Excellent blog posting by a Dominican student, Shroud on Trial | Cantate Domino:
Most Christians have heard of the Shroud, and many believe in its authenticity, but there are far more who think it is a hoax or a fake. Why? A number of atheists and perhaps not a small number of agnostics simply believe that Jesus did not exist. They will believe empirical evidence of man’s flight to the moon, but they simply refuse to believe that there was a man named Jesus. History is littered with accounts Jesus. So even if one were to discount the Christian sources, what of the writings of others? We have only the NASA and the US government to believe that man landed on the moon. It all boils down to credibility. Certainly if you choose not to believe any source that isn’t first-hand experience, then you might as well deny that your great-great-grand parents ever lived.
However, the story of the Shroud has a twist—radio carbon (RC) dating. Back in the 1990s the Shroud curators allowed a portion of the cloth to be RC dated. The results? Somewhere in the Middle Ages. Many proponents were devastated while the opponents were vindicated. While at the time I was practicing Christian, I wanted to believe, but it seemed that the RC results pretty much sealed that fate. Of course, I didn’t do any research, I just went with the findings. This single piece of evidence contradicts literally dozens of other pieces that point to the authenticity of the Shroud. But for some reason, we want to believe the science as an authority over everything else. But what if the science was not flawed?
. . . My good friends Andy and Cathy had met a retired federal prosecutor, Larry. As a practicing Catholic he is a believer in Jesus Christ, but again this is independent of the authenticity of the Shroud. But he was intrigued enough to investigate. As a lawyer, he needs to rely on more concrete evidence. So he started to look into the whole Shroud business. Last week I traveled to see him and hear his case and his closing arguments. I must say, that after his evidence, I have to say that overwhelmingly the Shroud is authentic. Well, so what about the RC dating (never mind that RC dating is approximate at best)? But what if the piece of cloth tested was not actually the Shroud, but a piece of cloth that was woven into the Shroud in the Middle Ages?
Is this retired federal prosecutor named Larry, the Larry Schauf’s who presentation (actually a trial) at Newman University we reported about? Is this the same “trail” that I recommended be video taped for public viewing (see Word in on Shroud of Turin Presentation at Newman University in Wichita) ?