Definitions

from The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, 5th Edition.

  • noun The status, character, or condition of being a saint.
  • noun Saints considered as a group.

from The Century Dictionary.

  • noun The character, condition, rank, or dignity of a saint.

from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.

  • noun The state of being a saint; the condition of a saint.
  • noun The order, or united body, of saints; saints, considered collectively.

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • noun the state of being a saint
  • noun saints collectively

from WordNet 3.0 Copyright 2006 by Princeton University. All rights reserved.

  • noun the status and dignity of a saint
  • noun saints collectively

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

From saint +‎ -hood.

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Examples

  • He added, "the elevation of Jade Goody to sainthood is an important step in bringing the Church in line with modern life".

    Goody to Become Saint Jade Dungeekin 2009

  • He added, "the elevation of Jade Goody to sainthood is an important step in bringing the Church in line with modern life".

    Archive 2009-02-01 Dungeekin 2009

  • While that public sentiment appears to be firmly in place, any official elevation to sainthood is still years of church bureaucracy away.

    USATODAY.com - Rome becomes giant church for funeral of pope 2005

  • It's all dubious Catholicism (at best), since sainthood is traditionally a slow and careful process that typically doesn't even begin for five years after someone dies and usually takes AT LEAST decades if not centuries before winding up.

    04/13/2005 2005

  • No doubt alcohol, tobacco, and so forth, are things that a saint must avoid, but sainthood is also a thing that human beings must avoid.

    Reflections on Gandhi 1949

  • He then quitted the Congress membership, finding that sainthood is tarnished by too close contact with politicians.

    Changing India 1938

  • To the very contrary, we remember the story of the Good Samaritan; a man lay wounded by robbers while two sanctimonious fellows passed by, carefully keeping their skirts clear of the blood, and our ideal of sainthood, is in the man who came and helped him who had been robbed and wounded.

    The Philosophy of Canada's Position in the British Empire 1936

  • If you touch the idea of sainthood, especially in this country, people feel you've taken something from them personally.

    For the Sake of Argument 1993

  • The next step to sainthood is to have a miracle attributed to the person's intercession with God after death.

    NPR Topics: News 2011

  • "sainthood" -- and all who approached him were made participators in his

    Modern Saints and Seers Jean Finot 1890

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