‘can-a’ wedding have no wine?

Cana in Galilee is celebrated as the scene of Jesus’ first miracle. In the Gospel of John it is the place of the first two public miracles Of Jesus in Galilee; the changing of water into wine and the remote healing of an official’s son 32km away in Capernaum.

Jesus and his disciples turned up at a wedding feast when the wine ran out and so Mary turned to her Son to save the couple from embarrassment (John 2: 1-11). “Woman, what concern is that to you and to me?” he responded. “My hour has not yet come.” But she persisted and her Son turned six stone water jars holding more than 550 liters of water (equivalent to more than 730 bottles) into fine wine. One such stone jar can be seen in the crypt of the Church. This small stone cistern was found fitted into a flagstone floor.

Cana’s actual location is uncertain, with at least three other possible candidates. One possible site for Cana, preferred by many modern scholars, is the ruined village of Khirbet Kana (Khirbet Qana meaning “the ruins of Cana”)), 12km northwest of Nazareth. But the commemoration of the miracle of the wine is traditionally fixed at Kefer-Kenna (also known as Kefr Kana and Kfar-Cana), about 5km north-east of Nazareth on the road to Tiberias. It is here, by tradition, that the Franciscans, relying on the testimony of early pilgrims including St Jerome, established themselves in 1641.

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