``Where
the Bishop is, there let the multitude of believers be;
even as where Jesus is, there is the Catholic Church'' Ignatius of
Antioch, 1st c. A.D
Feast of St. Veronica
Old Testament
law treated vaginal bleeding very strictly. Leviticus 15:19-24 relates
how a menstruating woman (a niddah)
should be dealt with:
The woman, who
at the return of the month, hath her issue of blood, shall be separated
seven days. Every one that toucheth her, shall be unclean until the
evening. And every thing that she sleepeth on, or that she sitteth on
in the days of her separation, shall be defiled. He that toucheth her
bed shall wash his clothes: and being himself washed with water, shall
be unclean until the evening. Whosoever shall touch any vessel on which
she sitteth, shall wash his clothes: and himself being washed with
water, shall be defiled until the evening. If a man copulateth with her
in the time of her flowers, he shall be unclean seven days: and every
bed on which he shall sleep shall be defiled.
When a woman bled after giving birth or suffering a miscarriage
(thereby becoming a yoledet),
she had even stricter rules to
follow. Leviticus 12:2-5:
If a woman
having received seed shall bear a man child, she shall be unclean seven
days, according to the days of the separation of her flowers. And on
the eighth day the infant shall be circumcised: But she shall
remain three and thirty days in the blood of her purification. She
shall touch no holy thing, neither shall she enter into the sanctuary,
until the days of her purification be fulfilled.
But if she shall bear a maid child, she shall be unclean two
weeks, according to the custom of her monthly courses, and she shall
remain in the blood of her purification sixty-six days.
And a woman who experienced bleeding from such things as endometriosis,
endometrial hyperplasia, polycystic ovary syndrome, fibroids, polyps,
etc. (a zavah)? Leviticus 15:
25-30 tells us:
The woman that
hath an issue of blood many days out of her ordinary time, or that
ceaseth not to flow after the monthly courses, as long as she is
subject to this disease, shall be unclean, in the same manner as if she
were in her flowers. Every bed on which she sleepeth, and every vessel
on which she sitteth, shall be defiled. Whosoever toucheth them shall
wash his clothes: and himself being washed with water, shall be unclean
until the evening.
If the blood stop and cease to run, she shall count seven days of her
purification: And on the eighth day she shall offer for herself to the
priest, two turtles, or two young pigeons, at the door of the
tabernacle of the testimony: And he shall offer one for sin, and the
other for a holocaust, and he shall pray for her before the Lord, and
for the issue of her uncleanness.
St. Veronica -- also known as Berenika or Berenice1 -- was
such a zavah. Tradition
relates that just
as Jesus was walking to raise the synagogue leader Jairus's 12-year old
daughter from the dead, it was St. Veronica who, after suffering for
twelve years from
bleeding and the ostracism that came with it, in spite of being a
veritable
"untouchable," grabbed the hem of His garment in faith that she
would be healed. All three synoptic Gospels tell the story (Matthew
9:20-22; Mark 5:24-34; Luke 8:43-48), but I think the Gospel of Mark
tells it best:
And he went with
Him, and a great multitude followed Him, and they thronged Him.
And a woman who was under an issue of blood twelve years, and had
suffered many things from many physicians; and had spent all that she
had, and was nothing the better, but rather worse, when she had heard
of Jesus, came in the crowd behind him, and touched His garment [Luke
8:44 specifies that it was the hem of His garment]. For she said: If I
shall touch but His garment, I shall be whole.
And forthwith the fountain of her blood was dried up, and she
felt in her body that she was healed of the evil.
And immediately Jesus knowing in Himself the virtue that had
proceeded from Him, turning to the multitude, said: Who hath touched My
garments?
And his disciples said to Him: Thou seest the multitude
thronging Thee, and sayest Thou who hath touched Me?
And He looked about to see her who had done this.
But the woman fearing and trembling, knowing what was done in
her, came and fell down before Him, and told him all the truth.
And He said to her: Daughter, thy faith hath made thee whole:
go in peace, and be thou whole of thy disease.
Imagine it! She is seen as impure. Her very touch would be seen as
polluting another. She'd not have dared to touch anyone else. But
Jesus? While still afraid and tentative, she approached Him nonetheless
-- creeping up behind Him just to touch the hem of His garment so she
would be healed. And Christ's response? Of the encounter, St. John
Chrysostom writes,
[F]irst He
removes the woman’s fear, lest she should suffer the pangs of
conscience, for as it were stealing the grace. Next He reproves her for
thinking to lie concealed. Thirdly, He makes known her faith publicly
for the sake of others, and betrays no less a miracle than the
stanching of blood, by shewing that all things are open to His sight.
But there is an even deeper meaning to this story. The writer whom St. Thomas Aquinas refers to as Pseudo-Jerome
in his Catena Aurea writes
that " Mystically, however, Jairus comes after the healing of the
woman, because when the fulness of the Gentiles has come in, then shall
Israel be saved." Blessed Maurus Magnentius Rabanus relates more of
this mystical angle:
It should be
noted, that the ruler’s daughter was twelve years old, and this woman
had been twelve years afflicted; thus she had begun to be diseased at
the very time the other was born; so in one and the same age the
synagogue had its birth among the Patriarchs, and the nations without
began to be polluted with the pest of idolatry. For the issue of blood
may be taken in two ways, either for the pollution of idolatry, or for
obedience to the pleasures of flesh and blood. Thus as long as the
synagogue flourished, the Church languished; the falling away of the
first was made the salvation of the Gentiles. Also the Church draws
nigh and touches the Lord, when it approaches Him in faith. She
believed, spake her belief, and touched, for by these three things,
faith, word, and deed, all salvation is gained.
This healing of St. Veronica, a miracle that has inspired Christians
for millennia, was depicted artistically in the Catacombs of
Marcellinus and Peter in Rome, in the 3rd century:
Historians tell us that the event was depicted even earlier than that,
by a
statue made, or at least erected, by St. Veronica herself. Book VII,
Chapter 18 of "Church History" written by Eusebius (b. A.D. 260)
describes St. Veronica's statue and attests that he saw it first hand:
1. Since I have
mentioned this city [Caesarea Philippi] I do not think it proper to
omit an account which is worthy of record for posterity. For they say
that the woman with an issue of blood, who, as we learn from the sacred
Gospel, received from our Saviour deliverance from her affliction, came
from this place, and that her house is shown in the city, and that
remarkable memorials of the kindness of the Saviour to her remain there.
2. For there stands upon an elevated stone, by the gates of
her house, a brazen image of a woman kneeling, with her hands stretched
out, as if she were praying. Opposite this is another upright image of
a man, made of the same material, clothed decently in a double cloak,
and extending his hand toward the woman. At his feet, beside the statue
itself, is a certain strange plant, which climbs up to the hem of the
brazen cloak, and is a remedy for all kinds of diseases.
3. They say that this statue is an image of Jesus. It has
remained to our day, so that we ourselves also saw it when we were
staying in the city.
By the time Sozomen (c. 375-c. 447) wrote his "Ecclesiastical History,"
the Christian-hating Julian the Apostate had come to power and decided
to replace the statue of Christ with one of himself. What happened next
evokes what
happened when he tried to help Jews rebuild the Temple. From Book
V, Chapter 21 of Sozomen's history:
Having heard
that at Cæsarea Philippi, otherwise called Paneas, a city of Phoenicia,
there was a celebrated statue of Christ which had been erected by a
woman whom the Lord had cured of a flow of blood, Julian commanded it
to be taken down and a statue of himself erected in its place; but a
violent fire from heaven fell upon it and broke off the parts
contiguous to the breast; the head and neck were thrown prostrate, and
it was transfixed to the ground with the face downwards at the point
where the fracture of the bust was; and it has stood in that fashion
from that day until now, full of the rust of the lightning. The statue
of Christ was dragged around the city and mutilated by the pagans; but
the Christians recovered the fragments, and deposited the statue in the
church in which it is still preserved.
The next we hear about St. Veronica comes from tradition. It was during
Christ's Passion, as He walked the Via Dolorosa. He'd fallen for the
first time, and then met His mother along the way. After this, he was
helped by St. Simon the Cyrenean to carry His Cross. Then he
encountered St. Veronica, who went to Him and wiped the sweat and Blood
from His Face with her veil. This moment is remembered
every year when we Catholics make the Stations
of the Cross -- at the sixth station specifically -- especially on Good Friday.
First Station:
Second Station:
Third Station:
Fourth Station:
Fifth Station:
Sixth Station:
Seventh Station:
Eighth Station:
Ninth Station:
Tenth Station:
Eleventh Station:
Twelfth Station:
Thirteenth Station:
Fourteenth Station:
Jesus is
condemned to die
Jesus is Made to
Bear His Cross
Jesus Falls for
the First Time
Jesus Meets His
Mother
Simon Helps
Jesus Carry His Cross
Veronica Wipes
Jesus' Face
Jesus Falls the
Second Time
Jesus Meets the
Women of Jerusalem
Jesus Falls the
Third Time
Jesus is Stripped
Jesus is Nailed
to the Cross
Jesus Dies on
the Cross
Jesus is Taken
Down from the Cross
Jesus is Laid in
the Tomb
Consider the words of Isaias 53:2-5 that foretold Christ's Passion:
...there is no
beauty in him, nor comeliness: and we have seen him, and there was no
sightliness, that we should be desirous of him: Despised, and the most
abject of men, a man of sorrows, and acquainted with infirmity: and his
look was as it were hidden and despised, whereupon we esteemed him not.
Surely he hath borne our infirmities and carried our sorrows: and we
have thought him as it were a leper, and as one struck by God and
afflicted. But he was wounded for our iniquities, he was bruised for
our sins: the chastisement of our peace was upon him, and by his
bruises we are healed.
No beauty or comeliness, despised as if He were a leper, covered with
Blood and spit and mud... Crowds surrounding Him, howling and
mocking... And Veronica made her way through the jeering horde and went
to Him to give Him some comfort. I find it lovely that in our Stations
of the Cross are enshrined the facts that Simon, a man, used his
masculine gifts to help Christ physically carry His heavy cross while
Veronica, a
woman, used her feminine gifts to love Him, approaching the Lord like a
mother, tenderly wiping His Face as a parent would do for a child.
When St. Veronica tended to Our Lord in this way, His Face was
imprinted onto the cloth she used. This cloth -- known as the veronica
or sudarium2 -- is kept at St. Peter's Basilica in Rome.
Just behind and to the left
of Bernini's baldacchino there is one of four great pillars that hold
up the dome, and in
front of
it is a statue of St. Veronica made by Francesco Mochi.3
Above the
statue is a loggia, and behind the loggia is a niche where the veronica
is kept hidden away. It is brought out for display only once a year, on
Passion Sunday (the
fifth Sunday of Lent) for just a few minutes. People gather as two
Churchmen stand on the balcony,
holding up the veronica for all to see.
There are a number of copies of the veronica (a famous one is kept in a
church in Manoppello, Italy), but the true veronica can only be seen in
Rome. Before it was brought to the Eternal City, however, tradition
relates that it was taken
by St. Veronica herself to be shown to the Emperor Tiberius, healing
him of disease in the process. It's a long, convoluted tale, but you
can read come to know it by this excerpt from the "Anglo-Saxon Legends
of St. Andrew and St. Veronica" by Charles Wycliffe Goodwin, published
in 1851. Know, though, that this account refers to Veronica's veil as a
piece of Christ's garment.
St. Veronica,
like SS. Martha and Mary Magdalene, ended up
in France, with Veronica finally landing in Soulac, on the West coast,
where she died. To protect them from Viking raids, most of
her relics were moved inland a bit to the Church of Saint-Seurin in
Bordeaux (both Soulac and Bordeaux are in Nouvelle-Aquitaine --
formerly Aquitaine). Her feast is on July 12 (it is on this date
in the East as well) -- but in France and certain other francophone
countries, she is remembered on February 4. She is the patron saint of
photographers, laundresses, textile workers, and cloth merchants, and
can be recognized in art most often by the presence of her veil on
which is imprinted the Holy Face.
Note that it is commonly asserted that her name stems from the Latin
"Vera Icon," meaning "True Icon." I don't think that is true at all;
she is known in the East as "Berenika" (or "Berenike" or "Berenice").
"Veronica" is a simple Latinization of that name. That the Latin name
by which we in the West know her is an anagram of the Latin words for
"true icon" is, I believe, purely providential.
Customs
First, a prayer for the day:
O Holy Face of
Jesus, grant me tears to weep my ingratitude. How often have I turned
my eyes from Thee and Thy sufferings to fix them on the world and its
vanities! Saint Veronica, help me to set God before my eyes every day
of my life, Who is the Protector of my soul. Henceforth, O Holy Face of
Jesus, stamp Thy image on my soul, that it may never admit another
love. Take possession of my heart that my soul may take eternal
possession of Thee in glory. Amen.
This feast is a good time to consider emulating St. Veronica by taking
up devotion to the Holy
Face. To quote myself from this site's page on the topic,
In the mid-19th
century, in Tours, France, a Carmelite nun named Sister Marie de Saint
Pierre (1816-1848) received a private revelation from Our Lord that
"Those who will contemplate the wounds on My Face here on earth, shall
contemplate it radiant in heaven." In her vision, she was transported
to the road to Calvary and saw St. Veronica wiping away the spit and
mud from His Holy Face with her veil. Sister realized that the taking
of the Name of God in vain and all the other sacrilegious and
blasphemous acts that men do fall on the Lord's Face like that spit and
mud that St. Veronica so lovingly wiped away. Jesus revealed to Sister
that He desired devotion to His Holy Face in reparation for sacrilege,
the profanation of Sundays, and blasphemy, which He described to her as
being like a "poisoned arrow."
Think of this! Imagine Our Lord's Face being spat on every time you
hear someone take His Name in vain! Please
see Devotion
to the Holy Face to
learn more about this devotion and to learn specific practices to
make reparation for the sacrilege we see so much
of today.
There are no special foods for this feast that I am aware of, but we do
have music for the day. The first is a song sung in St. Veronica's
voice -- "O vos omnes."
O vos omnes qui
transitis, qui transitis per viam!
O vos omnes qui transitis, qui transitis per viam!
Attendite et videte si est dolor sicut dolor meus.
Attendite et videte si est dolor sicut dolor meus.
Oh! You all who
pass, who pass this way!
Oh! You all who pass, who pass this way!
Look and see if there is pain like mine.
Look and see if there is pain like mine.
The second piece
of music is
from Franz Lizst's Via Crucis (S. 53) which, in its entirety, depicts
all of the Stations of the Cross. Below is the music for the Sixth
Station -- the
Station at which St. Veronica wipes Lord Christ's Face:
O Haupt voll
Blut und Wunden,
voll Schmerz und voller Hohn,
o Haupt, zum Spott gebunden
mit einer Dornenkron;
o Haupt, sonst schön gezieret
mit höchster Ehr und Zier,
jetzt aber höchst schimpfieret:
gegrüßet sei'st du mir!
O sacred Head,
now wounded,
with grief and shame weighed down,
now scornfully surrounded
with thorns, Thine only crown;
O sacred Head, what glory,
what bliss till now was Thine!
Yet, though despised and gory,
I joy to call Thee mine.
Finally, know that the Plantaginaceae family of plants is named for St.
Veronica. Among them is Veronica
spicata, a flower that's also commonly known as speedwell. These
flowers grow about a foot tall and have beautiful, rich purple, blue,
pink, or white blossoms. They'd be lovely in a Mary Garden!
Footnotes:
1 She was known as "Berenika" or
"Berenice" ("Veronica" in Latin) since at least the 4th century. The
Gospel of Nicodemus, formerly called The Acts of Pontius Pilate, was
written in the 4th century and says in chapter VI,
And a certain
woman named Bernice (Beronice Copt., Veronica Lat.) crying out from
afar off said: I had an issue of blood and touched the hem of his
garment, and the flowing of my blood was stayed which I had twelve
years. The Jews say: We have a law that a woman shall not come to give
testimony.
2 Not to be confused with the Sudarium of
Oviedo, the small cloth that
covered the Face of Christ after death. Read about it and the Shroud of
Turin here: The Shroud of Turin and the
Sudarium of Oviedo
3 The other three pillars are centered on
St. Longinus (his spear is the relic contained in the niche), St. Helen
(a piece of the true Cross is the relevant relic), and St. Andrew (his
head is contained there).
