Tag: relics

Relics are friends

Do you have trouble focusing at Mass? Does your attention wander, and do you find yourself forgetting why you’re there and what you’re doing?  

May I recommend worshipping with 18 saints? That’s what has helped me.  

Here’s how that came about. As I describe in Our Sunday Visitor, I found a first-class relic of St Helen and a second-class relic of St Peter’s own altar at a second-hand store.  

I paid six dollars to rescue them, got them restored and authenticated, and then set about learning why these little bits and pieces of bodies and cloth are so central to our faith.  

I ultimately turned the relics I found over to my pastor, who put them together with 16 other relics another parishioner had donated, and now all of them are in two glass cases at the altar. And we all go to Mass together: St Helen and St Peter, Sts Bridget, Bernadette, Peregrine, Anthony, Maria Goretti, Mary Magdalen, Monica, Augustine and Cecilia, Therese of Lisieux, and the apostles Phillip, Thomas, James, Bartholomew, Andrew and John, and me.  

I did not anticipate how moving it would be to see them all there, and to be there with them, with the Lord. 

I grew up in a Catholic home and had some exposure to relics, but I never really understood why the heck the church was so involved with them. I knew we were supposed to avoid treating them like magic talismans, and I understood that they were holy, but it always felt a little bit embarrassing – the kind of thing you have always done in your family but you gradually realize nobody else does; and when you ask your parents why you do it, they don’t have a good explanation.  

It felt like something that wasn’t sacred, because it was clearly a scrap of something with a little glue; but it also wasn’t profane (in the sense of ordinary and everyday), because it was a saint. It felt like something that should be hidden away, something that I would simply rather not deal with.  

It feels very different now.  

One of the things I learned, as I researched this piece, is that Catholics (and before that, ancient Jews) have always cherished and venerated physical relics of their holy dead, even – or especially – when the rest of the world found that practice creepy or dangerous or just kind of gross.  

We just really like our saints, and we like being with them, and ever since God came to earth and took on a body like ours, it just makes sense for a people who believe in the Incarnation to worship God together with bodies of the saints – not only after they die, but especially after they die.  

Because they are dead, we know they are on to something better, something we can anticipate if we stick close to them. It’s a whole group effort: Some of us are in heaven, some of us still on earth; some of us have passed into eternity, and some of us are just making our way through the 9:30am Mass on a Sunday in October; but we are all still doing the same thing, visibly together, before God. 

Seeing the relics displayed on the altar helps me tap into the mysterious gravity of what we are doing when we assemble in the church.  

When I start to feel that vague, rambling, everyday sensation, I try to remember to glance up at the altar and see the relics of the saints who are enjoying the Beatific Vision RIGHT NOW, silently but unmistakably joining in to our imperfect human form of worship here in my little New England parish. I feel, for the first time, like this august collection of saints are my friends.  

Me from 20 years ago would have rolled my eyes at this. … Read the rest of my latest for The Catholic Weekly. 

Relics are central to the Catholic faith

It was so hot and the air conditioning was so feeble I almost bailed out of line at the Salvation Army. Instead, I passed the time by checking out the jewelry case.

Blue rhinestone earrings. Some plastic bracelets. A grimy jackknife. And two relics. 

Yes, relics. They were unmistakable to the Catholic eye. Two round, brass cases the size of a half dollar, each with a glass window showing a scrap of organic material mounted on red cloth with a tiny paper label underneath. I didn’t have my reading glasses, so I couldn’t see who they were. But they were clearly somebody.

They were $3 each, so I bought them, tucked them into my wallet and drove home, trembling.

At home, I took a closer look, and nearly fell down. One said “s.Helen.Imp” and the other “S. Petri Ap.” St. Helen? St. Peter? Was this possible? 

I opened the backs, and each one revealed a blob of red wax imprinted with a seal holding in place two thin red cords. These were starting to look very real indeed. 

I took careful photos and sent them to Sacra, a Minneapolis-based private organization that restores and documents relics. Then I went back to the store to tell the manager it’s not her fault she didn’t recognize these things as relics, but if she gets any more, she should call a priest; these were very likely human remains.

Strange that they ended up at a Salvation Army in rural New Hampshire; but perhaps stranger that the Catholic Church is in the habit of saving little bits of bodies and bones and scraps of hair and cloth, putting them under glass, and praying before them in our homes and in our churches. 

Why do we do this? What does it mean? 

Pagan dread

Catholics have collected and preserved relics of their holy dead since the earliest days of the Church. 

“Anywhere you have the authentic Catholic faith, you have relics,” Sean Pilcher, founder of Sacra, told me.

When Emperor Trajan threw St. Ignatius of Antioch to the lions around the year 110, Christians recovered what was left of his body, and now his arm, breastbone and possibly his head repose in various churches. When St. Cyprian was beheaded in 259, Christians spread cloths to sop up his spilled blood. 

St. Polycarp, a disciple of the apostle John, was martyred by burning in the year 155, and the faithful collected his ashes and venerated them, calling them “more valuable than gold,” according to Deacon Tom McDonald, a teacher, hospice minister and author of the Weird Catholic Substack.

What Christians were doing was something new, and their pagan neighbors were baffled and sometimes horrified to see them so comfortable with death. It’s one thing to have keepsakes of the beloved dead, but it’s another to keep pieces of the dead themselves. The Jewish people considered dead bodies ritually impure, and even cultures that worshipped their ancestors generally did so with more fear than reverence. 

“The dead are protected against, chained down, covered in amulets to keep them from walking,” McDonald told me. “(Stories about) ghosts in the ancient world almost uniformly are based on failure to properly care for the body.” 

But Christians were not only unafraid of the dead, they believed the remains of the dead were a connection to eternal life. 

“Relics are inherently sacred things. If you say St. Andrew is in heaven, what you really mean is the soul of St. Andrew is experiencing the beatific vision; but his body is really him. It’s still on earth. So there is some way that Andrew, who is beholding the face of God, is still connected to his body,” Pilcher said. 

The bodies of the saints — especially the martyrs, who willingly followed Christ in death — have a particular relation to the the risen body of Christ.

“We believe those remains will participate in the resurrection, and we anticipate that moment by preserving them and venerating them,” McDonald said. 

“We don’t kick someone out just because they’re dead. They’re still going to come to Mass. We’re going to put them close to the altar, because that’s the first place the dead will rise. We won’t be afraid of them anymore. In fact we’re going to put their heads in glass cases and process them around the church. Take that, pagans!” 

If ancient people were afraid of making contact with dead bodies, modern people — even Catholics — often find it distasteful or disgusting. This unease is partly because modern people simply aren’t used to being close to death. We hide dead bodies away, and if they’re on view at funerals, they’re embalmed and heavily made up. 

But even those who are comfortable with death might ask how Catholics can claim to respect the human body so highly, from conception to natural death, and then cut the best ones up into bits and send them around the world. … Read the rest of my latest and I guess my last for Our Sunday Visitor. 

What’s for supper? Vol. 384: One caprese summer (relics notwithstanding)

Happy Friday! I had a week that was just plain weird.

Let me tell you about it, and also what we ate. 

SATURDAY
Nachos

Saturday I was still in the grips of whatever it was that made food into my mortal enemy last week. I went grocery shopping verrrrry slowly and cautiously, and then came home and made nachos, but did not take a photo, because I can buy food and make food, and even eat a little bit of food, but apparently pointing a camera at it is a bridge too far. 

My nachos are not terribly inspiring anyway. I just cook and season some ground beef and sprinkle it over tortilla chips, throw some jalapeños over that, and cover it with shredded cheese, then heat it up, and serve it with sour cream and salsa. It’s one of those dishes I don’t really want to start making better, because then people will expect it, and I need to preserve some quick and brainless meal preps for myself.

In the afternoon, I rested for a bit and then to the flower farm up at the top of the hill, because the rabbits gobbled my beloved poppies up, and I was just feeling tragic about my garden and its stubs. It had been murderously hot and and humid for several days, but it suddenly turned cloudy and breezy, and flower son stood gazing at the horizon, and said, “. . . In about five minutes.” And then it started to sprinkle.

So I scurried around grabbing what I came for (perennial dianthus, tickweed, and some eggplants), but not fast enough. SUCH A DOWNPOUR. I briefly turned into Fielding Mellish

But I got my flars!

SUNDAY
Grab whatever

Sunday was a little rough. I ended up having to leave Mass early and go sit in the car because I was feeling so blehhhhh. Not too bleh to take a selfie because my hair was having a nice day, though. 

Clara and Damien went to a Bonny Light Horsemen concert, and a bunch of the other kids were doing this and that, so I couldn’t work up the enthusiasm to cook anything for the small group that was left. I may have had a bagel, but I truly don’t remember.

MONDAY
Steak and peach salad

Monday I was feeling quite a bit better, and agreed to take the kids to the library. Then on the way home, I remembered we needed duck food; and then the exit from the feed store is a weird traffic spot where it’s hard to turn left, so I decided to go right and take the long way home, and as long as we were on that road, I asked the kids if they wanted to hit the Salvation Army. 

And that is how I found the first class relics of Saint Peter, Apostle, and St. Helena, Empress. 

I am not kidding. They were in the jewelry case for $3 each and I was like, “oh, um, could I see those little round pieces, please?” and then I was like, “um, oh, I will take them, please.” I zipped them into my Vera Bradley wallet, because I didn’t know what else to do. And that is where they still are, actually. 

I didn’t have my reading glasses onat the store, so I couldn’t read the little labels until I got home. It just felt too insane to take in, and still does.

But I carefully unscrewed the backs

and saw this:

I talked to Sean Pilcher of Sacra Relics and sent some photos, and he said they are “doubtlessly authentic,” and that the wax seal inside is the seal of Giuseppe Nicolini, the bishop of Assisi who founded the Assisi Network that saved hundreds of Jews during World War II.

So. 

I have relics. Most likely.

I still have to pack them up and send them over to be cleaned and repaired, and I hope they can be documented. Pilcher said one of the major misconceptions about relics is that Catholics expect you to accept on blind faith that they are what we say they are; but actually it’s a pretty rigorous process of authentication that draws on expertise from several different fields. So we shall see!

In the mean time, it sure looks like our household picked up a couple of amazing new friends. I’m working on writing a long piece about it, and just trying to understand what it could possibly mean that I’m temporarily sharing a bedroom with some nearly 2000-year-old bone fragments of a man who was chosen by Jesus to be the rock on which the Church is built, and the woman who found the true cross. I’m open to ideas! I’m open to all kinds of things. 

My sister and her husband are making a reliquary for them, for as long as they will be in our house, and I’m waiting to hear back from my pastor about whether our parish wants and can accommodate them, and I talked further with Sean Pilcher and left some messages with Fr. Carlos Martins who hosts Treasures of the Church. My first goal is to have them as local as possible, with as much access for the faithful as possible.

I just. I don’t know. At first I was frightened and distressed, but now I am growing attached. 

Told you I was having a weird week! And yes, I did go back to the Salvation Army to see if there was . . . anything else. Which there was not, except for a silly nicknack from Target or something that looks exactly like a monstrance, except with a mirror in the middle. I talked to the manager about what I had found, and she said that, if someone drops off relics again, they will call a priest. (I was like, “So, for future reference, these are human remains. . . ” and she was like, “We can’t know everything!” and I was like “OH, I KNOW.”)

But! Relics none the less, I still needed to make supper. And this is still a food blog. So.

London broil was on sale, so I got four nice cuts. I seasoned them with salt and pepper, heated a skillet up screamingly hot and melted some butter on it, and then seared each steak for three or four minutes per side. 

Very nice. 

Some of it was a little underdone, even for us, so I threw those pieces back in the pan and finished them up while I cut up a bunch of peaches. So we had mixed greens, beef strips, peaches, crumbled goat cheese, and a sweet vinaigrette. 

Superb. I was feeling extremely depleted in general, so some lovely rare beef really hit the spot. 

TUESDAY
Corn dogs and chips

Tuesday I was feeling very much better, and RELICS NONETHELESS, I scurried around getting caught up on weeding and mulching and yard work. The grass was pretty high, and that is how I mowed right over an aerosol can of bug spray, which exploded with a bang and a cloud. No biggie, I have St. Peter and St. Helen in charge of the house now. I can run over whatever I want!

I’m just talking. I don’t know what is going on, for real. 

WEDNESDAY
Caprese pasta

Wednesday was our long-anticipated annual dumpstravaganza, relics howbeit. The kids cheerfully and willingly, just kidding, helped me drag a year’s worth of clutter and horrible crap from the yard into the driveway

and then I ruthlessly cleared off the porch, and four trips to the dump later, it looks like human beings live here.

You know you’re having a wonderful day when the dump guy asks if you’re okay. I was okay! I was just hot and exhausted and deep in “WE HAVE TO THROW EVERYTHING OUT AND WHAT IS THE MATTER WITH THESE PEOPLE AND WHAT IS THE MATTER WITH THIS HOUSE” mode. You’d think a dump guy would be familiar with that look, honestly. 

Got home and decided to tear down the vines that I had spent the last five or six years cultivating to grow over the porch to disguise its shabbiness. I had ordered Concord grape vines, which arrived as bare roots. I dutifully watered and fertilized and trained them, and was so excited that they finally started putting out fruit last year! And that is when I discovered that I may have ordered grape vines, but what they sent me were actually porcelain berry, which is poisonous and invasive. LE SIGH. So we’re starting over. 

Around 5:00, I saw to my dismay that I had scheduled myself to make a brand new recipe, which wasn’t ideal for how hot and pissed off I already was, but I didn’t want to waste the tomatoes and basil I had bought. So I made this caprese pasta from Sip and Feast.

Tiny little bit of prep work

but it came together very fast, and I thought it was delicious. 

Tasted exactly like what it was, of course (you can’t see it, but there are hunks of half-melted fresh mozzarella in there, and a good amount of red pepper flakes), which is a good thing. Lovely summer dish.

And now the last three times I made pasta, I did not overcook it! I can learn. 

THURSDAY
Pizza

On Thursday (relics regardlessly) I finally finally finally got back to working on the deck. In my old age, I have gained enough wisdom to realize that nobody who is feeling weak and shaky needs to be messing with a Sawzall, so I kept putting it off and putting it off.

But Thursday I was ready, and I got so much done. I took out the bad joist and put in a new joist with different hardware (and it fit, and *ahem* I rejoist) and cut and installed some floor planks, to close up the gap between the original structure and the new platform

Before:

and after:

Then I added a post on one corner and reinforced it with a sort of sheath of two long boards; and then I put a bottom sort of kickboard thingy (I don’t know what you call anything) and a top railing on. 

So today, all I need to do is buy some spindles or something, to fill in the railing, and then paint or stain it all, and it will be DONE.

I really wanted stairs for it, but that will be next year’s project. It has a ladder on one end and a climbing wall on the other, so it’s easy enough to get up and down. I know this, because I did it approximately 927 times yesterday, because I am constitutionally incapable of thinking about what tools I will need before I climb up a ladder.

I am so pleased with how it’s turning out.  I know it still looks very much like something that most people would be finally getting around to getting rid of; but it’s quite stable and strong, and the kids like hanging out of it. Once it’s had a little sanding and it’s all one color, I think it will look a lot more reputable. I have a vision, I tell you! And my secret is being too dumb to stop even when I realize I don’t know what I’m doing. 

Clara kindly made pizza for us. One pepperoni, one cheese, and one with leftover goat cheese, leftover basil, and red onion, which was fantastic. I forgot to eat all day, so believe me when I tell you. That was some good pizza. Relics notwithstanding. 

FRIDAY
Fish tacos

Just tortillas, frozen breaded fish, avocados, salsa, and sour cream. I just this moment realized this is supposed to have shredded cabbage on it, which I forgot to buy. Maybe I will chop up some collard greens, which are coming in nicely and desperately need thinning.

Oh, and fish tacos are supposed to have cilantro and limes. WELL, maybe I will go to the store. Maybe I’ll go to Aldi and find the Ark of the Covenant, who knows? 

Also, in relics notwithstanding news, I think I can say for certain that the weight loss I experienced when I was in full on NO FOOD NO HOW mode was not “just water weight.” I lost nine pounds when I was super sick, but I’ve been back to eating normal food for several days now, and, deliberately riding the wave of encouragement from having lost nine pounds, I lost another three pounds, meaning I’m back under The Terrible Number once again. 

My only regret is that I’m still revolted by even the idea of shrimp. Shrimp used to be my all-time favorite luxury treat, and now it feel like more of a threat. But you know, when I was about six, I had some Crackerjacks and then threw up out the window of my grandfather’s Toyota on the New Jersey Turnpike, and it was years and years before I could even think of Crackerjacks again. But now I can! Crackerjacks, crackerjacks. See? I’m fine. So I’m sure someday I’ll live to shrimp again. 

And that was my week! Headed to adoration in a bit, and I will ask St. Peter and St. Helena to watch over all of you, and make your collards grow or your power tools behave or your fat melt or your kids be helpful or whatever it is that you need. It’s on the house, especially if you’re too dumb to stop when you realize you don’t know what you’re doing. What a world. 

 

 

Padre Pio’s relics touring North America (and here’s what my husband said about his heart)

Relics of Padre Pio, including his glove and robe, a lock of his hair, a sweat-soaked handkerchief from his deathbed, some blood-stained cotton gauze, and scabs from his stigmata will be visiting several churches in North America for veneration by the faithful.

Yeah, it’s weird! Our faith is weird. 

Here is the full list of cities the relics will visit.

In 2016, the beloved saint’s heart came to Immaculate Conception Church in Lowell, MA, and my husband Damien, who is a newspaper reporter, went to see and venerate it. I asked him a few questions about his experience (originally published in 2016).

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What made you want to go and see Padre Pio’s heart? 

I really didn’t know that much about Padre Pio, other than the stigmata and “Pray, Hope, and Don’t Worry.” I found out about his heart coming to the area just a couple of days before. The relic’s first stop was in Lowell, Massachusetts, which is a 10-minute drive from the paper’s offices. I figured I could get something pretty interesting out of a saint’s heart, and I would get a chance to go see a relic as part of my job. Maybe not entirely noble, but I’m busy.

I like relics, and I like that Catholics have this weird and intense spirituality that includes things like hearts, and fingers, and bits of the True Cross, and incorruptible saints. It’s hard to describe to outsiders, and it is as strange as anything, but it somehow feels right.

What was the scene like in the church? What was the mood like among the people there? 

The line to get in went outside the church. I was later told more than 3,000 people went to this church to see Padre Pio’s heart. There were a lot of people from different religious orders, and a few oddballs, but I was kind of taken aback by how many normal looking people were there. Lots of senior citizens and moms with kids, lots of guys in suits, stopping by on their lunch break. It was a big mix of people. The folks in line with me were really excited to be there.

Inside the church, the priests were leading a rosary in French, and Spanish, and English. Lowell is a big, old New England mill town, with a ton of French Canadian immigrants from decades ago, and a new influx of Latino immigrants. It’s a very Catholic city. But it wasn’t just Lowell people there. There were people from all over New England making the pilgrimage.

What did the actual relic look like? How were people venerating it? 

A stern-looking Capuchin held the reliquary that contained the heart, and people would get a chance to touch it. One by one, they would genuflect and either touch the reliquary, or kiss it. Some people brought prayer cards to touch to the reliquary.

It’s hard to describe, because it was hard to look at. It was red, and in two connected parts. There seemed to be some white bone underneath it. I say it is hard to look at, because I was overcome with a sense of too-muchness. It was too much to see. Not in a gross way, but in a personal way; here was Padre Pio, showing something deeply personal about himself to me.

It wasn’t until I got outside that I realized I was overcome with emotion. I was happy to nearly the point of tears. I felt like something heavy and difficult had been taken away, but I don’t even know what.

Do you feel any differently about Padre Pio now than you did before?

I’ve been reading about him since yesterday, and I am trying to take the experience I had by touching the reliquary that held his heart, and bring it to what I can learn about him.

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Photos by Damien Fisher, used with permission

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