A miracle confirmed and a date set. From the New York Times:

Pope Benedict XVI moved his beloved predecessor one step closer to sainthood on Friday, confirming a miracle by John Paul II and setting May 1 as the date of his beatification….

Benedict said in a decree on Friday that a French nun had been miraculously cured from Parkinson’s disease thanks to John Paul’s intercession. John Paul himself suffered from Parkinson’s. A second miracle is needed for him to become a saint.

After John Paul is beatified, he will be considered “blessed” and can be publicly venerated. Benedict is expected to celebrate the beatification Mass himself, the first Sunday after Easter.

In a statement on Friday, Benedict said that a Vatican-appointed committee of cardinals, bishops, doctors and theologians had determined that the recovery of Sister Marie Pierre Simon from Parkinson’s Disease was “miraculous” and “scientifically inexplicable.”

Kerry Weber joined the staff of America in October 2009. Her writing and multimedia work have since earned several awards from the Catholic Press Association, and in 2013 she reported from Rwanda as a recipient of Catholic Relief Services' Egan Journalism Fellowship. Kerry is the author of Mercy in the City: How to Feed the Hungry, Give Drink to the Thirsty, Visit the Imprisoned, and Keep Your Day Job (Loyola Press) and Keeping the Faith: Prayers for College Students (Twenty-Third Publications). A graduate of Providence College and the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism, she has previously worked as an editor for Catholic Digest, a local reporter, a diocesan television producer, and as a special-education teacher on the Navajo reservation in Arizona.