RELICS (in Latin, " ") is a term used to signify the remains, bones, or garments of departed holy men, which are honoured by the followers of the Church of Rome. During the early ages of the Christian Church, martyrs were held in veneration ; and their relics were treasured up as something sacred. The anniversary of their martyrdom was celebrated by assemblies of the faithful, held round their tomb or on the places where they had perished, and chapels and sanctuaries were raised on the spot. In the 4th and 5th centuries the previous veneration for the saints became a kind of worship ; miracles were said to be performed by fragments of their bones or garments, and pilgrimages were undertaken to obtain these relics. Helena, the mother of Constantine, went to Palestine, and was said to have found the identical cross on which Christ suffered. The employment of images and that of relics as accessories to church worship seem to have grown up together (luring that period. Towards the end of the 6th century, Pope Gregory I. displayed a great veneration for relics. Them is a letter of his to the empress Constantino, who had asked him for a part of the body of St. Paul, in which he excuses himself by saying that it was not the custom of the Romans, and, in general, of the Christians of the West, to touch, much less to remove the bodies of saints ; bnt that they put a piece of linen called " braudeurts " near the holy bodies, which is afterwards withdrawn, and treasured up with due veneration in some new church, and as many miracles are wrought by it as if the bodies themselves were them : he adds that they were much surprised at the Greeks removing the bones of saints from place to place ; Lut that in order not to disappoint the piety of the empress, he would send her some filings of the chains which St. Paul wore on
his neck and hands. This letter is quoted by Baronius, Fleury, and other church historians. From that time the veneration for relies increased, but there was no longer the same scrupulosity about re moving the relies. Relic worship became during the middle ages a vulgar superstition and disgraceful traffic ; and the abuse has been censured by many sincere Roman Catholics. It was ordered by several synods that no relies should be exposed to view without the sanction of the local bishop. Pope Innocent III. forbade the sale of relics. The Roman Catholic Church however admits that the relics of saints have performed and may still perform miracles ; and that they are a proper object of veneration.
(Billiothegus &scree, par lea P2res Richard a Giraud, articles 'Re liques ' and Saints,' 3rd section, Iteliques des Saints ;' and also Father liononi do Sainte Marie, Dissertation sue lea Reliques ; and the Abb& de Cordemoi Traits des &antes Reliques.)