Healing from the Mother of God

As Hail Marys resound in churches in the month of October there is joy in the hearts of Marian devotees. Joy not for any other reasons but for just hearing the very sound of this prayer of prayers, the sound especially of the holy name of Jesus coming to one's senses like an unending cascade of gentle waters. Joy as the soul reflects on Gospel mysteries and finds solace from the cares of the day.

Like most people, Mary's people have many cares: Health cares, financial cares, cares about interpersonal relationship and others. But unlike other people, they accept these as part of life. Hope never leaves their hearts. Knowing that the Mother of God is with them is enough consolation. She never forgets her children, they are sure of this. Thus in Guadalupe when Juan Diego, the visionary, was seen by Our Lady with a sorrowful face, she told him, What are you worried about? Don't you know I am your mother?

Such motherly concern on the problems of her children is characteristic of Mary. This is the subject of St. John's Gospel wherein our Lord and His mother attended a wedding feast at Cana. They have no more wine, Mary told her son, feeling solicitous for the host. And Jesus, albeit the reluctantly, transformed tubs of water into wine, thus saving the newly-wed from embarrassment.

It was not a life-threatening situation, yet Mary intervened. How much more when illness threatens? It is not surprising therefore that in many apparition sites and shrines healing of the sick has been the central events. In Guadalupe, Mexico; in Lourdes France; in Fatima, Portugal and in other places where the icon of the Mother of God is venerated, restoration of the health of pilgrim faithfuls is a common occurrence.

Sometimes though it is not physical wholeness that comes as a blessing, but healing in spirit and conversion, themselves no less important, as Mary's gift to her people.

Lourdes, France, is known world-wide for healing miracles. Hopelessly sick people who visited Our Lady's grotto and bathe in the pool therein experienced miraculous restoration of health. Here is one story about a person named Gabriel Gargam, quoted from a Lourdes literature: "He was paralyzed from the waist down… Taken to a hospital, his existence for sometime was a living death. After months he had wasted to a mere skeleton, weighing about seventy-eight pounds, although normally a big man. He became gangrenous. He could take no solid food and was obliged to take nourishment by tube…"

"In Lourdes he was carried to the miraculous pool and tenderly placed in its waters - no effect. Rather a bad effect resulted for the exertion threw him into a swoon and he lay apparently dead. After a time as he did not revive, they thought him dead. Sorrowfully they wheeled the carriage back to the hotel. On the way they saw the procession of the Blessed Sacrament approaching. They stood aside to let it pass, having placed a cloth over the face of the man they supposed to be dead.

"As the priest passed carrying the Sacred Host, he pronounced Benediction over the sorrowful group around the covered body. Soon there was a movement from under the covering. To the amazement of the bystanders, the body raised itself to a sitting posture… Gargam said in a full, strong voice that he wanted to get up. They thought it was a delirium before death and tried to soothe him, but he was not to be restrained. He got up and stood erect, walked a few paces and said that he was cured. The multitude looked in wonder, and then fell on their knees and thanked God for the new sign of His power at the shrine of Our Lady."

That was a miracle in a far-away land. Here in Cebu there's a shrine of the Virgin Mary in Lindogon, Sibonga, which for a few years now has been the scene of miraculous healings. Built upon a small hill in what was once a barren and desolate barangay, the Church of the Virgin of the Holy Rosary has been attracting hundreds of Marian devotees from all over the country mainly because of the countless cures received by many a sick pilgrim. Paraplegics have regained the strength to walk, cancer patients found relief and oftentimes complete healing. Victims of other serious ailment too became healthy again. All these were believed to have happened through the motherly intercession of the Virgin Mary.

One of the beneficiaries of the Virgin's healing grace is one of our faculty members who was diagnosed with a breast cancer a few months ago. Following the advice of her doctor, she was scheduled to undergo an operation recently. But when she had a pre-operation examination, the cancerous mass had miraculously disappeared. Asked what medicine she took, she answered none, except the holy oil from Lindogon which she applied to the cancerous mass every day, and even drank it just before the day of operation.

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