Selling relics on Ebay

[mammallama]

… was just discussing this with my priest earlier today… before I saw this thread…I’ve bought a lot of Catholic items off ebay,but never any thing purported to be a genuine relic…I would however attempt to buy at a local farm auction,garage sale,thrift store.When an item is out in the open market I believe it’s important for a Catholic to purchase it rather than take the chance that it may end up where it shouldn’t.

 

[BigRedpg51]

If there is no paperwork then how would the buyer know its a relic in the first place? Too many gullible people out there.

True, there are “fake” relics out there I suppose, but it’s not difficult to tell a genuine relic from a fake one under the right circumstance.

If you familiarize yourself with what genuine relics look like you will be able to recognize one fairly easily. Generally, the piece of relic material (cloth, bone, hair, etc.) will be very very small. Also, there will be an identification band next to (or more commonly ‘under’) the piece of relic material, identifying which saint or blessed person it comes from. This will almost always be in Latin.

But, to me, one thing that stands out most of all in helping to authenticate whether it might be a genuine relic or not…is when the seller does not promote it as a relic. He/she might be selling it as a trinket or a piece of estate jewelry or old ornament.

If I had to err, I’d rather err on God’s side and buy the apparent relic and give it honor in my home…rather than take the chance that it might actually be genuine, but did not have enough paperwork or provenance to convince me of it’s authenticity…and just leave it to be discarded or sold to someone else as a piece of old jewelry or something.

I would also rely upon the merciful eye of God to direct me to the relic in the first place. We can’t discount God’s guidance.

God bless you!
John

 

[franciscanhobbi]

Also anyone who thinks reliquaries are sold for a price and the relic is thrown in free (to get round Canon law) is simply deluding themselves. The relic is not free. Its part and parcel of the price. I don’t understand how people can be so gullible to think the relic is not being sold.

The bottom line is that relics should be in the hands of the Church where they can be venerated by all and not in the hands of individuals who want them for selfish reasons.
thistle;4167514:

I disagree. It used to be done all the time. It is not selfish.

 

[franciscanhobbi]

You have the moral obligation to buy it and give it to the Church, NOT keep it for yourself.

Canon law says nothing of what you say…that those who have relics must give them up…

 

[redrosetea]

I saw one that was supposed to have some strands of hair belonging to Mary…they wanted about $3,000 for it…I don’t even believe this is a relic…there were lots of frauds that were made during the middle ages, and lost of abuse…The church couldn’t really stop it from happening

They can’t sell any relics that are actaully bones

 

[franciscanhobbi]

I saw one that was supposed to have some strands of hair belonging to Mary…they wanted about $3,000 for it…I don’t even believe this is a relic…there were lots of frauds that were made during the middle ages, and lost of abuse…The church couldn’t really stop it from happening

They can’t sell any relics that are actaully bones

What hurts me is that if these are real, somebody gave them away ; some unbelieving sneering intellectualising church person (who else would have access?) just destroyed my cultural patrimony by saying ‘oh these aren’t worth anything’ and taking it as a given that he had the right to just get rid of them. The above eBay case may not be such,
but I heard from a reliable friend of one church that did this…

 

[a_cermak]

Well, well, it sounds like the relic fakery business is alive and well! I thought it had died out in the middle ages.

Back in the day, relic faking was hot business and in fact, today, many of those fakes are now considered to be valuable, not because they’re relics of saints, but because they’re relics of history that tell us something about the people who valued them.

If Mary was assumed into heaven, her hair probably went with her! Or was she such a vain person that she kept clippings of her own hair? But then, as a Jewish woman, would she have cut her hair anyway? And that true cross? How big was it for every Church in every backwater town of Europe to have a splinter? And why didn’t it rot away through the centuries? Even to survive to the Middle Ages would require common wood to last a millenium or so.

 

[BigRedpg51]

Often, genuine relics come into the hands of ‘flea marketeers’ and such through estate sales. Maybe someone – who genuinely loved and venerated the relic – died. And then, through an estate sale or relatives trying to “clean out the junk”, these relics get discarded or sold with a bulk of costume jewelry and such.

The people who are responsible for moving the relics from the ‘venerated’ environment to the ‘discarded’ environment do not always realize what they are…and their culpability may be less or even negligible.

Our task is – when we see what we suspect is a genuine relic – to rescue it from it’s neglectful state and restore it to veneration again, even if it’s just in our own home. How grateful will the saint be, whose remains reside in that relic! How happy will God be that we wish to honor the relics of people who He has touched so profoundly!!! (even if we’re not certain that the relic is genuine)