Such is the case of Cardinal Marcello Semeraro, prefect of the Vatican Dicastery for the Causes of Saints, who was in charge of officiating the beatification ceremony of Livatino in 2021. In the last episode of the series, the Italian cardinal summarizes the purpose of the Catholic Church in preserving and venerating the relics of the saints.
“Relics carry us away to stories of holiness, stories of men and women who let themselves be sustained by God. We need relics because without memories we would have no hope,” he said.
Regarding the relics related to Jesus, the series gives special attention to the 2019 fire that gutted Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris where the crown of thorns that the Roman soldiers placed on the head of the Lord was almost lost.
The miniseries shows images from April 15, 2019, in which Parisians cried as they watched the iconic church burn. There the crown was kept in a secret place to protect it from the anti-Christian violence unleashed during the French Revolution. Since the revolution, the relic is only displayed once a year, on Good Friday, to be venerated by faithful from all over the world.
The firefighters didn’t know where the crown was kept, and it was due to the efforts of Father Jean-Marc Fournier, chaplain of the Paris firefighters, that the precious relic could be rescued.
After a few moments and “to preserve the relics, a team of firefighters was obliged to break the reliquary, unfortunately pulverizing it,” he said in a 2019 interview.
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