Q&A Home > C > Cross

Which year was the cross found? Where can we find exhibits of the cross today? Did St. Helena find the cross whole and then chopped it into pieces?

The Holy Cross was discovered by Queen Helena in 326 after it had been buried underneath amassed accumulated rubble in Golgotha. St. Helen built a church (the Church of The Resurrection) on that spot.

Queen Helena took a part of the Cross to Constantine; she sent, or rather carried, another part to Rome to be placed in the church which she had built there and named "The Holy Cross of Jerusalem", where it remains to this day. She enclosed the rest in a silver reliquary that was left at the Church of The Resurrection in the care of Bishop Macarius, who exhibited it periodically.

The relics of the cross are still present in those churches.

Saint John Chrysostom relates that fragments of the True Cross were kept in golden reliquaries, "which men reverently wear upon their persons".