home *** CD-ROM | disk | FTP | other *** search
- GRAPEVINE, Page 30SCIENCE AND SACRILEGE ROIL THE FAITHFUL
-
-
- By JANICE CASTRO/Reported by Sidney Urquhart
-
-
- It was a rough week for Italian saints. To start with,
- scientists in Milan announced that a mixture of iron chloride
- and calcium carbonate, which looks like dried blood, can
- duplicate a phenomenon that has long been regarded as the
- miracle of ST. JANUARIUS. A vial believed to contain blood from
- the 4th century priest is kept in Naples, where several times
- a year the contents spontaneously liquefy and then return to a
- powdery state. The researchers, who demonstrated the same
- phenomenon with the chemical compound, speculate that a chemist
- may have concocted a hoax. The next day, in Padua, four masked
- thieves broke into the basilica and stole a gold-plated,
- jewel-encrusted reliquary. It contained the jaw and teeth of ST.
- ANTHONY.
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-