Magnificent Corpses: Searching Through Europe for St. Peter's Head, St. Claire's Heart, St. Stephen's Hand, and Other Saintly Relics

Rating:
Summary: Magnificent Revelations!
Review: This work is absolutely marvelous! I'll never forget picking up a copy of the Rufus/Lawson book "Goddes Sites" a couple of years ago in Monterey and being blown away by the sheer wit, insight, and fascinating information. This book is just as good! Here, Rufus points her wit at the utterly macabre, morbid, and frankly disgusting penchant of the European Catholic tradition to hack up, dismember, and disgrace the bodies of its alleged "saints" to satisfy the superstitious fixations of the clergy and people. I just spent several months traveling in Europe, and I can tell you that her portrayal of the various churches, practices, and sights are dead-on(no pun intended!). Her style of writing is wonderfully funny and at times even poetic.As a reluctant Catholic, I thrilled to her descriptions of the various churches. I would dare EVERY Roman Catholic to read this book and face the fact that so many of the people the church has pompously(and foolishly) lifted up as "saints" were nothing more than sado-masochistic, psychotic, demented nut-cases! Rufus' historical research is great and I am rightly embarrassed to be a Roman Catholic right now! But who cares?-- I couldn't have laughed more or enjoyed this book more! You MUST read it. It's quirky and superb! One of the most unique travel accounts you'll ever read--just like her "Goddess Sites!" Well done!

Rating:
Summary: unsatisfying and superficial
Review: What does it say about a person that she can visit numerous sites held holy by millions of people and come away with only the basest, most obvious and often unkind observations? Anneli Rufus packed her bags for visits to many of the most famous Catholic shrines in Europe, but neglected to bring along the slightest shred of respect for others or their spiritual traditions. The result is an unsatisfying and superficial travel account-- of interest only to those who, like the author, view saints and relics with morbid curiosity alone. One searches in vain for the slightest insight as to why millions of people continue to place their faith in saints and their relics in today's world. These people crowded around Rufus at every stop; instead of trying to understand them she sneers at them and their faith.
Anyone genuinely interested in a book by a non-Catholic writer who succeeded in penetrating the mystery behind the cult of the saints is directed to Hannah Green's recently published, magnificent, 'Little Saint.' That book left me feeling calm and joyful; this one made me want to take a bath.

Rating:
Summary: A straightforward, insightful look at religious perversions
Review: While I am in no manner an expert in the study of medieval relic worship(unlike the previous and--dare I say--disturbingly verbose reviewer) I have traveled extensively with an eye acutely fixed upon the various eccentricities of European Catholicism. There are enough of those to fill hundreds of books, indeed. I found the author's travel narrative to be quite competent. It does not purport to be an exhaustive, scholarly work and only those obsessed with the most miniscule of historical minutiae could legitimately raise a complaint. That said, Rufus has done her work admirably. The historical references are clearly well-researched and if there are one or two inaccuracies, these seem to be circumstantial at best and hardly detrimental to the clear intention of the book. The previous reviewer lamented that the author does not devote energy to explaining the alleged complexities and various nuances of medieval relic worship. The fact is, the whole point of the author's work is to assert that there WERE no complexities or intricacies: saint/relic worship sprung from a very straightforwardly daffy, ludicrous, ghoulish, bizarre, macabre, desecrating and (plain old ignorant) human religious impulse. The author's wit and narrative style are wonderfully accurate and capture the sights, sounds, and places of modern Europe with aplomb. There is nothing flippant in this work; the author describes her subjects as she sees them and lets the setting speak for itself. In fact, her observations are loaded with insight--particularly when revealing that many of the lauded holy folk of yore would have been rightfully locked away in padded cells in an age of reason. Her descriptions of countless dead and allegedly miraculous bodies worshipped for their wildly varying and generally dubious states of rot is a sad commentary on the human tendency toward the moronic. In a world where ignoramuses once gathered around yet another pitifully exhumed shepherd-girl corpse, it is easy to imagine the conversation: "Aye, this one must've been a saint. Her nose has rotted off, her fingernails are green and she smells a little musty, but her tongue looks kind of moist. IT'S A BLOODY MIRACLE! Chop her up for distribution to the flock!" To conclude, the author's whole point seems to be the exposure of one of the most sickening symptoms of a very diseased medieval(and modern) institution's "spiritual" traditions. Rufus warns us in a readable, witty way, that some allegedly cherished religious customs mask downright perverted, shameful foundations. She succeeds marvelously in skewering one of the greatest shams and obscenities in human history--the whole, frightfully organized relic mania. There was nothing noble about the practice, and, sadly, nothing noble or remotely virtuous about the lives of many of the "saints" whose body parts were involved. I give this book five stars and a kiss for bravery!