The Special Collection
This all sounds a bit shady in an Indiana Jones villain kind of way, but it seems that there is an organization (I oh so badly want to write “secret brotherhood”) that has collected materials (mostly water and soil it seems) from many holy and religious sites from around the world and has finally put up a website so that you can buy them and send them to your friends. From the website:
In the 1920s a small group of Europeans interested in collecting religious and sacred material began to assemble a special collection.
They were interested in Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Buddhism, Sikhism, Judaism, Shinto, Bahá’í Faith, Jainism, Confucianism, Taoism, Zoroastrianism, as well as other religions and indigenous belief systems. They traveled to Africa, the Americas, Asia, Europe, and the Middle East. They visited well known as well as obscure, remote and ancient sites and they carefully collected and documented material from these sites, such as holy water, ritual water, well water, melted snow and ice, rain and mist, and soil samples. In the 1920s, by asking and receiving permission from local authorities, it was possible to collect material of this type. In today’s world, because of environmental, cultural and governmental restrictions, that sort of on-site collecting is generally limited or prohibited.
This unique collection has now been moved to the United States and an organization, TheSpecialCollection.org, has been formed to create awareness and respect for these religious and sacred sites. The organization supports itself by selling samples from the original collection to churches, synagogues, mosques, temples, religious schools and museums, as well as to individuals (the samples make exceptional gifts).