John Paul is no saint – his canonisation is political theatre

The week after Easter, Pope Francis presided over the canonisation ceremony which declared his two most famous contemporary predecessors, John Paul II and John XXIII, were now “saints”. This is an important marker in his papacy, a transparently political act which seeks to balance the canonisation of the deeply conservative John Paul II with a simultaneous nod to John XXIII, who reigned from 1958 to 1963 and unleashed the progressive reforms of Vatican II.