For decades, it sat in a corner of a classroom at St. Albert Catholic High School — a relic of a holy man who could reportedly perform miracles.
Now, this relic has been donated to an Edmonton charity to help pregnant women in need.
Greater St. Albert Catholic trustees received a report June 23 on the donation of a relic of St. Gerard Majella, the patron saint of expectant mothers, to Catholic Social Services’ Gianna Centre in Edmonton.
The relic in question is a fragment (likely a hair, nail, or bone) of St. Gerard sealed within a roughly one-foot-square slab of white marble with five black crosses engraved upon it.
In Catholicism, relics are the physical remains or personal effects of a saint, explained GSACRD superintendent Clint Moroziuk. Roman Catholic churches typically have at least one relic encased in their altar; the one at St. Albert Catholic Parish contains relics to St. Eugène de Mazenod and St. Margaret Mary Alacoque, for example. Catholics will sometimes pray to the saints represented by these relics for intercession on various matters.
Holy hand-me-down
Moroziuk said this relic was originally part of an altar at Clement House in Edmonton, which was a residence for Redemptorist priests. When the residence closed about 20 years ago, one of the priests gave the relic to his niece, Jacquie Stamp, who at the time was an educational assistant at SACHS. She in turn gave it to SACHS teacher Lynn Zakreski, who set it up on her classroom’s prayer table.
“It sat in my classroom for years and years and years,” Zakreski said, adding that she did not observe any relic-related miracles or phenomenon in her classroom during this time.
When Zakreski became GSACRD’s religious consultant last fall, she met Calgary’s V. Rev’d Fr. Adrian Martens at a conference and mentioned the relic to him. He suggested she donate the relic to someone, with St. Albert’s Fr. Jack Herklotz suggesting it go to someone who provided pregnancy support. Moroziuk said board staff realized almost immediately that the Gianna Centre in Edmonton would be a perfect fit, as it supported women with unplanned pregnancies.
Moroziuk reached out to Troy Davies, CEO of Catholic Social Services (which runs the Gianna Centre), and gave him the relic in the week of June 18.
Davies said his group was very grateful to receive this relic, which would bring hope and comfort to staff and clients at the Gianna Centre.
“To have a relic of [St. Gerard] in a pregnancy centre is a remarkable blessing,” he said.
“It’s almost like the divine hand [was at work], that this was meant to be.”
Davies said his staff plan to install the relic in the Gianna Centre’s prayer room in the weeks to come.
Saintly superpowers?
St. Gerard was an Italian lay brother in the 1700s known for his piety and wisdom, Catholic Online reports. Several miracles were attributed to him in his life, including restoring life to a boy who fell off a cliff, blessing a poor family’s supply of wheat so that it lasted until the next harvest, and multiplying bread for the poor.
“This humble servant of God also had faculties associated with certain mystics, including levitation, bi-location [the ability to be in more than one place at once], and the ability to read souls,” Catholic Online reports.
St. Gerard is considered the patron saint of expectant mothers in most part due to his last recorded miracle. Shortly before his death, a young women tried to return a handkerchief he dropped. He told her to keep it as she “may need it someday.” Years later, when the woman went into sudden labour and was at risk of losing the baby, she asked for the handkerchief to be applied to her.
“Almost immediately, her pain abated and she proceeded to give birth to a healthy child,” Catholic Online reports.
Efforts to canonize Majella began shortly after his death due to these many miracles. He was officially made a saint on Dec. 11, 1904.
