Saint Januarius’ Blood

Saint Januarius, Bishop of Naples, is a martyr saint of the Roman Catholic Church. He was imprisoned while visiting incarcerated deacons at the sulphur mines of Puteoli, the modern Pozzuoli. After many tortures, including being thrown to lions in Pozzuoli’s Flavian Amphitheater, he was beheaded at Solfatara along with his companions. He died in 305 AD. According to an early hagiography, his relics were transferred by order of Saint Severus, Bishop of Naples, to the Neapolitan catacombs. In the early tenth century the body was moved to Beneventum by Sico, prince of Benevento, with the head remaining in Naples. Subsequently, during the turmoil at the time of Frederick Barbarossa, his body was moved again, this time to the Abbey of Montevergine where it was rediscovered in 1480.
Despite very limited information about his life and works, he is famous for the reputed miracle of the annual liquefaction of his blood, first reported in 1389. The dried blood is safely stored in small capsules in a reliquary. When these capsules are brought into the vicinity of his body on three occasions in the year, the dried blood supposedly liquefies. Thousands of people assemble to witness this event in the cathedral of Naples. The archbishop, at the high altar amid prayers and invocations, holds up a glass phial that is said to contain the dried blood of the city’s patron saint. When the liquefaction has taken place, the archbishop holds up the phial again and demonstrates that liquefaction has taken place. The announcement of the liquefaction is greeted with a 21-gun salute at the 13th-century Castel Nuovo. The ceremony takes place three times a year. The most famous is on the feast day on September 19, which commemorates the saint’s martyrdom. Attempts to explain the event in scientific terms suggest that the liquefaction miracle involves not blood but rather a thixotropic gel, such as hydrated iron oxide, FeO(OH) which has demonstrated similar behavior in a laboratory – but the fact that the dried blood liquifies on certain dates add further to the mystery.

Is there any superpower controlling this phenomenon?