Faith in Power of Healing : Serra Relics Expected to Be in Demand

The day after the funeral of Father Junipero Serra on Aug. 29, 1784, in Carmel, the doctor who had attended him asked a favor of the priest’s good friend, Francisco Palou.

Dr. Juan Garcia, Royal Physician, requested a square of material owned by the founder of the California mission system. The Franciscan priest already had a reputation for sanctity so great that guards had to be posted at his open casket to stop people from cutting locks of his hair and pieces of his habit to use as religious relics.

“With this little cloth I expect to effect more cures than with my books and pharmacy,” Garcia said.

Today, unofficial prayer cards with the name and image of the Franciscan friar are available in several of the mission gift shops. But to make use of Serra relics at the Carmel Mission, including fragments of his bones encased in glass, Bishop Thaddeus Shubsda’s permission is necessary. “What happens is that when somebody requests the relic, I usually send it to a priest. And the priest knows about this sick person, and they take the relic to where the person is, whether it be in the home or in a hospital. They may just ask God for a favor through Father Serra, and they’ll make the sign of the cross with the relic, and then they touch the person with the relic or have the person kiss the relic,” or glass case.

Serra the Intermediary

“What they would probably say is, ‘God, would you grant healing or this favor through the intercession of Father Serra on behalf of my husband or my wife or my child or my friend,’ or something like that. In other words, I think it’s important that all of us understand that we’re not asking Father Serra to do this; we’re asking Father Serra to intercede with God, and we ask God to grant the favor.”

If, as expected, Serra is pronounced beatified, or “blessed,” by Pope John Paul II in Carmel in September of 1987, relics are expected to be in even greater demand. Father Juan Folguera, who is in charge of all Franciscan candidates for sainthood, has given permission from Rome for Serra relics to be put aside in anticipation of the pontiff’s declaration.

According to Father Noel Francis Moholy of San Francisco, the officially designated chief promoter of the Serra cause, bone fragments of a beatified individual are considered relics “of the first class.” Moholy said he does not know how many Serra relics of this kind are in existence. A few fragments, removed when Serra’s remains were disinterred and examined by church and forensic experts in 1945, are on display in the Franciscan archives at Mission Santa Barbara. Articles of clothing are considered relics of the second or third class.