Easter Homily on the Burial Cloths of the Lord

 The Solemnity of the Resurrection of the Lord

Mass During Easter Day

Dear brothers and sisters,

             There are, regrettably, a growing number of people throughout the western world who doubt the reality of the Resurrection of the Lord Jesus from the dead. There are even a growing number of people who doubt even that Christ Jesus ever lived in our human flesh. Perhaps you know one of these persons; perhaps you are one of them yourself.

             In his homily for Good Friday in the Basilica of St. Peter in Rome, the Preacher to the Papal Household, Raniero Cardinal Cantalamessa – whose name literally means, “sing the Mass” – spoke to our “brother and sister atheists, agnostics, or those still searching for the truth (if any are listening).”[1] In his preaching, he quoted a letter of J.R.R. Tolkien, who said:

 

It takes a fantastic will to unbelief to suppose that Jesus never really ‘happened,’ and more to suppose that he did not say the things recorded all of him — so incapable of being ‘invented’ by anyone in the world at that time: such as ‘before Abraham came to be I am’ (John 8:58). ‘He that hath seen me hath seen the Father’ (John 14:9).[2]

 Why does the author of The Hobbit and the Lord of the Rings say it takes “a fantastic will to unbelief” to doubt the reality of life, death, and resurrection of Jesus? Leaving aside the various historical, philosophical, and theological arguments, we have another sort of argument, a tangible one.

             At Easter, we often speak of the “empty tomb,” but, in point of fact, the tomb was not empty on that first of the day week after the Crucifixion of the Messiah. We heard a moment ago the account of the tomb provided for us by the Evangelist Saint John.

            “So Peter and the other disciple went out and came to the tomb,” he says. He continues, saying, “They both ran, but the other disciple ran faster than Peter and arrived at the tomb first; he bend down and saw the burial cloths there, but did not go in” (John 20:3-5). “The tomb was empty, then, inasmuch as nobody was there. It was not completely empty, however;” it contained the various cloths with which Jesus had been entombed.[3] The presence of the burial cloths inside the tomb is also attested to by Saint Luke (cf. Luke 24:12).

             He goes on to say something remarkable, something that is very often overlooked: “When Simon Peter arrived after him, he went into the tomb and saw the burial cloths, and the cloth that had covered his head, not with the burial cloths but rolled up in a separate place” (John 20:6-7). We have, then, here mention of at least three cloths within the tomb: at least two on his body and a third that covered his face.

             But then Saint John says something even more striking: “Then the other disciple also went in, the one who had arrived at the tomb first, and he saw and believed” (John 20:8). What did he see that caused him to believe? The tomb without the body of Jesus? Certainly not. No, he saw the burial cloths and believed. Why? What was so special about these cloths. You may be surprised to learn that the burial cloths of the Lord Jesus have not been lost to history; we are still in possession of four cloths that were found in the tomb of Christ.

             First, there is a long, thin strip of cloth that was wrapped around Jesus’ chin up to the top of his head to keep his mouth closed in death.

             Second, there is a bloodstained cloth measuring 33 inches by 21 inches called the Sudarium of Oviedo, because it is housed in Oviedo, Spain where it has been since at least the year a.d. 840. It was placed upon the face of Jesus at the moment he died to catch what is called the death blood that came out of his nose and mouth.

             Third, there is a long, rectangular cloth measuring 14 feet by three and a half feet that bears the image of a man who was five feet and eleven inches tall. The man depicted on this cloth was crucified, an image best seen in photographic negatives. Although this Shroud of Turin – so named because it is now kept in the Italian city of Turin - is the most studied cloth in the world, the image found on it cannot be explained.

             Whether considered individually or together, these three cloths cannot be what Saint Peter saw that caused him to believe in the Resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ. The first two cloths show nothing but blood and the shroud could not have been unrolled inside the tomb; even if it could have been, it would have been too dark inside to see the image. What, then, did he see? There is a fourth cloth, a hand cloth that had been placed over Jesus’ face, the one found not with the burial cloths, but rolled up in a separate place, because it was quite different the rest.

             This fourth cloth is called the Volto Santo – the Holy Face – and the Veil of Manoppello, because it is housed in the Italian village of Manoppello, where it has been since the sixteenth century. It was kept in Rome from 708 - where it was called the Veronica, the true image - until the sack of Rome by the German emperor until 1527. The cloth itself measures 17.5 centimeters by 24 centimeters and is the largest piece of byssus surviving from the ancient world. As if on the cloth, we see

 

…the face of Christ on a transparent veil in delicate byssus colors, framed by shoulder-length hair parted in the middle and a sparse beard. The left cheek is slightly swollen, the mouth slightly open, and the eyes are open in an expression that is not included in the vocabulary of arrest warrants: perfectly merciful.[4]

 It is the most priceless treasure in the world, the very image of the Face of God, and served as the basis on which artists depicted the Savior for almost fifteen hundred years, but that is a story for another day.

             Byssus, the material of which this veil, this napkin, this sweat cloth is made, is woven from the silk with which a particular mollusk attaches itself to rocks. Byssus cannot be dyed and it cannot be painted; its color only comes from the color of the silks taken from the mollusk. In the ancient world, it was a precious material, never sold but only given as a gift. Pharaohs were buried with a piece of it over their faces and wealthy women wore it as a veil because they could see out, but others could not see their faces through the cloth. Away from the light, byssus appears brown, dark, and opaque, but when held in the light byssus shimmers in golden hues and is transparent, so much so that you can read a newspapers through it. Byssus is photoactive; it responds to light, strange as this might seem. Today, there is only one woman in the world who knows how to weave byssus, Chiara Vigo, who lives on the island of Sardinia.

             What happened that first Easter morning when Saint Peter entered the tomb of Christ? The cloth placed on Jesus’ face was on the ground, but

 

…it was not lying there flat. It was a haze, but it must have been recognizable as a “thing,” as an “object” that caught the first rays of dawn. Naturally, Peter bent down and picked it up. It was the precious little cloth that had lain on Jesus’ face, the finest sea silk. It was a light as a feather as Peter picked it up, unfolded it and held it against the light of the entrance. What else? He must have held that way, not toward the interior of the dark chamber, but up to the light. It was, however, a cloth of light. It reacts to light.

 

What Peter saw now in the tomb on the veil against the morning light made it in a blink of the eye as clear as the sun: no one had taken the Lord from the tomb. Jesus had not been stolen and carried away. Something completely new was in the world now. It was unheard of it, what Peter glimpsed in the blue hours of the first Easter morning here, on that transparent fabric held against the light of the entrance. Here suddenly Christ looked back at him! With open eyes! No man had ever seen this before. This cloth was “not made by human hands,” as was said later. It was the true image. Three days earlier Peter has said that he did not know that man. Hours later he had had to watch from a distance and hear how Jesus, streaming with blood, cried out once again on the cross and died. Peter was still reeling from the shock – when now suddenly Christ himself looked out at him from the veil in his hand. Now he knew him. Now he recognized him immediately. “In thy light we see light,” Israel had read for centuries in the Book of Psalms [Ps 36:9]. Did that verse perhaps occur to him? Or did he already remember then the earlier intimations of Jesus that “the Son of man must … be killed, and on the third day be raised” [Lk 9:22]? We do not know. Only one thing do we know. Besides the bewildering emptiness of linens in the tomb, this message in pictures read: “I live.” Jesus was no longer dead. The only thing corresponding to this image was not another image, no icon or other sort of portrait; the only thing corresponding to what he saw there was the living man.[5]

 This cloth is what Peter saw that caused him to believe, but it was not only Peter who saw it.

             Mary, too, treasured this cloth with the image of the Face of her Son. We are told that

 

She had received it from the hands of God himself and kept it with her at all times, so that she might always be able to contemplate the wondrously fair face of her Son. Each time she wanted to adore her Son, she stretched the image out to the east and prayed before it with her gaze on her Son and with open, uplifted hands. Before the burden of her life was finally taken from her, the apostles carried Mary on a stretcher into a cave. In this cave, they laid Mary down to die before the face of her Son.[6]

 We see in this cloth that Jesus “does not limit himself merely to affirming his love, but makes it visible and tangible. Love, after all, can never be just an abstraction.”[7] Those who look upon this Face cannot but believe.

             When examined forensically, the face on the Shroud of Turin and the face on the Veil of Manoppello belong to the same man, and the blood stains on the Veil of Oviedo belong to this same man.

             This Easter, dear friends, look upon the Face of Christ, the proof of his Resurrection from the dead. Look upon the Face of Mercy and believe! Amen. Alleluia!

---

[1] Raniero Cardinal Cantalamessa, Homily for Good Friday, 15 April 2022. Accessed 16 April 2022. Available at https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/250993/full-text-cardinal-cantalamessa-s-homily-at-the-vatican-s-good-friday-2022-liturgy.

[2] J.R.R. Tolkien, Letter __________. In The Letters of J.R.R. Tolkien. Humphrey Carpenter, ed. (), .

[3] Paul Badde, The True Icon: From the Shroud of Turin to the Veil of Manoppello. Trans. Michal J. Miller. (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2012), 33.

[4] Paul Badde, ibid., 65.

[5] Ibid., 92-93.

[6] In ibid., 49.

[7] Pope Francis, Vultus misericordiae, 9.

Homily - 14 May 2017 - Will the face of the God be enough for us?

The Fifth Sunday of Easter (A)

Dear brothers and sisters,

It is a simple and beautiful prayer the Apostle Saint Philip utters today: “Master, show us the Father, and that will be enough for us” (John 14:8). It is a plea simple, beautiful, and bold. With these words, Philip expressed the deepest yearning of the human heart, to look upon the face of the Creator. David, the great King of Israel, recognized this longing and sang to God in words each of us can also sing: “You have said, ‘Seek my face.’ My heart says to you, ‘Your face, Lord, do I seek.’ Hide not your face from me” (Psalm 27:8-9).

The Lord, the Good Shepherd, calls out to each of us; he seeks us, even as we seek him! When Adam and Eve hid themselves from the Lord, he called out to them, "Where are you" (Genesis 3:9)? Does he not likewise still call out to us? Are these not the very words we so often use when we cry out to him? How often do we cry within our hearts, "O that you would tear the heavens and come down, that the mountains might quake in your presence" (Isaiah 64:1)?

King Solomon, David’s son and heir, likewise sang words that may be both addressed by us to the Lord and by the Lord to us: "O my dove, in the clefts of the rock, in the covert of the cliff, let me see your face, let me hear your voice, for your voice is sweet, and your face is comely" (Song of Songs 2:14).

And yet, despite his longing to see us and our longing to see him, the Lord said to Moses, "[Y]ou cannot see my face; for man shall not see me and live," so great is the glory of the Most High (Exodus 33:20). Even the prophet Elijah heard the Lord in “a still small voice,” he “wrapped his face in his mantle” let his see the face of God (I Kings 19:12-13). Knowing all of this, Philip said, “Show us the Father, and that will be enough for us.” Is it true? Is seeing the face of God enough for us, or do we want something more? To look upon him who is Goodness, Beauty, Truth, and Love, what more could the human heart desire?

Generation after generation longed to look upon the face of God but none could because they were not pure, because they were not holy and without sin. King David knew that only "he who has clean hands and a pure heart, who does not lift up his soul to what is false, and does not swear deceitfully," "shall stand in his holy place" (Psalm 24:4, 3). Even so, David sensed he would come to know the satisfaction of his – and our - deepest longings: "As for me, I shall behold your face in righteousness; when I awake, I shall be satisfied with beholding your form" (Psalm 17:15).

“Because of his transcendence, God cannot be seen as he is, unless he himself opens up his mystery to man's immediate contemplation and gives him the capacity for it.”[1] For this reason, in the fullness of time, the only begotten Son of God took on our flesh and was born of the Virgin Mary; he who was invisible made himself visible and said to the Apostle Thomas, "He who has seen me has seen the Father" (John 14:9). In Jesus, humanity can now look upon the face of God and live.

Now that he has ascended to the right hand of the Father we still call out to him, "Your face, Lord, I seek!" He has left us the image of his face in the Shroud of Turin - the linen cloth in which he was buried - and in the Veil of Manoppello - "the napkin, which had been on his head" in the tomb and which Saint Peter found "not lying with the linen cloths but rolled up in a place by itself (John 20:7). The one shows his face in death; the other, his face risen from the dead. In Jesus of Nazareth, the Son of God and the Son of Mary, the one who died and is raised, we can look upon the face of God and live. In him, “the human face of God has burst into history to reveal the horizons of eternity.”[2]

The Holy Face of the Shroud of Turin (left) and of the Veil of Manoppello (right).

In death, each of us will stand before him and see him as he is; we will look upon his face and look upon our faces. What will we see? We know that

before his gaze all falsehood melts away… His gaze, the touch of his heart heals us through an undeniably painful transformation “as through fire”. But it is a blessed pain, in which the power of his love sears through us like a flame, enabling us to become totally ourselves and thus totally of God… At the moment of judgment we experience and we absorb the overwhelming power of his love over all the evil in the world and in ourselves. The pain of love becomes our salvation and our joy.[3]

This is why Saint Philip can say that the Beatific Vision, the sight of the face of God, will be enough for us.

If the vision of God’s holy face will satisfy the deepest yearnings of our hearts, why does Jesus tell us today not to let our hearts be troubled (cf. John 14:1)? The reason is twofold:

In commanding them not to be troubled, Jesus placed them, as it were, on the threshold between hope and fear. This way, if they fell into weakness and suffering in their human frailty, the hope of his mercy might help them to recover. On the other hand, the fear of stumbling might urge them to fall less often…[4]

We should not let our hearts be troubled, so long as we acknowledge our sinfulness and confess our sins, because Jesus “is the face of the Father’s mercy” and there is nothing to fear in mercy.[5]

Let us, then, seek to be so transformed through the power of his love that we will desire nothing else than to see him face to face knowing that it will be enough for us. Amen.

---

[1] Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1028.

[2] Pope Benedict XVI, Prayer Composed Following a Pilgrimage to the Shrine of Manoppello, 2006.

[3] Ibid., Spe salvi, 47.

[4] Cyril of Alexandria, Commentary on the Gospel of John, 9. In Thomas C. Oden, et al, eds., Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture, New Testament Vol. IVb: John 11-21 (Downers Grove, Illinois: Inter Varsity Press, 2007), 120.

[5] Pope Francis, Misericordiae vultus, 1.

On the Shroud of Turin

At a length of 14.3 feet, the Shroud of Turin is the longest piece of fabric surviving from the ancient world, no small feat for a piece of cloth almost destroyed by fire in 1531.

The image of the body is not easy to see from a distance.

In many ways, the image of the Crucified on the Shroud is easier to see in photographs than it is in the Shroud itself (which I found a little surprising), but standing before the Shroud it was very easy to see the various holes in the fabric and the areas damaged by fire, which are not always so clear in photographs.

The Shroud has been housed in several different locations over the centuries. Today, it bears pollen from each of these documented locations, including pollen from the Holy Land from plants that only bloom around Passover. Blood - testing AB+ - is found on the Shroud of Turin (a blood type that, as I am told, matches that present in the Eucharistic miracles). Though the cloth bears the image of a man who suffered greatly, there are no pigments on the cloth (which means it is not painted) and the image is only on the upper part of the fibers.

Following a brief discussion of the historic and scientific evidence of the Shroud of Turin in his excellent book The True Icon: From the Shroud of Turin to the Veil of Manoppello, Paul Badde writes:

In the pages that follow, therefore, I intend to pursue a reverse inquiry. Not the question of whether the shroud is genuine but rather the question: What if it is? The shroud, then, in this book, will not be defended against the arguments of its many opponents but rather will serve as a foil for a completely different experiment. For Christ's tomb is described by John in only twelve verses. He does not say that it was empty. Instead, in that brief passage he spends four verses writing about the cloths that he found there. Opponents of the shroud therefore say that it was fabricated so as to correspond to the text. It was a forgery to substantiate a lie. I say, on the other hand: This cloth is the relic of a true statement. Against all probability it has survived. There was talk about cloths already in the first documents of Christian history - and now here we have a cloth that corresponds perfectly to that talk. All the Gospels speak about this cloth. What a weight of converging evidence! Not one contradictory indication separates it from the hypothesis that we truly have that cloth before our eyes in Turin. If we were in a court of law, the shroud would easily win any circumstantial case. It would be confirmed officially that it is identical with the "clean linen" cloth that Joseph of Arimathea bought for Jesus (16-17).

It goes without saying that Badde is right. Even the radio carbon-14 test performed by Oxford University 1988 was false (the scientists mistakenly tested a patch put on the cloth in the middle ages, which explains why the test erroneously dated the Shroud to 1320; how they made such a mistake is anyone's guess, unless it was purposeful).

When His Holiness Benedict XVI venerated the Shroud of Turin in 2010, he spoke of the power of the Shroud:

This is the power of the Shroud: from the face of this "Man of sorrows", who carries with him the passion of man of every time and every place, our passions too, our sufferings, our difficulties and our sins Passio Christi. Passio hominis from this face a solemn majesty shines, a paradoxical lordship. This face, these hands and these feet, this side, this whole body speaks. It is itself a word we can hear in the silence. How does the Shroud speak? It speaks with blood, and blood is life! The Shroud is an Icon written in blood; the blood of a man who was scourged, crowned with thorns, crucified and whose right side was pierced. The Image impressed upon the Shroud is that of a dead man, but the blood speaks of his life. Every trace of blood speaks of love and of life. Especially that huge stain near his rib, made by the blood and water that flowed copiously from a great wound inflicted by the tip of a Roman spear. That blood and that water speak of life. It is like a spring that murmurs in the silence, and we can hear it, we can listen to it in the silence of Holy Saturday.

These were the sentiments of my heart as we made our way to Turin. I wanted to look upon the wounds the Savior received for us as a way of completing, if you will, my experience of the Holy Sepulchre. Already I had looked several times upon one of the four cloths taken from his tomb, the napkin that covered his face and now bears his living image. In Manoppello, where it is housed today, it is called il Volto Santo, the Holy Face. At Turin, I was able to look at a second of the cloths, which so clearly shows him dead.

The Shroud of Turin is a clear reminder of Jesus' own words, which we heard this past Sunday: "This is why the Father loves me, because I lay down my life in order to take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down on my own. I have power to lay it down, and power to take it up again" (John 10:17-18).

Indeed, I brought with me five pages of intentions from my friends, and most of these intentions concerned one of form of suffering or another. Even on the way to Turin more sufferings were added to these intentions as we learned of the devastating earthquake that struck Nepal and killed more 4,400 people (and maybe as many as 10,000). The sufferings of the Lord's people are great and numerous, but so are his own sufferings. I wanted to unite their sufferings and mine to the sufferings of the Jesus by meditating upon his wounds, but the Lord seems to have had another idea for me.

Despite my best intentions, I found my eyes continually drawn to his face; I could not focus on his wounds, but had to look at his face. Having seen his face, having looking upon the face of mercy and into the eyes of love, what more is there to seek?

As I looked upon his face in death, I could not help but recall my first experience before the Veil of Manoppello:

As I continued to contemplate the image it seemed to shift ever so subtly as people moved behind it or the light hit at a different angle.  At one point, I could see very clearly the image of the Lord's face from the Shroud of Turin imposed about it; the face on the two cloths is the very same face.

You can see a superimposition of the face of Jesus on the Shroud of Turin and the face of Jesus on the Veil of Manoppello here.

The Shroud of Turin proves, in a certain sense, that what Gospels recount of the Lord's Passion is true. He was scourged. He was crowned with thorns. He was crucified. His side was pierced by a lance. But that is all. The Shroud of Turin can only prove that Jesus "suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, died and was buried." The Veil of Manoppello, on the other hand, offers a certain kind of proof that "on the third day he rose again from the dead." Without the Veil of Manoppello, the Shroud of Turin only tells half of the story.

To Turin to see the Merciful Face of the Suffering Servant

Tomorrow, I will join twenty-five other priests living at the Casa Santa Maria (there are sixty-two of us in total this year) on a quick pilgrimage that will involve some fourteen hours on a bus over a thirty-six hour period. It will likely be somewhat tedious, but it will also be worth it. We are going to look upon and pray before the Shroud of Turin, which only recently was exposed again for the veneration of the faithful.

The Shroud of Turin is among the cloths found in the tomb mentioned by the Apostle and Evangelist Saint John:

They both ran, but the other disciple outran Peter and reached the tomb first; and stooping to look in, he saw the linen cloths lying there but did not go in. Then Simon Peter came, following him, and went into the tomb; he saw the linen cloths lying, and the napkin, which had been on his head, not lying with the linen cloths but rolled up in a place by itself. Then the other disciple, who reached the tomb first, also went in, and he saw and believed; for as yet they did not know the Scripture, that he must rise from the dead (John 20:4-9).

In total, four cloths were taken from the tomb, the Shroud and three others:

1. the napkin, also known as the sudarium, (the most important of the cloths) which covered his face - and now bears the image of the Risen Lord - is housed at the Shrine of the Holy Face in Manoppello, Italy;
2. the cloth used to wipe his face and catch his blood when he was taken down from the Cross is housed in the Cathedral of San Salvador in Oviedo, Spain; and,
3. the cloth used to keep his jaw shut when he was placed in the tomb is housed, if memory serves, somewhere in Germany.

The Shroud of Turin displays in remarkable detail the terrible sufferings Christ Jesus endured for us and looking upon the image left in the cloth we can hear the Lord call out to us: “Come, all who pass by the way, pay attention and see: is there any pain like my pain” (Lamentations 1:12)? To understand and know the sufferings of the Lord is of great importance, for in them we see unmistakable evidence of his merciful love, that what the Evangelists wrote of his sufferings in the Gospels is true

Within the Notre Dame Center in Jerusalem is an exhibit dedicated to the Shroud of Turin that contains a detailed model of the man shown in the Shroud, produced with the latest technology:

 

That this man suffered greatly, there can be no doubt. Nor can it be doubted that he died in peace:

His face displays a certain serenity because he died knowing that "it is finished" (John 19:30).

Looking upon the Shroud Sunday morning will be an opportunity for each of us to say with Saint Bonaventure:

O Lord Jesus Christ, who for me did not spare yourself, you have pierced my heart with your wounds and inebriated my mind with your blood. Wherever I turn, I always see you crucified for me; whatever I look at seems to me stained with your blood. And so, turning totally to you, I find nothing but you, nothing except the sight of your wounds. It would be consoling to me if I were crucified with you, my Lord. It would afflict me deeply to meditate on anything other than you. Every time I think about the wonderful condescension of divine piety in our regard, I am greatly ashamed and embarrassed because of my ingratitude. And so, the more I realize the great worth of the benefits of redemption, the viler are the sins of my ingratitude (Soliloquium, I.34).

Having already seen the Veil of Manoppello several times, I am going to Turin tomorrow as if to complete my experience of being in his tomb; I want to see the cloths that the Apostles found so as to better understand the experience of that first Easter morning.

This past Sunday, the Holy Father Pope Francis said of the opening of the exhibition of the Shroud of Turin: "I hope that this act of veneration helps us all to find in Jesus Christ the Merciful Face of God, and to recognize it in the face of our brothers and sisters, particularly those suffering most."

I will be bringing with me many intentions from my family and friends, many of which involve great sufferings of one form or another. Those who suffer so greatly for bearing the name of Christian will be remembered in my own intentions. Let each of us strive to unite our sufferings to his, that his merciful love may be better known.

A news round up - March 30th

• MSNBC host Joy Reid implies Catholics on the Supreme Court cannot be trusted. And you thought anti-Catholicism was dead.

•  Young men attending university in North Korea now have a required hair style.

•  A man from the north of Italy spent part of yesterday on the dome of the Basilica of St. Peter protesting Italy's economic situation. This was his fourth time doing so. How does that happen?

• The Shroud of Turin will be displayed for public veneration between April 19 and June 25, 2015 in Turin.

• Since the civil war broke out in Syria in 2011, 98 churches, 1,900 mosques, 1,600 schools, and 60% of the nation’s hospitals have been at least partly destroyed. 

• Each year in San Francisco 16,000 children are born and 18,000 are aborted. Welcome to the culture of death.

• President Obama has delayed, yet again, the implementation of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Art. As Timothy McCartney said: 

When Obama is done with all his unilateral amendments and delays, all that is left of the bill is forcing nuns to buy birth control.
— Timothy P Carney (@TPCarney) March 26, 201

Curiously, the new deadline is on the "honor system."

On the Shroud of Turin

This past Sunday the Holy Father made a pilgrimage to Turin to venerate the Shroud enshrined there.

Naturally, he preached a homily there, the text of which follows, with my emphases and comments:

Dear brothers and sisters!

I am happy to find myself with you on this festive day and to celebrate this solemn Eucharist for you. I greet everyone present, in particular the pastor of your archdiocese, Cardinal Severino Poletto, whom I thank for the warm address to me on behalf of everyone. I also greet the archbishops and bishops present, the priests, religious, the representatives of ecclesial associations and movements. I turn deferentially to the mayor, Dr. Sergio Chiamparino, grateful for the courteous address and greeting, to the representatives of the government and to the civil and military officials, with a special thanks to those who generously offered their cooperation for the realization of this pastoral visit of mine. I bear in mind those who were not able to be present, especially the sick, those who are alone and those who find themselves in difficulty. I entrust to the Lord the city of Turin and all its inhabitants in this Eucharistic celebration, which, as every Sunday, invites us to participate in a communal way at the twofold table of the Word of truth and the Bread of eternal life.

We are in the Easter season, which is the time of the glorification of Jesus. The Gospel that we have just heard reminds us that this Glorification is realized through the Passion. In the paschal mystery, Passion and Glorification are closely joined; they form an indissoluble unity. Jesus says: “Now the Son of Man is glorified, and God is glorified in him” (John 13:31) and he says this when Judas leaves the Upper Room to carry out the plan of his betrayal, which will lead to the Master’s death: precisely at that moment Jesus’ glorification begins. The Evangelist John makes it clear: he does not, in fact, say that Jesus was glorified only after his passion, through his resurrection, but shows that his glorification is begun precisely with the passion. In it Jesus manifests his glory, which is the glory of love, which gives its entire self. He loved the Father, doing his will to the very end, with a perfect oblation; he loved humanity, giving his life for us. Thus, already in his Passion he was glorified, and God is glorified in him.

But the Passion is only the beginning. Thus Jesus says that his glorification is also to come (cf. 13:32). Then the Lord, in the moment that he announces his departure from this world (cf. 13:33), almost as a testament to his disciples to continue his presence among them in a new way, gives them a new commandment: “I give you a new commandment: that you love one another. As I loved you, love one another” (13:34). If we love each other, Jesus will continue to be present in our midst.

Jesus speaks of a “new commandment.” But what is new about it? Already in the Old Testament, God gave the commandment of love; now, however, this commandment has become new insofar as Jesus makes a very important addition to it: “As I loved you, love one another.” What is new is precisely this “loving as Jesus loved.” The Old Testament did not give any mode of love but only formulated the precept to love. Jesus, however, gave himself to us as model and source of love. This is a love without limits, universal, able to transform all the negative circumstances and all the obstacles into occasions for progress in love. In centuries past the Church that is in Turin knew a rich tradition of sanctity and generous service -- as the archbishop and the mayor pointed out -- thanks to the work of zealous priests, men and women in both active and contemplative religious communities and faithful laypeople. Jesus’ words thus acquire a particular resonance for this Church, a Church that is generous and active, beginning with her priests. Giving us the new commandment, Jesus asks us to live his own love, which is the truly credible, eloquent and efficacious sign that announces to the world the Kingdom of God.

Obviously with our own power we are weak and limited. There is always a resistance to love in us and in our existence, there are many difficulties that provoke divisions, resentment and rancor. But the Lord promised us to be present in our life, making us capable of this generous and total love, which knows how to overcome all obstacles. If we are united to Christ, we can truly love in this world. Loving others as Jesus loved us is possible only with that strength that is communicated to us in our relationship with him, especially in the Eucharist, in which his Sacrifice of love that generated love is made present in a real way.

I would like to say, then, a word of encouragement especially to the priests and deacons of this Church, who dedicate themselves with generosity to pastoral work, and to the religious. Sometimes being a worker in the Lord’s vineyard can be tiring, duties multiply, there are so many demands, there is no lack of problems: Know how daily to draw from this relationship of love with the Lord in prayer the strength to convey the prophetic announcement of salvation; re-center your existence on what is essential in the Gospel; cultivate a real dimension of communion and fraternity in the presbyterate, in your communities, in relationships with the People of God; in service testify to the power of love that comes from on high.

The first reading that we heard indeed presents a special way of glorifying Jesus: the apostle and his fruits. Paul and Barnabas, at the end of their first apostolic trip, return to the cities that they have already visited and reanimate the disciples, exhorting them to remain solid in the faith, because, as they say, “we must enter into the Kingdom of God through many tribulations” (Acts 14:22). Christian life, dear brothers and sisters, is not easy [I like to say, "The Christian life is simple, but it is not easy. Love is simple, but it is often difficult]; I know that there is no lack of difficulties, problems, worries in Turin: I think in particular of those who concretely live their lives in precarious conditions, because of the scarcity of jobs, the uncertainty of the future, physical and moral suffering; I think of families, young people, of old people who often live in solitude, the marginalized, immigrants. Yes, life leads to many difficulties, many problems, but it is precisely the certainty that comes from faith, the certainty that we are not alone, that God loves everyone without distinction and is near to everyone with his love, that makes it possible to face, to live through and to overcome the toil of daily problems. It was the universal love of the risen Christ that moved the apostles to go out of themselves, to spread the word of God, to spend themselves without reserve for others, with courage, joy and serenity. The Risen One has a strength of love that overcomes every limit, that does not stop at any obstacle. And the Christian community, especially in the situations that are the most pastorally demanding, must be a concrete instrument of this love of God.

I exhort families to live the Christian dimension of love in simple daily actions, in family relationships, overcoming divisions and misunderstandings, in cultivating faith, which makes communion still stronger. Also in the rich and diverse world of the university and culture, witness to the love that today’s Gospel speaks of is not lacking, in the capacity for attentive listening and humble dialogue in the search for Truth, certain that it is the same truth that comes to meet us and draws us. I would like also to encourage the effort, often difficult, of those who are called to look after the public sphere: Collaboration to pursue the common good and make the city ever more human and habitable is a sign that Christian thought about man is never against his liberty but in favor of a greater fullness that finds its realization only in a “civilization of love.” To everyone, in particular the young people, I want to say never to lose hope, that which comes from the risen Christ, from God’s victory over sin and death.

Today’s second reading shows us precisely the final outcome of Jesus’ resurrection: it is the new Jerusalem, the holy city, that comes down from heaven, from God, prepared as a bride for her husband (cf. Revelation 21:2). He who was crucified, who shared our suffering -- as the sacred Shroud also reminds us in an eloquent way -- is he who is risen and wants to reunite all of us in his love. It is a stupendous, “powerful,” solid hope, because, as Revelation says: “[God] will wipe away every tear from their eyes and death will be no more, nor will there be any mourning or lament anymore, because the former things will pass away” (21:4). Does the holy Shroud not communicate the same message? In it we see, as in a mirror, our sufferings in the sufferings of Christ: “Passio Christi. Passio hominis.” It is because of this that the Shroud is a sign of hope: Christ faced the cross to put up a wall against evil; to make us see, in his passion, the anticipation of that moment in which for us too, every tear will be wiped away, when there will be no death, no mourning, no lament anymore.

The passage from Revelation ends with this statement: “He who sits upon the throne says: ‘Behold, I make all things new’” (21:5). The first absolutely new thing realized by God was Jesus’ resurrection, his heavenly glorification. It is the beginning of a whole series of “new things” in which we also have a share. “New things” are a world full of joy, in which there are no more suffering and destruction, there is no rancor and hate, but only the love that comes from God and transforms everything.

Dear Church that is in Turin, I have come among you to confirm you in the faith. I would like to exhort you, firmly and with affection, to remain solid in that faith that you have received and that gives meaning to life; never to lose the light of hope in the Risen Christ, who is able to transform reality and make all things new; to live God’s love in a simple and concrete way in the city, in the neighborhoods, in communities, in families: “As I have loved you, love one another.”

Amen.

After venerating the Shroud, His Holiness offered a few more words which follow, again with my emphases and comments:

Dear Friends,

This is a moment that I have been waiting for for quite some time. I have found myself before the sacred Shroud on another occasion but this time I am experiencing this pilgrimage and this pause with particular intensity: perhaps because the years make me more sensitive to the message of this extraordinary icon; perhaps, and I would say above all, because I am here as Successor of Peter, and I carry in my heart the whole Church, indeed, all of humanity. I thank God for the gift of this pilgrimage, and also for the opportunity to share with you a brief meditation, which was suggested to me by the title of this solemn exhibition: “The Mystery of Holy Saturday.” One could say that the Shroud is the icon of this mystery, the icon of Holy Saturday. It is in fact a winding sheet, which covered the corpse of a man who was crucified, corresponding to everything that the Gospels say of Jesus, who was crucified about noon and died at about 3 in the afternoon.

Once evening came, since it was Parasceve, the eve of the solemn Sabbath of Passover, Joseph of Arimathea, a wealthy and influential member of the Sanhedrin, courageously asked Pontius Pilate to be able to bury Jesus in his new tomb, that he had made in the rock not far from Golgotha. Having received the permission, he bought linen and, taking the body of Jesus down from the cross, wrapped him in the linen and put him in that tomb (cf. Mark 15:42-46). This is what is related by the Gospel of St. Matthew and the other evangelists. From that moment, Jesus remained in the sepulcher until the dawn of the day after the Sabbath, and the Shroud of Turin offers us the image of how his body was stretched out in the tomb during that time, which was brief chronologically (about a day and a half), but was immense, infinite in its value and its meaning.

Holy Saturday is the day of God’s concealment, as one reads in an ancient homily: “What happened? Today there is great silence upon the earth, great silence and solitude. Great silence because the King sleeps … God died in the flesh and descended to make the kingdom of hell (‘gli inferi’) tremble” (“Homily on Holy Saturday,” PG 43, 439). In the Creed we confess that Jesus Christ “was crucified under Pontius Pilate, died and was buried; he descended into hell (‘negli inferi’), and the third day he rose again from the dead.”

Dear brothers and sisters, in our time, especially after having passed through the last century, humanity has become especially sensitive to the mystery of Holy Saturday. God’s concealment is part of the spirituality of contemporary man, in an existential manner, almost unconscious, as an emptiness that continues to expand in the heart. At the end of the 18th century, Nietzsche wrote: “God is dead! And we have killed him!” This celebrated expression, if we consider it carefully, is taken almost word for word from the Christian tradition, we often repeat it in the Via Crucis, perhaps not fully realizing what we are saying. After the two World Wars, the concentration camps, the gulags, Hiroshima and Nagasaki, our epoch has become in ever great measure a Holy Saturday: the darkness of this day questions all those who ask about life, it questions us believers in a special way. We too have something to do with this darkness.

And nevertheless, the death of the Son of God, of Jesus of Nazareth, has an opposite aspect, totally positive; it is a font of consolation and hope. And this makes me think that the sacred Shroud acts as a “photographic” document, with a “positive” and a “negative.” And in effect, this is exactly how it is: The most obscure mystery of faith is at the same time the most luminous sign of a hope without limits. Holy Saturday is the “no man’s land” between death and resurrection, but into this “no man’s land” has entered the One, the Only One, who has crossed it with the signs of his passion for man: “Passio Christi. Passio hominis.” And the Shroud speaks to us precisely of that moment; it witnesses precisely to the unique and unrepeatable interval in the history of humanity and the universe, in which God, in Jesus Christ, shared not only our dying, but also our remaining in death. The most radical solidarity. In that “time-beyond-time” Jesus Christ “descended into hell” (“agli inferi”) What does this expression mean? It means that God, made man, went to the point of entering into the extreme and absolute solitude of man, where no ray of love enters, where there is total abandonment without any word of comfort: “hell” (“gli inferi”). Jesus Christ, remaining in death, has gone beyond the gates of this ultimate solitude to lead us too to go beyond it with him.

We have all at times felt a frightening sensation of abandonment, and that which makes us most afraid of death is precisely this [abandonment]; just as when as children we were afraid to be alone in the dark and only the presence of a person who loves us could reassure us. So, it is exactly this that happened in Holy Saturday: In the kingdom of death there resounded the voice of God. The unthinkable happened: that Love penetrated “into hell” (“negli inferi”): that in the most extreme darkness of the most absolute human solitude we can hear a voice that calls us and find a hand that takes us and leads us out. The human being lives by the fact that he is loved and can love; and if love even has penetrated into the realm of death, then life has also arrived there. In the hour of extreme solitude we will never be alone: “Passio Christi. Passio hominis.”

This is the mystery of Holy Saturday! It is from there, from the darkness of the death of the Son of God, that the light of a new hope has shone: the light of the Resurrection. And it seems to me that looking upon this cloth with the eyes of faith one perceives something of this light. In effect, the Shroud was immersed in that profound darkness, but it is luminous at the same time; and I think that if thousands and thousands of people come to see it -- without counting those who contemplate copies of it -- it is because in it they do not see only darkness, but also light; not so much the defeat of life and love but rather victory, victory of life over death, of love over hatred; they indeed see the death of Jesus, but glimpse his resurrection [too]; in the heart of death there now beats life, inasmuch as love lives there. This is the power of the Shroud: from the countenance of this “Man of sorrows,” who takes upon himself man’s passion of every time and every place, even our passion, our suffering, our difficulties, our sins -- “Passio Christi. Passio hominis” -- from this moment there emanates a solemn majesty, a paradoxical lordship. This face, these hands and these feet, this side, this whole body speaks, it is itself a word that we can hear in silence. How does the Shroud speak? It speaks with blood, and blood is life! The Shroud is an icon written in blood; the blood of a man who has been scourged, crowned with thorns, crucified and wounded in his right side. Every trace of blood speaks of love and of life. Especially that large mark near the side, made by blood and water that poured copiously from a great wound caused by a Roman spear, that blood and that water speak of life. It is like a spring that speaks in silence, and we can hear it, we can listen to it, in the silence of Holy Saturday.

Dear friends, let us praise the Lord always for his faithful and merciful love. Departing from this holy place, we carry in our eyes the image of the Shroud, we carry in our heart this word of love, and we praise God with a life full of faith, of love and of charity.

Thank you.

Translations via Zenit.

Death certificate of the Savior?