Originally published at crisis magazine
Two new forensic science papers raise concerns about Eucharistic miracle investigations. The main author, Dr. Kelly Kearse, is a faithful Catholic, Eucharistic minister for over 20 years, and science teacher at Knoxville Catholic High School in Tennessee. Kearse is also an immunologist who trained at Johns Hopkins, worked as a principal investigator at the NIH’s cancer and immunology branch, and served as editor for a Methods in Molecular Biology textbook.
Before summarizing his concerns, I want to make it clear that his purpose is not to disprove miracles and not to question the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist. Quite the opposite! The present concerns address exaggerations and how to correct them. Kearse points out important natural explanations that were never addressed. Until those are ruled out as causes, it is premature to claim a miracle. Kearse also provides analytical protocols that would decisively show whether the blood and cardiac tissue samples all originate from a single source, a key point in the validation of Eucharistic miracles that has never been addressed.
The first paper, “The relics of Jesus and Eucharistic miracles: scientific analysis of shared AB blood type,” was published in the Journal of Forensic Science, Medicine and
