TURIN, Italy — Pope Benedict XVI all but gave an outright endorsement of the authenticity of the Shroud of Turin on Sunday, calling the cloth that some believe is Christ's burial shroud an icon "written with the blood" of a crucified man.

During a visit to the shroud in the northern Italian city of Turin, Benedict didn't raise the scientific questions that surround the linen and whether it might be a medieval forgery. Instead, he delivered a powerful meditation on the faith that holds that the shroud is indeed Christ's burial cloth.

"This is a burial cloth that wrapped the remains of a crucified man in full correspondence with what the Gospels tell us of Jesus," Benedict said. He said the relic — one of the most important in Christianity — should be seen as a photographic document of the "darkest mystery of faith" — that of Christ's Crucifixion and Resurrection.

The shroud bears the figure of a crucified man, complete with blood seeping from his hands and feet, and believers say Christ's image was recorded on the linen's fibers at the time of his Resurrection.

Benedict focused in his meditation on the message that the blood stains conveyed, saying the shroud was "an icon written in blood; the blood of a man who was whipped, crowned with thorns, crucified and injured on his right side.

"The image on the shroud is that of a dead man, but the blood speaks of his life. Each trace of blood speaks of love and life," Benedict said.

The Vatican to date had tiptoed around the issue of just what the Shroud of Turin is, calling it a powerful symbol of Christ's suffering while making no claim to its authenticity.

Benedict's meditation — delivered after he prayed before the shroud — appeared to imply that in the end it doesn't matter what science says about its authenticity.

"The Shroud of Turin offers us the image of how his body lay in the tomb during that time (of death); time that was brief chronologically — about a day and a half — but was immense, infinite in its value and significance," Benedict said.