and weekday Mass when you can. Confession is where you bring your falls and receive grace to fight them. Many people who are serious about holiness go regularly, often once a month. The Church encourages confessing even everyday faults, because it helps form your conscience and lets Christ heal you (CCC 1458).

Your daily duties

St Francis de Sales taught that devotion takes a different shape for a worker, a servant, a married woman or a prince, and that holiness that neglects your actual duties isn't real holiness. For most people the path runs through the job, the dishes, the kids' homework and the aging parent. Doing these well, for God, is the material holiness is made of. A nurse becomes holy by nursing with love, a father by fathering, a student by studying honestly.

Charity

Love the people God has actually put in your life: your spouse, your coworker, the neighbor who talks too much. Jesus said we will be judged on how we treated the hungry, the stranger and the sick (Matthew 25:31-46).

Small things

St Thérèse of Lisieux, a Carmelite nun who died at twenty-four and is now a Doctor of the Church, called her path the little way: doing small, hidden things with great love, and trusting God like a child. In her autobiography she describes going out of her way to be kind to a sister in her convent whom she found deeply irritating, so kind that the sister thought Thérèse especially liked her. That is what sanctity looks like on most days.

Isn't sainthood only for special people?

It can feel that way, because the saints we hear about did dramatic things. But the Church holds up saints from every kind of life: mothers and fathers, farmers, soldiers, teenagers, doctors. Many of them started out far from holy. St Peter denied Jesus. St Augustine spent years living for pleasure before his conversion.

In Gaudete et Exsultate, his letter on the call to holiness, Pope Francis wrote about "the saints next door": parents raising children with love, people working to support their families, the sick, elderly religious who keep smiling. Holiness doesn't wait until you've fixed yourself. It starts with the person you are now, sins and all, turning toward God.

If you feel stuck or half-hearted, that's common. Read lukewarm Catholic: how to wake up. Every saint had days like that.

Practical steps for every day

1. Offer the day when you wake up. One sentence is enough, or the Morning Offering. It turns everything after it into a prayer.
2. Pray for ten minutes. Same time, same place if you can. Read a Gospel passage and talk to Jesus about it.
3. Do your work well. Pick one task today and do it carefully, for God, even if no one notices.
4. Do one hidden act of love. A kindness no one will thank you for. Thérèse's little way, in practice.
5. Look back at night. A short daily examen: thank God for the day, notice where you fell short, ask for help tomorrow.
6. Go to Confession regularly. Monthly is a good rhythm. Don't wait until things feel serious.
7. Get help. A spiritual director, a good parish, friends who want the same thing.

Don't try all seven at once. Pick two, keep them for a month, then add another.

How does the Church declare someone a saint?

Canonization is the Church's formal declaration that a person lived a holy life and is in heaven, so they can be honored and asked for prayers by the whole Church. It doesn't make anyone a saint. It recognizes one.

The process usually begins years after death. The person is first called a Servant of God. If the Church finds they lived the virtues to a heroic degree, they're declared Venerable. Beatification, with the title Blessed, normally requires a miracle attributed to their prayers (martyrs are an exception), and canonization usually requires a second one. It can take decades or centuries.

None of that is your concern. Your part is the same as theirs was: say yes to God today, and again tomorrow.

Where to start tonight

Before bed, take two minutes. Thank God for one good thing from today. Name one moment you'd do differently. Ask him for help with tomorrow. That's a saint's habit, and you can begin it tonight.