VATICAN CITY (RNS) Cardinal John Henry Newman, the preeminent figure in 19th-century English Catholicism, will soon be known as “blessed,” after Vatican officials attributed a miracle to his intercession.

Newman was an Anglican theologian and leader in the philo-Catholic Oxford Movement before converting to Catholicism in 1845. He died in 1890.

Newman’s work and life have inspired a number of prominent English converts to the church, including the poet Gerard Manley Hopkins (1844-1889) and former British Prime Minister Tony Blair.

Pope Benedict XVI on Friday (July 3) authorized the Vatican’s Congregation for the Causes of Saints to promulgate a decree recognizing as miraculous the cure from spinal disease of an American, Jack Sullivan, who had prayed for Newman’s intercession.

One miracle is required before a candidate can be beatified and thereafter venerated as “blessed.” A second miracle, occurring after beatification, is required for canonization as a saint.

Newman’s beatification still requires the formal approval of the congregation and of Pope Benedict.