San Thome Church

The word Santhome or San Thome is derived from Saint Thomas, one of the twelve apostles of Jesus Christ. The local Christian belief is that the apostle came to India in A.D.52, was martyred in A.D.72 at St.Thomas Mount in the City and was interred in Mylapore. A church was built over his tomb and this is known as the San Thome Basilica. The Basilica is one of three churches that claim to have been built over the tomb of an apostle. The other two are St. Peter's Basilica in Rome, Italy and the church of Saint James the Great in Santiago de Compostela, Spain.
Commonly known as Santhome Church, the International Shrine of St. Thomas Basilica has an underground tomb chapel where pilgrims can pray in front of the sepulchre of St. Thomas. Superstitious people believe that sand taken from the tomb has miraculous healing powers. Marco Polo the great Venetian traveller visited the tomb in 1292 and made a record of his visit in his travel diaries:
"The Christians who go thither in pilgrimage take of the earth from the place where the saint was killed (or buried), and give a portion thereof to anyone who is sick of a quartan or a tertian fever ; and by the power of God and of St. Thomas the sick man is incontinently cured."--Travels of Marco Polo Vol.II by Yule Edited by Cordier. Faithful people have had to wait many years to get a little sand from the tomb, as it is only opened infrequently, at intervals of a few hundred years.
The church has made a beautiful credit card for pilgrims, the St. Thomas Card,[1] with a little of the St. Thomas sand embedded in it. This can be carried around like a normal credit card in a wallet or purse.