The Finding of the Holy Cross - Roman Breviary

After that famous victory that the Emperor Constantine gained over Maxentius, in the year 312, on the eve of which the banner of the Cross of the Lord had been given to him from Heaven, Helena, the mother of Constantine, being warned in a dream, came to Jerusalem, in 326, to seek for the Cross. There it was her care to cause to be overthrown the marble statue of Venus, which had stood on Calvary for about 180 years, and which had originally been put there to desecrate and destroy the memorial of the sufferings of the Lord Christ.

Helena caused deep excavations to be made, which resulted in the discovery of three crosses, and, apart from them, the writing that had been nailed on that of The Lord. But which of the crosses had been His was unknown, and was only manifested by a miracle. Macarius, Bishop of Jerusalem, after offering solemn prayers to God, touched with each of the three a woman who was afflicted with a grievous disease. The first two had no effect, but at the touch of the third she was immediately healed. Helena, after she had found the life-giving Cross, built over the site of the Passion a Church of extraordinary splendour, wherein she deposited part of the Cross, enclosed in a silver case. Another part, which she gave to her son Constantine, was laid up in the Church of the Holy Cross of Jerusalem, which he built at Rome on the site of the Sessorian Palace.

The historicity of this discovery was accepted by the Church mainly on the testimony of St. Cyril, Bishop of Jerusalem (c. 315-386). Being a resident of the area from his childhood, he might even have seen the excavations and would almost certainly have heard about them. He later mentioned, with particular reference to the Cross, that "the Holy Places that had been hidden were revealed" during the reign of Constantine.

In his Catechetical Lectures, St. Cyril made several references to "the wood of the Cross, which is seen here among us even to the present day". And, preaching in 348 in the Church founded by Constantine on the recently discovered site of the Crucifixion, he stated: "There He was crucified for our sins. If you deny it, this place refutes you visibly - this blessed Golgotha, in which we are even now assembled for the sake of Him who was here attached to the Cross – as does the wood of the Cross, of which fragments without number have already been carried throughout the world".