The Shroud Codex - Jerome R. Corsi [69]
The next images shown were of the Shroud of Turin. Ferrar narrated: “Several knowledgeable experts have come forward to document that the wounds being displayed by Father Bartholomew resemble the Shroud of Turin.” The report next showed the main library on the Columbia University campus on New York’s Upper West Side. “Today I was able to interview Dr. Richard Whitehouse, a professor of medieval studies at Columbia University who has devoted decades to studying the Shroud of Turin.”
The report showed Ferrar interviewing Dr. Whitehouse in the professor’s office. “Tell me, Dr. Whitehouse, what first drew your attention to Father Bartholomew and the Shroud of Turin?”
“There’s a long history of religious believers going back centuries exhibiting stigmata, most commonly the nail wounds Christ suffered on his wrists when he was crucified,” Whitehouse said. “But when I saw your video of the wounds on Father Bartholomew’s chest when he was in the hospital window today, I was surprised. Most people who experience the stigmata do not also experience wounds that look like the scourging that the gospels say Jesus Christ took at the pillar.”
“So you compared this to the Shroud of Turin?” Ferrar asked.
“Yes, I did,” Whitehouse acknowledged. “Your video images weren’t clear enough to say for certain, but the pattern of wounds on Father Bartholomew’s chest and arms looks similar to the wounds we see in the Shroud of Turin.”
As Whitehouse said this, viewers saw side-by-side images: negative photographs of the torso of the man in the Shroud, and Father Bartholomew with his arms outstretched and chest naked in the window of his Beth Israel hospital room.
“It’s also remarkable, don’t you think, how much Father Bartholomew with his long hair and beard looks like Jesus?” Ferrar asked the professor.
Whitehouse proceeded carefully. “Again, I can’t say the man in the Shroud is Jesus. That is still the subject of a lot of debate. But I can say that the face of the man in the Shroud and Father Bartholomew with his long hair and beard do resemble each other.”
As Whitehouse answered, the camera showed close-ups of Father Bartholomew’s face as seen through the hospital window and the face of the man in the Shroud.
“There you have it.” Ferrar concluded his report. “Has Jesus Christ come back to life in the person of Father Bartholomew? Is the Second Coming upon us? So far, we have had no official comment from the Vatican.”
EARLY THURSDAY EVENING in Rome, a television rebroadcast of Ferrar’s news report from outside the hospital had a big impact at the Vatican. “I think you need to hold a press conference as soon as possible and Father Morelli should attend to represent the Vatican,” Pope John-Paul Peter I told Archbishop Duncan over the phone. “It’s better if the press knows the Vatican is involved.”
“What do you want us to say?” Duncan asked.
“I doubt if there is much you can say,” the pope answered. “Let Castle do most of the talking. He will be limited by the doctor-patient relationship, so there is little he can disclose, but I think he will be successful in damping down the enthusiasm of the press to sensationalize Father Bartholomew, if that’s possible to do.”
The press conference was set for 5 P.M. ET on Thursday in Archbishop Duncan’s office at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York City.
The press conference was packed. Multiple video crews broadcast back to their home studios through remote satellite uplinks via trucks parked on the side streets along the cathedral.
A table was set up in the front of the room for the press conference. Archbishop Duncan sat in the