Relics of Carlo Acutis and 6 saints coming to National Eucharistic Congress

Rome Newsroom, Jul 13, 2024 / 07:00 am

Relics of Blessed Carlo Acutis, St. Juan Diego, and five other saints will be available for veneration each day of the National Eucharistic Congress in Indianapolis next week. 

Catholics attending the congress will have the rare opportunity to pray with the relics of Sts. Elizabeth Ann Seton, Manuel González García, Paschal Baylon, Junípero Serra, Juan Diego, and Blessed Carlo Acutis, as well as part of a relic from Chartres, France, known as “the Veil of Our Lady.”

Organizers announced that the relics will be displayed at a specially designated reliquary chapel within the Indiana Convention Center July 15–20 from noon to 6:30 p.m. each day, allowing the faithful to offer prayers of intercession and reflect on the lives of the saints who exemplified profound devotion to the Eucharist.

“From our Blessed Mother through Blessed Carlo Acutis, the Eucharist has been at the center of the lives of all saints, and these particular patrons can inspire us to share in their closeness to Our Lord, present in the holy Eucharist,” Father Eric Augenstein, the reliquary chapel coordinator for the congress, told CNA.

Relics are physical objects that have a direct association with the saints or with Our Lord. First-class relics are the body or fragments of the body of a saint, such as pieces of bone, and second-class relics are something that a saint personally owned, such as a shirt or book (or fragments of those items).

Catholics venerate relics for the sake of worshipping God, as St. Jerome described in “Ad Riparium” in 404 A.D.: “We venerate the relics of the martyrs in order the better to adore him whose martyrs they are.” 

The Church has documented medical miracles that have occurred when people have prayed with relics, including the miracles that led to the approval of Acutis’ upcoming canonization.

Here are the Eucharistic saints whom people can encounter at the National Eucharistic Congress:

St. Manuel González García

Known as the “Bishop of the Abandoned Tabernacle,” St. Manuel González García (1877–1940) was a bishop amid the Spanish Civil War known for his profound devotion to the Eucharist. After his episcopal ordination in Seville, he said: “I desire that in my life as a bishop, as before in my life as a priest, my soul should not grieve except for one sorrow which is the greatest of all, the abandonment of the tabernacle, and that it should rejoice for one joy, the tabernacle, which does not lack company.”

On his tomb in the Blessed Sacrament Chapel of Palencia Cathedral, it is written: “I ask to be buried next to a tabernacle, so that my bones after my death, like my tongue and my pen in life, may always be repeating to those who pass by, ‘Jesus is here! Jesus is here! Do not leave him abandoned!’”

First-class relics of St. Manuel González García’s bone, blood, and hair are being brought to Indianapolis from Spain by several sisters who are members of the Eucharistic Missionaries of Nazareth, a community he founded.

Blessed Carlo Acutis

A relic of Blessed Carlo Acutis’ heart (pericardium) from Assisi, Italy, will be on display in the congress reliquary. The Italian teenager who died in 2006 is known for his devotion to the Eucharist and his passion for technology. He called the Eucharist “my highway to heaven” and used his computer skills to catalog Eucharistic miracles from around the world. Diagnosed with leukemia at the age of 15, Carlo offered his suffering for the Church and the pope. Pope Francis has put forward Acutis as an example for young people and recently approved his canonization as the first millennial saint, expected during the Catholic Church’s 2025 Jubilee Year.

Acutis’ Eucharistic Miracles Exhibit will also be on display in the Indiana Convention Center each day of the congress. 

St. Paschal Baylon

St. Paschal Baylon was born on the feast of Pentecost in 1540 in Torrehermosa, Spain. A humble shepherd who joined the Franciscan order as a lay brother, he was known for his deep piety and devotion to the Blessed Sacrament. Despite his lack of formal education, he was revered for his wisdom and spirituality. He was canonized in 1690 by Pope Alexander VIII and declared the patron saint of all Eucharistic congresses and associations by Pope Leo XIII.

A relic of Baylón’s mummified finger is provided to the Eucharistic congress from the Shrine of All Saints in Chicago.

St. Junípero Serra

St. Junípero Serra was a Franciscan missionary who played a pivotal role in the establishment of the California mission system. The missionary saint from Mallorca, Spain, arrived in Mexico in 1749 and later moved north to found the first nine of 21 missions in California, starting with San Diego de Alcalá in 1769. His efforts significantly influenced the spread of Christianity in the American West. Pope Francis declared Serra a saint in the first canonization on U.S. soil in 2015. 

St. Juan Diego

St. Juan Diego is best known for his encounters with the Virgin Mary, who appeared to him as Our Lady of Guadalupe in 1531. The Virgin Mary instructed Diego to build a church in her honor, leaving her image miraculously imprinted on his tilma as proof. The Mexico City basilica that now houses the tilma has become one of the world’s most-visited Catholic shrines. Pope John Paul II beatified St. Juan Diego in 1990 and canonized him in 2002.

St. Elizabeth Ann Seton

A pioneer in American Catholic education, St. Elizabeth Ann Seton was the first native-born American to be canonized as a saint. Seton was born into an Episcopalian family in New York City in 1774. After her husband's death, she converted to Catholicism and founded the Sisters of Charity, the first American religious community for women. She established schools and orphanages, laying the foundation for the Catholic parochial school system in the United States. 

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The Bishop Simon Bruté College Seminary in Indianapolis provided Seton’s relic for the congress.

The Veil of Mary

A piece of a relic of the Veil of Our Lady from the Chartres Cathedral in France will be displayed for veneration at the National Eucharistic Congress. The veil, also known as the Sancta Camisa, has been preserved and venerated in the Chartres Cathedral since the 10th century. This piece of the veil belongs to Holy Rosary Church in Indianapolis and is on loan for the congress. 

The Shroud of Turin

Visitors to the National Eucharistic Congress will also have the chance to see a replica of the Shroud of Turin, which is part of an educational exhibit on display in the Wabash Ballroom Three of the Indiana Conversion Center each day of the congress. 

Eucharistic adoration

Eucharistic adoration will be available 24 hours a day throughout the congress at St. John the Evangelist Church next to the Indiana Convention Center starting at 9 a.m. on July 15 and concluding at 9 a.m on July 21.

“The Eucharist we receive and adore today is the same Jesus who was received and adored by these great saints, and so many others before us. We are united to the Communion of Saints most intimately through the Holy Eucharist,” Augenstein said.