On 19 December 2009, Pope Benedict XVI issued a decree accepting the validity of the second miracle needed to clear the way for Mary MacKillop to be canonised (declared a saint).

An amazing amount of media coverage followed — self-appointed experts pronouncing about why miracles can or cannot be believed in — and why doesn’t God prevent all sickness, pain etc., instead of just a few miracles now and then etc.

The focus on the miracle was overdone.

The most essential prerequisite to a person being accepted as a saint is not their miracles, but their holiness.

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Right from her death in 1909, Mother Mary MacKillop’s holiness was recognised.

People touched her body with their rosary beads — others took home samples of soil from around her grave — signs of awareness that she was a saint.

Even before her death . . . .

Four days before she died, Cardinal Moran, head of the Australian Catholic Church, visited Mother Mary for the last time. On leaving the building, he said, “I consider that I have this day assisted at the deathbed of a saint.”

Yet 100 years later she isn’t officially a saint. Why so long?

The Church required unhurried investigation of everything known about Mary’s life, to ensure that she was truly a holy person — before considering any matters regarding miracles.

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Some words Mother Mary wrote in a letter to Monsignor Kirby in 1873 sum up her life and thought: “To me the will of God is a dear book which I am never tired of reading, which has always some new charm for me. I cannot tell you what a beautiful thing the will of God seems to me.”

That’s what makes Mary MacKillop a saint – her desire, above all else, to accept God’s will, and live in obedience to his will.

That’s what God asks of everybody.

Being holy isn’t something God requires only of a few — priests, nuns or certain people that way inclined — no, God wants every person be holy.

That is God’s will for you, too, dear blog-reader — that you, also, should be holy, a saint.

Yes, you.

If you doubt whether that it is possible, then you are doubting God.

Or perhaps you are doubting whether you are willing to give up your favourite sin?