Relic and shrine veneration

Domain XVI · Historical, discredited & harmful · 300 · Western Europe

What it is

From late antiquity, Christians across Western Europe sought healing, justice and protection at the tombs and relics of saints. Brown argues that relics were experienced as a link between heaven and earth, and that this devotion was shared across social classes rather than being a practice of…

Format

• Session number and length follow the client's needs and the setting; the phases below are the psychotherapist's own sequence.

Who practises it, and how they are trained or regulated

• Geel, 13th century to the present: the legend of Dymphna, an Irish king's daughter said to have fled her father and been killed near Geel. From the 13th century people with mental illness were brought to pray for her intercession; a pilgrims' guest house is dated 1286 and a sickroom beside the church 1480. Pilgrims made a nine-day stay of prayer (novena) at the church, extended if no cure followed; cures were…
• Present-day healing shrines: HRW documented shackling at shrines, including the release in 2015 of over 700 people chained at one shrine near Marrakesh, and the BBC's report of hundreds of people chained to trees at a Sufi shrine near Burewala, Punjab. In India, 28 people died in a 2001 fire at a private asylum in Erwadi, Tamil Nadu, mainly because they were chained; the National Human Rights Commission then…

Evidence status, as the guide reports it

• Core idea of change, as its participants understood it. Healing was attributed to the saint's presence and intercession, sought through pilgrimage, prayer and time spent in or near the holy place. Historians do not treat the records as clinical evidence: Trenery cautions against reading modern…

Questions to explore with your client

• What drew you to it, and what are you hoping it will change?
• Is there physical contact? Was it explained beforehand, and do you feel free to say no or stop at any point?
• Does it involve any substance, plant preparation, remedy or supplement? Has your doctor or prescriber been told, especially about any medication you take?
• Does it involve fasting, a special diet or 'detox'? Have you discussed this with your doctor?
• Is it a group, retreat or community? How do they respond if someone wants to leave or raises a concern?
• Who runs it, and what training or registration do they hold?
• What actually happens in a session or meeting, and how often?
• What does it cost, and is there pressure to commit to more?
• How do you feel afterwards, in the hours and days that follow?
• Does it fit with, or clash with, the work we do here?

What practitioners of it watch for

• proselytising or debunking. Working signs: the client feels free to disagree with you.
• pressure on the client from either side. Working signs: aligned messages from faith and care.
• imposing a medical frame too early. Working signs: a formulation the client recognises as theirs.
• re-traumatisation through public testimony. Working signs: the client feels agency rather than exposure.
• scapegoating one relative; defensive denial. Working signs: the family can talk about what happened together.

When to involve someone else

• New or worsening physical symptoms, or advice to stop or change prescribed medication: involve the client's doctor or prescriber.
• Signs of coercion, isolation from family and friends, escalating costs or secrecy: discuss openly and consider safeguarding.
• A crisis or thoughts of suicide: follow your crisis protocol. In the US, call or text 988; in the UK and Ireland, Samaritans on 116 123.

Drawn automatically from the guide's own sections. Stay curious: neither endorse nor dismiss what the client values, and check anything that matters against the full guide and its sources. Not medical advice.