I have nothing against Stephen Jay Gould, but I don’t think he deserves to be a Virian saint. I don’t dislike him or anything, but (this is just one complaint among many) not only was he never a big fan of Dawkins’s meme theory, he didn’t even like the concept of cultural evolution. As he says in his otherwise-excellent book Full House (pages 219–220), “Using the term—evolution—for both natural and cultural history obfuscates far more than it enlightens. . . . Why not speak of something more neutral and descriptive—‘cultural change,’ for example?”

But Gregor Mendel might work, despite his religious handicap.
I had originally intended to try to get Nietzsche canonized as a Virian saint (as a few other Virions have proposed in the past), but after further reflection, I don’t think he was a paragon of Virianhood. And he understood Darwin too poorly (because he probably only knew Darwinism through second-hand sources) to fully appreciate the explanatory power of evolution by natural selection. (And in his autobiography, Ecce Homo, he seemed genuinely offended that some “scholarly oxen” had accused him of Darwinism because of the way he had explained the concept of the Übermensch in Thus Spoke Zarathustra—that the overman will be as superior to man as man is to the apes.)

I do, however, stand by the canonization of Richard Dawkins as a Virian saint. I’m conducting a little informal poll on the Suggestion Box message board. (Because, as far as I know, I’m not authorized to initiate a formal poll.) And, hopefully, depending upon the response, this will lead to a more formal poll.