215. Relics
215. RELICS
What justifies the veneration of relics of the saints?
As Augustine says: If a father’s coat or ring, or anything else of that kind, is so much more cherished by his children as love for one’s parents is greater, in no way are the bodies themselves to be despised, which are much more intimately and closely united to us than any garment, for they belong to man’s very nature. It is clear from this that he who has a certain affection for anyone venerates whatever of his is left after his death, not only his body and the parts thereof but even external things such as his clothes and such like. Now it is manifest that we should show honor to the saints of God as being members of Christ, the children and friends of God, and our intercessors. Wherefore in memory of them we ought to honor any relics of theirs in a fitting manner: principally their bodies, which were temples and organs of the Holy Ghost dwelling and operating in them, and are destined to be likened to the body of Christ by the glory of the Resurrection. Hence God Himself fittingly honors such relics by working miracles at their presence. . . .
Jerome says: We do not adore, I will not say the relics of the martyrs, but either the sun or the moon or even the angels—that is to say with the worship of latria—but we honor the martyrs’ relics, so that thereby we give honor to Him Whose martyrs they are. We honor the servants, that the honor shown to them may reflect on their Master (III,25,6).
The veneration of relics comes neither under latria (adoration) nor dulia (the kind of veneration due to persons alone); they deserve a lesser veneration but a real one.
The practice of venerating relics of the saints goes back to the earliest Christian times. St. Thomas’ first reason justifying it is the analogy with merely human veneration. It is an a fortiori argument: if even the veneration of a beloved father’s relics after he dies is a good thing, how much more the veneration of a saint’s?
A second reason is that the practice is justified by two things in combination: by (1) the veneration of persons by a motive of love—the more we love someone, the more we venerate him—and by (2) the metaphysical fact that human bodies are not just instruments of persons but the embodiment of persons. What you do to my body, you do to me.
This is true even in the secular world. It is even more true for a Christian, for whom the body while on earth is the temple of the Holy Spirit, and destined to be resurrected and eternalized in Heaven.
This applies to physical possessions like clothes as well as, but to a lesser degree than, actual body parts. The same is true in the secular world: even Protestants who oppose the veneration of relics still venerate the bodies of their beloved dead. They bury them, with great ceremony, and visit and care for their gravesites. And they venerate their possessions and their clothing, but less. (They do not bury these or care for their grave sites.)
Another argument is taken from the miracles God works through the relics of the saints.
Jerome’s point is similar to the point about images in #213 above: our love and attention, like a rubber ball, bounces off the image or relic and onto the person. The relic, like the image, is looked—along rather than just looked—at. Thus when we see the King’s servant, we see the King. When a Roman soldier saw his commander, he saw Caesar, Lord of the world. (See Mt 8:5-13.)