The Biblical, Theological and Historical Foundation
of the Veneration of
The Relics of the Saints in the Catholic Church

By Fr. Christopher Owczarek, sdb

At the end of this year, the relics of Don Bosco will arrive to East Africa. This will be just one stop on a world-wide pilgrim journey to commemorate the 150th anniversary of the founding of the Salesian Congregation — 1859-2009 and to prepare for the bicentennial of the birth of Don Bosco — 1815-2015.
It is in this context, that we wish to deepen our understanding of this coming event by re-examining the biblical, theological and historical foundation of the veneration of the relics of the saints in the Catholic Church. In order to do so, we shall try to answer few relevant questions.

1. What are the relicts?

Relicts are the material remains of the saints which are venerated as signs of their continued presence in the world. The word relic comes from the Latin
reliquiae, meaning "remains" or "something left behind" (the same root as relinquish). A reliquary is a repository or receptacle or even a shrine that houses one or more religious relics.

These relics are divided into three classes:

2. Is the Veneration of the Relics peculiar to the Catholic Church?

The veneration of relics, is to some extent a primitive instinct, and it is associated with many other religious systems besides that of Christianity.

At Athens the supposed remains of ancient heroes, Oedipus and Theseus enjoyed an honour which it is very difficult to distinguish from a religious cult (see for all this Pfister, "Reliquienkult in Altertum", I, 1909), while Plutarch gives an account of the translation of the bodies of Demetrius (Demetr. iii) and Phocion (Phoc. xxxvii) which in many details anticipates the Christian practice of the Middle Ages. Miracles and healing were only rarely attributed to them;
rather, their presence protected the city, as the tomb of Oedipus was said to protect Athens. The tomb of Theseus, instead, became a sanctuary and a place of refuge for runaway slaves and all men of low estate who were afraid of men in power.

The bones or ashes of Aesculapius at Epidaurus, of Perdiccas I at Macedon, and even of the Persian Zoroaster (Zarathustra), were treated with the deepest veneration.

As for the Far East, the famous story of the distribution of the relics of Buddha, an incident which is believed to have taken place immediately after his death, seems to have found remarkable confirmation in certain modern archaeological discoveries. (See Journ. of R. Asiatic Society, 1909, pp.
1056 sqq.). Some relics believed to be original remains of the body of the Buddha still survive, including the much-revered Sacred Relic of the tooth of the Buddha in Sri Lanka. In any case the extreme development of relic-worship amongst the Buddhists of every sect is a fact beyond dispute.

Even looking at the recent history, the relics of the famous people are carefully preserved. At Ford's Theater Museum for instance, we can see things that belonged to President Lincoln, including the blood stained pillow on which he died.

In our technological age the idea of relics should also not be strange as all of us treasure things that have belonged to someone we loved — a piece of clothing, another personal item, a lock of hair. Those "relics" remind us of the love we shared with that person while they were still living and even after death. Our hearts are torn when we think about disposing of the very personal things of a deceased loved one.

3. Has then the Catholic Church “baptized” and theologically justified those pagan or, we can say, purely human practices
and even developed them? Or, as the great Reformer Martin Luther maintained, was the worship of relics a money-making
invention of the worldly Church that deserved and deserves a condemnation?

We need to state this right away: the Church has not invented the veneration of the relics as she has not invented the Incarnation of Christ nor his Resurrection. As in the case of the Incarnation and Resurrection of Jesus, those who came to believe in him did so because of the overwhelming evidence of his supernatural power and presence even after his death. Similarly, in case of the relics, i.e., the material remains of the saints, the believers simply witnessed some extraordinary events associated with them.

Regarding Christ’s Incarnation and Resurrection we read in 1 John 1:1-3: That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon and touched with our hands, concerning the word of life — 2 the life was made manifest, and we saw it, and testify to it, and proclaim to you the eternal life which was with the Father and was made manifest to us — 3 that which we have seen and heard we proclaim also to you….

For Paul who was a Pharisee, deeply rooted in the Law of Moses, it was absolutely impossible to believe that a crucified man could be the Messiah.
The Law positively excluded this (Deut 21:22-23: And if a man has committed a crime punishable by death and he is put to death, and you hang him on a tree, 23 his body shall not remain all night upon the tree, but you shall bury him the same day, for a hanged man is accursed by God). That is why he felt obliged to eradicate “the Jesus’ sect” considered by him as a pernicious heresy (cf. Phil 3:5-6; Acts 26:5-11) till the day he himself met the risen
Christ and was compelled to re-think and re-evaluate everything he believed to be true. As a result, Paul became one of the greatest apostles of the crucified and risen Son of God.

Already during his ministry on earth, Jesus displayed his divine power through his word and touch. Even the clothes he wore when approached with faith could transmit his healing power. We read in the Gospel according to Luke 8:43-48: 43 And a woman who had had a flow of blood for twelve years and could not be healed by anyone, 44 came up behind him, and touched the fringe of his garment; and immediately her flow of blood ceased. 45 And Jesus said, "Who was it that touched me?" When all denied it, Peter said, "Master, the multitudes surround you and press upon you!" 46 But Jesus said, "Some one touched me; for I perceive that power has gone forth from me." 47 And when the woman saw that she was not hidden, she came trembling, and falling down before him declared in the presence of all the people why she had touched him, and how she had been immediately healed. 48 And he said to her, "Daughter, your faith has made you well; go in peace." What happened to that woman was not just an isolated event, for as the Gospel according to Mark (6:56) tells us: wherever he came, in villages, cities, or country, they laid the sick in the market places, and besought him that they might touch even the fringe of his garment; and as many as touched it were made well.

Jesus promised his disciples that those who believe in him would do the works he was doing and even greater then these (John 14:12: Truly, truly, I say to you, he who believes in me will also do the works that I do; and greater works than these will he do, because I go to the Father.) This prophecy came true after the ascension of Jesus. In the New Testament we find the description of such great works in the life of the apostles Peter and Paul.
We read in the Acts of the Apostles: (5:14-16) And more than ever believers were added to the Lord, multitudes both of men and women, 15 so that they even carried out the sick into the streets, and laid them on beds and pallets, that as Peter came by at least his shadow might fall on some of them. 16 The people also gathered from the towns around Jerusalem, bringing the sick and those afflicted with unclean spirits, and they were all healed. Then in 19:11-12: And God did extraordinary miracles by the hands of Paul, 12 so that handkerchiefs or aprons were carried away from his body to the sick, and diseases left them and the evil spirits came out of them.

If just a shadow cast by Peter’s body or a handkerchief that touched the body of Paul were bringing healing, this was a clear indication that their bodies were the dwelling place of the Holy Spirit and the divine power emanated from them. (Cf. 1 Cor 6:19 Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit within you, which you have from God?). Christians expected that even after their death the time would come when their bodies would rise to everlasting life, transformed and glorified but still their bodies (cf. 1 Cor 15:35-57).

The Old Testament believed that where was God there was no death and where was death there was no God. In fact, whoever touched the dead body or was just present in the room where the diseased person was became unclean for a week and needed to undergo a ritual bath on the third and seventh day (cf. Num 19:11-22). The Resurrection of Jesus changed all this as it was the best proof that God was present even in the death of Jesus and thus, in Jesus, the death itself has been redeemed.

The bodies of all who believed in Christ were now destined for the future glorification when they would be enjoying the life in communion with the glorified Lord himself. That is why, Christians, right from the beginning, venerated the bodies of their great apostles and martyrs and wished to be buried close to them in order to be raised together with them. It seems to have been felt that when the souls of the blessed martyrs on the day of general resurrection were once more united to their bodies, they would be accompanied in their passage to heaven by those who lay around them and that these last might on their account find more ready acceptance with God. In this way, martyriums began to be built over the sites of martyr's graves. One of them was Old Saint Peter's Basilica. These were initially not regular churches, but large "funerary halls" or "covered cemeteries" crammed with graves, and celebrating funerary and memorial services.

St. Gregory of Nyssa (c. A.D. 335-394) in his sermons on the forty martyrs, after describing how their bodies were burned by command of the persecutors, explains that "their ashes and all that the fire had spared have been so distributed throughout the world that almost every province has had its share of the blessing. He then adds: “I also myself have a portion of this holy gift and I have laid the bodies of my parents beside the ashes of these warriors, that in the hour of the resurrection they may be awakened together with these highly privileged comrades” (P.G., XLVI, 764).

A really touching in this regard is the letter written by the inhabitants of Smyrna, about 156 A.D., describing the martyrdom of St. Polycarp. After he had been burnt at the stake, as the Smyrnaeans say, “we took up his bones, which are more valuable than precious stones and finer than refined gold, and laid them in a suitable place, where the Lord will permit us to gather ourselves together, as we are able, in gladness and joy, and to celebrate the birthday of his martyrdom.” This is the keynote which is echoed in a multitude of similar passages found a little later in the patristic writers of both East and West. Other accounts attest that the faithful visited the burial places of the saints and miracles occurred. Moreover, at this time, we see the development of "feast days" marking the death of the saint, the celebration of Mass at the burial place, and a veneration of the remains.

After the legalization of the Church in 313, the tombs of saints were opened and the actual relics were venerated by the faithful. A bone or other bodily part was placed in a reliquary — a box, locket, and later a glass case — for veneration. This practice especially grew in the Eastern Church, while the practice of touching cloth to the remains of the saint was more common in the West. By the time of the Merovingian (V-VIII cent. A.D.) and Carolingian (VIII-IX cent. A.D.) periods of the Middle Ages, the use of reliquaries was common throughout the whole Church. Belief in the efficacy of such relics led to the division of remains among many churches and believers. Wherever the relics of great saints were known to exist, Christians confidently expected miracles to take place. In 415 AD the disinterred body of St Stephen wrought miraculous cures and pilgrims flocked to his shrine in Jerusalem.
St. Ambrose (ca. 337-397) and St. Augustine (354-430) declared in their writings that they had not merely heard and read about the marvels witnessed at the tombs of the martyrs, where “the blind and cripples are restored to health, the dead recalled to life, and devils expelled from the bodies of men”; they did not only hear about such miracles as many did but saw them with their own eyes", (Ambrose, Epist. xxii, nn. 2 and 17, Augustine, Serm. cclxxxvi, c.v.; City of God XXII, "Confess.", ix).

The early Fathers often quoted the event linked to Elisha’s bones in order to demonstrate the efficacy of the relics. We read in 2 Kings 13:20-21 20 So Elisha died, and they buried him. Now bands of Moabites used to invade the land in the spring of the year. 21 And as a man was being buried, lo, a marauding band was seen and the man was cast into the grave of Elisha; and as soon as the man touched the bones of Elisha, he revived, and stood on his feet.

St. Cyril of Jerusalem (A.D. 313-386), after referring to the miracle wrought by the body of Elisha, declares that the restoration to life of the corpse with which it was in contact took place: “to show that even though the soul is not present a virtue resides in the body of the saints, because of the righteous soul which has for so many years inhabited it and used it as its minister". And he adds, "Let us not be foolishly incredulous as though the thing had not happened, for if handkerchiefs and aprons which are from without, touching the body of the diseased, have raised up the sick, how much more should the body itself of the Prophet raise the dead?” (Cat., xviii, 16).

The idea of St. Cyril of Jerusalem was developed by St. Gregory of Tours (A.D. 538-594). According to him the virtue (virtus), that is, the mystic potency, that has been acquired by the saints can be transmitted to the objects associated with them. The manifestation of this mystic power may be thought of as a contact between the natural and the supernatural in which the former, being an inferior reality, of course yielded. These points of contact and yielding are the miracles we continually hear of. Thus, according to the well known story repeated by St. Ambrose, when doubt arose as to which of the crosses discovered by St. Helena (ca. 318) was that of Christ, the mother of emperor Constantine asked that a sick, bed-ridden man be carried to the site of the discovery. Then she ordered that he be touched by all the crosses one by one. One of those crosses healed the sick man and thus confirmed its association with the body of Christ. The Cross found by St. Helen had been then distributed piecemeal and had filled the whole world (Cyril of Jerusalem, Cat., iv, 10; x, 19; xiii, 4).
Perhaps no single writing supplies a more striking illustration of the importance attached to the veneration of relics in the Christian practice of the fourth century than the panegyric of the martyr St. Theodore by St. Gregory of Nyssa (P.G., XLVI, 735-48). Contrasting the horror produced by an ordinary corpse with the veneration paid to the body of a saint the preacher expatiates upon the adornment lavished upon the building which had been erected over the martyr's resting place, and he describes how the worshipper is led to approach the tomb “believing that to touch it is itself a sanctification and a blessing and if it be permitted to carry off any of the dust which has settled upon the martyr's resting place, the dust is accounted as a great gift and the mould as a precious treasure. And as for touching the relics themselves, if that should ever be our happiness, only those who have experienced it and who have had their wish gratified can know how much this is desirable and how worthy a recompense it is of aspiring prayer” (col. 740).

That is why, since the beginning of Christianity, individuals have seen relics as a way to come closer to the saints and thus form a closer bond with God. Since Christians during the Middle Ages often took pilgrimages to shrines of holy people, relics became a large business. The pilgrims saw the purchasing of a relic as a means, in a small way, to bring the shrine back with him or her on returning home, since during the Middle Ages the concept of physical proximity to the “holy” (tombs of saints or their personal objects) was considered extremely important. Instead of having to travel hundreds of miles to become near to a venerated saint, one could venerate the relics of the saint within one's own home.

In 401 the Council of Carthage decreed that all churches not honouring the relics of saints should be destroyed. In the Eastern Church, worship of relics receded in the face of the growing cult of icons, but in 787 the second council of Nicaea required that relics be present in the altars of consecrated churches and gave a liturgical role to the salutation of relics after the celebration of the Mass. We learn from a letter to Pope Hermisdas in 519 (Thiel, "Epist. gen.", I, 873) that in order to obtain the supply of relics needful in the consecration of churches, it was customary to lower into the Confession of the Apostles as far as the second "cataract" a box containing portions of silk or cloth, known as brandea, and these brandea, after lying for a time in contact with the remains of the holy Apostles, were henceforth treated as relics.

During the Middle Ages, the “translation of relics”, meaning the removal of relics from the tombs, their placement in reliquaries, and their dispersal, grew. Sadly, abuses also grew. With various barbarian invasions, the conquests of the Crusades, the lack of means for verifying all relics, and less than reputable individuals who in their greed preyed on the ignorant and superstitious, abuses did occur. Even St. Augustine (d. 430) denounced impostors who dressed as monks were selling false relics of saints. Pope St. Gregory (d. 604) forbade the selling of relics and the disruption of tombs in the catacombs. Unfortunately, the popes or other religious authorities were powerless in trying to control the translation of relics or prevent forgeries.
Eventually, these abuses prompted the Protestant leaders to attack the idea of relics totally. Many a times their reaction was grossly exaggerated. For example, since pieces of the True Cross were one of the most highly sought after relics; many churches claimed to possess a piece of it, so many that John Calvin famously remarked that there were enough pieces of the True Cross to build a ship from. However, a study carried out in 1870 found that put together the claimed relics weighed less than 1.7 kg.

4. What is the Catholic doctrine regarding the veneration of relics of the saints?

The above mention abuses and misconceptions of relics in the history of the Church, such as selling relics (simony) or their forgeries and using relics as kinds of good-luck charms led the Church to establish guidelines defining the proper use of relics. As the Catechism of the Catholic Church states: “Pastoral discernment
is needed to sustain and support popular piety and, if necessary, to purify and correct the religious sense which underlies these devotions so that the faithful may advance in knowledge of the mystery of Christ. Their exercise is subject to the care and judgment of the bishops and to the general norms of the Church.” (CCC #1676).

In fact, right from the beginning the Church strived to keep the use of relics in perspective. In his Letter to Riparius, St. Jerome (d. 420) wrote: “We do not worship, we do not adore, for fear that we should bow down to the creature rather than to the Creator, but we venerate the relics of the martyrs in order the better to adore Him whose martyrs they are.” St. Cyril of Alexandria (376-444) added ("Adv. Julian.", vi, P.G. LXXVI, 812): “We by no means consider the holy martyrs to be gods, nor are we wont to bow down before them adoringly, but only relatively and reverentially”.

The medieval scholastics, and notable St. Thomas had this to say regarding the relics: “Those who have an affection to any person hold in honour all that was intimately connected with him. Hence, while we love and venerate the saints who were so dear to God, we also venerate all that belonged to them, and particularly their bodies, which were once the temples of the Holy Spirit, and which are some day to be conformed to the glorious body of Jesus Christ. Whence also”, adds St. Thomas, “God fittingly does honour to such relics by performing miracles in their presence” (Summa III:25:6).

The teaching of the Catholic Church with regard to the veneration of relics is summed up in a decree of the Council of Trent (Sess. XXV), which enjoins on bishops and other pastors to instruct their flocks that “the holy bodies of holy martyrs and of others now living with Christ—which bodies were the living members of Christ and ‘the temple of the Holy Ghost’ (1 Corinthians 6:19) and which are by Him to be raised to eternal life and to be glorified are to be venerated by the faithful, for through these [bodies] many benefits are bestowed by God on men, so that they who affirm that veneration and honour are not due to the relics of the saints, or that these and other sacred monuments are uselessly honoured by the faithful, and that the places dedicated to the memories of the saints are in vain visited with the view of obtaining their aid, are wholly to be condemned, as the Church has already long since condemned, and also now condemns them.”
Further, the council insists that “ in the invocation of saints the veneration of relics and the sacred use of images, every superstition shall be removed and all filthy lucre abolished.” To secure a proper check upon abuses of this kind, “no new miracles are to be acknowledged or new relics recognized unless the bishop of the diocese has taken cognizance and approved thereof.” Moreover, the bishop, in all these matters, is directed to obtain accurate information to take council with theologians and pious men, and in cases of doubt or exceptional difficulty to submit the matter to the sentence of the metropolitan and other bishops of the province, “yet so that nothing new, or that previously has not been usual in the Church, shall be resolved on, without having first consulted the Holy See.” Pope Sixtus V responded to accusations about the worship of false relics when he gave juridical form to the authentication of sainthood and of relics in 1588. This preserved the doctrinal basis of relics in Catholicism, established uniform guidelines for reviewing claims to sanctity, and created norms for the exhibition of relics. New guidelines for the display of relics were drafted in the late nineteenth century, to ensure their accessibility to the individual believer The Church has also taken stringent measures to insure the proper preservation and veneration of relics.

The Code of Canon Law (no. 1190) absolutely forbids the selling of sacred relics, and they cannot be “validly alienated or perpetually transferred” without permission of the Holy See. Moreover, any relic today would have proper documentation attesting to its authenticity. The Code also supports the proper place for relics in our Catholic practice: Canon 1237 states, "The ancient tradition of keeping the relics of martyrs and other saints under a fixed altar is to be preserved according to the norms given in the liturgical books," (a practice widespread since the fourth century). Many churches also have relics of their patron saints which the faithful venerate on appropriate occasions. And yes, reports of the Lord's miracles and favours continue to be connected with the intercession of a saint and the veneration of his relics..

5. What do we as Christians express and what we gain when we venerate relics?

By venerating the relicts of the saints we express

Finally, the relics remind us of the holiness of a saint and his cooperation in God’s work and, at the same time, relics inspire us to ask for the
prayers of that saint and to beg the grace of God to live the same kind a faith-filled life.