The blood of Saint Januarius in Naples. The tongue of Saint Anthony in Padua. The head of John the Baptist in Rome. The tail of the donkey ridden by Jesus in Genoa… Welcome to the imaginative world of Roman Catholic relics. Many Catholic churches hold relics of various kinds and origins that have been venerated for fifteen centuries.
As material objects, relics are fragments of bones, limbs (arms, legs, fingers), organic tissues and textile fabrics, and various objects that belonged to figures from the Gospel or church history to whom the Roman Catholic Church attributes a role in pointing people to God. Since these objects come from or have been in contact with “saints,” they are considered capable of transmitting a sense of divinity or holiness to those who venerate them (by going on pilgrimage, touching them, or praying in front of them).
This is how Rome explains the reason for relics: “Relics in the Church have always received particular veneration and attention because the body of the Blesseds and of the Saints, destined for the resurrection, has been on earth the living temple of the Holy Spirit and the instrument of their holiness, recognized by the Apostolic See through beatification and canonization.” [1]
A new and fascinating book by historian Federico Canaccini, Sacred Bones: Stories of Relics, Saints and Pilgrims (Italian edition: Sacre ossa. Storie di reliquie, santi e pellegrini, 2025), tells the history of how objects and bones became religious relics.
The question that prompts the book is the following: If the Christian faith starts from the empty tomb of the risen Lord Jesus, why has Roman Catholicism filled its churches with objects to be venerated?
If the Christian faith relied on the eyewitness testimony of those who saw the risen Jesus and then wrote the books of the New Testament as “proof,” why did the Christian masses go in search of artifacts to help them believe?
If apostolic teaching says that “we walk by faith, not by sight” (2 Corinthians 5:7), why has Roman Catholic imagery filled itself with things to see, touch, and kneel before?
The book shows how the “Constantinian shift” of the fourth century changed the face of Christianity by adding the collection and veneration of relics to Christian spiritual practices. After Constantine became emperor, his mother, Helena, organized an expedition to Jerusalem to search for objects and artifacts related to the history of Jesus with which to fill the temples that were being built throughout the empire.
From that expedition, Helena brought back the wood of the cross, the nails of the crucifixion, hairs from the Lord’s beard, etc., effectively “creating” the phenomenon of Christian relics and introducing into Christian life the idea that they were “charged” with holiness that could be transferred to the faithful.
The phenomenon of relics thus arose during that complex and sadly decisive transformation of Christianity from its post-apostolic phase (still largely anchored in biblical teaching) to its “Roman” phase. It was a transition in which Greco-Roman religious beliefs were covered with a Christian veneer, rather than being challenged by the Gospel and reformed accordingly.
Instead of following the words of the Lord that “blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed” (John 20:29), the Christianity of relics changed the rules of engagement of faith: From listening to the Word to viewing objects, from the mediation of the risen Lord Jesus to that of saints and other mediators, from the presence of the Holy Spirit to the touch of artifacts.
Canaccini’s book is a fascinating journey through the history of relics and documents how, from Helena onwards, Roman Catholicism was swept up in a frantic search for relics, to the point of becoming a factory for them. The author also appropriately reports the devastating criticism of the Protestant Reformation (above all, John Calvin, who wrote a “Treatise on Relics” in 1543), which contested not only the abuses associated with relics but also their biblical legitimacy.
Canaccini seems to understand Protestant criticism but remains within the narrative of relics as fulfilling a deep anthropological need—that of contact with the sacred through an object considered close.
Here, there is a fundamental choice. Roman Catholicism chooses to accommodate its religious offer to the quest for tangible objects mediating the sacred. In theological terms, Rome integrates grace into nature, elevating it to a supernatural level. From this perspective, relics are felt as a necessity of nature, and grace responds to the need for contact with the divine through the relics of saints. This happens in analogy to the way Roman Catholicism believes that the Eucharist is the “real” presence of Christ, whereby the bread and the wine are transubstantiated (i.e., the nature is changed into the body and blood of Christ).
Roman Catholicism understands grace as being transmitted by means of objects (wine, bread, oil, water, sanctified altars, relics, etc.) that are “sacraments” or “sacramentals”. Relics are among those graced “objects” that can administer grace as part of the sacramental system.
The Evangelical faith is different; based on Scripture, it knows that “faith comes from hearing the Word of God” (Romans 10:17) and that faith is “the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen” (Hebrews 11:1). It also believes that “by grace we are saved through faith” (Ephesians 2:8). Jesus Christ is truly present through the Holy Spirit in the signs He left behind (baptism and the Lord’s Supper), but not in objects imbued with the divine.
Ultimately, the choice is between religious anthropology filtered through Greek thought and cloaked in Christianity, i.e., the Roman Catholic option, or the biblical Gospel that renews one’s entire life, i.e., the Evangelical option. Relics are the symbol of the former, not the latter.
[1] Instruction “Relics in the Church: Authenticity and Preservation” (2017) issued by the Congregation for the Causes of Saints.
