Shrine of the Holy Face - Manoppello, Italy

(CNS photos/Paul Haring)

Destination:  At the Shrine of the Holy Face in Manoppello, Italy, about 117 miles east of Rome, visitors see a transparent cloth encased between two glass panes within an ornate silver frame above the sanctuary’s altar.
Devotees of the Manoppello veil claim that it is “Veronica’s Veil” and that it was secretly moved to the little hilltop town in Abruzzo on orders from Pope Clement VII to protect it following the Sack of Rome in 1527.
Masses are offered at the shrine, but we found no regular times on the website.
Photos: The Shrine of the Holy Face (left) is in Manoppello, Italy. The Holy Face of Manoppello (below right) is on display at the shrine.
Why to go: Although the traditional Stations of the Cross include “Veronica wipes the face of Jesus,” none of the Gospels recount a woman wiping Jesus’ face as He carries His cross to Calvary.
A pious legend says Veronica later went to Rome to leave the relic with St. Clement, one of the early popes.
The Capuchin friars at Manoppello have been the custodians of a veil since 1630.
For centuries, few people outside the small town knew of the cloth and its image of Jesus. But a Capuchin priest, Father Domenico di Cese, made it his life’s work to spread devotion to the Holy Face of Manoppello.

When he first saw the veil as a young priest in the 1930s, the face looked like the same unidentified man who had rescued him from the rubble of a church after a major earthquake in 1915 when he was a child. Father di Cese died in 1978.
But in 1999 the veil caught the world’s attention when Jesuit Father Heinrich Pfeiffer, an art historian at Rome’s Pontifical Gregorian University, announced at a press conference that the cloth was the true “veil of Veronica.” He said  after conducting research, he discovered that the image on the veil could be perfectly superimposed on the face of the Shroud of Turin, the relic many believe is Jesus’ burial shroud.
The Vatican does not formally recognize the authenticity of relics like the Veil of Manoppello or the Shroud of Turin. However, since Pope Benedict XVI became the first pope to visit the shrine in 2006 and venerate the image, visits to the shrine have increased. But Benedict made no pronouncement about the image.
(Grand) Kid friendly: Of course.
Info: Address — Rector of the Shrine of the Holy Face, Via Cappuccini, 26, 65024 Manoppello (PE) Italy
Phone — 085859118 or 0854979194
Website — www.voltosanto.net (click on the British flag for English)

— Junno Arocho Esteves, CNS; Sharon Boehlefeld contributed to the story
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