p. 466 | OVER-ISSUE OF BONES by Observer

Seventh-day Adventist Missionary Society · Oakland, California · Oct 13, 1881

OVER-ISSUE OF BONES.

By Observer

“A ROMAN correspondent telegraphs from Rome that Leo XIII. having become aware that a sacrilegious traffic in spurious relics was being carried on under the cover of the authority of the Cardinal Vicar of Rome, to whom the authentication of such articles belongs, called his attention recently to this scandal, ordering him to institute strict inquiry into the matter and visit the Simoniacal ecclesiastics with the utmost severity. The subject is now before the Congregation of Relics, and the Cardinal Vicar has addressed a circular to all the Catholic diocesan bishops, vicars-apostolic, and administrators throughout the world, intimating that no bodies have been taken out of the catacombs for the last thirty years and warning them against these imposters. It is reported that the dealers in spurious relics have found their most lucrative field in America, whither have been shipped an entire osteological collection of specimens of what purported to be the remains of early Christian martyrs, freshly dug out of the catacombs of Rome.”

We do not approve of this over-issue of the stock in the Roman Catholic company at Rome: But for the comfort of those who have been swindled, we have no hesitation in saying that the fresh bones are just as good as the old for miracles and any other business for which they are required.—Observer.