Pope Francis canonised Argentina's "gaucho priest" Sunday, bestowing sainthood on the ponchowearing pastor with whom the first Argentine pope shares many similarities, from a taste for mate tea to a dedication to bringing the ministry to even the most isolated people.

Francis honored Jose Gabriel del Rosario Brochero along with six others in a Mass before a crowd of 80,000 in St. Peter's Square, saying the new saints, "thanks to prayer, had generous and steadfast hearts."

"The saints are men and women who enter fully into the mystery of prayer. Men and women who struggle with prayer, letting the Holy Spirit pray and struggle in them," the pope said.

Also made into saints were two Italian priests, Lodovico Pavoni and Alfonso Maria Fusco, French martyr Salomone Leclercq, French nun Elisabeth of the Trinity, Spanish bishop Manuel Gonzalez Garcia and Mexican layman Jose Sanchez del Rio.