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EXPERT SAYS FLOW OF LIQUID FROM CORPUS REMAINS MYSTERIOUS
John Blair, project manager for Jozef Custom Ironworks, a large firm in Bridgeport, tells Spirit Daily that the fact that a large bronze corpus of Christ at Medjugorje is filled at the bottom with concrete might increase the chance of humidity but that "it would be a stretch" to try to explain the flow of liquid on the filling.
"It doesn't make sense," said Blair, an expert on bronze. "It doesn't make sense that it would hold water that long. Absolutely not."
It was around the 20th anniversary of Medjugorje last month that pilgrims began to note a strange flow of watery drops that felt like a cross between saltwater and oil flowing from the 15-foot corpus of Christ behind St. James Church at the famous site of alleged apparitions. The substance was coming from a scraped part of the metal at the side of the right knee and continued at least until last week. It was later learned that the statue is filled from the feet to waist with cement. The statue has been there for at least two years.
Blair was asked if when there's humidity bronze sweats to the point where something can exude from the metal itself. "That's a really curious question," he replied. "I've never seen it from humidity. However, when I apply a patina, when I flame it with a torch, it does sweat then. You do get moisture over the surface of the bronze. But I've never seen it from heat or humidity."
Blair said the only probable explanation at this point (and he has not examined the actual statue) is water somehow finding its way into the interior and then leaching out.
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