Letter 26

From: Desiderius of Cahors, bishop To: [Unknown recipient] Date: ~642 AD Context: Desiderius of Cahors, letter 26; on the question of relics and their role in Christian devotion. To my dear colleague, The question of relics is one where pastoral wisdom must navigate between two errors: the error of dismissing them entirely as superstition, and the error of allowing the veneration of relics to become a substitute for genuine faith and moral life. The orthodox teaching is clear: we do not worship relics; we honor the saints whose relics they are, and we ask the saints' intercession. The physical remains of those who have been united to God retain, in some sense that we do not fully understand, a connection to the holiness that marked those persons in life. This is the theological basis for the miracles that are reported at the shrines of saints, and those miracles, properly investigated and authenticated, are real. The pastoral problem is that the popular veneration of relics can easily drift into something quite different from this orthodox understanding — into a kind of magical thinking that treats the physical proximity of the relic as automatically efficacious regardless of the faith and disposition of the person who approaches it. This is the error to be guarded against. What I do: preach the theology clearly and regularly, take the investigation of miracles seriously rather than promoting every report, and maintain relationships with the custodians of major shrines so that the veneration is properly directed. Desiderius