The Shroud of Turin: Picture of the Resurrection?

It seems beyond coincidence to me that just at this moment with turmoil swirling around us–joblessness, the situation in Iran, the economy in general, corruption in politics–that so much new evidence emerges that the Shroud could be…and maybe was…the burial cloth of Jesus. Here we are the day before Easter and it’s possible to believe that we’ve been given the greatest gift of all, an image on a linen cloth from 2000 years ago showing us the face of the Messiah! Proof that the resurrection occurred–that life extends into eternity!

Last week the History Channel showed an astounding documentary on the three-dimensional aspect of the Shroud. Scientists and photographers and computer experts worked together on a project that proved the image on the Shroud was not created by any technique known to science, and that it is not only a negative image (as in a photograph) where others are positive, but it is also three-dimensional, unlike any other in the world. A photograph of the Shroud was studied using sophisticated instruments that created a topical map of the distance between each part of the body image to the cloth covering it when the image was formed– sort of a mathematical map. Using that information, a computer generated duplicate was created and, adding information such as the curvature of the face and cloth over the body, the color of the hair and beard, an actual picture–skin, eyes, blood, and all–formed on the screen.

Were we looking back through time, two thousand years ago?

And why now?