https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-manchester-55748879A 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.
Bishop of Shrewsbury, the Rt Rev Mark Davies, said he was overjoyed and said it was appropriate the announcement came during the coronavirus pandemic for a woman who "helped many during the epidemics which swept the industrial communities of Victorian England".
