(LifeSiteNews) — After a 12-year investigation, the Vatican has recognized as a Eucharistic miracle the appearance of the face of Jesus Christ on a host consecrated during a Mass in Kerala, India.
The apostolic nuncio to India announced to the Archdiocese of Tellicherry in Kerala, India, that the Vatican recognized the remarkable image as a miracle, Archbishop Joseph Pamplany reported on May 9.
Father Thomas Pathickal told Matters India that the visible miracle began at the elevation of the host when he noticed a “large spot’ on it that “became larger and brighter” until a face soon appeared.
According to Catholic teaching and tradition, the bread and wine used at Mass undergo transubstantiation – that is, become the Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Jesus Christ – just before the elevation at Mass.
Pathickal said he set aside the Eucharistic host with the image of Christ and used another consecrated host from the tabernacle during Mass. The church sacristan later confirmed to the priest that the image was of the “face of Jesus.”
Thousands of people reportedly then flocked to Christ the King Church in Vilakkannur, the remote village where the apparition occurred, as news of the miracle spread. Former parish trustee Joseph Payikatt told Matters India that, as many prayed before this Eucharistic host, “the phenomenon had brought considerable changes in the parishioners’ spiritual and social lives.”
The archdiocese began an investigation, and the Syro-Malabar Church’s Theological Commission also looked into the apparition and “found strong theological grounds supporting” the conclusion that it was a Eucharistic miracle, CatholicVote reported.
In January 2020, the archdiocese sent the Host to Rome for further investigative studies by the International Theological Commission.
“This is not merely a sign – it is a cry from Heaven, a divine reminder that the Eucharist is not a symbol, but a Person, the living Jesus Christ, truly present – Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity,” remarked Sanoj Thomas, a Catholic from India, on X.
The Catholic Church has officially recognized over 100 Eucharistic miracles that have occurred over the centuries, including four that have taken place in the 21st century in Poland, India, and Mexico, with at least a few other apparent Eucharistic miracles under investigation, including one in Australia.
Eucharistic miracles most commonly consist of the bleeding of the consecrated host, or visible transformation of parts of the host into bloody flesh, considered a visible sign of what has already occurred in a manner undetectable to the senses during consecration.
These miracles have often occurred when a priest struggled to believe in the Real Presence of Jesus Christ in the Eucharist. Christ declared in His Bread of Life Discourse, “Amen, amen I say unto you: Except you eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink his blood, you shall not have life in you.” This was immediately controversial. Many of his disciples replied, “This saying is hard, and who can hear it?” and many afterward “walked no more with him.”
The Catholic Church has a standardized process by which it investigates Eucharistic miracles that requires the following:
- There must be “absolute certainty” of the chain of custody of the Eucharistic Host.
- The bishop or archbishop must testify to an extraordinary occurrence.
- The bishop or archbishop must “convene a scientific panel with a principal scientist, credible experts and tests.”
- These different scientific tests analyzing the Eucharistic host must all corroborate one another.
Catholics number about 23 million in India, 1.5 percent or so of India’s population of over a billion, which is mostly composed of Hindus.
