With the Oct. 15 canonization of St. Mother Theodore Guerin, foundress of the Sisters of Providence of St. Mary-of-the-Woods, Ind., seven sainthood causes from the United States have been successfully completed.

In its declarations of sainthood, the Catholic Church recognizes the saints' holiness, declaring they are with God in heaven and worthy of universal veneration. Churches and altars may be built in their names. Their feast days are listed in the Roman martyrology, the official calendar of saints' feast days.

Of these U.S. saints, only two, St. Elizabeth Ann Seton and St. Katharine Drexel, are native-born; the others were born in Europe and came to North America as missionaries.

They are:
---The Jesuit North American martyrs: St. Rene Goupil (1607-1642), St. Isaac Jogues (1607-1646), St. Jean Lalande (died 1646), St. Antoine Daniel (1601-1648), St. Jean de Brebeuf (1593-1649), St. Gabriel Lalemant (1610-1649), St. Charles Garnier (circa 1606-1649) and St. Noel Chabanel (1613-1649). Six of the eight French-born Jesuits --- all missionaries among the Huron and Iroquois Indians --- were priests; one was a lay brother and one a lay volunteer. Three were martyred in New York, the others in Canada. They were beatified in 1925 and canonized in 1930. Their feast day is Oct. 19.

---St. Frances Xavier Cabrini (1850-1917) was the Italian foundress of the Missionary Sisters of the Sacred Heart. She emigrated to America in 1889, establishing a convent in New York to work among Italian immigrants. She became a U.S. citizen in 1909, and founded more than 50 convents in eight countries. She was beatified in 1938 and canonized in 1946. Her feast day is Nov. 13.

---St. Elizabeth Ann Seton (1774-1821) was born into an upper-class family in colonial New York. Widowed in 1803, she was left bankrupt with five children. She converted to Catholicism in 1805 and founded the Sisters of Charity in the United States in 1809 in Emmitsburg, Md. She was beatified in 1963 and canonized in 1975. Her feast day is Jan. 4.

---St. John Nepomucene Neumann (1811-1860) was a Bohemian-born missionary ordained in New York shortly after his arrival there in 1836. He was admitted to the Congregation of the Most Holy Redeemer in 1840 and professed as a Redemptorist in 1842. He served in Pittsburgh and Baltimore, and was appointed the fourth bishop of Philadelphia in 1852. He was beatified in 1963 and canonized in 1977. His feast day is Jan. 5.

---St. Rose Philippine Duchesne (1769-1852) was a French nun and educator who emigrated to the United States for missionary work in 1818. She set up the first U.S. convent of the Society of the Sacred Heart in Missouri, established a number of schools and worked with Native Americans in her final years. She was beatified in 1940 and canonized in 1988. Her feast day is Nov. 18.

---St. Katharine Drexel (1858-1955) was a Philadelphia-born heiress who used her family's banking fortune to establish more than 60 schools for Native American and African-American children. She founded the Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament and Xavier University of Louisiana, the country's only historically black Catholic university. She was beatified in 1988 and canonized in 2000. Her feast day is March 3.

---St. Mother Theodore Guerin (1798-1856) was a French nun who, despite poor health throughout her adult life, journeyed to the American frontier in 1840 to minister in a diocese that covered all of Indiana and one-third of Illinois. She founded the Sisters of Providence of St. Mary-of-the-Woods, Ind., and a girls academy that became St. Mary-of-the-Woods College. She was beatified in 1998 and canonized in 2006. Her feast day is Oct. 3.

---CNS