In 1273 in the town of Lanciano, a woman named Richiarella went to a witch and asked her how she could recover the affection of her husband, Giacomo Stasio. Following the witch’s advice, she went to Communion to obtain a consecrated Host. She returned home and put the Host on the fire in an earthenware jar with the intention of turning the Blessed Sacrament into powder to put into her husband’s food. The Particles, however, were transformed into living Flesh. Richiarella, horrified by these events, wrapped the jar and the Bloodied Host in a linen handkerchief that she then buried under the manure in her husband’s stable.
READ MORETwo Eucharistic miracles took place in 1230 and 1595 in Florence’s Church of Saint Ambrose. In 1230, a priest having finished celebrating Mass, did not realize that several drops of consecrated wine remained in the chalice. A day later, taking up the chalice, he found living blood coagulated. This was shown to all who were present, to the bishop, and to all the clergy. He took the Precious Blood from the chalice and put the Sacred Species in a crystal cruet and showed the people. The relic of the coagulated Blood (several drops of Blood that measure about a square centimeter) is conserved in a reliquary which has been placed inside a white marble tabernacle.
READ MOREIn 1263 a German priest, Peter of Prague, stopped at Bolsena while on a pilgrimage to Rome. He is described as being a pious priest, but one who found it difficult to believe that Christ was actually present in the consecrated Host. While celebrating Holy Mass above the tomb of St. Christina (located in the church named for this martyr), he had barely spoken the words of Consecration when blood started to seep from the consecrated Host and trickle over his hands onto the altar and the corporal. The priest was immediately confused.
READ MOREIn Alatri’s Cathedral of Saint Paul the Apostle, there is kept even today the reliquary of the Eucharistic miracle that occurred in 1228 and consisted in a fragment of the Host turning into flesh. A young woman, in an effort to regain the love of her sweetheart, consulted a sorceress who ordered her to steal a consecrated Host to make a love potion. During Mass, the young woman hid a Host in a cloth. But when she got home, she realized that the Host had been transformed into bleeding flesh.
READ MOREIn Rimini, there is a church that was built in honor of the Eucharistic miracle performed by Saint Anthony of Padua in 1227. This episode is cited in Begninitas, one of the most ancient sources regarding the life of Saint Anthony. “This saintly man was speaking with a faithless heretic who was opposed to the sacrament of the Eucharist and whom the saint had nearly led to the Catholic faith. But, after numerous arguments, this heretic declared: ‘If you, Anthony, produce a miracle and demonstrate to me that the Body of Christ is truly Communion, I will completely renounce my heresy and immediately convert to the Catholic faith.
READ MORETo this day in Trani, Puglia, the relic of this miracle is housed in the Cathedral of Holy Mary of the Assumption. There are numerous documents which retell this miracle. Brother Bartolomeo Campi describes in his work, “L’Inamorato di Gesù Cristo” (1625), an accurate account: “Pretending to be Christian, the woman received Communion with the others… and took the consecrated Host from her mouth and transferred the Holy Eucharist to a handkerchief. Once home she wanted to experiment with whether or not the Blessed Sacrament was bread and put the consecrated Host into a heated frying pan filled with oil. Upon contact with the boiling oil, the consecrated Host miraculously became Bloody Flesh and a hemorrhage, so to speak, would not stop flowing and went from the pan all over the cursed woman and her house. Terrorized, the woman began to scream… and the neighbors ran over to find out the reasons behind her cries…”.
READ MOREOn March 28, 1171, Father Pietro da Verona was celebrating Easter Mass with three confreres. At the moment of the breaking of the consecrated Host, Blood gushed forth from the Host and threw large drops on the ceiling of the small crypt above the altar. Histories tell of the “holy fear of the celebrant and of the immense wonder of the people who crowded the tiny church.” There were many eyewitnesses who told of seeing the Host take on a Bloody color and having seen in the Host the figure of a Baby.
READ MOREPope St. Gregory the Great was a direct eyewitness to this miracle. In the 6th century, it was customary to have the Eucharistic bread prepared by the parishioners. One Sunday, while celebrating the Sacred Mass in an ancient church dedicated to St. Peter, the Pope was distributing Communion and saw among the faithful in line, one of the women who had prepared the bread for the consecration laughing out loud.
READ MOREThe first and greatest Eucharistic Miracle of the Catholic Church occurred during the 8th century in the Church of St. Legontian in Lanciano, Italy, when a Basilian monk doubted Jesus' Real Presence in the Eucharist. After the consecration in Mass, the host was changed into live Flesh and the wine was changed into live Blood, which coagulated into five globules. The Flesh and the Blood can still be seen today. Various ecclesiastical investigations have been conducted since 1574. In the 1970’s, there was a scientific investigation by the scientist Professor Odoardo Linoli, eminent Professor in Anatomy and Pathological Histology and in Chemistry and Clinical Microscopy. He was assisted by Professor Ruggero Bertelli of the University of Siena. The results of their analyses are as follows:
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