Earlier this year, Benedict declared that "any trend to produce programs and products -- including animated films and video games -- which in the name of entertainment exalt violence and portray antisocial behavior or the trivialization of human sexuality is a perversion."
Brazilian news media said the crowd reached about 1 million -- as church officials had hoped for -- although there were large empty spaces on the airfield in South America's largest city.
Benedict pronounced the sainthood of Galväo, a Franciscan monk credited by the church with 5,000 miracle cures, while he sat on a throne of Brazilian hardwood, surrounded by Latin American bishops and choirs of hundreds.
Galväo is the first native-born saint from Brazil, home to more than 120 million of the world's 1.1 billion Catholics, and the 10th to be canonized by Benedict.
His canonization continues a push for saints in Latin America and elsewhere in the developing world that began under John Paul II, who sought role models as part of the church's worldwide reach. John Paul canonized more saints than all his predecessors combined.
"Do you realize how big this is?" asked Herminia Fernandes, who joined the multitude at the airfield for the open-air Mass. "It's huge, this pope is visiting Brazil for the first time and at the same time he is giving us a saint. It's a blessing."
Galväo, who died in 1822, began a tradition among Brazilian Catholics of handing out tiny rice paper pills, inscribed with a Latin prayer, to people seeking cures.
