St. Teresa’s body still incorrupt after five centuries
When the tomb of St. Teresa of Avila was reopened on August 28, her body was found to be still incorrupt. The remains of the reforming Saint of Carmel, who died in 1582, are in the same condition as in the last openings of the silver coffin that houses them, which took place in 1750 and 1914 respectively.
The ceremony, which required the use of ten keys held by the community of Alba de Tormes, the Duke of Alba, the Father General of the Carmelites and the King of Spain, was carried out with utmost solemnity. This time, the process took place on the occasion of the canonical recognition prior to the start of scientific studies aimed at obtaining more details about the saint’s state of health in her last years of life.
The research will be conducted in three stages: the first will be visual recognition and photographs, and x-rays of the body will be taken, as well as the cleaning of the reliquaries; next, an Italian team of scientists will analyse the results and prepare reports; finally, the experts will present some proposals for the better conservation of the relics. It is hoped that, before the reliquaries are definitively closed, the incorrupt body of the great Doctor of the Church will be exposed for the veneration of the faithful.
The numbers on religious violence in Nigeria
The Observatory for Religious Freedom in Africa recently published a report on religious persecution in Nigeria, with data collected between 2019 and 2023. According to the report, during this period there were 55,910 deaths and 21,621 abductions in 11,610 attacks, which equates to an average of eight attacks per day. The figures reveal the extent of the violence to which the civilian population, and Christian communities in particular, are subjected.
In fact, one of the study’s concerns was to ascertain the religion professed by the victims, and the results show a striking discrepancy: of the 30,880 civilians killed, 16,769 were Christians, 6,235 Muslims, 154 followers of African cults and 7,722 unknown.
Eucharistic Congress with 1,600 First Communions
The 53rd International Eucharistic Congress, held in September in the city of Quito, Ecuador, began with a large-scale Mass at which 1,600 children made their First Communion. Presiding over the celebration was Metropolitan Archbishop Alfredo José Espinoza Mateus, SDB; also present was Archbishop Andrés Carrascosa Coso, Apostolic Nuncio to Ecuador, together with numerous bishops, before an assembly of over 25,000 people on the esplanade of Bicentenary Park.
The children who received the Bread of Angels for the first time were invited to be true “Eucharistic missionaries” and to cultivate in their families the motto that guided the congress: Fraternity to Heal the World.
Costa Rica’s Patroness celebrates 200 years
On September 23, Costa Rica celebrated 200 years since Our Lady of the Angels was proclaimed the nation’s Patroness. Officially recognized by the Constitutional Congress in 1824, the image of this invocation is venerated in one of the most important Marian shrines in Central America, a symbol of the sincere faith of a people who want to grow under the aegis of the Blessed Virgin.
The small stone statue, whose devotion dates back to colonial times, was discovered in a forest by a local indigenous woman. After giving miraculous manifestations of her desire to remain in that location, a church was built there to house her. As part of the celebrations for the 200th anniversary of her patronage, the image will travel throughout Costa Rican dioceses, while solemn Eucharistic celebrations, pilgrimages and congresses are held in her honour.
Medieval Polychrome Sculptures
Discovered in Notre-Dame
The archaeological excavations begun during the restoration of Notre-Dame Cathedral in Paris continue to yield important discoveries that enrich its history. Recently, the National Institute of Preventive Archaeological Research published the results of the last few years of research: more than a thousand fragments of sculptures belonging to Notre-Dame’s medieval rood screen, built around 1230 and destroyed in the 18th century, have been found. More than half of the fragments still retain their original polychromy, surprising experts with the beauty and sublimity of the sculptures buried underground for centuries.
Research and restoration work is expected to continue until spring 2025, but as of November 19 some samples can already be seen at the Cluny Museum in Paris.
Laity invited to “be monks” for an afternoon
Providing moments of silence, meditation and prayer for the laity is the aim of the Afternoons in the Monastery initiative, organized by the San Ciprián de Viñas parish in the Spanish province of Ourense. Once a month, members of the faithful age twenty-five to sixty-five gather in one of the monasteries for men or for women, to pray with the religious and take part in the recitation of Vespers. The first community to be visited was the Monastery of Santa Maria Oseira, in the municipality of San Cristóbal de Cea.
A similar proposal is being implemented since May by the Archdiocese of Granada: Pray in the Cloisters, which invites the faithful to share periods of prayer with cloistered nuns. The initiative began in the Jeronimas convent in Granada and is due to subsequently go on to the communities of the Augustinian Recollect Sisters, the Comendadoras de Santiago, the Poor Clares and the Carmelites, among others.
Statue of Our Lady remains intact amid wildfires
Braving the wave of serious fires caused by the intense heat and severe droughts that ravaged the province of Córdoba, Argentina, in September, an image of Our Lady of Grace remained intact amidst the flames. The event took place at the Marian Centre of the Holy Spirit, located in Quebrada de Luna, in the Punilla region, and was extensively recorded by photographer Ariel Luna.
The photographs show a scene of contrasts: while the flames still consume what remains of the shrine, the image of the Virgin Mary remains, not only intact, but immaculate: “There were no marks, it was not scorched, nothing,” Ariel Luna told the media. The fact, which was interpreted as a miraculous sign of God’s intervention in the midst of the catastrophe, has become a reason for hope for all those affected by the fires.
Eight centuries since St. Francis of Assisi received the stigmata
Monte Alverne in Italy welcomed Franciscans from all over the world to celebrate the 800th anniversary of the reception of the stigmata by its founder, St. Francis of Assisi, which occurred on September 17, 1224. In the shrine built on the site of the miraculous event, where a stone at the foot of the altar marks the exact spot where the saint received the wounds of Christ, the friars offered the singing of offices proper to the feast and several Eucharistic celebrations in thanksgiving to God for the gifts bestowed on the Poverello, a pioneer in the history of the Church of this extraordinary mystical phenomenon.
As part of these celebrations, the Archbishop Felice Accrocca of Benevento published an article in the newspaper Avvenire entitled “800 Years: Are the Stigmata of St. Francis an Invention? This is How the Theory is Dismantled,” to defend the veracity of the stigmata in the face of old conjectures attributing the fact to invention. Accrocca analyses the primary historical sources – such as Friar Elias’ letter on the death of St. Francis, the hagiographic work written by Thomas of Celano and the manuscript rubrics of the saint himself sent to his confessor, Friar Leo, narrating what happened – to prove the historic nature of the episode, emphasizing the grandeur of this mystical experience lived by the Seraphic Patriarch.
