Relics in Your Parish (POLL)

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I have relics of Blessed Vasyl Velychovsky but don’t know if they are first, second or third class relics.
 
This is what it looks like:

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And this is the front:

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I got them a few years ago from the Archeparchy pilgrimage in honor of the Protection of the Mother of God. They were in the chapel and given away.

I know that the icon of Blessed Vasyl (it’s in a picture frame) was touched to his relics.
 
Margaret_Ann said:
I know that the icon of Blessed Vasyl (it’s in a picture frame) was touched to his relics.
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Then that icon would be a third class relic.

Classification of Catholic Relics;
First-class relics are the body or fragments of the body of a saint, such as pieces of bone or flesh.
Second-class relics are items that were used or owned by the saint
Third-class relics are items that have been touched to a first-class relic.
 
You posted a picture of an unopened envelope! None of us can divine what’s inside.

The classification of relics is pretty straight forward, as Mark121359 posted. Are there pieces of the saint’s body inside? It’s 1st Class. Is it part of an inanimate object that the saint once touched in his life? It’s 2nd Class. If it’s neither but was touched to one of the aforementioned kinds of relics (1st or 2nd class), then it is a 3rd Class relic.
 
The front says:

RELICS

of Blessed Bishop
and Martyr
Vasyl
Velychovsky

The seal on the back says

POSTULATOR GENERALIS

IS + M

CONGR. SS. RED.
 
I’m afraid to open it because I don’t have a reliquary here at home.
 
When I was on retreat some years ago, the priest had a relic of the True Cross. He let us touch our holy objects to it, so I touched it to my Byzantine crucifix which I wear every day.

Signing off now - it’s 11: 45 p.m…
 
I live “in the middle of nowhere” ™, relic displays aren’t really a big thing. There is a “relic” of unknown origin in the altar of the church. Any information about it got incinerated in a fire long ago.
 
There is almost always a label within the relic case itself. Many times, the stone under which the relic lies is not cemented in place. Also, if your Church is named in honor of a certain Saint, 99 times out of 100 it is a relic of that Saint. Officially, a relic of a Saint in the primary altar is a requirement for the Church to be named in their honor. The usual exception is if the altar had been salvaged from a different church and the relic was never replaced or the Church had been renamed for some reason.

If the church is Marian, named in honor of an event, or is named in honor of Christ, the relic is usually of a Saint which is affiliated in some way with the area itself or that particular name of the Church: i.e. relics of Peter, James the Greater, or John for Transfiguration Catholic Church or St. Dominic for Holy Rosary Catholic Church.
 
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CRM_Brother said:
Also, if your Church is named in honor of a certain Saint, 99 times out of 100 it is a relic of that Saint.
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This is very interesting.

I’ve come across a sizeable collection of relics the other day -some of them must be first class with historical provenance- I have seen so many relics that I just desist from hoping to understand the origin or history of them.

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I just moved house so I moved parish.

In my old parish there were (probably literally) hundreds of quite large relics. They had a whole chapel devoted to relics. Some were often on the high altar or in the sanctuary.

In my new parish there are none as far as I can see. I hope there is one on/ in the altar. Would it invalidate the Mass if there isn’t?
 
If it is a parish, then there definitely is one in the altar. It is a requirement for a consecrated chapel or church. If there were no relic, then no, it still would not invalidate the Mass.

The only time that I’ve seen a chapel without a relic directly in the altar was when our Order was given a parish and we had to turn a bedroom in the rectory into a private chapel for our common liturgy of the hours and personal masses, as each priest of the Order is required to say Mass every day. Many times in these chapels, the altar is simply a solid wooden table. We do, however, always have a relic of our Founder in these chapels either sitting directly on the altar, on the wall to the side of the crucifix or on a shelf next to the altar.
 
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A visiting priest brought a relic of St Dominic to the parish I attend TLM at we had the opportunity to venerate St Dominic’s relic after mass prior to First Saturday devotions. It made for an extra special first Saturday for me.
 
Tis_Bearself said:
The older ones may have one built into the altar - or may not, as the altars were often renovated around the time of Vatican II - but either way the relic is not visible.
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Do all Catholic altars contain relics? Traditional Catholicism
I’m not entirely sure all Catholic altars do have relics nowadays, especially the ones that are constructed of wood and made to look similar to normal tables. However, Vatican II never said anything about doing away with the tradition. Here are two sources of information about altars and relics: GIRM 298-302 and CIC 1235-1237. I’ve snipped out information that is irrelevant to the matter at hand: GIRM 298. It is appropriate to have a fixed altar in every church … An altar is called **“fixed…
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I’m pretty sure each altar, as long as it is fixed, does actually contain a relic.
 
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