Aussie saint-to-be immortalised in pop song

Australian Catholics were celebrating on Saturday after Pope Benedict XVI confirmed that Melbourne-born nun Mary MacKillop will become a saint -- ending an 85-year campaign to have her canonised.MacKillop, who founded her own order of nuns and who devoted her life to building schools and helping the poor, has been a revered figure in Australia since shortly after her death in 1909.

Australian Catholics were celebrating on Saturday after Pope Benedict XVI confirmed that Melbourne-born nun Mary MacKillop will become a saint -- ending an 85-year campaign to have her canonised.MacKillop, who founded her own order of nuns and who devoted her life to building schools and helping the poor, has been a revered figure in Australia since shortly after her death in 1909.

Mary MacKillop, a nun revered for her work with needy children as much as for her rebellious streak, is to become Australia's first Roman Catholic saint on October 17, Pope Benedict XVI said Friday.The pope announced the date at a consistory or meeting of cardinals at the Vatican.In December, Benedict recognised a miracle in which MacKillop apparently cured a woman of cancer, paving the way for the canonisation of a nun who is already a national icon in Australia.

Australia prepared to celebrate on Friday ahead of the expected announcement that Mary MacKillop, a rebel nun who was once excommunicated from the church, is to become the country's first saint.As devotees prayed at MacKillop's tomb in North Sydney, the Sisters of St. Joseph order she founded said they were confident Pope Benedict XVI would formally declare a date for her canonisation."I don't know what's been decided, but I am quietly confident," Sister Mary Casey, who has long argued for MacKillop's sainthood, told the ABC.

Thousands of pilgrims arrived in Rome this week to witness the canonisation of Australia's first saint, Mary MacKillop by Pope Benedict XVI, as "Mary Mania" grips her native country.MacKillop (1842-1909), a nun and teacher who fell out with church authorities after denouncing a paedophile priest, is due to be formally recognised as a Catholic saint at a mass in the Vatican on Sunday.

The Vatican echoed to the sounds of the didgeridoo on Friday at an Aboriginal show in memory of Mary MacKillop, who is about to be named Australia's first saint.A dozen bare-chested dancers wearing body paint performed songs and dances in front of hundreds of people, including dozens of nuns wearing turquoise scarves from the order that MacKillop helped found.Australian Foreign Minister Kevin Rudd, who formally apologised for the treatment of indigenous Australians in 2008, attended the show and opened an exhibition of Aboriginal art in the Vatican museum.

Nestled among pine forests, cattle farms and canary-yellow canola fields, the sleepy Australian Outback town of Penola seems an unlikely place for miracles.But thousands trek to Penola every year to pray and give thanks for Mary MacKillop, who once taught children in a disused stable here and is now poised to become the country's first saint."People come and tell us what they believe are miracles that have happened to them through prayer, praying to God through Mary," explains Claire Larkin, who works at Penola's Mary Mackillop Centre.

Pope Benedict XVI will formally recognise Australia's first saint, Mary MacKillop, at a ceremony in front of Saint Peter's basilica on Sunday.Australian Foreign Minister Kevin Rudd and Polish President Bronislaw Komorowski will be among the 50,000 spectators expected at the ceremony, where five other saints from Canada, Italy, Poland and Spain will also be announced.