BEATIFICATION IS THE third of four stages towards canonization and sainthood. The late Pope John Paul II beatified close to 1,500 people; a number that exceeded the combined total of all his predecessors since the 16th century. To be considered for beatification, the Church has to recognize a miracle as a result of the intercession of the deceased.

In 2001, Jack Sullivan, a deacon in Boston, Massachusetts, was diagnosed with a debilitating spinal condition. As Sullivan recounts on the official papal visit to Britain website, thepapalvisit.org.uk: “One surgeon told me that I was on the brink of complete paralysis . . . For days after the surgery, I was still suffering incredible pain with no end in sight . . . I was completely helpless and the situation seemed hopeless. But it was this state of mind that led me to prayer. I called upon my very special intercessor and faithful friend: “Please Cardinal Newman, help me to walk.”

As the website states, “Almost immediately Deacon Sullivan was able to walk. His doctors were unable to provide any medical explanation for the change in his condition.”

In 2008, prior to the expected recognition of the miracle, Newman’s grave was exhumed. He had been buried in 1890 in a cemetery at Rednal, near Birmingham. On his explicit instructions – “my last, my imperative will” – Newman was buried with Fr Ambrose St John, who had been his close friend for more than three decades. Fr St John had died five years previously, and on his death, Newman declared: “I have always thought no bereavement was equal to that of a husband’s or a wife’s but I feel it difficult to believe that anyone’s sorrow can be greater than mine.”

The exhumation was carried out in the hope that there may be some remaining bones, which could be distributed as relics, as is the Catholic practice. Nothing was found: dampness in the wooden coffin had caused total disintegration of the body. The subsequent “removal” of the non-existent remains to a grand sarcophagus inside Birmingham Oratory provoked much controversy, as the remains of Fr St John stayed behind, in violation of Newman’s wishes.

In July last year, the pope recognized the extraordinary recovery of Sullivan in 2001 as a miracle “resulting from the intercession of the Venerable Servant of God John Henry Newman”.

The beatification of Newman will be the final event of the Papal visit next week. Originally scheduled to take place at Coventry Airport, the ceremony will now take place at Cofton Park in Birmingham. Commemorative postage stamps that were printed featuring Coventry are already collectors’ items.

In common with the two other main public gatherings during the Papal visit, at Glasgow and London, people who attend are being asked to pay a “pilgrim contribution” in advance. For Glasgow, it’s £20, London is £5 and the beatification ceremony in Birmingham, at which upwards of 70,000 people are expectedwill cost £25. These mandatory “contributions” to attend ceremonies have proved controversial, as attendance was free for events at the previous Papal visit in 1982. This Papal visit will cost in the region of £20 million; a cost which will be shared by the Church and State. All the ceremonies require prior allocations of passes, available through local parishes.

At Birmingham, pilgrims will receive a “pilgrim pack”. In this drawstring bag will be a CD of tracks by Liam McNally, a 14-year-old finalist in Britain’s Got Talent , who sang Danny Boy . (Another famous finalist on the talent show, Susan Boyle, is due to sing at the Glasgow Mass.) In the bag will also be a “pilgrim passport” – essentially, an admission ticket – and a postcard. The bag itself is intended to be used to sit or kneel on, presumably without the contents.

In the past, the custom was that the beatification ceremony took place at the Vatican. However, the current pope has removed this custom, hence the on-site beatification. It seems likely that the Church has an eye to the eventual canonisation of Newman.

Newman was 89 when he died of pneumonia. Before he died, he wrote: “After the fever of life – after wearinesses, sicknesses, fightings and despondings, languor and fretfulness, struggling and failing, struggling and successing – after all the changes and chances of this troubled and unhealthy state, at length comes death – at length the white throne of God – at length, the beatific vision.”

And now, 130 years after his death, beatification itself, and the title of “Blessed”.