Pope Francis praises Turin shroud as an 'icon of love'

Pope Francis paused in silent prayer before the shroud of Turin on Sunday, following in the footsteps of hundreds of thousands of people who have come this year to Turin’s cathedral to view the burial linen some believe covered the body of Jesus after crucifixion but others say is a medieval fake.

Francis sat for several minutes before the shroud, which is contained in a protective glass case. He lowered his head at times in apparent reflection and occasionally gazed up at the 4.3m (14ft) cloth. Then he took a few steps, placed his hand on the case, and walked away without comment.

Later, after celebrating mass in a packed Turin square, Francis shared his thoughts on the cloth as he spoke of the love Jesus had for humanity when being crucified.

“The icon of this love is the shroud, that, even now, has attracted so many people here to Turin,” Francis said. “The shroud draws [people] to the tormented face and body of Jesus and, at the same time, directs [people] toward the face of every suffering and unjustly persecuted person.”

The display of the shroud began on 19 April and will continue until 24 June.

Other pontiffs have made the journey to the northern Italian city during previous displays of the shroud. When John Paul II saw the shroud in 1998, he said the mystery surrounding the cloth forced questions about faith and science and whether it really was Christ’s burial linen. He urged continuous study. Benedict XVI described the cloth as an icon “written with the blood” of a crucified man.

Sceptics say the cloth bearing the image of a crucified man is a medieval forgery.

Turin, the heartland of Italy’s car industry, is considered Italy’s working-class capital, and Francis used his two-day visit to the city to denounce exploitation of workers, singling out women, young people and immigrants as frequent victims.

“Immigration increases competition, but migrants shouldn’t be blamed because they themselves are victims of the injustice, of this throwaway economy and of wars,” Francis said in a speech in a square outside the cathedral.

He then made an apparent reference to European countries as well as some northern Italian regions that are refusing or reluctant to take some of the tens of thousands of migrants who have landed at southern Italian ports after being rescued in the Mediterranean from overcrowded, unseaworthy smugglers’ boats.

“It makes one cry to see the spectacle of these days in which human beings are treated as commercial goods,” Francis said.

Turin is the Piedmont region’s capital, and during mass, the Argentinian-born Francis quoted from a poem in local dialect that praises the qualities of those who emigrated from Piedmont — like some of his own ancestors — to seek work abroad.

“Our ancestors knew well what it meant to be rock solid,” Francis said. Quoting from the poem, the pope said these migrants were “proper and sincere, they appear to be what they are … they speak little but they know what they are talking about, even if they walk with ease, they go far. They are people who don’t spare time and sweat – our free and stubborn race.”

On Monday, before he heads back to Rome, Francis will have lunch in Turin with some of his relatives who live in Piedmont.