Church of the Holy Sepulcher

Church of the Holy Sepulcher  
The Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem — the church that stands today over the traditional sites of both the crucifixion and the resurrection — has a foundation story that most visitors standing inside it have never heard.

When Constantine became the first Christian Emperor in 312 AD one of the first things he wanted to do was locate and honour the physical sites of the death and resurrection of Jesus. He turned to his mother Helena — one of the most remarkable women in the history of the early church. Helena was approximately 75 to 80 years old when she undertook the journey to the Holy Land in 326 AD. She had converted to Christianity earlier in life and was known for her deep personal faith and her extensive charity work — founding churches, ransoming prisoners and caring for the poor throughout the empire. Constantine gave her unlimited access to the imperial treasury for her mission. In Jerusalem Helena sought out the site of the crucifixion and tomb — guided by local Christian tradition that had preserved the memory of the locations through nearly 300 years of Roman occupation. The site she identified was occupied by a temple built by the Emperor Hadrian around 135 AD during his rebuilding of Jerusalem — a pagan temple deliberately constructed to suppress Christian veneration of the site. Hadrian's strategy had backfired. Rather than erasing the memory of the location, the prominent pagan temple had actually preserved it — marking the spot so clearly that local Christians never lost track of where it was. Helena reported her findings to Constantine. He ordered Hadrian's temple demolished and excavation of the site begun. Ancient sources record that during the excavation a tomb was discovered consistent with the gospel accounts — cut into rock, with a rolling stone entrance. Constantine commissioned the Church of the Holy Sepulchre — a magnificent basilica complex incorporating both the site of the crucifixion and the tomb — which was consecrated in 335 AD. The church has been destroyed and rebuilt multiple times over the centuries — by the Persian invasion in 614 AD, by the Caliph al-Hakim in 1009 AD, and partially by the Crusaders who rebuilt it in the 12th century. The structure standing today incorporates elements from multiple historical periods but rests on Constantine's original foundation. An elderly woman in her late seventies. An imperial mission. A pagan temple that accidentally preserved the location it was meant to erase. And a church that has stood — in one form or another — for nearly 1,700 years over the site where the resurrection occurred.