Detroit friar may be on road to sainthood

For the past 50 years, a group in Detroit has been building a case that Father Solanus Casey, a Capuchin friar, should be made a saint.

“He could be the first American-born male saint,” said Colleen Crane, a spokeswoman for the Capuchin Province of St. Joseph, which includes friars in 10 states and several countries overseas. “In many ways, he has been thought of to be Detroit’s saint.”

The friar, who died in 1957, is two steps away in a lengthy process from sainthood by the Roman Catholic Church. 

But in Detroit, where he served for more than 20 years, people still come to his tomb, sometimes 100 of them a day, asking for his intercession.

He is credited with miraculous cures during his life and the Father Solanus Guild is now documenting cases where people believe their healing came from asking the late friar to intercede with them in their prayers.

“He answered the prayers of thousands of people,” said Brother Richard Merling, director of the Father Solanus Guild, which is working to keep alive his memory and make a case for sainthood.

Father Solanus was born in 1870 in Wisconsin as Bernard Casey. He entered seminary in Milwaukee at age 21 and became part of the Capuchin Order at Detroit in 1897. He received his religious name of Solanus.

The Capuchins were founded in 1528 as followers of St. Francis of Assisi.

When their robes were changed to have larger hoods, children called the friars the ones with the caps and the Italian reference was anglicized to Capuchin.

Father Solanus was a doorkeeper, a friar who struggled in his studies because he couldn’t speak Latin or German and was given the job of greeting people at the door. He couldn’t preach but he could listen. 

As the stressed, poor and sick came to him and concluded some of their prayers were being answered, hundreds of people lined up to see him.

During his time in Detroit, he wrote down more than 6,000 prayer requests and recorded more than 700 healings or answers to prayers.

During the Great Depression, when people came asking for food, he helped Father Herman Buss found a soup kitchen that now serves 500,000 meals a year between two locations.

Father John Celichowski, the leader of the Capuchin Province of St. Joseph, said the friar’s gentle, simple way of receiving people during difficult times helped draw them back to their faith.

“He not only listened but he also responded, praying for people and their needs, and some people have attributed what they believe are miracles to his prayers and intercession.”

When he died at the age of 86, more than 20,000 people attended his wake and funeral.

It can take hundreds of years for a Catholic to be declared a saint. Pope John Paul II declared Father Solanus “venerable” in 1995. 

He would have to be declared “blessed” before being considered for sainthood.

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