Articles by Diane Levero from Defend Life News, August 2000

See Conference Speakers' Bios and Photos Here  LINK

SHROUD CAN STRENGTHEN FAITH, SAYS FR. VALENTINO  

            Fr. Francis Valentino had known for a long time of the existence of the linen cloth that reputedly wrapped the body of Christ.

            "But when my mother asked me, 'What did Jesus look like?' it prompted me to study the Shroud of Turin", he told his audience at the Holy Face Conference in Emmitsburg June 24.

            "It's a universal desire of all people to see the face of Christ", he postulated--not an overweening assumption, when one considers that the Shroud is the most studied artifact in history.

            But, said the Jesuit lecturer, who is a licensed clinical psychologist with degrees in philosophy and theology, "I came at the study of the Shroud as an amateur scientist--and scientists tend to be skeptical."

            Fr. Valentino traced briefly the historic evidence for the Shroud, beginning with Gospel accounts that tell us that Joseph of Arimithea wrapped the body of Christ in a linen cloth.

            On Easter Sunday, according to John's Gospel, the Apostle Jesus loved hurried to the tomb, where he saw the linen, and "he believed that Christ had risen from the dead.

            Why would John have believed that, rather than that Christ's body simply had been moved or stolen?

            "Perhaps he saw the image of Christ on the Shroud", Father speculated.

            Through subsequent centuries there were various historical references to a shroud of Jesus.  In 1203 A.D. a crusader, Robert of Clari, wrote that he saw a shroud in Constantinople imprinted with Jesus' image.  A year later, when the Crusaders sacked the city, the shroud was missing.

            In 1354 a shroud turned up in Lirey, France.  Some bishops even then doubted its validity.  In 1578 it was moved to the Cathedral of St. John the Baptist in Turin, Italy, where it reposes today.

            Though the Shroud has always been a subject of fascination to historians and the devout, sindonology, or the study of the sindon, or Shroud, received a great boost in 1898 when photographer Secundo Pia took the first photos of the relic.

            Prior to then, Fr. Valentino noted, all anyone saw was a very faded, blotched image on the Shroud.  But when Secundo developed his prints, he was stunned and puzzled.  His film negative showed a positive image:  apparently, the image on the Shroud was actually a negative "print, making the "negative of the negative a positive, or actual view of the Man on the Shroud.

            His photo, offering an image of great clarity, was disseminated widely, and created a tremendous surge of interest.  In the 1960s two Italian scientists who studied the image concluded that it was not a painting, as no pigments could be discerned.

            A massive study in 1978, the Shroud of Turin Research Project, brought scientific equipment in on trailer trucks, and 40 to 50 specialists from a multitude of scientific disciplines.

            By 1980 a computerized tool called a VP-8 Analyzer could enhance the qualities of photos taken by space probes to produce an image showing depth.  Using this equipment rendered a three-dimensional version of the image, a result that did not occur with regular paintings.

            The consensus of all these studies was that there were no chemical or physical explanations for the image.

            In 1988, however, the long-awaited radiocarbon dating tests were performed, with jolting results:  they purportedly showed that the Shroud was medieval, dating the cloth as originating between 1260-1390 A.D.

            After the initial shock, critics pointed out many faults in the C14 dating methodology.  The most disturbing error, said Fr. Valentino, was that although the protocol required that three samples be taken for comparison, only one small sample was cut from one of the worst sites possible, the outside edge, where it had been handled for centuries and may have been repaired at some point.  The sample site was also in the middle of a water stain.

            In addition, no dry runs were conducted, and the tests were not double-blind.

            All of these irregularities led to a lot of confusion.

            "You can't judge the authenticity of the Shroud from one test", said Fr. Valentino; "you have to look at the totality of the evidence."

            Subsequent research by Dr. Leo Garza-Valdez points to one possible cause of error in the radiocarbon dating:  he found a bacterial coating on Shroud fibers, in sufficient quantity to throw the date of its origin way off.  Due to Dr. Valdez's research, there may be a retest, in which the bacterial coating would first be removed.

            "It now seems impossible that the Shroud is a hoax or a forgery," Father concluded.

            Believing the Shroud to be authentic is not essential to our faith, he said; nevertheless, it has strengthened the faith of believers.

            Devotion to the image of Christ has helped to turn Russia away from Communism, he pointed out.  Early Byzantine icons of the face of Jesus are believed to have been copied originally from the Face on the Shroud, to which they bear certain marked similarities.  Communism tried to replace these icons, which were widespread throughout Russia, with portraits of Lenin and Stalin, but never completely succeeded.

            St. Basil said that what the books of the Gospel show us by words, the icons show us in works.

            Moving on to modern-day scientific discoveries concerning the Shroud, Fr. Valentino observed, "Revelation is ongoing and progressive; we can build theology on the Holy Face.  This authenticated image of the Face may act as a witness of the Resurrection.  Pope Paul VI said perhaps the image can show us the glory of the risen Christ."

            What the Gospels don't reveal about Christ's suffering, science, studying the Shroud, can, he asserted.

            The Shroud, which "is a picture of great dignity and calm, but also a picture of suffering and death . . . speaks to us of Christ's sufferings as no other image can."

            Scientists continue to accumulate amazing discoveries about the Shroud, demonstrating that there is no conflict between faith and science, he said:  "Is it not the same Holy Spirit which inspires the scientist in his search for truth and the man of faith in his search?"

            Most importantly, perhaps, the Shroud confirms the stunning reality of God become man, said Fr. Valentino:  "As Pontius Pilate said, 'Ecce homo--behold the man'."

KURTZES HEAL JESUS' LAMBS WITH HOLY EUCHARIST

             Donna Kurtz says she is not a mystic.

            Yet, she told her audience at the Holy Face Conference in Emmitsburg June 24, one day while she was at prayer, Jesus came to me and said clearly, "Tender my lambs".

            Donna didn't know what His words meant.

            Webster's New World Dictionary says that an archaic meaning of the word "tender" is "to treat with tenderness".

            At the time, Donna and her husband John were living outside Philadelphia with their two adopted children.  (They had been unable to have children of their own.)

            Trying to discern God's will, Donna began babysitting for neighbors, working mothers and friends.  The Kurtzes also became foster parents for the state of Pennsylvania.  Gradually, God's will for their lives became clearer and they were led toward more adoptions.

            Today, the Kurtzes have 14 adopted children:  Maria Elena, 18, and Sandra and MariCarmen, both 16, all from Mexican orphanages; Rosa, 13, also from an orphanage; Natalie, 10, daughter of a Guatemalan immigrant; David, 9, adopted from the foster system in Philadelphia, as was Peter, 7; Margarita, also 9, from Estonia; Dominic, 5, Michael, 4, and Joseph, 2, three brothers whose mother suffered from drug addiction; and, adopted this spring from a Texas foster home, the "three caballeros, brothers Alex, 9, Jonathan, 7, and Jose, 5.

            In an amazing "leap of faith", the family recently moved from their comfortable Philadelphia home to the small Western Pennsylvania town of Bolivar, to live in the basement of a mission church--and John quit his job as a building contractor to devote full-time attention to the family.

            "We have sold our house and left everything through obedience to God's will", said Donna.  "It's all Divine Providence.  It's becoming more and more simple."

            "Our family is a microcosm of the kinds of children all over the world who are in orphanages or foster homes, said John.  Many of them have suffered years of emotional and physical neglect or abuse.

            As a result, he said, "These children suffer from Radical Attachment Disorder, or RAD--we call it a broken heart."

            Children with attachment disorder often show a complete lack of ability to give affection to others; they push people away.

            If a child does not form a loving attachment to his mother in the first three years of his life, he can't attach to others later on, said Donna:  "They have a deep-seated rage from the abandonment they felt as infants.

            "These children feel they must be in control; they don't allow anybody to come close to them, because when they were vulnerable, they were hurt."

            So their children have often come to them with serious behavior problems, she said; "They look and act like wild animals.  But Jesus can change wild animals into tender lambs."

            To accomplish the formidable task of healing the children's emotional scars, John and Donna rely completely on Jesus in the Holy Eucharist.

            Each morning they rise at 6 a.m., pile into their large van with all 14 children, and drive 20 minutes to attend 8 a.m. Mass at Holy Family Church in nearby Seward.  (St. Mary's Chapel, where they live, as a mission church has no resident priest.)

            And every day, as a family, they go upstairs to the chapel to pray before the Blessed Sacrament, do Adoration, and say their Rosaries.  The children also willingly pray for the needs of others.

            "One of our greatest role models is St. John Bosco, who took hundreds of children off the streets of Italy to care for them, said Donna.

            "John Bosco went to great lengths to convince each child that God wanted him to be a saint--and many of them became priests and saints.  He was thoroughly grounded in the Eucharist.

            "I've never met a child yet that when I bring him to the Tabernacle and say, 'This is Jesus,' they say, 'No, it's not.'  They know it is.  They have been waiting for the truth all their life.  They're hungry for the truth!"

            The children break down their self-imposed barriers first with Jesus, she said.  "We teach them how to talk to Jesus:  'Jesus, I need to be more kind--help me to be more kind'."

            "We have seen Eucharistic miracles, children turned around.  We have had children see Jesus in the Eucharist."

            The Kurtzes came to Bolivar in June, 1999, intending to build a home on 5 acres of donated land near the town.  Bishop Anthony Bosco of the Greensburg Diocese gave them permission to use the large basement of St. Mary's Chapel as a temporary dwelling.

            But by August, septic system problems for the building proved insurmountable.  They are currently looking at several options, in four different states, involving either building a new facility or renovating an existing one.

            In the meantime, Donna, a graduate of Catholic University, home schools the children in the cavernous chapel basement, which is partitioned off into rooms with the aid of boxes, furniture and shelves.  The older girls help out with meal preparation, laundry and caring for the younger children.

            Private donations and money from government agencies in support of several of the children have helped them financially.  In December they formed St. Joseph's House, a charitable, nonprofit corporation, which allows them to receive tax-deductible donations and apply for grants.

            This kind if work is not for everybody, Donna cautioned.

            But for Donna and John Kurtz, it truly appears to be God's will.

            St. Joseph's House's address is P.O. Box 371, Bolivar, PA 15923.  Their e-mail address is sjhkurtz@connect-me.net.

 RACHEL'S VINEYARD HELPS POST-ABORTION HEALING

Nearly a decade and a half ago, Theresa Burke was conducting a counseling session with a group of women suffering from bulemia and anorexia when the talk turned to abortion.  Gradually, the unsettling truth emerged that, of the ten women in the group, eight had had abortions.  "One woman wanted to talk about it, one started crying, and one left the room", Dr. Burke recalled in a talk at the Holy Face Conference in Emmitsburg June 24.  "Their reactions were like a microcosm of the world's."

Uncertain as to the proper method for handling such a volatile issue, Theresa consulted her supervisor.   "You have no business prying into people's abortions," she was told.  She was forbidden to bring the subject up.  But to Theresa, the troubling subject was not one to be ignored or suppressed, but one that cried out for attention and healing.

Shortly after that, she struck out on her own, founding The Center for Post Abortion Healing and starting the first therapeutic support group for post-aborted women in 1986.  Rachel's Vineyard began as a 13-week support group and eventually was adapted into a weekend retreat.  It is a place where men and women can deal with their grief and guilt over their abortions, and unite their sufferings with the passion of Christ.

"We have had 100 retreats this year, from Alaska to Florida," said Theresa.  "They last from Friday through Sunday; it's a very intense experience."

A retreat team, which includes a priest and a mental health professional, works with the participants, combining psychological technique with rituals, Scripture and creative spiritual exercises.

Participants reenact various Scripture passages concerning concrete experiences of Jesus.  For example, with the story of the woman caught in adultery, they first read the Scripture.  "Then we go through an exercise in which we hand around a big rock," explained Theresa.  As each participant receives the rock, the leader asks, "Is there anyone here to condemn you?"  "No, there is no one here to condemn me," the person replies.  The leader responds, "Neither do I condemn you.  Go, and sin no more."

 "Some people say, 'I know God will forgive me, but I can't forgive myself,'" said Theresa.  "We have them carry a rock with them everywhere all weekend; in that way, they begin to realize how their guilt is a burden to them."

 As part of learning to share in  and sympathize with one another's experiences, they pass around a "cup of bitterness," in which everyone deposits their guilt and shame.  They also share stories of their lives and of their abortions.

When people participate in these prayerful experiences, said Theresa, "They really do feel the presence of Christ; you see stony hearts being crushed."  The women are helped to establish a spiritual relationship with their aborted child.  Everyone receives a letter from their aborted child, and they are invited to name the child, thus giving him or her an identity.  They are comforted by knowing that their child is in heaven, and that he or she can be the mother's spiritual lifeline to Christ.  They have an opportunity to go to confession, and to spend an hour alone with Jesus in Eucharistic Adoration.

At the latter devotion, said Dr. Burke, "People have reported incredible miracles:  they will see the Holy Face of the Shroud of Turin in the Eucharist."

She remembers one woman who was having "real trouble" in unburdening herself of her guilt and grief.  "She wouldn't name her child, she wouldn't hold her baby doll."  (The latter is another therapy employed in the retreat.)  Theresa talked with the woman late into the night.  "I got nowhere.  Finally, I took her into the chapel for Eucharistic Adoration.  I told God, 'I've used everything in my psychological arsenal.  I'm tired.  You take over!'" After barely three minutes had elapsed, the woman, who had been gazing at the Holy Eucharist, gasped.  "Do you see it?  Do you see it?" she cried.

"I didn't see anything," recalled Theresa.

But the woman did.  Just above the Holy Eucharist, she saw the face of her child.  She grasped her baby doll lovingly and, weeping, rocked it for an hour.

"In my travels, it's consistent, said Dr. Burke.  "They either see the face of their child, or Jesus of the Holy Shroud."

Rachel's Vineyard, which has helped thousand of individuals and families woulded by abortion, began as a "grass-roots" effort, with no budget, office or advertising.  Theresa and her husband Kevin, a licensed social worker and clinical supervisor, covered expenses out of their own pockets.

Then, "After 14 years of faith and trust in God, one and a half years ago we were taken up [as a division of] the American Life League," said Theresa.

 Dr. Burke holds a Master's degree and a Doctorate of Philosophy in Counseling Psychology.  Theresa and Kevin live in Philadelphia with their five young children.

BODY THEOLOGY OFFERS ALTERNATE TO WORLD'S VIEW

             We live in a time when the body is under great attack, Sr. Sarah Doser told her audience at the Holy Face Conference in Emmitsburg June 24.

            Bodies of unborn children are assaulted and cut up for parts.  Wombs are rented out.  We mutilate our bodies by piercing them in strange places.

            The theology of the body is a discipline that counters modern-day contempt for the human body with an understanding of it based on faith and Church teaching, explained Sister Doser.

            But contempt for the human body is nothing new, she pointed out.  Many heresies in the early Church involved body theology.

            "People were scandalized that God would become flesh," she said.  So heretics such as the Gnostics denied that Jesus had truly become man.

            Sister identified five significant "moments" in the development of the theology of the body.

            The first is Scripture, which tells us how Jesus lived His enfleshment:  "He spoke, He healed, He cared for people.  He gave His body for our sins on the cross."

            There are over 150 references to the word "body" in the New Testament.  Perhaps the most important is "Take and eat; this is my Body."

            The second important "moment" occurred in the Third Century, when many heresies were raging.  Tertullian, a Church Father in Carthage, proclaimed that everything in the sacramental life of the Church sees the body and soul as one.

            "The flesh is the hinge of salvation," he said.  By that he meant that the flesh is the pivot, or turning point, on which our salvation rests.

            The third moment in body theology came sixteen hundred years later, with the 1968 publication of The Flesh, Instrument of Salvation:  A Theology of the Human Body, by Cipriano Vagaggini, OSB.

            Father Vagaggini's book expands on Tertullian's ideas.  He said that dualism, or anything that pits body and soul in conflict with each other, is warped; that Christianity is very clear that the body and soul are one:    "We're not pure spirit.  We're enfleshed even as Christ is enfleshed," Sister Doser explained.

            "Think again about God, so concerned and devoted to Adam's body," said Vagaggini; after all, God knew, when He created Adam, that He would eventually assume that same body Himself.  "In fact, in everything that came to be expressed in the human body, there was the life of Christ, the future God, shining through."

            The fourth significant moment in body theology began in 1979, when Pope John Paul II, in his weekly general audiences, started a catechesis, or series of lessons, on the bodily dimension of our human personhood.

            The Holy Father's talks, which ran from September 5, 1979, to November 28, 1984, were collected into a book, The Theology of the Body According to John Paul II:  Human Love in the Divine Plan, published in 1997.

            His theology of the body consists of a searching analysis of Biblical texts that reveal the mystery of the body, sexuality and marriage at three critical "levels" of human experience:  before the Fall; in human history affected by sin, yet redeemed in Christ; and as man will experience them in the resurrection of the body.

            According to John Paul, by reflecting on these three levels of "experiencing" the body, sexuality and marriage, we discover the deepest reality of human identity--we even penetrate the mystery of the Trinitarian God.

            The fifth moment of body theology is offered in Toward a Theology of the Body, by Sr. Mary Timothy Prokes, also published in 1997.

            Sister Prokes explores such topics as the body in Christian history, embodiment as vocation, bodily "working out" our salvation, and human suffering.

            The sacramental life of the Church offers the bodily communion with Christ that we long for, Sister Doser concluded.

            "The return to Eucharistic adoration is one of the most wonderful things that has happened in the Church in recent years.  We long to see the face of Christ."

            Sister Doser is director of Admissions of the John Paul II Institute for Studies on Marriage and Family, in Washington, D.C.  The Institute offers a course in theology of the body.  

            The Holy Face Conference was sponsored by Defend Life and The Cross and The Veil web resource. 

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