Chapter 8

Concerning the Discovery of the Precious Cross by the Blessed Saint Helen

Certain modern scholars who seek to deny every truth handed down to the Church express doubts even about the discovery of the precious Cross by Saint Helen, inferring this from the supposed silence of the historian Eusebius, who allegedly says nothing about the discovery of the precious Cross in his Life of Constantine the Great, whereas other contemporary historians speak at length about the discovery of the precious Cross. But imperial decrees, preserved to this day in various sacred monasteries, confirm the authenticity of the precious wood of the precious Cross of the Savior, and the very fragments of the precious wood—distinguished by their miraculous power—refute the baseless hypotheses of the modernists. Thus, according to the unanimous testimony of the ancient historians, whose passages we cite below, the most pious mother of Constantine the Great, Saint Helen, desiring to visit the sacred places where the Savior had lived, arrived around A.D. 326 in Jerusalem. Her first concern was the search for the tomb of the Savior. But the pagans, moved by envy toward the Christians who honored the tomb of the Savior in a special way, had long since filled it in. And in order to completely erase its memory, they built a temple of Aphrodite on the hill thus formed, in which was the tomb of the Savior, and set up idols in it. When this became known to the empress mother, the temple of the idols was demolished at her command, and the idols were removed from there. When the earth had been removed, the life-giving tomb was uncovered, and three crosses were found within it. Since it was difficult to distinguish the Cross of the Savior from those of the thieves, Macarius, who was then bishop of Jerusalem, brought each of the three crosses that had been found to a woman who was suffering from a fatal illness. And when the first two were placed on her in vain, as soon as the third touched the body of the dying woman, she was immediately restored and became well. In this way, then, the Lord’s Cross was found and identified. The empress mother divided it into two parts: one she wrapped in a silver case and deposited in Jerusalem, and the other she sent to her son the emperor for the imperial capital.

The silence of one historian who confined himself to narrating only those things pertaining to the life of Constantine the Great, and who wrote in detail, cannot be regarded as negative testimony and sufficient. Eusebius not only passed over this in silence, but also reports the events of Saint Helen’s stay in Jerusalem in a very abbreviated and condensed manner, with many other details omitted by others as well. For this reason it is neither just nor reasonable for anyone to use these as a measure for gauging the truth and to pronounce against the correctness and truth of events so ancient and possessing such catholic authority from the beginning, attested by history through a series of notable historical events confirmed by the state and the Church and witnessed by countless miracles.

But apart from this rational argument, contemporary history refutes those who contradict it.

And (a) The discovery of the precious Cross is confirmed by the letters of Constantine the Great to Macarius, Bishop of Jerusalem, and to the prefect Dracilianus (Theodoret, Ecclesiastical History, ch. 6).