|
The Faith Agenda
By William C. Carlotti, Torrington and NYC
Noel Ambery’s "Mythology Gone Crazy" [March 8] is one of the many good reasons that the readers of The Voice have honored him by voting him the "the best" religious writer. The piece is concise, responsive, and to the point. On the other hand, Jeff Messenger continues to whine about "personal attacks and characterizations" [The Skeptical Agenda, March 8] as though he has some special virtue in creating a dialogue where "people should be able to politely ‘agree to disagree.’" Such a presumptive virtue was apparently absent when Mr. Messenger began our dialogue by suggesting that I am a "prayer hater" [The Old Testament and Archeology, July 13] and requesting that I not respond to his contributions. Evidently, Mr. Messenger’s assessment of what is polite and what is a personal attack and characterization is dependent on whose chain is pulled, or whose ox is gored, or whose knob is burnished, or whose apple is polished. Be that as it may, it is the reader who will be the judge of the validity of the dialogue.
Mr. Messenger has apparently moved his search for "divine fingerprints" from a scorched mountaintop to a centuries old piece of linen cloth that bears an image purported to be a crucified man [Shrouded Science, March 29 and April 5]. The approximately ten foot long piece of cloth has been preserved in the Royal Chapel at the Cathedral of Turin and has become known as the Shroud of Turin, in spite of the fact that there is absolutely no evidence at all that it is a burial shroud taken from an entombed man. Gleaning much of his piece from other published descriptions of the image on the linen, Mr. Messenger has provided us with a brutally vivid description of the mutilation of the human body imposed by the crucifixion method of execution favored by the slave owners who ruled in the time of the Roman Empire. There were times in the course of their rule that thousands of such similarly crucified, mutilated bodies of slaves hung naked on wooden crosses along the sides of the Apian Way as judgment for an insurrection against their condition. In spite of the fact that Mr. Messenger refers to the the Shroud as a "compelling image," it is his myopia that directs the course of his inquiry—focusing on promoting a "mystery" to create a miraculously produced image of the crucifixion of Jesus Christ, rather than focusing on the historical lesson that the the compelling image can provide. His choice thus mirrors the enormous failing of the religious impulse: the promotion of form over substance.
The old linen cloth was first put on display by the family of Geoffrey DeCharney about fifty years after he was burned at the stake in 1314, along with Jacques de Molay, as part of the disbanding of the Knights Templars in 1307 under charges of heresy. Up until the time of the disbanding of the Knights, they served as the warrior monks of the Crusades, accumulating enormous riches in the process of genocidal assaults and the plundering of the wealthy cities of northern Africa and the Middle East. Over a two hundred year history they acquired a sufficient surplus wealth to become financiers of kings.
According to a Memorandum to Pope Clement VII written by Bishop Pierre d’Arcis, when the cloth was first exhibited, the Bishop of Turin, Henri de Poitiers, uncovered it as a fraud. According to Bishop Pierre d’Arcis: "Eventually, after diligent inquiry and examination, he discovered the fraud and how the said cloth was cunningly painted, to wit, it was a work of human skill and not miraculously wrought or bestowed." The Bishop wrote further that the Diocese at Lirey had "… falsely and deceitfully, consumed with the passion of avarice and not from any motive of devotion but only of gain, procured for their church a certain cloth cunningly painted, upon which, by clever sleight of hand, was depicted the two-fold image of one man, that is the back and front, they falsely declaring and pretending that this was the actual shroud in which our Savior Jesus Christ was enfolded in the tomb." The Bishop refers to the fact that the cloth was being promoted as a shroud to raise funds from the pilgrims who traveled to view it.
According to researchers at the McCrone Research Institute, the faint sepia image on the linen is made up of billions of submicron pigment particles (red ochre and vermilion) in a collagen tempera medium probably produced from parchment in medieval times. Dr. McCrone determined this in 1979 by polarized light microscopy. This included careful inspection of thousands of linen fibers taken from thirty-two different areas all over the cloth. Characterization of the image-forming particles was done by refractive indices, polarized light microscopy, size, shape, and microchemical tests for iron, mercury, and body fluids. There was no indication of body fluids or blood. In 1980 the Institute used electron and x-ray diffraction and found red ochre pigment (iron oxide, hematite) and vermilion pigment (mercuric sulfide). The electron microprobe analyzer found iron, mercury, and sulfur on a dozen of the claimed "blood-image" areas. The results fully confirmed the earlier analyses and further determined that the image was painted twice—once with red ochre pigment, followed by vermilion to enhance the "blood-image" areas. The dating by microscopy yielded a date of 1355 for the linen, which agreed with the subsequent C-14 carbon dating done in 1988.
The evidence supports the thesis that the image on the linen cloth is a meticulous painting of the brutality of a man’s execution by crucifixion, created about 1355, which, when purported to be the crucified image of Christ, served the purposes of a new church in need of a pilgrim-attracting relic.
Yet, even as Mr. Messenger continues the deceit by enveloping the brutal image he so vividly describes with his need for mystery or the miraculous, there are those of us who are more compelled by the substance of its meaning in words like those of Pope John Paul II: "The shroud is a challenge to our intelligence. It first of all requires of every person … that he humbly grasp the profound message it sends to his reason and his life … It reminds modern man, often distracted by prosperity and technological achievements, of the tragic situation of his many brothers and sisters and invites him to question himself … in order to explore its causes. The imprint left by the tortured body … which attests to the tremendous human capacity for causing pain and death to one’s fellow man, stands as an icon of the suffering of the innocent of every age: of the countless tragedies that have marked past history and the dramas that continue to unfold in the world … How can we not think of the millions of people who die of hunger, of the horrors committed in the many wars that soak nations in blood, of the brutal exploitation of women and children, of the millions of human beings who live in hardship and humiliation on the edges of great cities, especially in developing countries? How can we not recall with dismay and pity those who do not enjoy basic civil rights, the victims of torture … the slaves of criminal organizations?"
Our government knows well the consequences of focusing our attention in the way that the Pope suggests. It is the reason that we are not receiving, by careful design and censorship, the full images of the wars currently being conducted. They learned from the experience of the anti-war protests of the Vietnam era (as Colin Powell has frankly admitted) that too much blood and guts and suffering in the images of the television news incites the humanity in us that impels the peace impulse.
|
|
