MIL says thousands of babies found under ancient Catholic Church!

by bluesapphire 24 Replies latest jw friends

• 

  nelly136

  its possible the nuns story was a variation of this, theres quite a bit of folklore attatched to bells and mentions of animal sacrifice.

  http://www.mybeijingchina.com/beijing-attractions/drum_tower_bell_tower.htm

  According to legend, an official named Deng tried unsuccessfully for over a year to cast the bell. On the eve of the final casting, his daughter, fearing that further delays and loss of working time would bring blame on her father, decided to sacrifice her life in order to move the gods to bring about a perfect casting, and threw herself into the molten bronze. Her panic-stricken father could only recover a single embroidered slipper from the flames. The casting was a success and the emperor, moved by the young girl's spirit of sacrifice, named her the "Goddess of the Golden Furnace" and built a temple in her honor near the foundry. By the ordinary people she was remembered as the "Goddess Who Cast the Bell."

  After the bell was installed, the chimes could be heard clearly and resonantly all across the city. But on stormy evenings, the bell would emit a desolate moaning sound similar to the word xie, which means "shoe" in Chinese. Recalling the old legend, mothers would comfort their children with: "Go to sleep! The Bell Tower is tolling. The Goddess Who Cast the Bell wants her embroidered slipper back."
• 

  nelly136

  http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/2378831.stm

  A house on offer in Essex comes with some interesting features: fireplaces, a garden, and mummified cats which were found in the walls.

  Winter's Armoury is one of the oldest homes in Magdalen Laver, and its unique selling points include its use by Oliver Cromwell during the Civil War.

  But it is also home to cats whose skin and bones were preserved by mummification.

  The cats were placed in the walls while still alive hundreds of years ago, supposedly to ward off evil spirits.

  http://www.cronaca.com/archives/003265.html more buried cats

  one of my favourite pubs (17th Century) had old boots buried in its walls by the original builders which were found when they did some work on the place

  burying things in walls used to be tradition to ward off evil spirits or to bless, i dont doubt theres a few things in some walls that would have been stuffed away for other purposes.
• 

  hillbilly

  I've heard the story, and it was not from a J.W. The thought was, those were aborted babies that were buried under a church, or some churches. They said the unwanted pregnancies were the result of priests and nuns having relations.

  Pretty common story..I heard that everytime a construction fence went up around a Catholic jobsight for an expansion or remodel of Parrish properties.

  ~Hill
• 

  Gerard

  There is story of at least one catholic cathedral in San Juan, Argentina with "dozens" of skeletons -many oth them children- burried inside underground tunnel walls discovered by workers in the mid 40's after the building was destroyed by an earthquake on January 19th. 1944.

  One popular theory -that later became urban legend- is that several families with a single but pregnant daughter, used to give a "donation" to the convent and send the girl to become a nun, and spare the family honor. An other theory is that those babies were conceived by clandestine relations bbetween nuns and priests. The children would be born inside, in secret, and disposed of.

  Remember that many catholic churches have underground niches for sale to followers wishing to place their loved ones to rest in the most sacred and secure place, beneath a church.

  In this particular case, it was later shown that the San Juan cathedral had niches and was built in 1846 over its municipal cemetery.
• 

  bluesapphire

  LOL! It figures!