www.byzcath.org Forums General Discussions Town Hall Eep! Ebay seller selling relic of the "True Cross"

Ebay Auction [http]

The most fitting thing to do, and we are talking about a verifiable relic, is to buy it and donate it to a church for safe keeping. That way it takes it off the market and places it in a venue where it can be venerated properly.

JoeS

I think someone already did something. When I click on the link I get a search engine.

The trouble is that once we start paying ransom to these ghouls there's no end to it - if we buy back one relic they'll steal two dozen more, just to sell them back to us. In the words of a fine old American saying "millions for defense but not one cent for tribute".
Hint - if you run into some [expletives deleted] person planning to throw away relics or sell them commercially, I suggest urging him instead to contribute them to Madonna House, which maintains a list of churches and people who want specific relics.
Incognitus

Yes, I agree, but once you put a relic "out of business" it is one more that the hucksters cant sell. Keep buying but verify. There are a lot of forged or imitations out there.

JoeS

I saw this one earlier. The problem that I see is that they offer no documentation as to authenticity. Without that, I wonder if what is offered is indeed a relic of the True Cross at all.

BOB

Rose,
Go to Ebay and type "True cross" into the Search. I found several relics of the True Cross there today. The one in question may be now up to $600. the seller is from Rome.
Marya

This reminds me of the peddlers in medieval times who were on the road or at the fairs selling all sorts of 'true relics' of the cross and Saints. Bones of the Saints were big time items to sell back then.

Mystery writer, Ellis Peters, includes many tales of relics as part of her Brother Cadfael series. (Also the series on PBS some years back) She writes fiction but her stories are based on research into historical details, e.g. relics. See her account of the bones of St. Winifred in A Morbid Taste for Bones

Although I know there have been many true relics.( I think my mother had a piece of cloth worn by St. Martin de Poores); if this relic on ebay has no proof of authenticity, I would agree that it is most likely not genuine.

Blessings,

Mary Jo

It's difficult to know what to do on these relic sales. We could all go broke trying to rescue all the relics out there for sale. And how many are authentic? Is there any way to verify their authenticity?

Good question, byzanTN, I don't really know. If memory serves me right my mother had some kind of paper work from some shrine, but I was quite small then so not sure where or what. The relic itself was just a tiny square of white cloth not even a quarter of inch square on a card with a picture of Blessed Martin(not canonized yet then). I think it was the kind of cloth used on white Dominican habits of his day. The tiny piece of cloth and card got burned up in a house fire years later; we no longer have it or I would check. I do know that she thought it was genuine and she was very devoted to her, "Blessed Martin de Poores."

Maybe someone here knows how to establish authenticity. ???

Mary Jo...

There is an office in the Vatican that authenticates relics that it dispenses. But I read some time back that it will no longer give relics to individuals. At one time it did, since a friend has a relic and the authentication papers.

A second class relic (piece of cloth) doesn't need papers. But a first class relic does. Perhaps that relic of Martin de Porres is a THIRD Class relic; that is, a piece of cloth touched to a first class relic. I have thousands of them attached to holy cards.

A first class relic should have a paper attesting to its authenticity. It is usually signed by either the postulator of the cause or the Vicar of Rome.

Don't blame people for selling relics on the internet and say that they are "stealing "them. Some of them come from estates, or worse, from churches who throw them out into the garbarge!!
Yes, they don't fit into the "spirit of Vatican II". I saw one of our Gospel books from the 1600's for sale on ebay. Originally, it was posted at $100. I was willing to go up to $300. I think it finally sold for about $600. (I was going to donate it to the museum in West Paterson).