.Father Ignatius Spencer is pictured in an undated portrait. On Feb. 21, Pope Francis recognized the heroic virtues of Father Spencer, a 19th-century Passionist priest and a relative of Princes William and Harry through their mother, Princess Diana. (CNS photo/courtesy Passionists) Editors: best quality available. .Father Ignatius Spencer is pictured in an undated portrait. On Feb. 21, Pope Francis recognized the heroic virtues of Father Spencer, a 19th-century Passionist priest and a relative of Princes William and Harry through their mother, Princess Diana.(CNS photo/courtesy Passionists) Editors: best quality available. .Father John Kearns, the British Passionist provincial, prays in 2016 at the tomb of Father Ignatius Spencer at St. Anne and Blessed Dominic Church in St. Helens, England. On Feb. 21, Pope Francis recognized the heroic virtues of Father Spencer, a 19th-century Passionist priest
A CATHOLIC nun who helped bring education to the area and was buried in the grounds of a St Helens church has moved a step closer towards Sainthood as the Pope declared her Venerable . Mother Elizabeth Prout laboured in the slums of towns in the north west of England and in Manchester until she died aged 43 from tuberculosis in 1864. Elizabeth, who became known as the Mother Teresa of Manchester , was born in Shrewsbury in 1820, baptised as an Anglican, but was received into the Catholic faith in her early 20s by Blessed Dominic Barberi. At 28 she became a nun and a few years later was given a teaching post in some of the poorest areas of industrial Manchester, working largely among Irish migrants, women and children, and factory workers.
A Victorian nun known as the Mother Teresa of Manchester has been classed as a woman “of heroic virtue” by the Vatican, moving her one step closer to becoming Britain’s first female saint of modern
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image captionSister Elizabeth Prout opened schools for children in poverty and homes for destitute women
A Victorian nun is a step closer to being the first modern female English saint not killed for her faith after Pope Francis recognised her heroic virtue .
Elizabeth Prout, known as the Mother Teresa of Manchester , was declared venerable at the Vatican on Thursday.
The announcement leaves her two steps away from canonisation.
The nun would be the first non-martyr English female saint since an 11th Century Anglo-Saxon princess.
Her new status comes in a year marking the bicentenary of the birth of Prout in Shrewsbury.