- Feb 5, 2002
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Fr. Dwight Longenecker
On All Saints Day we will have on display in our church over twenty first class relics for the faithful to venerate. The most famous relics are those of saints whose mortal remains have not suffered the ordinary process of decomposition.
The People’s Pope Preserved
In March 2001 they dug up the body of Pope John XXIII. He’d been dead for thirty seven years. The present Pope decided John XXIII needed a new resting place since there were so many people who wanted to reverence his tomb in the crypt of St Peter’s Basilica in Rome. Furthermore, Pope John XXIII, son of peasants and known as ‘the peoples’ Pope’ is on the road to being declared a saint. One of the steps in the process is for the potential saint’s body to be exhumed for suitable identification.
Although Popes’ bodies are not fully embalmed they are ‘preserved’ with formalin to help keep the body for the few days of public viewing. Funeral director Joseph Watts commented to the New York Daily News, ‘He was embalmed right away, it was done by doctors, nothing but the best, and he was placed in the perfect place, the Catacombs.’ According to Watts, who has visited the tomb, the preservation of the pope’s body was probably the result of a number of factors. ‘The embalming fluid was formaldehyde-based with other chemicals…he was also in a triple-sealed casket—–a casket, an outer case, another outer case of cypress wood—–and that was in a marble crypt… There was no water or anything that could disintegrate [the body].’ Vincenzo Pascali, from the University of Rome said he doesn’t think Pope John’s preservation is very unusual. ‘It’s more common than you might think. The body of the Holy Father was well protected. Oxygen couldn’t get into the coffin and any in there would have been used up very quickly…[in the caskets] they used materials like lead and zinc which oxidise and slow the decomposition process,’ he added.
Continued below.
theimaginativeconservative.org
On All Saints Day we will have on display in our church over twenty first class relics for the faithful to venerate. The most famous relics are those of saints whose mortal remains have not suffered the ordinary process of decomposition.
The People’s Pope Preserved
In March 2001 they dug up the body of Pope John XXIII. He’d been dead for thirty seven years. The present Pope decided John XXIII needed a new resting place since there were so many people who wanted to reverence his tomb in the crypt of St Peter’s Basilica in Rome. Furthermore, Pope John XXIII, son of peasants and known as ‘the peoples’ Pope’ is on the road to being declared a saint. One of the steps in the process is for the potential saint’s body to be exhumed for suitable identification.
Although Popes’ bodies are not fully embalmed they are ‘preserved’ with formalin to help keep the body for the few days of public viewing. Funeral director Joseph Watts commented to the New York Daily News, ‘He was embalmed right away, it was done by doctors, nothing but the best, and he was placed in the perfect place, the Catacombs.’ According to Watts, who has visited the tomb, the preservation of the pope’s body was probably the result of a number of factors. ‘The embalming fluid was formaldehyde-based with other chemicals…he was also in a triple-sealed casket—–a casket, an outer case, another outer case of cypress wood—–and that was in a marble crypt… There was no water or anything that could disintegrate [the body].’ Vincenzo Pascali, from the University of Rome said he doesn’t think Pope John’s preservation is very unusual. ‘It’s more common than you might think. The body of the Holy Father was well protected. Oxygen couldn’t get into the coffin and any in there would have been used up very quickly…[in the caskets] they used materials like lead and zinc which oxidise and slow the decomposition process,’ he added.
Continued below.
On the Incorruptible Bodies of Saints
It may be that incorrupt bodies are proof of the possibility that spiritual practice has physical effects. When we understand how the mind and body work together, we may also start to understand why some saintly characters wind up being both dead as a doornail and fresh as a daisy. (essay by...
theimaginativeconservative.org
