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Austrian Cardinal Christoph Schonborn celebrates Mass at St. John the Baptist Cathedral in Turin in 2000, the last time the Shroud of Turin was on public display. (CNS/Nancy Wiechec) By Cindy WoodenCatholic News Service VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Pope Benedict XVI will join hundreds of thousands of pilgrims traveling to northern Italy in 2010 to see the Shroud of Turin, which many believe is the burial cloth of Christ. The Vatican and the Archdiocese of Turin announced Oct. 27 that Pope Benedict will visit the city May 2. "As the first act of his visit, the Holy Father will...

Dr. John P. Jackson / The Shroud of Turin Colorado Springs, Colo., Oct 6, 2009 / 09:27 pm (CNA).- An Italian scientist is claiming to have re-created the burial cloth believed to have covered the crucified body of Jesus, called the Shroud of Turin.  However, CNA spoke with experts who maintain that there are till several major differences between the new shroud and the ancient one.According to Reuters, Luigi Garlaschelli, an organic chemistry professor at the University of Pavia announced that he and his team “have shown it is possible to reproduce something which has the same characteristics as...

Austrian Cardinal Christoph Schonborn celebrates Mass at St. John the Baptist Cathedral in Turin in 2000, the last time the Shroud of Turin was on public display. (CNS) That’s right, an Italian scientist whose work was funded by an Italian association of atheists and agnostics has undertaken some experiments that he claims “prove” the Shroud of Turin isn’t really the burial cloth of Jesus, but rather a fraud created in medieval times. What is the conclusive research that the scientist has conducted, that allegedly refutes the substantial body of scientific findings that suggest the cloth was indeed wrapped around the...

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Pope Benedict XVI confirmed his intention to visit the Shroud of Turin when it goes on public display in Turin's cathedral April 10-May 23, 2010. Cardinal Severino Poletto of Turin, papal custodian of the Shroud of Turin, visited the pope July 26 in Les Combes, Italy, where the pope was spending part of his vacation. The Alpine village is about 85 miles from Turin. The cardinal gave the pope the latest news concerning preparations for next year's public exposition of the shroud and the pope "confirmed his intention to go to Turin for the occasion," said...

Pope Benedict XVI confirmed his intention to visit the Shroud of Turin when it goes on public display in Turin's cathedral April 10-May 23, 2010. Cardinal Severino Poletto of Turin, papal custodian of the Shroud of Turin, visited the pope July 26 in Les Combes, Italy, where the pope was spending part of his vacation. The Alpine village is about 85 miles from Turin. The cardinal gave the pope the latest news concerning preparations for next year's public exposition of the shroud and the pope "confirmed his intention to go to Turin for the occasion," said the Vatican spokesman, Jesuit...

To believers it is the burial cloth of Jesus Christ, miraculously marked with his image. But the Turin shroud was widely dismissed as a hoax in 1988 when scientific tests found it could not be more than 1,000 years old. Now one of the scientists who first studied 12 foot-long sheet has spoken - from beyond the grave - of how he came to believe that it could be genuine. A video made shortly before Raymond Rogers died in 2005 has been discovered, in which the U.S. chemist reveals his own tests show the relic to be much older -...

New evidence suggests the Turin Shroud could have been the cloth in which Jesus was buried, as experiments that concluded it was a medieval fake were flawed. Radio carbon dating carried out in 1988 was performed on an area of the relic that was repaired in the 16th century, according to Ray Rogers, who helped lead the Shroud of Turin Research Project (STRP). At the time he argued firmly that the shroud, which bears a Christlike image, was a clever forgery. snip "Sue and Joe were right. The worst possible sample for carbon dating was taken. "It consisted of different...

Medieval knights hid and secretly venerated The Holy Shroud of Turin for more than 100 years after the Crusades, the Vatican said Sunday in an announcement that appeared to solve the mystery of the relic’s missing years. The Knights Templar, an order which was suppressed and disbanded for alleged heresy, took care of the linen cloth, which bears the image of a man with a beard, long hair and the wounds of crucifixion, according to Vatican researchers. The Shroud, which is kept in the royal chapel of Turin Cathedral, has long been revered as the shroud in which Jesus was...

Medieval knights hid and secretly venerated The Holy Shroud of Turin for more than 100 years after the Crusades, the Vatican said today in an announcement that appeared to solve the mystery of the relic’s missing years. The Knights Templar, an order which was suppressed and disbanded for alleged heresy, took care of the linen cloth, which bears the image of a man with a beard, long hair and the wounds of crucifixion, according to Vatican researchers. The Shroud, which is kept in the royal chapel of Turin Cathedral, has long been revered as the shroud in which Jesus was...

Medieval knights hid and secretly venerated The Holy Shroud of Turin for more than 100 years after the Crusades, the Vatican said yesterday in an announcement that appeared to solve the mystery of the relic’s missing years. The Knights Templar, an order which was suppressed and disbanded for alleged heresy, took care of the linen cloth, which bears the image of a man with a beard, long hair and the wounds of crucifixion, according to Vatican researchers. The Shroud, which is kept in the royal chapel of Turin Cathedral, has long been revered as the shroud in which Jesus was...

The investigative study of the history and origin of the famous Shroud of Turin, this program also looks at what the mysterious man of pain on the Shroud has come to symbolize in today's world. Airs March 21 at 8pm March 22 at 2am March 26 at 1pm 60 mis running time Check your local cable or satellite provider for channel or watch live, online at EWTN

Tonight, the Discovery Channel will have a special on the Shroud of Turin featuring the late Raymond N. Rogers. Rogers published a paper in the scientific journal Thermochimica Acta. that is generally viewed as undermining the carbon 14 dating of the shroud in 1988 that proved the Shroud was a fake. 1. Rogers was not authorized to conduct the tests by the Church. 2. The Church said they could not authenticate that the samples he used came from the Shroud. 3. If the Samples were really from the Raes sample and the Riggi Sample, they were taken and distributed illegally....

It is on now... Discovery Channel. 7:00PM Pacific, 10:00PM Eastern.

He doesn’t charge for lectures, although some churches provide a stipend and he sells his DVDs and books after the program. “You start to get the idea there’s only one person in history” whose image is imprinted on a centuries–old cloth,” he told a crowd of more than 100 gathered at St. Peter Parish in DeLand Sept. 23 to hear his presentation, “The Mystery of the Holy Shroud: A Case for Authenticity.”

PRESS RELEASE: Los Alamos National Laboratory team of scientists prove carbon 14 dating of the Shroud of Turin wrong COLUMBUS, Ohio, August 15 — In his presentation today at The Ohio State University’s Blackwell Center, Los Alamos National Laboratory (LANL) chemist, Robert Villarreal, disclosed startling new findings proving that the sample of material used in 1988 to Carbon-14 (C-14) date the Shroud of Turin, which categorized the cloth as a medieval fake, could not have been from the original linen cloth because it was cotton. According to Villarreal, who lead the LANL team working on the project, thread samples they...

New Scientific Evidence For The Shroud of Turin Photo negative of Shroud of Turin Scriptural Reference To The ShroudJohn 19:38-42 After this Joseph of Arimathe'a, who was a disciple of Jesus, but secretly, for fear of the Jews, asked Pilate that he might take away the body of Jesus, and Pilate gave him leave. So he came and took away his body. Nicode'mus also, who had at first come to him by night, came bringing a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about a hundred pounds' weight. They took the body of Jesus, and bound it in linen cloths with the...

Dr. John and Rebecca Jackson (Photo credit: The Tablet, newspaper for the Diocese of Brooklyn) Colorado Springs, Aug 19, 2008 / 03:00 am (CNA).- The Shroud of Turin Center in Colorado Springs is preparing linen samples similar to the materials used in the Shroud of Turin in an attempt to determine whether or not the carbon dating tests of the shroud could have been skewed by contamination from atmospheric carbon monoxide.The Shroud of Turin is considered by some to bear an image of the face of Jesus Christ. Made of herring bone linen, the shroud has dimensions of about...

A Colorado couple researching the shroud dispute radiocarbon dating of the alleged burial cloth of Jesus, and Oxford has agreed to help them reexamine the findings.COLORADO SPRINGS, COLO. -- The tie that binds John and Rebecca Jackson is about 4 feet by 14 feet, woven of herringbone twill linen. It once led to their romance; years later, it still dominates their thoughts and fills their conversations. It brought Rebecca, an Orthodox Jew, to the Catholic Church; it led John to suspend himself from an 8-foot-tall cross to study how blood might have stained the cloth. Together, the two have committed...

A Colorado couple researching the shroud dispute radiocarbon dating of the alleged burial cloth of Jesus, and Oxford has agreed to help them reexamine the findings. The tie that binds John and Rebecca Jackson is about 4 feet by 14 feet, woven of herringbone twill linen. It once led to their romance; years later, it still dominates their thoughts and fills their conversations. It brought Rebecca, an Orthodox Jew, to the Catholic Church; it led John to suspend himself from an 8-foot-tall cross to study how blood might have stained the cloth. Together, the two have committed to memory every...

Introduction: An Exercise in Pseudoscience Ray Rogers, a retired chemist who formerly worked at the Los Alamos national laboratory, recently published a pro-authenticity Shroud of Turin paper in a legitimate and peer-reviewed chemistry journal, Thermochimica Acta (hereafter TA). The Rogers paper makes two claims: First, the piece of the Shroud linen that was age-dated using radiocarbon technology in 1988 was actually a much-younger patch of cloth that allowed the radiocarbon labs to reach an incorrect medieval date. Second, using his own age-dating method, Rogers claims that the Shroud is actually much older than the early 14th century radiocarbon date. This...

Thursday, August 7, 2008Oxford view on Shroud of Turin eagerly awaited UNDER THE MICROSCOPE: Is the Turin Shroud real or a medieval forgery? The centuries-old question may soon be answered, writes William RevilleTHE TURIN SHROUD (TS) poses a fascinating mystery. It is a linen cloth (4.42m x 1.13m) bearing the image of a man that many believe is the crucified Jesus Christ. The cloth has been investigated scientifically but the jury is still out as to the age of the TS and the identity of the man whose image it carries. Much has been written on the TS. I would...

Will Judean Desert find shed light on Shroud of Turin? By ETGAR LEFKOVITS Updated May 29, 2008 7:28 Can a 6,000-year-old shroud uncovered in the Judean Desert in 1993 help illuminate the centuries-old debate over the Shroud of Turin? The Shroud of Turin Slideshow: Pictures of the week That is the question posed by Olga Negnevitsky, a conservator at the Israel Museum who was involved in the conservation of the lesser-known shroud for the Antiquities Authority after it was discovered inside a small cave near Jericho. The idea to use the older shroud to learn more about the famous one...

The Turin Shroud is to go on public display for the first time in a decade, sources at the Vatican have indicated, coinciding with a new set of tests on its age. The linen has only been put on display five times in the last century The Vatican keeps the 14ft by 4ft piece of linen, believed by some to be the death shroud of Jesus, in an aluminium case built by an Italian aerospace company to shut out all light, air and humidity. The case is filled with Argon gas in order to prevent bacteria from eating the...

Colorado Springs, May 23, 2008 / 05:01 am (CNA).- A physics professor has persuaded an Oxford laboratory to revisit the question of the age of the Shroud of Turin, the reputed burial shroud of Jesus Christ.  The professor argues that carbon monoxide contaminating the shroud could have distorted its radiocarbon dating results by more than 1,000 years.In 1988 and 1989 scientists at three laboratories drew on the results of radiocarbon dating to conclude that the shroud was a medieval forgery.  They dated its creation to between 1260 and 1390 AD.The Denver Post reports that John Jackson, a physics lecturer...

FOUNTAIN VALLEY, Calif. — The Shroud of Turin is undoubtedly the most famous relic in Christendom — and the best loved. During those rare times when it is displayed, millions of pilgrims travel from all over the world to see the purported burial cloth of Jesus Christ, a piece of linen 3 feet 7 inches-by-14 feet 3 inches that bears the detailed front and back images of a man who was crucified in a manner identical to that of Jesus of Nazareth as described in the Scriptures. In 1978, more than 3.5 million people stood in line for up to...

The Oxford laboratory that declared the Turin Shroud to be a medieval fake 20 years ago is investigating claims that its findings were wrong.The head of the world-renowned laboratory has admitted that carbon dating tests it carried out on Christendom's most famous relic may be inaccurate.   Carbon dating tests carried out 20 years ago on the Shroud of Turin suggested that the relic was a forgery Professor Christopher Ramsey, the director of the Oxford University Radiocarbon Accelerator Unit, said he was treating seriously a new theory suggesting that contamination had skewed the results. Though he stressed that he would...

ROME, FEB. 15, 2008 (Zenit.org).- Leaked information about a BBC interview to air on Holy Saturday reports that Christopher Bronk Ramsey, director of the Oxford Radiocarbon Accelerator Unit, thinks the 1998 tests on the Shroud of Turin should be re-evaluated. The 1988 carbon-14 tests -- done in the Oxford laboratories -- dated the shroud in the Middle Ages, thereby negating that it could be Christ's burial cloth. ZENIT spoke with Capuchin Father Gianfranco Berbenni, professor of "Science and Theology Regarding the Holy Shroud" at Rome's Regina Apostolorum university. In this interview, he comments on the long history of research on...

In 1978, a team of scientific researchers (STURP: Shroud of Turin Research Project) was allowed for the first time to carry out a scientific comprehensive study of the Turin Shroud. Visual examination, macro and microphotographies, X-Ray radiographies; IR, visible and UV reflectance spectroscopy and photographs and UV-Vis fluorescence studies were conducted in situ. 32 surface samples (5 cm2 each) were obtained from specific locations using inert, non-reactive pure hydrocarbon sticky tapes for later examination. The results of the studies were published in different peer-reviewed scientific journals in the following years. In 1981, STURP officially concluded that: No pigments, paints, dyes...

First, I would like to thank all of you who wrote or called me after seeing the program. I truly appreciate hearing your comments and your individual points of view. I am also sorry that it is simply impossible for me to respond to every e-mail I receive. When I was first asked to appear in a television documentary about the Shroud of Turin, sometime in 1996, I was very insecure about taking a public stand on the Shroud and wondered if I should do it at all. Somewhat ironically, since I am Jewish, I consulted with a Catholic priest...

I am posting this special website update to let you know that a new television documentary, titled, "Is It Real? Secrets of the Shroud," will premiere on the National Geographic Channel (NGC) here in the U.S. on Monday, July 23, 2007 at 9:00pm EDT. To be safe, check your local listings to verify the times. The program will air again on Tuesday, July 24, 2007 at 12:00am EDT and Sunday, July 29, 2007 at 2:00pm EDT. This is the description the NGC website included about the program: Believed to be the burial cloth of Jesus, the Shroud of Turin is...

Mechthild Flury-Lemberg began to spin and weave wool shorn from the sheep on her family's post-World War II German farm at the tender age of 16, "for fun," she says. She never imagined that the hobby, which led to a career in textile conservation, would also eventually lead her to head the restoration of one of the most cherished and mysterious relics in Christendom -- the Shroud of Turin -- or that her examination would produce new evidence that the famed linen dates to the first century A.D., to the time of Christ.

Speaking at the launch of a new book on the Shroud of Turin by Australian author, Brendan Whiting, NSW Minister for Commerce John Della Bosca says that the most likely explanation for the Shroud is that "it is in fact the burial cloth of Jesus Christ". Mr Della Bosca (left) was speaking at a NSW Parliament House launch of Brendan Whiting The Shroud Story, the Catholic Weekly reports. Saying that any reasonable inference based on available evidence as detailed in the book, points to this explanation, Mr Della Bosca described Mr Whiting's book as a "very balanced, very thoughtful and...

Almost four centuries after its mysterious disappearance, Fr. Heinrich Pfeiffer reported that he has rediscovered one of Christendom's most intriguing relics: the Veil of Veronica, the cloth with which Jesus wiped His face on the road to Calvary. Fr. Pfeiffer, a professor of Christian Art History in Rome, found the relic in the Abbey of Manoppello, Italy. The German Jesuit invested 13 years of searching through archives to prove that this is the same cloth that disappeared from the Vatican in 1608. Manoppello is a small, ancient town in the Abruzzo region of Italy, about 150 miles from Rome...

Dr. John Jackson, director of research for the Turin Shroud Center of Colorado, explains the history of the ancient burial cloth believed by some to be the burial cloth of Christ. Herald/Bill Howard COLORADO SPRINGS. Tucked away inside a plain-looking office complex near St. Patrick Parish, the Turin Shroud Center of Colorado is dedicated to studying the reputed burial cloth of Jesus Christ and delivering educational lectures around the globe. Opened in 1990, the center contains an actual-size photographic image of the shroud as well as three-dimensional models, images and artifacts illustrating the shroud's origin and possible authenticity as...

Author: Shroud of Turin wrongly condemnedBelieves dating scientifically flawed, linen could be burial cloth of Jesus A new book says the controversial Shroud of Turin – said to bear the image of the crucified Jesus Christ – has been wrongly condemned as a fraud and desecrated due to serious errors in its study and conservation. "The Rape of the Turin Shroud – how Christianity's most precious relic was wrongly condemned, and violated," by William Meacham, contends the shroud was dismissed as a medieval fake by the general public after poorly planned Carbon-14 dating in 1988. The linen also suffered major...

Far too large and graphic intensive to post, here are some excerpts. Click on the link below to move to the Stations of the Cross, according to the Shroud of Turin. What better way to comprehend the true reality of the Passion of Christ than to compare the traditional Stations of the Cross — handed down to us by St. Francis and the Franciscans — than by comparing them with the scientific and medical Truths found in more than 600,000 hours of peer-reviewed research surrounding the Shroud of Turin. For it is the very burial cloth of Jesus, proven not...

Shroud of Turin and the Resurrection of Jesus : Voice from the Past  The Hymn of the Pearl Deep within the Hymn of the Pearl, itself deep within the Acts of Thomas, some very interesting lines of poetry are found. These words are translated, and understood, many ways. This is but one interpretation, one reflection, one point of view interpolated from different translations and analyses:   TWO IMAGE - Within the Hymn of the Pearl - Suddenly, I saw my image on my [burial a] garment like in a mirror Myself and myself through myself [or myself facing outward...

The Shroud of Turin for Journalists PDF Version (Best for Printing & Page Reading) Where Have All the Skeptics Gone? By Daniel R. Porter   (Updated October 28, 2005)  One might think the Papal custodians of the Shroud of Turin would be pleased. The primary skeptical argument, carbon 14 dating, had been eliminated. The shroud might be 2000 years old, after all.  But like Hydra, the Greek mythological beast, controversy grew a weird new head. With the Winter Olympics coming to Turin in February, 2006, bringing a million spectators and thousands of journalists, articles that describe this magnificent Italian city...

While periodic claims continue to surface purporting to debunk the Shroud of Turin as a hoax — including one made earlier this year by an Idaho academic — one local scientist has no doubt that the cloth covered the crucified Christ and has survived intact for nearly two millennia. Deseret Morning News graphic DNA testing of blood found on the fibers of the Shroud of Turin has been inconclusive.       Eugenia Nitowski, an archaeologist and former nun, bases her conclusion as much on science as on faith: The shroud's existence has forced science to seriously debate the Resurrection...

p>World-renowned Los Angeles liturgical artist Isabel Piczek earned accolades for "opening new doors of research" at the Dallas International Shroud of Turin Conference held at the Adolphus Hotel Sept. 8-11. The landmark event drew 160 scientists, artists and physicians from around the world sharing the latest research on the shroud, believed by many to portray a full-length image of the crucified Christ. Using a statue she created as a visual aid measuring one-third the actual size of the man depicted on the shroud, Piczek presented her explanation of the image's "Concealed Bas-Relief Effect." She theorizes the image of the shroud...

Fr. Mitch Pacwa welcomes Dr. Zugibe to his program this evening. Dr. Zugibe, former Medical Examiner for Rockland County (NY), has done extensive studies on the Shroud of Turin. He also delivered the following lecture, A Forensic Way of the Cross

Science photographer Barrie Schwortz considers it ironic that he, an Orthodox Jew, is spending much of his time trying to convince Christians that the Turin Shroud may well be an artifact of Jesus. As Christendom is entering the holiest season in the church year, Schwortz joined a group of international scholars Friday appealing to Cardinal Severino Poletto, archbishop of Turin, to permit a new carbon dating of the 14-foot cloth bearing the features of a crucified man. At the last test of this kind in 1988, a majority of scientists concluded that the Shroud was woven between 1260 and 1390...

New Analysis Confirms Second Face on Shroud of Turin and Raises Questions About Other Images NEW YORK, March 11 /PRNewswire/ -- Skeptics and people who believe the Shroud of Turin is the genuine burial shroud of Jesus have always shared one common perception: they thought they knew what the man on the shroud looked like. Now, new computerized image analysis suggests they may be wrong. Results of this analysis published at http://www.shroudstory.com suggest that many characteristics of the images on the shroud are optical illusions caused by random plaid patterns in the cloth. For instance, because of these patterns, the...

The Shroud of Turin has long confused, amazed, and befuddled both its critics and proponents. There are many issues surrounding the Shroud and the debate over its authenticity. This site will avoid most of those issues. This site contains the results of a crude experiment that could potentially explain how the Shroud was produced. For centuries no one has been able to explain how a photonegative image of a man could be three-dimensionally encrypted onto linen by medieval forgers unable even to appreciate the completeness of their own art. The Shadow Theory postulates that such an image could be created...

Rome, Feb. 11, 2005 (CNA) - Forensic scientists in Italy are working on a different kind of investigation—one that dates back 2000 years. In an astounding announcement, the scientists think they may have re-created an image of Jesus Christ when He was a 12-year old boy.Using the Shroud of Turin, a centuries-old linen cloth, which many believe bears the face of the crucified Christ, the investigators first created a computer-modeled, composite picture of the Christ’s face.Dr. Carlo Bui, one of the scientists said that, “the face of the man on the shroud is the face of a suffering man. He...

The true skeptical inquirer knows no certainty: that is his misfortune; he is aware of it, and that is his gift. Imagine slicing a human hair lengthwise, from end to end, into 100 long thin slices, each slice one-tenth the width of a single red blood cell. The images on the Shroud, at their thickest, are this thin. The faint images, golden-brownish, formed by a caramel-like substance, are wholly part of a super-thin film of starch fractions and sugars. Where this film is not brown, it is clear.  Knowing the way certain ancient linen was made, the film covering just...

The Shroud of Turin is much older than the medieval date that modern science has affixed to it and could be old enough to have been the burial wrapping of Jesus, a new analysis concludes. Since 1988, most scientists have confidently concluded that it was the work of a medieval artist, because carbon dating had placed the production of the fabric between 1260 and 1390. In an article this month in the journal Thermochimica Acta, Dr. Raymond N. Rogers, a chemist retired from Los Alamos National Laboratory, said the carbon dating test was valid but that the piece tested was...

Shroud of Turin: Old as Jesus? By THE NEW YORK TIMES Published: January 27, 2005 he Shroud of Turin is much older than the medieval date that modern science has affixed to it and could be old enough to have been the burial wrapping of Jesus, a new analysis concludes. Since 1988, most scientists have confidently concluded that it was the work of a medieval artist, because carbon dating had placed the production of the fabric between 1260 and 1390. In an article this month in the journal Thermochimica Acta, Dr. Raymond N. Rogers, a chemist retired from Los Alamos...

Shroud of Turin: Old as Jesus? By THE NEW YORK TIMES Published: January 27, 2005 he Shroud of Turin is much older than the medieval date that modern science has affixed to it and could be old enough to have been the burial wrapping of Jesus, a new analysis concludes. Since 1988, most scientists have confidently concluded that it was the work of a medieval artist, because carbon dating had placed the production of the fabric between 1260 and 1390. In an article this month in the journal Thermochimica Acta, Dr. Raymond N. Rogers, a chemist retired from Los Alamos...

The Shroud of Turin is much older than suggested by radiocarbon dating carried out in the 1980s, according to a new study in a peer-reviewed journal. A research paper published in Thermochimica Acta suggests the shroud is between 1,300 and 3,000 years old. The author dismisses 1988 carbon dating tests which concluded that the linen sheet was a medieval fake.