The Holy Grail

On the night of the Last Supper (Holy Thursday), Jesus and His Apostles gathered in the Upper Room to celebrate the Passover Seder according to Jewish custom. At four different times during the Seder Meal, a cup of wine is raised in blessing to Almighty God. When Jesus raised the third cup of blessing, He pronounced the words, This is the cup of My Blood, the Blood of the new and everlasting covenant. Ever since that night, the cup Jesus used at that moment has been revered as one of the most precious treasures on earth. What happened to the cup that Jesus held as He instituted the miracle of Holy Mass and thereby gave us the Gift of His Real Presence in the Most Blessed Sacrament? This cup, which has come to be called the Holy Grail, has been the source of many works of literature for a thousand yearsbecause saints, knights, and adventurers went on quests to find this elusive holy relic. While speculation continues to this day about the Holy Grailwhat it is and where it isTradition (that is, Church history that came from oral witness) says that St. Peter brought the actual cup of our salvation to Rome and used it when he said Mass. After Peter died in about 65 AD, every Pope after him used the cup to say Mass, until Pope Sixtus II was martyred by Emperor Valerian in 258 AD because he refused to give this treasure to the Emperor. Before dying, Pope Sixtus II entrusted the holy cup to his deacon Laurence, who had come to Rome from Spain. When Laurence, too, was called before Valerian, he told the Emperor he needed three days to get the Churchs treasures together. During those three days, Laurence gave the cup to a soldier returning to Spain, who took it to Laurences family home, where it was kept until 553 AD, when it was moved to a church built in its honor. Because Moslems invaded Spain in 711 AD, the Holy Grail was hidden in several monasteries in the Spanish mountains until Spain was finally able to drive the Moslems out of Spain in the early 1300s. In 1416 AD, the Holy Grail was taken to Valencia, where it has been venerated since, except for being hidden during the Napoleonic Wars and the Spanish Civil War by those who protected it with their lives. The Holy Grail is today in a special chapel in the Cathedral of Valencia. Pope John Paul II visited Valencia in 1982 and was the first Pope to use the Holy Grail to say Mass since Sixtus II had used it in 258 AD. Incidentally, Laurence did return to the Emperor Valerian after three days, taking with him the poorest Christians in Rome, He told Valerian that these people were the true treasures of the Church. Laurence earned the crown of sainthood by being martyred over a huge barbecue grill. Legend has it that he told his executioners to turn me overI am done on this side.

SAINT OF THE WEEK

The Holy Grail

The Holy Grail is the name given to the cup that Jesus used at the Last Supper, when He said the words, This is the cup of My Blood, the Blood of the new and everlasting covenant. This cup came to be called the Holy Grail. For centuries, this cup was hidden to protect it. The picture on the left shows the Holy Grail as it looks today, but only the top portion of the cup was used at the Last Supper. The base decorated with pearls, rubies, and emeralds, as well as the engraved golden stem and handles, were added about 1,000 years after Christ died. The simple cup on the top is made of a precious stone called chalcedony. This special kind of chalcedony is called carnelian, because of its flame-red colors. This type of stone cup was just the kind of cup that would have been used for a special meal, such as the Passover Seder, in first-century Jerusalem. An exhaustive study of the Holy Grail by several archaeologists in 1960 concluded that the upper cup was crafted by ancient Syrian craftsman in about 100 BC and that there is no evidence against the possibility that this cup would have been used by Jesus Christ at the Last Supper. The Holy Grail is mentioned in ancient documents dating back to the sixth century as having been sent to Spain by St. Laurence before he was martyred in Rome. Its presence is mentioned in several inventories in Spanish monasteries and cathedrals over the centuries, and it is mentioned by Charlemagne (777 AD) and in Wolfgang von Eschenbachs Parcival (1209 AD) as being hidden somewhere in Spain. The name Holy Grail, which comes from an old Spanish word graal meaning cup, was translated to Old French as Seynt Graal and to medieval English as Holy Grail. To learn more about the Holy Grail in Valencia, consult

SAINT OF THE WEEK

St. Laurence and the Holy Grail: The Story of the Holy Chalice of Valencia by Janice Bennett
(Littleton, CO: Libri de hispania, 2002), www.libridehispania.com