Eucharistic Miracle of Turin (1453)

A few weeks ago I was able to visit the Corpus Domini Basilica in Turin Italy, which was built on the site of the Eucharistic Miracle of Turin, which occurred in 1453.  The following account is from The Real Presence Association. I wish this remarkable story was more widely known.

The Story:

Inside the Corpus Domini Basilica in Turin, there is an iron railing that closes in the place where, in 1453, the first Eucharistic miracle of Turin occurred. An inscription inside the railing describes the miracle: “Here the she-mule that was carrying the Divine Body fell prostrate; here the Sacred Host was miraculously freed from the bag containing the Sacred Species and rose high; here came gently down among the suppliant hands of the people of Turin; here then, the place made holy by the miracle. Remembering, pray on your knees. (June 6, 1453)”. 

In the Alta Val Susa, close to Exilles, the army of René D'Angiò met the army of the duke Ludovic of Savoy. Here the soldiers indulged in plundering the town and some of them entered the church. One of them forced open the little door of the tabernacle and stole the monstrance with the consecrated Host. He wrapped up all that he had stolen in a bag and headed for Turin on a mule. On the main plaza close to St. Sylvester’s Church (now the Holy Spirit Church, where later the Church of Corpus Domini was built), the she-mule stumbled and fell. Then suddenly the bag fell open and the monstrance with the consecrated Host rose over the surrounding houses while the people were filled with wonder. Among those present there was also Don Bartholomew Coccolo. He ran with this news to the Bishop, Ludovic of the Romagnano’s Marquises. The Bishop, accompanied by a cortege of people and clergy, went to the plaza, prostrated himself in adoration and prayed with the words of the Emmaus disciples, “Stay with us, Lord”. Meanwhile a new miracle had happened; the monstrance had fallen on the ground, leaving the consecrated Host free and shining as a second sun. The Bishop who was holding a chalice in his hands lifted it up high, and the consecrated Host slowly started coming down and settled in the chalice.  

The devotion for the miracle of 1453 was at once adopted by the town that first promoted the building of an aedicule on the place of the miracle, and then soon substituted by the church dedicated to the Corpus Domini. But the most significant display of this is expressed by the celebrations organized in occasion of the centenaries and fiftieth anniversaries (1653, 1703, 1853, and partially 1803). The documents that describe the miracles are many. The most ancient are the three Capitulary Acts of 1454, 1455 and 1456, and some writings contemporary of the Turin Municipality. In 1853 the Blessed Pope Pius IX solemnly celebrated the fourth centenary of the miracle. In this celebration Saint John Bosco and Don Rua participated. Furthermore, Pius IX on this occasion approved the Office and the Mass Proper of the miracle for the Turin archdiocese. In 1928 Pius XI raised the Church of Corpus Domini to the dignity of minor basilica. In the XV century the Holy See gave the order to consume the Host of the miracle, “to not oblige God to make the miracle an eternal miracle by keeping always incorrupt, as they had being doing, those very same Eucharistic species”.

The Basilica in Photos:

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