The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) voted to advance the cause of beatification and canonization for Catholic missionary John Rick Miller on the local level.
Miller was an American businessman and missionary known for numerous apostolates including the association “For the Love of God Worldwide,” which promotes consecration to God through the Sacred Heart of Jesus and the Immaculate Heart of Mary.
The bishops voted in favor of moving the servant of God’s cause forward at the spring USCCB plenary meeting held in Orlando, Florida, on June 10.
As the bishops prepare to consecrate the U.S. to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, they referenced Miller’s cause, noting his long focus on national consecration.
“The Dicastery for the Causes of Saints has granted the confidence of the forum to the Archdiocese of Miami,” Archbishop Thomas Wenski of Miami said at the meeting. “This particular cause recognizes, or underscores, the vocation of the laity to holiness.”
“St. John Paul II wrote … that to ask to be baptized means to ask to become holy,” Wenski said. “Miller is a layman who, after a deep conversion, lived that baptismal call to holiness in an exemplary way, which is why we present his cause for your consideration today.”
Miller “was born in New York City in July 1948 into a Catholic family. He was a husband, a father of two children, [and] an international corporate executive,” Wenski said. “In 1988, after some years of distance from religious practice, he experienced a deep conversion through the intercession of the Blessed Mother.”
“From that moment, his spiritual life rested on two inseparable pillars — a life of prayer, adoration, and daily Eucharist, before which he placed every apostolic initiative and intent, and also [an] intense Marian devotion, lived a filial entrustment to the Sacred Heart of Jesus and the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary, and also the chaste heart of St. Joseph.”
“The three hearts … became the hallmark of his apostolate,” Wenski said. “He left a fervent and industrious corporate life and dedicated himself fully to the apostolate.”
Mission abroad
Miller’s work reached numerous nations, as he evangelized and taught the catechism across the globe.
“I think thereʼs enough evidence of holiness in multiple nations recognized by bishops and archbishops — Mexico, Colombia, and Ecuador, honored by many civil institutions,” Wenski said.
“He co-founded the Apostolate of St. Joseph in 2001, he founded the Guild of Our Lady of Willesden in London under Cardinal Cormac Murphy-OʼConnor, and with the Pallottine Fathers, he promoted 10 Marian shrines in southern India,” he said.
“Through his initiative, Colombia was consecrated to the Immaculate Heart of Mary in 2008. With that experience, the Mission for the Love of God Worldwide was born in 2009 and recognized in 2011 by the Ecuadorian Episcopal Conference as a private association of the faithful,” he said.
“Diagnosed with esophageal cancer at the end of 2012, he continued to evangelize until his final weeks,” Wenski said.
“His life is a testament to the living out, or the following, of Lumen Gentium that states that it belongs to the laity by their very vocation to seek the kingdom of God by engaging in temporal affairs, and directing them according to God’s will,” Wenski said.
“There is a pastoral need for lay models of holiness, and he and his life exemplified that,” Wenski said.
Miller joins the 87 U.S. Catholics on the official path to sainthood, in addition to the 11 canonized Americans who have already been declared saints.
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