On April 7, Jim Bertrand from the American Confraternity of the Holy Shroud delivered a captivating presentation at the Catholic Church of St. Andrew in Fairfax on the history and spirituality of the Shroud of Turin, believed by many to be the burial shroud of Christ.

Physical Characteristics

The Shroud is approximately 14’ 6” tall and 3’9” wide. Expert consensus is the man was about 5’ 10” tall and about 170lbs. The image is hard to discern by the human eye but when photographed in 1898, the features of the man jumped out in the photograph’s negative.

The Shroud of Turin reveals the man was crucified with nails like how the Romans had done it, scourged, had a crown of thorns on their head, and with a lance wound in their side. From the Shroud, 372 wounds were counted across the body and this count is low because the Shroud does not show the sides of the body.

Scientific Evidence

There are many remarkable attributes of the Shroud of Turin that lean towards its authenticity as the burial Shroud of Christ. For example, the pollen analysis found 49 different kinds of pollen. Thirteen species were unique to the Jerusalem area, while other species were linked to Constantinople (now Turkey), France and Italy. This follows the path the Shroud is believed to have travelled after leaving Jerusalem and finally coming to Turin, Italy.

In addition, rare soil was found on the Shroud and Jerusalem is one of the few locations in the world where this dirt can be located. The soil was on areas of the cloth that were touching the nose, knees and soles of the feet. These parts of the body which would have made contact with the ground on Good Friday, especially as those often crucified by the Romans had their hands tied to the bar of the cross, which prevented them from using their hands to break a fall.

Another unusual feature is the Shroud’s fibers, which are only colored on the very top surface. One thread of the shroud is thinner than a strand of hair (less than 1/3 of a millimeter thick). A cross-section of the thread shows that the color only penetrates 0.2 microns into the fiber.

The shroud reveals an image in three-dimensions unlike what is seen in a traditional painting. When analyzed with 3D imaging technology, it revealed a sculpture-like image of a man. The cloth shows the parts of the body that were closer to the cloth as lighter, like the nose or the swollen check, while those parts of the body further away from the cloth, like the eyes, as darker.

Carbon-14 Dating of the Shroud from 1988

In 2019, the raw data from the carbon-14 dating of the Shroud of Turin was released. And though it was claimed that the shroud was from the Medieval Ages due to the dating, the raw data showed the tests were invalid. One thread of the Shroud was tested (versus several threads to provide a comparison) and as they tested the thread from the outside to the inside of the shroud, each inch of the thread tested was 100 years younger. This is not plausible that the thread would be hundreds of years apart in age depending on which end you start at.

A Sign of Love

The Shroud of Turin shows the immense love Christ bears for each person and the tremendous suffering he endured. This amazing relic remains as an invitation for a deeper more profound faith and trust in God. As science and technology continue to examine the Shroud, more secrets are revealed. It is a divine love letter to a society obsessed with only what can be proven - behold how much he loves us that he gave his only begotten Son that we may have life.