Non Tasarmi, Fratello!

“Wherever the Catholic sun doth shine, There’s always laughter and good red wine. At least I’ve always found it so. Benedicamus Domino!” Hillaire Belloc

Thursday, November 19, 2015

Pope Benedict XVI on The Shroud of Turin

 Not LITERALLY. The Pope was making a speech about it.
 
 The Anchoress provides an excerpt from the book,"The Vatican Prophesies" by John Thavis:



 As one might expect, Pope Benedict, who was often called “the pope of reason,” was much more circumspect on the [Shroud, than Pope John Paul II.] He, too, was interested in the Shroud and had stood before it as a cardinal. As pope he ordered the extraordinary exhibition of the Shroud in 2010. Benedict himself flew to Turin to venerate the cloth and gave a speech in which he described the Shroud as an “icon,” a term that disappointed some of its devotees. In the code language of the Shroud, “icon” denotes just a holy image, while “relic” is the genuine object. But this was an icon with a capital “I” — literally, in the official text of the papal speech — which signaled some support for authenticity. Benedict added that the Shroud was “a winding-sheet that was wrapped round the body of a man who was crucified, corresponding in every way to what the Gospels tell us of Jesus.” That appeared to reject out of hand the theory that it was a medieval artistic creation. 



The pope then went o to speak of the Shroud in dramatic and poetic language that moved many of his listeners: “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 copious from the 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.”

Labels: , , ,