August 28, 2009

• Miracles

   

  I remember a moment from when I was probably around six years old. I was at the Tipton park with the youngest daughter of my babysitter, Holly. We were standing on top of the big wooden jungle gym, ready to go down the slide, and I happened to notice the sunbeams coming through the clouds. Naturally, it reminded me of a scene from Disney’s “The Sword in the Stone.” 

  

  Yeah, that part. Remember? When the sun is streaming down on the sword? Anyways, I remember the big mean guy with the walrus mustache who bossed Arthur around during the moment when everyone witnesses Arthur pull the sword from the stone. He just says, “It’s a miracle…”

  So here I was, this little kid, pointing at the sunbeams in the distance and I said to Holly, “It’s a miracle!”

  Being a very practical person, even at such a young age, she promptly replied, “That’s just sun shining through clouds, stupid.”

  So I still have yet to witness a full-blown miracle. However, in my few years as a Jesuit, I have met priests who have been witness to some amazing things. Here are a few that I have picked up from sane, trustworthy priests who have no reason whatsoever to make things up.

  The Healing Power of the Eucharist

  A priest told me of a time when he received a phone call about a man who was close to death. The priest was tempted to say “no” because he felt he was very busy but his nagging conscience prevailed and he went. It was a very hot day, it had been a long day, and everything about that day was just tiresome; his heart was not in it.

  When he arrived at the address, he noted that it was a three-story building and immediately hoped there was an elevator. He went inside and asked a random person where Mr. So-and-So lived.

  Third floor.

  And the elevator?

  There isn’t one, Father.

  Thanks.

  Being a slightly heavy man, not in terrific shape and already sweating, this priest was an out-of-breath, dripping grump by the time he got to the third floor. Finding the man’s apartment, he knocked and was invited in.

  The man lay on his bed, his daughter near at hand. The man was breathing in short gasps, eyes closed, not really responding. The daughter explained that doctors had done all they could, and the man’s wish was to die at home. The priest took out the oils, anointed him, said the prayers and then opened the little golden pyx. (A pyx is a small, golden vessel used to safely and reverently transport the Eucharistic Body of Christ).

  When he placed the Eucharist on the man’s tongue, to the priest’s utter amazement, it dissolved instantly and vanished. The man’s hectic breathing slowed to a peaceful rhythm, and a gentle smile spread over his face. Peace fell over the whole room. The man passed away quiety not long after, and the priest’s life was changed forever.

   

  The Power of the Rosary

  When I was on Hospital Experiment at our Jesuit Infirmary in Wisconsin, I had several conversations with an elderly Jesuit priest who has since passed on. He spent most of his life on the reservations in South Dakota and was witness to many tragic events. I don’t know, and I doubt anyone could count the number of suicide victims he has buried, how many scenes of death he has had to cross to comfort family and friends… the priest, though, was one of the most peaceful and prayerful men I’ve ever met.

  Once there was this native woman who would come to speak with him once in a while. She struggled tremendously with drugs and alcohol and would try quitting, only to get right back into it a short time after. But each time she would be sober a little longer, a little longer until once it finally seemed like she’d kicked her bad habits. She continued to visit the priest, and he would always give her advice on prayer and the like, and even helped her to get a job.

  Just when everything seemed to be going well for her, however, she had a relapse and soon died. The priest attended her wake, finding sadly that only two other people were in attendance.

  “Father,” one of them asked, “she always had a rosary. Do you have a rosary we could put in her hands?”

  “I have one in the rectory; I’ll go get it.”

  “We’ll wait right here,” the two women said.

  When he returned, the two women were gone, so he went to the open casket and reached for the hands of the woman who would be buried tomorrow. As he brought the rosary to them, he was shocked to find that her hands, in spite of having been dead for several days and embalmed, were warm and supple as though she were only asleep. He suddenly became aware of someone else in the room with him, and recognized it as the woman who used to visit him, the woman he would bury tomorrow. He remembered very distinctly sensing that she was assuring him that she was overjoyed and free and grateful for all of his help. The sensation passed and he placed the rosary reverently around her hands before departing for the evening. He spoke with an undertaker soon afterward, asking if he’d ever experienced such a phenomenon in all his many years of work. Taking the priest quietly aside he said “yes, but I rarely talk about it; it is the most strange thing and I can’t explain it.”

   

  I AM the Bread From Heaven

  The priest telling me this story is famous throughout my province for his tall tales. But after a few weeks, I learned all of his “tells” and knew when he was serious, and when he was not.

  He was serious when he told me this one.

  When he was stationed out at the Pine Ridge Reservation in South Dakota, he became acquainted with a British author who had recently written a book on the importance of forgiveness. The topic became especially relevant when the priest, the author and a mutual friend were talking about the Wounded Knee Massacre. The priest decided that he would take his guests to the Wounded Knee Church, right at the site of the mass grave and across the road from the massacre itself, and have Mass.

  They arrived only to find the church locked and a complete downpour of rain. With no key and no time to go anywhere else, the priest decided they would have a “dashboard Mass.” Parking with the mass grave before them, the priest opened his Mass kit and set up the dashboard as best they could in their circumstance.

  During the intercessory prayers, the author asked if they could pray for and forgive all those responsible for the massacre and all those who had inflicted suffering on the Lakota, and he also wished to pray for and forgive all the Lakota who had their part, whatever it might have been. Basically, he felt moved to ask for God’s total forgiveness of everyone involved in the tragic events that began long before the massacre, included it, and continued on to that day.

  Keeping these intentions and prayers in mind, the priest began the Eucharistic prayer, and as it proceeded on toward the Agnus Dei he swears he began to see people appearing out of the grave, dressed in traditional Lakota garb and, smiling, rising up into the sky.

   

  Humble in Appearance, Mighty in Power

  Catholics, as most people know, believe that the Eucharist is the actual, living, Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Christ- the full and real presence,though shrouded in deep mystery and under the “appearance” of bread and wine. Even in a little fragment we believe it is fully Christ, capable of all that Christ was capable of in the Gospel. The power of the Eucharist has been told throughout the ages as stories of miracles became known. Some stories, like these, don’t circulate very far. This one in particular amazed me, though it is more spectacular than the moving stories above.

  I lived in community with an interesting priest for two years. He would often travel and do retreats all over the United States and South America and when he was home, if you were lucky, you could get him to tell a story about himself. For instance, he once met a man who pleaded with him to anoint his daughter who was born with a spinal deformity that paralyzed her from the chest down. The priest anointed her and told the father to lay his hands on his daughter’s back every night and pray an Our Father. One night a few years later, the father was doing just that, as he had done since then, and suddenly during the prayer he and his daughter heard a loud pop and, suddenly, she could move her legs, and was walking within the month.

  But that isn’t the story I wanted to tell. This story is very short, but because of its nature I didn’t want to pry!

  Exorcism, specifically Catholic exorcism, is something that is very misunderstood and is almost entirely obscured by superstition and Hollywood. It is 99.99% of the time not at all like Hollywood. Period. But there are occasions when the miraculous and the terrifying happen to occur during this ancient prayer.

  This priest was asked by a young girl’s parents to come and pray over their daughter. He did, and in the conversation the young girl indicated that she desired exorcism, and explained her reasons behind it. The priest judged that one should be done soon, so he spent some time preparing himself.

  He wouldn’t give much detail, save for this one: there was a moment when things were very intense and things started moving around the room. The priest had set a small monstrance on a table near at hand which contained a small Eucharistic host in it. During this time a book went sailing straight for the monstrance, much to the priest’s dismay. To his surprise, however, the book stopped in midair, mere inches from the monstrance, was lifted a few inches above it, and allowed to continue its flight into the wall.

   

  So no, I have not seen any bonafide miracles. Perhaps someday I will have stories of my own like this to share. But every day there is one Miracle that I witness time and time again, and I am so grateful for it.

  Oh my Jesus, who am I that you would deign to become the very Bread I eat, the Wine I drink? Lord, receive me and consume me; make me whole in your Body. Thank you for the bounty of your Precious Blood, that I might drink from the Cup of your Suffering, the Cup of my Salvation.

  • 12:19 am
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