Sacred Origins of Profound Things, page 28
MIRACLES. The canonization process—which may take place years or decades later, and is essentially the same—cannot begin until, traditionally, at least two authentic miracles have occurred in the candidate’s name since beatification. However, judging miracles today, in light of medical knowledge and the physiological aspects of disease, is quite a different process than in the past. In fact, it is so difficult to authenticate a “healing” miracle today, that a pope may decide to modify greatly—or suspend entirely—that requirement for sainthood.
It was not until the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, under popes Urban VIII and Benedict XIV, that the processes of beatification and canonization were formalized. And a special process called “equivalent canonization” was invoked to grant persons already venerated for centuries the status of official sainthood.
SUPPRESSING A SAINT
Just as a pope through an “annulment” can dissolve an undissolvable marriage between a man and a woman—after many years of the husband and wife sleeping together and rearing children—so, too, can a pope “suppress” a saint after that saint has enjoyed decades of public veneration and papal approval.
Why would a saint long venerated suddenly be suppressed?
Further historical research may cast serious doubts on a saint’s holiness, virtue, or miracles associated with his or her name. However, just as a legal prosecutor is loath to reopen a criminal case, viewing the action as an admission of error, so, too, is the Vatican disinclined to retry a saint and evidence of miracles.
Most saints are suppressed because historical sleuthing reveals that a particular saint never existed in the flesh, only in popular imagination. Pope Paul VI, in 1968, for instance, abolished forty saints’ feast days from the Church calendar.
Among the suppressed:
SAINT BARBARA, fourth-century virgin martyr; patron of gunners, artillery men, firefighters, fireworks makers, miners, fire and lightning, and sudden death. In short, explosives. Former feast day, December 4.
Barbara, a great beauty, youthful virgin, and secret Christian, was locked in a tower by her father, Dioscurus, for her own good, he said. Dioscurus commissioned a bathing pool to be built for his own use near the tower. The construction worker glimpsed the chaste beauty, who asked him to add a third window to her tower—symbolizing the Trinity. The father, certain the window was not the only thing the worker had erected, drew his sword to slay his daughter, who leaped from her new window.
Father and daughter then fought; he demanded she renounce her faith, as she had given up her virginity; she declined. He stripped her naked, flogged her bloody, cut off her head. From Heaven came a mighty bolt of lightning that instantly rendered the father cinders. Hence, Barbara became the patron of explosives.
Venerated in Italy throughout the Middle Ages, Saint Barbara was suppressed by the modern Church, which could find only fanciful legend as the basis for her existence.
SAINT CHRISTOPHER, third-century bachelor martyr; patron of travelers, motorists, pilgrims, bus drivers, truck drivers, skiers; anyone on the move. Former feast day, July 25. One of the best known and most loved of all the patron saints, Christopher was suppressed in 1969 after centuries of veneration. The act was inevitable. Still, it troubled many Catholics at the time.
At twenty-four feet tall, with the face of a dog (some legends say he had the full head of a dog), Christopher was the most feared man in his native Palestine. He intimidated Satan himself. One stormy night, he ferried a small child on his shoulders through raging floodwaters. The child grew mysteriously heavier and heavier, but the giant Christopher never collapsed. Upon reaching the safety of shore, the child revealed himself to be Christ; the name “Christopher” is from the Greek Christophoros, “one who carries Christ,” and its original connotation was spiritual, not shoulder-bearing physical.
Christopher planted his staff in the floodwaters and it instantly became a palm tree. Then he set off on a campaign of preaching and brothel-closing. His cult soared during the Middle Ages, and with the advent of the automobile, Saint Christopher medallions dangled from many a rearview mirror. By then, his visage was that of a handsome man, if overly large.
The suppression of no other saint in modern times—his status was reduced to that of a “local cult”—has caused such disappointment among believers. Many Roman Catholics continue to carry Saint Christopher medals.
SAINT EUSTACE, martyr of the early Church; patron of hunters, people in difficult situations, families in turmoil. Former feast day, September 20.
One of the most popular saints of the Middle Ages, Eustace was a wealthy Roman, perhaps captain of the guards under the emperor Trajan. While hunting one day in the woods near Tivoli, Italy, he encountered a stag with a luminous crucifix between its antlers. “Thou shalt suffer many things for My sake,” said a mysterious voice. And right it was. The huntsman converted to Christianity, was kicked out of the army and reduced to abject poverty. Pirates kidnapped his wife. Wild boars carried off his son.
Years later, his wife miraculously reappeared, none the worse for wear; then the son reappeared, intact. As the family celebrated their good fortune, the emperor ordered them to worship idols. When lions would not consume them in the arena, the family was stuffed into the belly of a large brass bull and roasted to death. Hence, Eustace became the patron of families in trouble. The legend did not hold up under modern scrutiny.
EXPEDITUS, Armenian martyr; patron of emergencies and hospital emergency rooms—most likely because of the word play between his name and the term “expeditious.” Former feast day, April 19.
Amazingly little is known about the saint; that’s the problem. His name was long invoked in Germany and Sicily in cases of pressing emergency. He seems to have come into existence through a misunderstanding.
As the tale goes: Bishops in Rome once mailed a crate containing the bones of an anonymous saint to a convent in Paris for safekeeping. The crate was labeled in Italian SPEDITO, “Express” or “Special delivery.” The well-intentioned nuns, schooled in Latin, took “spedito” to be the martyr’s name and christened him with the Latin equivalent, Expeditus. With so flimsy a legend, it’s surprising the saint was not suppressed more expediently.
SAINT MARGARET, virgin martyr; patroness of childbirth; former feast day, July 20. Hers was one of the “voices” that spoke to Joan of Arc.
One of the most popular female saints of the Middle Ages, Margaret is yet another example of a stunning beauty who sought lifelong virginity but was sexually harassed by overbearing men; one threw her in jail. In her cell, she was visited by Satan in the form of a dragon, who swallowed her. A crucifix around her neck elongated into a sword, and she sliced her way out of Satan’s belly. Hence she became the patron of C-sections.
Another spurned suitor had her beheaded. Her many mortal relics were highly prized in the Middle Ages, and were stolen from churches on more than one occasion. Later research revealed that her life was pure fiction, something of a “romance novel,” written by a man who called himself Theotimus. Whether it was fact or fiction, the tale of a beautiful virgin forced into sexual submission and then slaughtered by her oppressor riveted common folk, for whom it obviously rang true.
SAINT PHILOMENA, virgin martyr; former feast day, August 11. In 1802, the bones of an adolescent girl were unearthed in the catacomb of Priscilla in Rome. Turned over to a parish priest of Mugnano, near Naples, they were enshrined in his church as relics of the legendary Saint Philomena. Local veneration escalated into near worship; miraculous cures were reported at the shrine; pilgrimages to Mugnano multiplied; new churches were dedicated in the name of Saint Philomena. Her feast day was set.
In this century, the science of archaeology proved that the bones could not have belonged to a centuries-old virgin martyr. The facts precipitated a scandal, for Philomena was no obscure, half-forgotten saint, but one actively venerated throughout Italy. Still, in 1961, the pope declared Saint Philomena “suppressed.” The shrine at Mugnano was dismantled, and her name was stricken from the Church calendar.
CHAPTER
15
Relics
Buddha’s Tooth to Christ’s Cross
MORTAL RELICS AND SACRED ARTIFACTS: ALL FAITHS
Buddha’s tooth, canine, left side, is honored at the Tooth Shrine at Kandy, Sri Lanka. His two collarbones and three other canine teeth are the focus of widespread devotion in other Asian temples. His alms bowl, with which he solicited donations, is venerated in Peshawar, India.
In Buddhism, in fact, relics play a greater role than in any other of the major non-Christian religions. A follower circles a stupa, or shrine, several times, offering food and flowers while meditating on doctrines taught by the Buddha, a devotion called “circumambulation.”
In Christianity, there are Saint Paul’s handkerchiefs, which he used to swab the sick. The hankies aren’t extant, but they are significant in that they represent the very first Christian reference to relics—those personal artifacts or mortal remains of holy men and women. Items that spawn miracles still. The New Testament mentions these first Christian relics. Gospel writer Luke, a physician, writing in 65 C.E., tells us:
God worked extraordinary miracles at the hands of Paul. When handkerchiefs or cloths which had touched his skin were applied to the sick, their diseases were cured and evil spirits departed from them. (Acts 19:11–12)
There is the heart of Saint Teresa (d. 1582), patron of heart disease, at the convent in Ávila. In life, she claimed to have experienced God’s deep love “like a lance driven into the heart,” and today her heart is displayed under glass, wearing a small decorative crown. According to tradition, a slice of the heart is venerated in Milan. An arm in Lisbon. A breast in Rome at the Church of Saint Pancras—himself the patron of headaches; he was beheaded at age fourteen and is best known today for the London railway station that bears his name. Saint Teresa’s remains are said to be miraculously incorrupt, still emitting “a fragrance of roses that is overpowering.”
Then there are innumerable splinters from Christ’s bloodied cross; plus the nails that held Jesus to the wood; plus the vinegar-soaked sponge on which he sucked, and the lance that pierced his side, as well as the cotton shroud, now at Turin, which swaddled Christ’s body and became stained with his crown-of-thorns likeness. All of which we’ll examine.
What to believe, though? What is authentic?
At least it can be said with certainty that the word “relic” is from the Latin plural relinquiae, “remains.” Equally trustworthy, the Latin verb form of the word, relinquere, gives us our English verb “to relinquish.”
Let’s start at the beginning, with the Jews.
JEWISH SACRED OBJECTS:
OLD TESTAMENT, 2 KINGS 13:20–21
Jews do not recognize saints, and they do not venerate relics.
Jews do recognize certain religious articles as being sacred, such as a Torah, a mezuzah, and tefillin. In Hebrew, such items are called tashmishay kodesh, “appurtenances of holiness,” and they must be treated with respect; buried or stored away when no longer in use.
The Talmud details how sacred articles are to be disposed of, or converted into other uses. For instance, an eternal light or menorah can be sold in order to earn money to commission a scribe to write a Torah, but a Torah cannot be sold to buy a menorah because the latter is of lesser sanctity. The hierarchy of worth is not unlike the Catholic concept of relics of three different classes, which we’ll get to.
Hebrew Scriptures suggest that some people believed relics of holy prophets retain miraculous powers. Elisha, for instance, is long dead and buried when the body of a second man is tossed into the prophet’s grave:
When the man came in contact with the bones of Elisha, he came back to life and rose to his feet. (2 Kings 13:21)
CHRISTIAN RELICS: SECOND CENTURY C.E.
Devotion to relics started early in the Christian Church. Not surprisingly, the mortal remains and personal artifacts of martyrs were among the earliest venerated objects. They were abundant, and their authenticity was probably genuine, due to the propinquities of time and place.
HINDUISM Hinduism, like Judaism, does not recognize relics. This is undoubtedly the result of two facts. Hinduism has no historical founder like Judaism’s Abraham, Christianity’s Christ, Islam’s Muhammad, or Buddhism’s Buddha. Then, too, Hinduism regards the physical world, and existence itself, as illusory. Thus, it is somewhat pointless to venerate the corporeal remains and earthly possessions of holy men.
During the second century C.E., in the Martyrdom of Polycarp, the bones of the martyred bishop of Smyrna in Asia Minor, collected out of his cremation ashes, are described as “more valuable than precious gems, more costly than gold.” Already a cultus had begun.
Saint Polycarp (c. 65 to c. 151) preached the Gospel throughout Greece. When he was in his eighties, he attended a festival held in Smyrna, attended by Statius Quadratus, a proconsul of Caesar. In the public arena, Statius demanded three times that Polycarp deny Christ and embrace Caesar. Thrice Polycarp refused, finally saying: “For eighty-six years I have served Christ, and he has done me no injustice. How, then, can I blaspheme my king and Savior? Hear me declare with boldness, ‘I am a Christian.’ ”
Incensed, Statius ordered that the bishop be burned at the stake alive. As flames licked his robes, Polycarp was heard to pray: “I thank thee, Heavenly Father, that thou hast thought me worthy of this day and hour, that I should have a part in the number of thy martyrs in the cup of Christ.” The feast day of Saint Polycarp is February 23, the date, according to tradition, of his martyrdom.
Every new Christian congregation sought relics of martyred saints to seal into its church altar. By the sixth century, side altars were being built specifically to honor certain saints and their mortal remains. Three classes of relics developed.
• First-class relics are corporeal parts of saints—hair, bones, teeth, and “incorruptible” flesh, blood, and hearts; as well as artifacts from Christ’s Passion and death.
• Second-class relics are articles of clothing and household artifacts touched by saints, as well as instruments of a martyr’s torture.
• Third-class relics stretch the definition of reliquiae as “remains,” for they are merely items that have touched second-class or first-class relics. Holy by association. Their ability to work miracles is, by the logic of hagiolatry, less impressive than that of higher-class relics.
ISLAMIC RELICS Like Christians, Muslims have hoarded and honored mortal remains and personal artifacts of their many saints, and of their Prophet Muhammad: two hairs from Muhammad’s head are kept in a domed reliquary in Jerusalem, which itself rests beside the huge limestone rock from which the Prophet is said to have ascended into Heaven. This is known as the Dome of the Rock. The rock itself is also a relic, since it touched the Prophet.
Unlike Christianity, Islam has never officially sanctioned the veneration of relics; or for that matter homage paid at the tombs of saints. In fact, as we’ve seen earlier, saints themselves were only grudgingly due to the devotions of the faithful. The reason for the official resistance is simple. Muhammad, unlike Christ, insisted that his nature was purely human, nondivine; not a bone in his body was more than a bone. Only Allah was to be worshiped, all idolatry condemned.
CHURCH APPROVAL. The veneration of relics grew rapidly in Christianity. Saint Augustine found that soil from the Holy Land worked miracles (and grew better plants; the Miracle-Gro of its day), and Saint Jerome early on distinguished between the worship of God and the veneration of relics: “We do not worship [relics] … but we venerate the relics of the martyrs in order to better adore Him whose martyrs they are.”
The Council of Gangra in 340 C.E. decreed excommunication of Christians who did not believe wholeheartedly in relics. The Second Council of Nicaea in 787 was equally harsh in its condemnation of those suspicious of relics. This stand was backed by the Council of Constantinople in 1084.
HOW MIRACLES HAPPEN. Although miracles were associated with relics from the beginning, it was during the hardships of the Dark Ages that relics acquired an almost fierce magical potency. And dubious authenticity. There was, in short, a suspicious glut of saintly remains coming from all parts of Europe and Asia. The bloody Crusades of the late Middle Ages produced countless questionable relics and brought into suspicion the ethical means of procurement.
There was, of course, no concept of scientific testing for authenticity. Tradition was the sole measure of a relic’s value; if the legend surrounding a relic was old enough, believed devoutly enough, and the relic produced miracles—a major criterion—the item was deemed genuine.
Five planks from the wooden manger that held the Infant Jesus were brought to Rome during the pontificate of Theodore I (642–49).
Master theologian Thomas Aquinas championed the veneration of the relics of saints, and reasoned that God would indeed work miracles in the presence of a relic. How did a relic work? A relic served as a magnifying lens, said Thomas, which concentrated the glorious rays of God’s grace. A saint’s bone fragment served as a kind of home base from which the Holy Spirit worked.
Today, many relics in shrines around the world stretch credulity. Their “authenticity” is based largely if not solely on legend and lore. That they are still working miracles, and drawing pilgrimages, says less about the relics themselves and more about the role of belief in the phenomenon of healing. The Church itself acknowledges this.
