St. Jude may be best known in the United States for being the patron saint of St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital in Memphis, a cancer treatment center founded by entertainer Danny Thomas.

Thomas credited St. Jude — also well known among Catholics as the patron saint of hopeless causes and desperate situations — with reviving his career during a particularly low moment. He founded the hospital in gratitude.

Now more Catholics are learning about this faithful apostle, martyr and saint as his relic — bone fragments from an arm believed to be his — travels around the U.S. in a tour sponsored by Treasures of the Church.

The relic left Italy for the first time last fall, making its first U.S. stop in Chicago in 2023 and traveling through the Midwest and to parts of the East Coast. The tour has finally made its way to the Pacific Northwest, with seven stops in Western Washington: 

  • Sept. 19: Holy Redeemer Church, Vancouver
  • Sept. 20: St. Michael Church, Olympia
  • Sept. 21: St. Jude Church, Redmond 
  • Sept. 23: Sacred Heart Church, Tacoma
  • Sept. 24: Our Lady Star of the Sea Church, Bremerton
  • Sept. 25: St. Mary Magdalen Church, Everett
  • Sept. 26: St. Mary Church, Anacortes

At each parish, there will be time for public veneration and a special Mass. (The complete schedule with Mass and veneration times is here.)

As the church-appointed custodian of the relic, Father Carlos Martins, a priest of the Companions of the Cross religious community, is directing the tour.

“The visit provides an opportunity for individuals to experience intimacy with someone who dwells in Heaven and beholds God face-to-face. It allows devotees to receive his blessing and entrust him with their petitions,” Father Martins said in a news release.

A woman prays in front of the arm-shaped reliquary containing a bone from the arm of St. Jude at St. Jude Church in Mastic Beach, N.Y., on Nov. 27, 2023. (OSV News photo/Gregory A. Shemitz

St. Jude Thaddeus was a first cousin of Jesus Christ — the son of Mary of Clopas (Cleophas), a relation of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Along with St. Bartholomew, he is one of the patron saints of the Armenian Apostolic Church. The last Jewish bishop of Jerusalem, Judah Kyriakos, was the great-grandson of St. Jude.

Following his martyrdom around AD 65, when St. Jude was killed with an ax, his body was buried in Beirut, where he was slain. According to tradition, the apostle’s remains were transferred to Rome during the reign of the Roman emperor Constantine, and his tomb rests directly below the main altar of the left transept of St. Peter’s Basilica.

The arm was separated from St. Jude’s remains several centuries ago and placed in a wooden reliquary carved in the shape of an upright arm in the gesture of imparting a blessing. It bears the seals of Cardinal Francesco Marchetti Selvaggiani, who was vicar general of Rome from 1931 to 1951.

According to Treasures of the Church’s news release, pilgrims will be able to receive an extraordinary plenary indulgence issued by Pope Francis and published by the Vatican’s apostolic penitentiary. According to the Code of Canon Law, an “indulgence is a remission before God of the temporal punishment for sin, the guilt of which is already forgiven.” A plenary indulgence is obtained by a person in the state of grace with the condition he or she must show detachment from sin, go to confession, receive the Eucharist and pray for the intentions of the pope.

Learn more about the relic and the tour at apostleoftheimpossible.com.

Kurt Jensen writes for OSV News from Washington, D.C.

Northwest Catholic contributed to this report.

This wooden, arm-shaped reliquary holds bones from an arm of St. Jude the Apostle. This relic will visit seven parishes in Western Washington this fall. (OSV News photo/courtesy Father Carlos Martins)