Benedict called him that shortly after he died. It's caught on pretty widely. Peggy Noonan's biography referred to him that way and there's already a university named after him in California.

I do like the idea that an actual public figure that I remember well from my lifetime is now "The Great". It makes me feel like I lived through something important. But I'm pretty much indifferent to the actual suffix itself. On one hand, it's kind of organic in a way that other titles really aren't. Albert the Great doesn't have much in common with Gregory the Great and John Paul the Great except that they were all great. It's just Albert was mostly great at being really, really smart and the other two (while also really smart) were great leaders. But the titles were largely contemporary, and if the people decide somebody's great, it's probably prudent not to interfere.

On the other hand, that's also made it sort of a title of utility so far after the fact. Most people aren't really aware of what made Albert so great (I actually *am* aware of it and I still only think of him as "the guy who taught Thomas Aquinas), just that he's the St. Albert who is called "The Great" and the other several St. Alberts aren't. If it's only going to be used as a way of distinguishing one Albert from another, that's hardly the sort of gravity people intended when they started calling him that. Plus, maybe it shouldn't be such a spontaneous title. We appropriately acknowledge that Albert was really smart when we refer to him as a Doctor of the Church. With such a wide variety of potential honorifics and nicknames, maybe "The Great" is a bit on the vague side.

But, ambivalence aside, I still kind of want it to catch on. So I'm going to use it.