“He loved them to the end.”

While this Biblical verse found in John 13:1 is in reference to Jesus Christ, it also sums up the life of John Bradburne, the British-born missionary martyred in Zimbabwe more than four decades ago that many Christians are hopeful will become the country’s first Catholic saint.

“He deserves it, in him we saw the love of Jesus Christ in action,” said Zvoku Chitsike, an elderly woman who was being assisted by her great granddaughter to reach the Mutemwa Leprosy Catholic and Care Center one more time for the annual pilgrimage to commemorate the 45th death of Bradburne that took place on Sept. 7-8.

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“He was a true Servant of God,” she added.

Mutemwa is located in Mutoko, some 90 miles (145 kilometers) northeast of Zimbabwe’s capital Harare, where Bradburne, a lay member of the Third Order of St. Francis, who was killed on Sept. 5, 1979. He had spent the last 10 years of his life caring for people suffering from leprosy.

Born in 1921 in England, Bradburne was executed by armed fighters in the final days of Zimbabwe’s 15-year long liberation war. In what is widely regarded as an act of martyrdom, Bradburne was repeatedly asked to leave the war-ravaged zone — including by his abductors — but he refused.

“The [liberation war] guerrillas would never have killed him,” Father Fidelis Mukonori, Bradburne’s friend and driver and now a popular Jesuit cleric in Zimbabwe, told the BBC.

Since his death, Bradburne has become a revered figure in Zimbabwe’s Catholic circles and the broader Christian community, with Mutemwa attracting multi-denominational crowds of pilgrims. Several people have claimed miraculous healings and answered prayers after visiting the sigte to pray in the tin hut that he lived or on the mountain where he prayed.

On Sept. 24, the government of Zimbabwe posthumously granted Bradburne national hero status, the highest honor given to anyone in the country.

“At long last, John is being recognized by the country as a figure of national importance for its people,” the John Bradburne Memorial Society said in a statement.

Lengthy stages to sainthood

On July 1, 2019, the Congregation for the Causes of Saints in Rome issued a formal cause for Bradburne’s beatification.

This is a lengthy process, carried out by several levels within the church and can take many years. Each step involves the involvement and approval of the candidate’s home diocese, theologians and the Congregation for the Causes of Saints (a panel of cardinals, bishops and others) before the approval is granted by the pope.

This formal process involves presenting arguments for — and against — a candidate being made a saint. In Bradburne’s case, there have been no opposers to the cause. This process is also followed by the gathering of testimonies from those that knew the candidate.

This is passed to the Congregation for the Causes of Saints that examines evidence of the candidate’s holiness, work and signs that people have been drawn to prayer through their example. If the case is approved, it is passed on to the pope. If the pope concurs that the candidate lived a life of “heroic virtue,” they can then be called “venerable.”

To reach the beatification stage, a miracle needs to be attributed to prayers made to the individual after their death. The prayers being granted are regarded as proof that the individual is already in heaven and hence able to intercede with God on others’ behalf. Canonization is the final stage in the declaration of sainthood. This step requires a second miracle attributable to prayers made to the candidate after they have been beatified. However, for those candidates that are martyrs, only one verified miracle is required for them to become saints.

Bradburne’s cause is based in the Diocese of Harare, where John spent his final years working. It is being coordinated by Archbishop Robert Ndlovu, Dr Enrico Solinas and Father Mgcini Moyo. The cause was officially launched on Sept. 5 2019 at a ceremony attended by 400 clergymen and 15,000 devotees.

At Mutemwa, where many miracles and healings have been reported after praying to Bradburne over the years, pilgrims line up to offer their prayers inside the hut where he lived or to deposit pieces of paper with their prayer requests.

Followers anxiously wait

For the thousands of these people who make the pilgrimage, the sentiment was that the process for Bradburne’s sainthood has taken too long. Although not unusual, the process has always been known to take several years — even decades — to be finalized.

Kate Macpherson, Bradburne’s great-niece and secretary of the John Bradburne Memorial Society, told Religion Unplugged that the process was disrupted for three years by the pandemic, but is now back on course.

“At present, John is ‘Servant of God,’ [and] nearly all the testimonies have been gathered and we are just waiting on the historical and theological commission’s to be completed then these documents will be sent to the Congregation of Saints,” she said.

With 15 testimonies having been gathered so far, the postulators are waiting for at least five more before they can submit the documents the Congregation of Saints at the Vatican to move Bradburne from Servant of God to Venerable.

Teresa Yonge, Bradburne’s niece who is also working on the sainthood cause, is hopeful the process would be concluded soon.

“[Bradburne’s death] was completion of his wishes … to die a martyr, to die for his friends, for this faith and his spirituality … and in a way it was a wonderful thing as well,” she said.

For Bradburne’s supporters like Chitsike, the momentum is there for his beatification. Their only prayer is that it be achieved in their lifetime.

Cyril Zenda is a Christian and an African journalist and writer based in Harare, Zimbabwe.