Friday, October 11, 2019
CARDINAL JOHN HENRY NEWMAN - MIRACLE
Newman’s Miracle
October 03 2019 |
MELISSA Villalobos pulled into her driveway after returning from an ultra-sound scan that confirmed she had been suddenly and inexplicably healed from a condition which hours earlier threatened to kill both herself and her unborn child. Though it was a sunny day, in front of her house were two rainbows – a primary rainbow and beneath it a smaller secondary rainbow in reverse colors.
It focused Melissa’s mind on the biblical story of Noah, of how God had put a rainbow in the sky as a sign of his covenant between Creator and created, and as a guarantee that there will be no more flooding. Melissa saw this as a personal sign that the danger of her dying in a flood of her own blood was over for good.
Extraordinary day
Wednesday May 15, 2013, had been an extraordinary day for her, after all. It was when she became the beneficiary of the second miracle required for canonization of Cardinal John Henry Newman as the first English saint in half a century.
Melissa had started to bleed during her fifth pregnancy, and scans revealed that the placenta had become partially detached from the wall of her uterus, and that the blood meant to nourish her eight-week unborn child was escaping through the tear. Scans also found a sub-chorionic haematoma, a blood clot on the foetal membrane, that was by that time almost three times the size of the child. Doctors could treat neither mother nor daughter. They fully expected Melissa to miscarry, and warned her also that her own life might be in danger from a haemorrhage. She had to be ready to call 911 at any time.
On May 15 she awoke in a pool of blood. She was worried that she had no-one to care for her children if she had to go into hospital because her husband, David, was flying to Atlanta on a business trip. So she arranged a simple breakfast for her four children – aged 1 to 6 – as she considered her options. Afraid the children might see the bleeding, she gave them instructions to stay in their seats at the kitchen table “no matter what” while she took time in private to try to ease the flow.
The last scream?
“I decided to go upstairs to my bathroom in our master bedroom,” she said. “I closed the bedroom door and I went in the bathroom and closed that door as well. I didn’t want the kids to sneak up on me and see the trauma. I knew that if I closed the doors I would hear them opening the doors before they saw me. By now, I had made things worse by going up the stairs,” she continued. “I was on the floor, I was weak and exhausted. The bleeding was worse than it had ever been and I thought ‘I need to call 911.’”
But then she realized that she had left her phone downstairs. “I couldn’t believe it,” she says. “I probably wasn’t carrying it around because of the stress of all that was going on and also because my husband was flying to Atlanta and he would have been the one I wanted to call.
“I thought, ‘Oh no, I can’t get up at this point and go downstairs and get the phone’. So my next thought was I could scream for one of the children to come up and ask them to go get the phone but I knew that I couldn’t scream. I knew that the amount of force I would have had to exert to scream through two closed doors all the way down to the kitchen would have been tremendous and the situation was so delicate.
“Because the bleeding was so heavy I didn’t know if the placenta was hanging by a thread, and that I had done more damage by going upstairs… I didn’t know if that scream would have ripped the last thread off the placenta and killed me instantly. I didn’t want to scream because I didn’t know if it would be my last scream.”
Scent of roses
Instead, Melissa paused in the hope her children might look for her, but the silence left her nervous. In the midst of her desperation, Melissa said, “Please, Cardinal Newman, make the bleeding stop. Just then, the bleeding stopped completely. It was just flowing very rapidly and then came to a sudden, complete stop.”
Astonished, she climbed to her feet and said, “Thank you, Cardinal Newman, you made the bleeding stop. Just then, the scent of roses just filled the air,” she said. “It was a powerful scent, it was so intense. It was more intense than if you went to a garden, or a store and smelled roses. I inhaled the smell of the roses and thought, ‘Wow!’ It lasted for several seconds, it felt like a while, then it stopped and I said, ‘Cardinal Newman did you just make those roses for me?’ I knew he did and thought, ‘what a great gift’. Then he made a second blast of roses up there. I thought, ‘Thank you Cardinal Newman’. I realised I was okay and the baby was okay. I knew the baby was fine. I just couldn’t imagine that Cardinal Newman would stop the bleeding and then the baby wouldn’t make it. I knew in my heart that she was fine.”
Melissa said her recovery was so thorough that she “jogged” downstairs to find her children obediently in their seats, as she had instructed them.
She said, “At this moment I was filled such gratitude and joy… We were all okay. I sat down at the kitchen table with them, and as soon as I sat in the chair I said, ‘Thank you Cardinal Newman’, and just then the scent of roses filled the air in the kitchen. This was the third time and the final time of the roses. As it filled the air I inhaled their beautiful scent.”
Active mom
The scan she underwent later in the day revealed the placenta to be healed perfectly. Nor, to the astonishment of medics, some of whom later gave evidence to the Church investigation into the healing, was there any trace of the haematoma.
Melissa had been debilitated for more than a month by a dangerous condition, but returned to life as an “active mom” straight away, carrying and playing with her children, pushing them on swings, and running with kites. On December 27 of that year Melissa gave birth to Gemma, who arrived at the very healthy weight of 8lb 8oz.
Gemma is now a 5-year-old girl and Melissa has since given birth to two more children, the first of whom was baptized John Henry.
Although she grew up a Catholic in St Louis, Missouri, and always enjoyed going to Mass and praying the rosary, she discovered Cardinal Newman only as an adult while watching a program on EWTN as she did her ironing. She was struck by the palpable “admiration and affection” the guests on the show held for him.
A guiding light
Melissa’s interest developed, and in 2011 her husband David came home with two Newman prayer cards, one of which Melissa placed in the master bedroom and the other in the living room.
“I thought his expression was so modern in the sense that he looked as if he might live today and that he was listening to me,” she said. “As I passed the picture in the house I would talk to him. I seemed to have this constant dialogue with him and would pray to him for all kinds of needs.
“I was aware that I was possibly becoming annoying to him. I knew he was a genius and here I was just talking to him as a regular person.”
Melissa soon began to read his works, and said she “fell in love with his brilliance and with him as a person,” and particularly enjoyed reading his letters because they revealed Newman’s cares for ordinary people.
“He is like a spiritual father to me,” she says. “He is a guiding light to help me to live a holier life and to learn about the faith. He explains Jesus in a way that is simple yet profound… he helps me to know Jesus more accurately.”
“I am in awe that such a holy and brilliant man as Cardinal Newman would help me, and I am extremely grateful,” she adds. “I feel that my prayer to him was like his motto, my heart speaking unto his heart. We are very close… I love him with my whole heart.”
Witness of conscience
Melissa, David and their seven children will be attending the canonization ceremony in St Peter’s Square in Rome on October 13.
Also likely to be present will be Jack Sullivan, a Boston deacon whose healing from a spinal condition led to Newman’s beatification by Pope Benedict XVI in 2010.
That ceremony represented a moment of personal significance for the emeritus Pontiff who had been an admirer of Newman since he entered seminary in 1947, once describing the Cardinal, who died in 1890, as Britain’s “great witness of conscience” alongside St Thomas More, the 16th century martyr.
Newman’s teachings on conscience have often been disputed, but recent discoveries of how his sermons influenced some members of the White Rose, the German resistance movement, to oppose ‘Nazi terror’ are instructive of how the role of conscience, according to Newman, is to be properly understood. Benedict also saw Blessed John Henry as a “gentle scholar” who identified the Christian life “as a call to holiness.”
While beatifying him, Benedict said Newman’s “insights into the relationship between faith and reason, into the vital place of revealed religion in civilized society, and into the need for a broadly-based and wide-ranging approach to education, were not only of profound importance for Victorian England, but continue today to inspire and enlighten.”
Fr. Ian Ker, author of the definitive biography of Newman, is among those who believe the teachings of the Cardinal are so rich that he deserves to be declared a “Doctor of the Church” as soon as he is made a saint.
Intellectual faithfulness
Bishop Mark Davies of Shrewsbury says it is “hard to underestimate the significance of Newman’s canonization.”
“In foreseeing the unprecedented challenge of relativism, and what he called ‘the infidelity to come’ he stands as a witness to the intellectual faithfulness and striving for personal holiness which is the precondition for the new evangelization of western societies,” he said.
“The canonization surely comes at a providential moment for the universal Church in helping us to recognize what constitutes true development of doctrine and a right understanding of conscience,” he added.
“Amid all the confusion of the early 21st Century, Cardinal Newman will be for us a calm witness and gifted teacher of the truth and continuity of Catholic teaching.”
Thursday, October 10, 2019
Fear of the Cross
Fear of the Cross
September 15 2019 |
AT THE JUNE 1, 2019 ordination Mass of three young priests, Bishop Kevin Rhoades, of the Diocese of Fort Wayne-South Bend, spoke of the world’s deadliest disease: ‘staurophobia’. “I would not ordain a man if I thought he had staurophobia, which means ‘fear of the cross.’ The definitive act of Christ’s priesthood was His sacrifice on the cross. A man will not be a holy priest if he has staurophobia. We must not be afraid of carrying the cross, of giving of ourselves in love. In other words, are you resolved to imitate Christ in the daily carrying of His cross? In giving yourselves in love to God’s people? In imitating the Good Shepherd who laid down His life for the sheep?”
Staurophobia affects pastors as well as Catholic priests. “90 percent of conservative pastors agree that abortion and gay marriage are biblically wrong, but only 10 percent will preach this.” Why? Fear of loss of financial support, of negative publicity, of repercussions from abortion and gay lobbies, of criticism from the congregation.
Staurophobic solutions
Staurophobia weakens moral fiber, and can lead to gravely sinful acts which destroy God’s grace in the soul. What tribulation is not infected by staurophobia?
- Terminal illness: Fear of suffering. Staurophobic solution: Euthanasia.
- Emotional anguish over ____ (fill in the blank): Fear of emotional pain: Staurophobic solutions: Drugs, alcohol, promiscuity, suicide.
- Unwanted pregnancy: Fear of parenting; fear of revelation of sexual activity. Staurophobic solution: Artificial birth control, abortion.
- Sexuality: Fear of being unattractive. Staurophobic solution: Homosexual acts, promiscuity, immodesty.
- Financial concerns: Fear of poverty. Staurophobic solution: Cheat, steal, lie.
- Gender confusion. Fear of being different. Staurophobic solution: Gender change.
- Social acceptance. Fear of rejection. Staurophobic solution: Assume a persona.
- Anger: Fear of powerlessness. Staurophobic solutions: Bullying, power struggles, murder.
Fear is one of Satan’s primary tools. In tempting Eve to eat the forbidden fruit, what did Satan say? “If you eat of it, you will be like God, knowing good from evil” [Gen. 3.5]. Eve was afraid of missing out on something good. She could have accepted her cross and said, “No, I will endure the discomfort of not knowing something.” Instead, succumbing to staurophobia, she ate the fruit and introduced sin to the human race.
Love: the antidote
What is staurophobia’s antidote? Love. “There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not made perfect in love” (1 John 4:18). Notice how each staurophobic reaction in the above list tries to keep the individual from being ‘punished’ by pain.
Christopher Bader, Ph.D, professor of sociology at Chapman University, spearheaded a 2017 fear study. He noted that “People tend to fear what they are exposed to in the media. Many of the top 10 fears this year can be directly correlated to the top media stories of the past year.”
Fear of dying used to be one of the top 5 fears. Among those surveyed, ‘Fear of Dying’ now ranks 48th, with only 20 percent of those surveyed saying that they were afraid of dying. This does not indicate an increase of belief in life after death. 17 percent of Americans do not believe in life after death, and 20 percent more are unsure. Lack of fear over death indicates a huge cultural shift toward the acceptance of death by choice – suicide, euthanasia, abortion.
What do people fear? 74.5 percent stated that they are “afraid or very afraid” of “Corrupt Government Officials.” 53 percent feared “Pollution.” 48 percent were concerned about “Global warming and climate change.” Amazingly, only 50 percent were concerned about not having enough money. Further down the list were fear of “People I love dying” (39.7 percent) and “People I love becoming seriously ill” (39.1 percent). Nowhere, in the top 47 fears, were fear of sin, judgment, or hell.
Golden candlestick
“St. Augustine says, ‘Charity is the name I give to that movement of the soul to delight in God for his own sake, and in self and neighbor for God’s sake.’ He who lacks this, however many things he does which are in themselves good, he does them in vain,” writes St Anthony. (Sermons for Sundays and Festivals I, p.59; translated by Paul Spilsbury; Edizioni Messaggero Padova).
People with no belief in God cannot delight in Him, nor can they delight in self or neighbor for God’s sake. Seeing the value of the cross is as impossible for them as flying by flapping their arms.
“Charity led the Son of God to the wood of the Cross,” Anthony, like Bishop Rhoades, noted. “In the Canticles, it says: Love is as strong as death, [Cant 8.6] and St. Bernard comments on this passage, ‘O charity, how strong is your bond! Even the Lord was bound by you!’” (Sermons I, p. 59).
Anthony compares charity to a golden candlestick, “The candlestick of charity is ‘beaten’ with the hammer of tribulation, to be increased not in itself, but in the human mind” (Sermons III, p. 65). God permits tribulation (the cross) in order to increase charity which prompts action. When we first begin to walk the way of love, charity is imperfect. Enduring tribulation in small matters strengthens us for enduring it in larger matters. Imperfections, both in precious metals and in charity, are hammered out with many hard blows. Those who choose staurophobic solutions to life’s crosses are negating the power of their tribulations to foster love.
4 loves
“St. Augustine says, ‘There are four things that should be loved. One is above us, namely God. The second is what we ourselves are. The third is beside us, our neighbor. The fourth is below us, our body.’ The rich man loved his body first and foremost, and cared nothing for God, his own soul, or his neighbor. That is why he was damned,” Anthony writes (Sermons II, p. 14). The rich man employed a staurophobic solution to his fear for the future. Instead of exercising charity toward his needy neighbors, he built bigger barns to hold his crops.
Anthony advocates the cross rather than comfort. “St. Bernard says, ‘We should treat our body like some sick person in our care. There are many things it would like which are not good for it, and these we must deny it. There are many things good for it, but which it does not like – but we must insist on them. We should treat our body as something not really belonging to us, but to him by whom we are bought with a great price, that we may glorify him in our body [cf. 1 Cor 6.20].’ We should love our bodies in the fourth and last place, ‘not as something for whose sake we live, but as something without which we cannot live’” (Sermons II, p. 14).
Christ’s “cross is victorious – it is the efficacious sign of the victory of love over sin and death. When we meet the Lord on the day of judgment, He will show us His glorious wounds and ask to see our wounds, the wounds of our love,” Bishop Rhoades noted. Christ’s cross wounded him. Ours will wound us. Accepting the wounding enables us to carry our cross, grow in love, and be immunized against staurophobia.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)