Even though I'm an agnostic, I find this story about the stone box utterly fascinating. During the middle ages, holy relics were a dime-a-dozen. In European museums one can often find a beautifully made empty relicary that once held the finger bone of Saint So-and-so. The relicary is empty because someone long ago realized the holy relic was a fraud and threw it in the trash. However now we have a holy relic that might be the genuine article. What's even more interesting is this empty stone box had some bone fragments in the bottom of it. It is quite possible those bone fragments were from James the brother of Jesus. If they were, they might have Mary's (and Jesus' Daddy's) DNA in it! Wouldn't that be funky if we could clone James or get a good DNA sequence for James. Ever wondered if you were related to Jesus? Soon you may be able to find out.

Gary