Doctor Declares Miracle After Father, Dead for 45 Minutes, Wakes Up When Son Prays and Screams: 'You're Not Going to Die Today'

Lawrence Yahle

Excerpt from Christianpost.com

By Leonardo Blair , CP Reporter

A doctor at the Kettering Medical Center in Ohio pronounced a miracle this month after a man he had declared dead for 45 minutes came back to life after the man's 17-year-old son prayed over his lifeless body and screamed: "You're not going to die today."

"Well, they (doctors) were working on him for 45 minutes and all the doctors and nurses came into the room. They sent us into a counselling room. They didn't have to say anything, you just knew they were gonna pronounce him dead," the teenager told CNN about his father, Tony Yahle, 37, a diesel mechanic.

But something wasn't right with the way the doctors were reacting said Lawrence.

"They almost just looked at us and no emotion almost. Everyone in tears. For some reason, I just thought 'he's 37 years old, he's never had a heart problem. He's not dead in that room," he said in defiance while sporting a crucifix around his neck, surrounded by his father, mother and two sisters.

"I go back there, my pastor, he was there. We were praying next to the room. I was in the doorway and something came in me and got me to point at him and I said 'dad, you're not going to die today.'"

"When I said that, I stood there for a few more moments and then started walking back to the counseling room to comfort my sisters and my mom and anyone else. I took about three steps when my pastor called," he continued.

"He looked at me and said, 'Lawrence, Lawrence,' got my attention then he said 'your dad, he has a heartbeat. So I got the rest of the counselling room and cheered everyone with that news. So it was awesome!" he said.

Tony's cardiologist at Kettering Medical Center, Dr. Raja Nazir, told ABCNews.com that it was a "miracle."

"I'm calling it a miracle because I've never seen anything like it," said Nazir.

"When I looked at the electrical activity, I was surprised," Nazir said after Lawrence had prayed and screamed at his father. "I thought we'd better make another effort to revive him."

And when he did, said Nazir: "Very slowly, the heart rate was picking up."

The incident took place on Aug. 5 and doctors thought that Tony Yahle would need a heart transplant or would be in a vegetative state for the rest of the life, but everything he has done since he came back from the dead has defied all medical logic.

Read more: Doctor Declares Miracle

Vatican medical board confirms second miracle attributed to Mother Marianne Cope

Mother Marianne Cope - Hawaii State Archives

Vatican group confirms second miracle attributed to Marianne Cope

The following excerpt is from Syracuse.com:

By Renée K. Gadoua / The Post-Standard

The former leader of Syracuse’s Franciscan sisters is just one step from being named a saint in the Roman Catholic Church.

A group of cardinals and bishops confirmed today a Vatican medical board’s finding that there is no medical explanation for a second miracle attributed to Blessed Mother Marianne Cope, known for her work with patients with leprosy in Hawaii.

With the approval of Pope Benedict XVI, Mother Marianne would become a saint, considered the church’s spiritual role models.

The Vatican’s Congregation for the Causes for Saints confirmed the unanimous ruling of the medical board that a medical miracle occurred as the result of prayers seeking the intercession of Mother Marianne on the patient’s behalf.

The case involves the healing of a woman who was ill with a fatal health condition. The diocese has not revealed the woman’s name or other details of her case, but may later, local church officials have said.

In 2004, Vatican officials ruled that a miraculous recovery involving a 14-year-old Syracuse girl in 1993 was the result of Mother Marianne’s intercession. The girl, Kate Mahoney, nearly died from complications after cancer surgery at Crouse Hospital.

Sister Mary Laurence Hanley, a Franciscan nun, visited Mahoney in the hospital and prayed to Mother Marianne to intercede with God on her behalf. Others also prayed for her to Mother Marianne.

The Sisters of St. Francis have a shrine to Mother Marianne at their residence on Court Street in Syracuse.

Read more: Mother Marianne Cope

Boy who nearly drowned makes miracle recovery

Boy who nearly drowned makes miracle recovery - KAYU

The following excerpt is from myfoxspokane.com:

By Amy Moreno

SPANAWAY, WA - About six weeks after 12-year-old Dale Ostrander nearly drowned, he returned to his Spanaway, home, Tuesday.

In August, he was caught in a riptide off the Long Beach peninsula and pulled out into deep water. He spent nearly 20 minutes submerged. When rescuers pulled his lifeless body out of the water, his chances of survival were small.

Ostrander surprised everyone when he opened his eyes and spoke a few days after he had no pulse. From that point his recovery has been nothing short of a miracle.

The Ostrander family is grateful for the support and prayers that poured in from around the world. Pictures snapped at the scene showed church friends on their knees. The family believes prayer is the reason he beat the odds.

“It’s a story not only of hope, but a story that God still works miracles,” said Chad Ostrander, Dale’s father.

Read more: Miracle Recovery

Ambassador says Padre Pio miraculously cured his son

Ambassador says Padre Pio miraculously cured his son

The follwing excerpt is from RomeReports.com:

(Romereports.com) Fernando Sanchez is the ambassador of Costa Rica to the Vatican, but his story has nothing to do with his job. He says, his son is alive thanks to a miracle of Padre Pio. He talks about it in his book “Birth of a spiritual child: Our history with Padre Pio of Pietrelcina.”

It happened three years ago. His child was born with serious heart problems. The doctors said there was no hope for him, but then something happened that changed everything.

Fernando Sánchez
Costa Rica's ambassador to the Vatican
“They called me to say, 'Look, Don Fernando, there is a priest with your son'. I imagined the worst and I ran for the neonatal ward in the intensive care unit and I found the father with a relic of Padre Pio praying over my son's crib. I joined him and nothing else.”

After two hours the child's heart was beating normally and the next day the doctors stopped all treatment and took him off medication.

Since then, Fernando Sanchez and his wife have no doubt that Padre Pio interceded in the healing of their son.

Fernando Sánchez
Costa Rica's ambassador to the Vatican
“Since then we have felt his presence. I have no doubt that he is interceding for us.”

Read more: Padre Pio Miracle

Husband Celebrates Miracle as 'Brain Dead' Wife Wakes Up in Hospital

Husband Celebrates Miracle as 'Brain Dead' Wife Wakes Up in Hospital - FoxNews.com

The following news story appears on FoxNews.com:

DARWIN, Australia -- A woman who was diagnosed as being brain dead has recovered three days after her husband begged doctors to put in a breathing tube before switching off a ventilator at an Australian hospital, the Northern Territory News reported Wednesday.

Gloria Cruz, 56, underwent brain surgery after a tumor was discovered when she suffered a stroke on March 7 and was rushed to the Royal Darwin Hospital in Darwin, Northern Territory.

Doctors told her husband Tani Cruz, 51, the case was “hopeless” and she would probably die within 48 hours following the surgery.

After two weeks, a breathing tube was inserted in Mrs Cruz's mouth and the ventilator was turned off. Hospital staff were stunned when she woke from her coma three days later.

When a doctor recommended that the ventilator be removed and Gloria Cruz be allowed to die, her husband told them, "I'm a Catholic -- I believe in miracles.”

“I told him that God knows how much I love her -- that I don't want her to suffer but I don't want her to leave us,” he said.

A doctor described her recovery as "a miracle."

Mrs Cruz is now alert and getting around in a wheelchair at the hospital.

"She's well on the way to recovery,” her husband said.

Vatican Investigating Possible Miracle Attributed to Blessed Kateri

Blessed Kateri
Photograph by Loci B. Lenar

KOMO News: Vatican investigating possible miracle in Washington state

The following excerpt is from KomoNews.com:

FERNDALE, Wash. - The Vatican is investigating a possible miracle right in Washington state.

Doctors at Children's Hospital worked miracles five years ago to save a young boy's life. But now the pope wants to know if more than medicine played a role.

To look at him today, nobody would guess Jake Finkbonner nearly died.

"He was as sick as any case ever seen," says Dr. Craig Rubens.

In the last minute of the last game of his 2006 season, Jake cut his lip.

"I fell down and hit my lip on the base of the basketball hoop," he says.

A flesh-eating bacteria raced through his lip and devoured his face. Now 11 years old, Jake recalls the day he died.

"I went and saw God up in heaven, and it was so beautiful I asked if I could stay. And he refused to let me stay - said my family needed me here on earth," Jake remembers.

His mother, Elsa Finkbonner, says, "That was his day in heaven, our day in hell."

Surgeons couldn't stay ahead of the fast-spreading infection.

"It got to the point where we called in a priest to give his last rites," says Jake's mother.



Blessed Kateri Tekakwitha
Photograph by Loci B. Lenar

Father Tim Sauer urged the Finkbonner family to pray for the intercession of Blessed Kateri, a Native American who converted to Catholicism. Smallpox scarred her face, and legend claims the scars disappeared when she died.

Kateri is now in the early stages of sainthood.

The day a friend named Kateri visited the Finkbonners, they gave them a relic of the blessed Kateri that the family placed on their son's hospital bed. It's the same day Jake's school prayed for him, and it's the same day his disease stopped.

"If it's a coincidence - wow," says Jake's mother.

"I think it's a matter of a miracle," says Jake.

The Vatican is investigating whether Kateri should become a saint and sent an investigative team from Rome to question Jake's family.

"We've given them everything," says Elsa. "They've spoken with all of our family friends and priests."

Read more: Jake Finkbonner

Prayers to Padre Pio are Answered with a Miracle

Lenny Martelli
Photo from National Catholic Register

The Rebuilding Year: A Miraculous True Story - Blogs - NCRegister.com

The following excerpt is from the National Catholic Register:

By Matthew Archbold

In sports, it’s called a rebuilding year. It’s when everything’s gone wrong, but there’s still hope for the future.

In life it’s called faith.

Everything went wrong a year and a day ago when 15 year old Lenny Martelli fell off his snowboard in Schwenksville Pennsylvania. His friends gathered round him as he lay in the snow and they heard the words nobody wanted to hear.

“I can’t move,” Lenny said.

This is a story about a year when reason allowed no reason to hope. It’s a story about a miracle that culminated on the basketball court at St. Joseph’s University—under the glare of television cameras from news networks and ESPN. Thousands in the stands cheered Lenny’s name, but there was no amazing basket with seconds left on the clock that night. No dunk highlights. This was a different kind of miracle altogether. The kind nobody expected. But maybe that’s exactly when miracles happen—when nobody expects them.

Doctors offered the Martellis a grim prognosis. The injury had left Lenny paralyzed from the chest down. They said the statistical likelihood of Lenny walking ever again was slim to none. But sometimes that little space between slim to none is all the space a miracle needs to slip in unnoticed and change everything.

Leti Martelli took a leave of absence from teaching at Our Lady of Victory School and she stayed with Lenny every day. She was there when doctors asked Lenny if he could move and she watched his frustration when he couldn’t. She asked the doctors every medical question she could think of and prayed at his bedside to Padre Pio and St. Therese. And she was there when a therapist off-handedly asked Lenny if he was related to Saint Joseph’s University basketball coach Phil Martelli. He said he wasn’t but he’d love to meet him. That was all Leti needed to hear.

When Leti heard that something might make her boy smile when smiling ever again seemed like a fantasy, she would’ve done anything. So Leti called Saint Joe’s and asked to speak to coach Phil Martelli. It was a desperate call to try to bring a little hope into her son’s life. She left a message and an hour later when she picked up the phone Phil asked if her name was really Martelli as well and then he said, “Tell me your story.”

Leti started but could hardly get through it. “My name is Leti Martelli and my son was in a serious accident.” Then came the tears. It’s strange how you can live through just about anything as long as you’re looking forward but when you look backwards even for a moment, the words themselves become too heavy to pronounce; as if saying them is harder than living them.

In the end, she asked Phil Martelli for a hat or a note with his autograph to brighten Lenny’s day. But Phil said that wouldn’t do. That wouldn’t do at all.

“What’s the room number?” he asked.

To the surprise of just about everyone, a few days later Phil Martelli walked into Lenny’s room. Lenny was startled this man he’d only seen on television before was suddenly in his hospital room. “I was just a 15 year old kid in the hospital,” he said. “I mentioned his name once and he came. I was shocked and amazed.”

Faith in the Martelli family is strong. Someone had given Lenny a Padre Pio prayer card and “so we started to pray to Padre Pio every night,” said Leti. “And we blessed Len with Padre Pio oil every day.”

Leti didn’t eat or sleep while her son was in the ICU. Lenny’s Dad took care of their other children and Leti stayed right next to Lenny. To ask her to leave his bedside would’ve been like asking her to jump to the moon—impossible.

One night in the quiet of the hospital Leti looked up and saw someone else in the room. She knew what she thought she saw but didn’t know if she believed what she was seeing. She says she saw Padre Pio in the room. “Oh my, now I’m thinking I see a dead monk in the room,” thought Leti. Her mind knew what she was seeing was impossible. It’s impossible because we’re told it’s impossible but she also knew what she was seeing. “He walked right up towards me but focused on Lenny. He put his arm over Lenny’s weakest leg, his right one, and then he went away.”

The next morning the therapist asked Lenny to put his arms around her and see if he could put any weight on his legs. Lenny stood up put his arms around her.

Lenny asked “now what do you want me to do?”

“Walk,” she answered.

So he did. He walked all the way down the hallway. When he reached the end of the hallway, he turned and wondered to himself, “How did I get from there to here?”

Then he told everyone “I told you so” in that way that only a fifteen year old could. He said he told them he would walk and then he did.

“I believe Padre Pio was with us,” said Leti.

But miracles are miracles and they don’t always get you across the finish line. Sometimes miracles just give you the strength to believe the impossible is possible. It still took Lenny fighting his body, forcing it to do things it couldn’t.

Read more: Lenny Martelli

Nun tells of healing after intercessory prayers to Pope John Paul II

Nun tells of healing after praying to John Paul II - FoxNews.com

The following excerpt is from FoxNews.com:

AIX-EN-PROVENCE, France – A French nun says she felt new inner strength and vitality as her Parkinson's disease suddenly disappeared in 2005 — a recovery the Vatican attributes to the miraculous intercession of Pope John Paul II.

Sister Marie Simon-Pierre, who works at a Paris maternity clinic, told reporters in a rare appearance Monday that she felt "reborn" on waking June 3, 2005 after she had prayed for healing to John Paul.

"There was a new strength inside me, and my body was rediscovering its vitality and fluidity," Simon-Pierre, appearing in good health, told reporters in the southern French city of Aix-en-Provence.

The 49-year-old nun — who has largely been shielded from the media — said she still sometimes talks to John Paul.

"For this news conference, I told him to stay right beside me!" said Simon-Pierre, who appeared smiling and wearing a white habit at the news conference.

Pope Benedict XVI has set May 1 as the date for his predecessor's beatification, a step toward possible sainthood.

Church authorities have studied Simon-Pierre's cure and determined it was inexplicable and due to the intercession of John Paul, who also suffered from Parkinson's. Benedict approved the miracle last week, paving the way for the beatification.

Simon-Pierre's healing came about two months after John Paul's death on April 2, 2005, at age 84. Soon before her mysterious recovery, she had asked to stop working, saying she was "ready to finish out her days in a wheelchair," her former mother superior recalled.

"When she came to ask me to replace her, I noticed that she was very worn out. I told her to wait. I told her that John Paul II hadn't had his last word on the subject," Sister Marie-Thomas recalled.

Read More: Nun Tells of Healing

Girl Cured of Chronic Pain while Watching Cardinal Newman Beatification

Catholic Deacon Jack Sullivan whose own miraculous healing came
 through the intercession of the Venerable John Henry Newman

Girl Cured of Chronic Pain while Watching Cardinal Newman Beatification - Saints and Angels - Catholic Online

The photograph of Deacon Jack Sullivan and the following article regarding intercessory prayers made to Cardinal John Henry Newman is from Catholic Online:

By Mark Greaves

LONDON, England (UK Catholic Herald) - A young girl was healed of intense chronic pain while watching the beatification of John Henry Newman on television, it has been claimed.

Deacon Jack Sullivan, whose severe spinal condition was miraculously cured after he prayed to Cardinal Newman, said the girl's mother called him after the Mass to say her daughter's pain had suddenly disappeared.

He said she was one of several people who had been cured of serious illness after attending healing services that he has conducted around America.

Deacon Sullivan's own healing, approved by the Vatican last year, led to the Victorian cardinal being beatified in September. A second miracle is all that is needed for the Church to recognise him as a saint.

He said the girl who was healed during Newman's beatification had suffered from reflex sympathetic dystrophy syndrome, a disease characterised by continuous and intense pain that worsens over time and for which there is no cure.

Deacon Sullivan told the Tablet: "Her mother asked me to pray for her daughter, who has been in hospital for two years. I prayed for her during the Mass and the mother called me back all excited saying that during the Mass all of the pain stopped. Lately I've been told that this young lady will be walking before Christmas."


Deacon Sullivan said two other people had been cured after he had touched them with a portion of Newman's hair in healing services in Boston and Salem, New Hampshire.

"One teenage boy was healed from a severe brain injury he had sustained in a car crash". Mr Sullivan said: "He could no longer speak or walk. When I touched him with the relic he seemed to come back to life."

Another man from Detroit was in the advanced stages of liver cancer but after the healing service he said a CAT scan showed "all the cancer had gone".

Deacon Sullivan also said that Newman was "still with me, very dramatically so". He said: "If it weren't for him I probably would have been paralysed, unable to continue with the diaconate or my job. I start my day by saying, 'Good morning, Cardinal Newman, my intercessor and my very faithful friend'."

The Johnsons: God's Amazing Grace

The Johnsons: God's Amazing Grace - Amazing Stories | CBN.com

The video and following excerpt is from CBN.com:

By Audra Smith

CBN.com – “We couldn’t have asked for a better Christmas gift. That was the greatest gift God could have ever given us.”

Dawn Johnson’s Christmas miracle really began with a promise she made as a 19-year-old girl. During a mission trip to Haiti, she visited a small, third world hospital.

She tells The 700 Club, "I remember going to this hospital with this gentleman, and I had asked that gentleman, 'What is in that room?' I remember him opening the door, and there were rows and rows of babies. I was horrified when he said, 'This is our dying room.'

"I locked eyes with one infant. I remember my eyes and my heart speaking back to that child, saying, 'One day, one day I promise I will make a difference for children like you.'"

As she grew older, Dawn never forgot her promise. She started her family with her husband Tom and had four biological children. They began to foster and eventually adopted Hailey in 1996. In 2004, they felt led to adopt again, this time a baby named Grace from Ethiopia.

"We knew immediately, just at how God has spoken, that this was the little girl we were supposed to have."

In May of 2005, Tom and Dawn traveled to Ethiopia to pick up their daughter.

"We walked into this room. It was lined up with these little cradles, and I remember passing one by one. Little Gracie’s eyes were wide open and instant connection. She looked at me and I looked at her, and it was such a beautiful connection because the last time I had stared into the eyes of an infant like that was in the devastation of Haiti. All of the sudden, this grin that took up her whole face exploded."

The next day, Dawn and Tom learned the hard truth about Gracie’s background.

"I remember the instructor sharing with us that our little girl had been found. She had been abandoned in a field underneath a little nook in a bush with a rope placed around her neck. She had been left naked, no food, no water, for two days. They couldn’t even get her birth date exactly on. They had to make a guess."

On May 23, 2005, Gracie came home to the States to her new brothers and sisters. But the Johnsons had more hard news waiting for them. When they took Gracie in for routine blood work, their doctor called with a sobering report.

Dr. Liebert says, "She did have an active Hep B infection that she probably ended up getting at the time of birth. For children that are chronic Hep B carriers, there is not a lot of treatment available and these children can go on to have cerosis when they are older. That can go on to have cancer."

Dawn says, "I didn’t know at that point how devastating Hep B can be, but I knew that she could be a very, very sick little girl. So after hearing the news, immediately we went in our bedroom and we prayed. We took our little girl and we prayed over her."

Just days later, the Johnsons felt God leading them to attend a healing crusade.

"At the healing crusade, I remember the pastor saying, 'People, pray, ask God anything and just believe. I remember placing her hand on her head, closing my eyes and just praying, 'Lord, just heal her. That is all I ask of You.' A beautiful vision came before me. I saw the side of Jesus had walked up in front of me and I just saw from His shoulder down. He was taking her disease, which He died on the cross to do. He was giving her His purity, His life, His healing through this circular blood flow. It was the most powerful thing I have ever witnessed, and I said, 'Father God, You are healing her. I claim this for her.'"

In December, the Johnsons took Gracie back in to have her blood retested.

"My cell phone rang, and it happened to be our doctor. He said, “Dawn, I have great news for you. I have a special gift for you.' It was just before Christmas, and Gracie’s blood came back clean and pure and Hep B negative."

Dr. Liebert confirms, "Her liver enzymes were back to normal. All evidence of the Hep B virus within her blood completely disappeared. She is the first one I’ve seen that has actual been able to completely clear the Hep B."

"What a beautiful time to give us for Christmas," Dawn says. "That Christmas was the most special Christmas we will ever celebrate. It is the gift that He gave us of her and her healing and all that she has been since!"

Today, Gracie is five years old and healthier than ever. She even has a little brother, Joseph, from the same orphanage in Ethiopia. Dawn says, "Everyday is such a miracle day. I am reminded everyday when I see her and the joy she has in her heart and in her spirit of God’s grace and love. He hears our cry and He wants to save us just as He saved that little girl. He is waiting for you."

Read More: God's Amazing Grace

Deerinda Lowe Gets A Second Chance in Life

Deerinda Lowe Gets A Second Chance - CBN TV - Video

An 18-wheeler truck ran into her, and Deerinda went from being trapped in her car to being on the stair steps of Heaven.

Life Saved from Cardinal Van Thuan's Intercession

Seminarian Joseph Nguyen - CNA Photo

 
Seminarian may owe his life to Cardinal Van Thuan's intercession :: Catholic News Agency (CNA)

The photograph and following excerpt is from CNA:

By Benjamin Mann

Denver, Colo., (CNA/EWTN News).- Doctors said Joseph Nguyen was dead. His heart rate was dropping beyond recovery, and all brain activity was gone. But while they wrote his death certificate, Joseph's parents were asking an old family friend for help: a Vietnamese cardinal who is being considered for beatification.

Joseph Nguyen has since re-enrolled in seminary. He's seen his own death certificate, now stamped “VOID.” He has only two memories of the 32-day coma, which he says felt otherwise like a “great night's sleep.”

During the weeks that he hovered between life and death in 2009, Joseph says he had two encounters with Cardinal Francois-Xavier Nguyen Van Thuan.

The revered Vietnamese Cardinal died in 2002. In 2007 he received a prominent mention in Pope Benedict XVI's encyclical “Spe Salvi,” where the Holy Father cited his exemplary Christian witness during his 13 years as a political prisoner. His cause for beatification began in 2007 as well. In October 2010, the Vatican began its own inquiry into his possible sainthood.

Long before anyone thought to declare him a saint, the future cardinal was simply a priest– often celebrating private Masses in the homes of some Vietnamese faithful. Although Joseph Nguyen never met Cardinal Van Thuan during his earthly life, his father's family knew “Father Van Thuan” quite well. They thought of the priest “almost like a family member.”

That family bond deepened when Cardinal Van Thuan became Archbishop of Saigon, and subsequently a prisoner of the Communist regime.

In 1975, Joseph Nguyen's parents immigrated from Southeast Asia to the United States, where their son was later born. Joseph knew about Cardinal Van Thuan's heroic life, and appreciated his message of peace and hope. But the young seminarian never imagined he would be describing details of his own life, and near-death, to investigators for the cardinal's canonization.

It began in August 2009, during Joseph's third year in the seminary. He was assigned to hospital work, visiting and counseling the sick, as well as bringing the Eucharist to Catholic patients. Early in the fall, he caught what he thought was only a common seasonal flu. When the illness worsened, he asked for leave from the seminary to recover at home.

“I remember October 1st,” he recounted to CNA. “I had no idea why I was gasping for air.” His father drove him to the hospital, where he checked himself in. But Joseph has no memory of that event, or the emergency tracheotomy he received after losing the ability to breathe.

Later, he would hear about the day he was pronounced dead, while his parents kept hope alive and prayed fervently for Cardinal Van Thuan's intercession. He would also hear about how, on the feast of Our Lady of the Rosary, while still comatose, he began violently pulling the tubes from his body, stopping only when his father placed a rosary in his hand.

He'd also learn about the second time his body seemed to be shutting down. That time, no one declared his death. They'd already seen one seemingly impossible recovery.

When Joseph awoke, after 32 days, he knew nothing about any of this. A doctor explained he had fallen ill not only with a seasonal flu, but also the H1N1 “Swine Flu,” and severe pneumonia. Friends and family later told him the details of his month in the coma.

But when he could speak again, Joseph had his own story to tell.

“During my coma, there are only two things I remember,” he said. “The only two things I remember are two visions of Cardinal Van Thuan … He appeared to me twice.”

Joseph said he not only saw, but actually met and spoke with Cardinal Van Thuan, during two vivid incidents he described as a “separation of soul and body.” Although he said he couldn't reveal the details of the ecounters, he did say that he suspected that they occurred while his doctors were observing his loss of brain activity and decline in vital signs.

“Soon after the second visit” with the cardinal, he said, “I woke up from the coma.” He had “no idea what had happened,” or why he had “all these tubes and wires” coming out of his body, particularly the tube in his neck that kept him from speaking.

Doctors thought it would be months or years before he could speak, walk, or study. But within days he was talking and breathing normally, racing his nurses around the rehabilitation room.

He also received an entirely unexpected phone call from Cardinal Van Thuan's sister in Canada, who ended up giving him one of her brother's rosaries.

Read More: Cardinal Van Thuan's Intercession

Jeff Markin: Back from the Dead, Reborn Into the Light

Jeff Markin: Back from the Dead, Reborn Into the Light - Amazing Stories on CBN.com

By Sheryl Fountain

CBN.com – It was the morning of September 20, 2006. Jeff Markin recalls heading for work as usual. What he doesn’t remember is driving himself to the hospital.

He had called his boss and told him he didn’t feel well. His boss was concerned and convinced Jeff to go to the emergency room. Somehow Jeff made it. Once he got there, he collapsed.

Dr. Chauncey Crandall was doing rounds in the intensive care unit that morning. He recalls, "An alert call came over the PA system that someone had arrived at the hospital with a massive deadly heart attack. Then a second call went out over the PA system and specifically asking for me because I was the cardiologist on that day. When I arrived there, it was like a war zone. It was chaos. Everyone there fighting to keep this man alive."

The ER staff worked on Jeff for 40 minutes. They shocked him a dozen times. Despite their efforts, there was no response.

Once Dr. Crandall decided the team had done everything medically possible, he called the time of death. Medically Jeff was dead, but he was still experiencing consciousness.

"I was standing in the back of a funeral home, and at that time, I determined that I had died," Jeff Markin says. "This funeral home was empty and was wondering where all my friends and family were."

While a nurse prepared Jeff’s body for the morgue, Dr. Crandall updated the charts.

"As soon as my note was completed, I walked out through the door to this emergency room and I heard this voice say, 'Turn around and pray for this man.' I wanted to ignore that voice because I said to myself, How can I pray for that man? He’s dead he’s gone. There’s no life in him, so I keep walking. The voice came back again and said, 'Turn around and pray for that man.' I stopped and thought I need to honor the Lord. So I turned around at the doorway, and I walked to the side of the body.

"The nurse was on the other side of the body, and she’s looking at me like, 'What are you doing? Why are you here?' And I stood there next to the corpse and I opened my mouth and these words came out: 'Father God, I cry out for this man’s soul. If he does not know you as his Lord and Savior, Father, raise him from the dead now, in Jesus name.‘"

‘I remember staring at bright lights and they were swirling around," Jeff says. "Out of those bright lights came an image and he told me that he was there to look over me and make sure that everything was going to be fine."

Dr. Crandall continues, "The other doctor walked in the room and I pointed to him and said, 'Shock this man one more time.' He looked at me and said, 'Dr. Crandall, we can’t shock him. He’s dead. There’s no life in him. He’s gone.' I said, 'For me, shock him one more time.' That doctor out of respect and honor for me went over to that body with those defibrillator paddles and put his paddles on that patient and shocked him. Immediately an instant heartbeat came back. Instant perfect, regular, which we’ve never seen before. Then suddenly this abdomen started moving and starting breathing and then a couple moments later, the fingers started twitching."

They immediately moved Jeff to the intensive care unit. Three days later, Jeff woke up with no evidence of brain or organ damage.

"Once I woke up, my daughter Jillian was there," Jeff says. "That’s when she told me what had happened."

Dr. Crandall says, "When I came in Monday morning, Jeff was sitting up in bed, and I said, 'Where were you that day that I prayed for you in the emergency room?' And he said, 'I was in total darkness and I was so disappointed.' I said, 'Jeff, what were you disappointed about?' He said, 'I was alone for eternity.'"

Jeff recalls, "He asked me at that time if I was willing to accept God into my life and into my heart and I did. I just opened my arms and accepted God. It was just a very emotional time and I remember crying in his arms."

Today Jeff is back at work and gets regular check-ups with Dr. Crandall.

"He still has no heart problems or residual complications from his brush with death," Dr. Crandall says.

"To know what I had gone through and to be fortunate... That’s been part of my daily battle is why me," Jeff ponders. "Why have I been so fortunate to have God shine on me? It’s been tremendous. I’ve been physically reborn. I’ve been spiritually reborn, and I’m just very grateful for that."

"This day that I prayed for Jeff was a day of very little faith. It wasn’t one of my big God days," Dr. Crandall says. " I was so much in a rush with my work, and I didn’t have a lot of faith backing that prayer up that day. But the Lord asked me to do it, so I honored the Lord and prayed. That’s all we need. Just a spark of faith like that mustard seed, and when you cry out to the mighty Holy Spirit, He will take over. Miracles are real, and they’re real today."

Ray Hayworth: Cancer Vanishes with Prayer

Ray Hayworth: Cancer Cast Out - Christian Broadcasting Network

By Dory Nissen and Aaron Little

CBN.com – Ray and Billie Hayworth are pretty happy with where they are in life. Their kids are grown and gone. They’ve been married over 46 years and still consider themselves best friends. But their lives were altered dramatically when Ray found a golf ball size lump on his neck. At first, he saw no reason for concern.

"That first day, even for the first week, I really had no thought of what the results would be," Ray said. "I wasn’t worried about it. There was no pain. So if there is no pain, there is no worry.”

Billie was immediately alarmed.

“I kept noticing him do this [feeling his neck],” Billie said. “And I said, ‘why do you keep doing that?’ And then he said, ‘well look at this. I’ve got this knot on my neck.’ I thought it was cancer instantly, immediately. And I said, ‘oh, honey. This isn’t good; I don’t think this is good.’”

"My wife caused me to realize the severity of it and the importance of getting some answers," Ray said.

Ray’s doctor called with the results of the biopsy. Billie answered the phone.

"And I said, 'please tell me, is it cancer?' And she said, 'yes it is cancer,'" Billie said.

Ray had not one, but two types of cancer: carcinoma and melanoma.

"Our worlds actually stopped," Ray said. "Probably the lowest part of my life is when the doctor said, ‘you have cancer.’ Your heart goes to the bottom at that point.”

"At night, I would lay my hands on his neck and he’d be sleeping away," Billie said. "And I would say, 'Satan, how dare you! How dare you come against us like this! Greater is He, God, who is in us!' And I would just yell out, 'I command you in the name of Jesus, you get off; you get off of his neck!"

Friends and family started praying.

"That really meant the world," Ray said. "It lightens your load. You don’t feel like you are carrying it yourself and that elates me."

The lump went completely away! A trip to the doctor confirmed the cancer was completely gone.

"The doctor walked in with a big smile on her face and immediately relieved our fears," Billie said. "She looked at Ray and said, 'I don’t know what you did, but whatever you did, don’t stop. Keep doing it. And he just raised his hands and said, 'thank you Jesus, thank you Jesus.' I looked at her and I said, 'Doctor, we just prayed and God healed him.'"

"I was elated when the doctor said there was no cancer," Ray recalled. "None of the scans showed it; there was no evidence of any cancer in my body. I was very happy for that and told her that. For her sake and for medical science sake, I went back and took another MRI and it was negative also."

Ray has had no sign of cancer for three years. He says the Lord gave him a scripture that signifies God’s amazing power.

“Be still and know that I am God. That’s my theme for the rest of my life," Ray said, “to know that God is still there."

Testimony on how Padre Pio Cured Woman's Cancer



Statue of Padre Pio - Photograph by Loci B. Lenar


Minister's mother tells how Padre Pio cured her cancer - CI News

The following story is from Catholic Ireland News:

By Sean Ryan

The mother of Minister for Tourism and Sport, Mary Hanafin has told how she believes she would have died in her twenties if she hadn't been cured of cancer by Padre Pio.

Thurles native Mary Hanafin, who has one of Padre Pio's mittens in her possession, has revealed how she believes she 'is a walking miracle' after her illness disappeared following a visit to the Saint in Italy in 1963.

And she told a new BBC documentary, The Miraculous Mitten, that Padre Pio is the key to helping Ireland out of the recession. She said, “He has to offer hope and peace of mind to a modern Ireland that has gone astray in every way. We are losing what he had; simplicity, prayerful life and helping people.”

Mary Hanafin was just four years old when doctors gave her mother the grim prognosis of cancer. She said, “I had been diagnosed with cancer and the surgeon said I had to have an operation in September and I had to have a hysterectomy.”

“I decided if they couldn't do anything for me I would go to see Padre Pio and he would cure me. I was very ill when I got to San Giovanni.”

“I had the privilege of going to the mass he celebrated at 5 o'clock. I thought in my mind would you put your hand on my head and bless me and so he did.” She added, “I was very sick going home two days later. They gave me the last rites and said there was no hope. I came to the following day and there was no cancer. It had to be Padre Pio there was no other way.”

The Capuchin monk Padre Pio became known as the living saint until his death on September 3 1968.

He was beatified in 1999 and canonised in 2002.

Novena to Mary MacKillop leads to Miracle

Jack Simpson
Photo by Angela Wylie

MacKillop's Untold Miracle - The Sydney Morning Herald

The photograph and following excerpt is from smh.com.au:

By Barney Zwartz

JACK SIMPSON should have died at least five years ago. Instead, he is about to leave for Rome to honour the woman whose intervention he credits with his cure, which the Vatican accepts is a miracle.

Jack, 19, was the ''runner-up'', the one held in reserve, for the second miracle Mary MacKillop needed to be canonised Saint Mary of the Cross MacKillop in Rome on Sunday week.

Disaster struck in April 1999. ''He went from a normal boy going to school to another boy we didn't know coming home that night. He lost all his competencies and became like a new baby,'' his mother, Sharon Simpson, recalls.

He was eventually diagnosed with multiple sclerosis, cancer, epilepsy and a loss of neurological functions.

Andrew Kornberg, director of the neurology department at the Royal Children's Hospital in Melbourne, called Jack's recovery miraculous and the Vatican agreed - not for the MS or cancer but the unprecedented recovery of his intellectual capacity.

Jack's story has not been told until now because while the case was being investigated by the Vatican the family was asked to keep it secret. It was presented to Pope Benedict last year along with Kathleen Evans's cure from inoperable brain and lung cancer - the case chosen as the second miracle.

The Simpson family's ordeal began in 1999 when Jack, then eight, collapsed at school. ''At first we thought he'd hit his head. His eyes were rolling, he couldn't stand and had no comprehension. It was unbelievably horrible,'' Mrs Simpson recalled yesterday.

For the first year there was no diagnosis, as his central nervous system went into meltdown, leaving him paralysed. Soon after the problem was revealed as juvenile MS - with a maximum life expectancy of five years - the family noticed lumps the size of bars of soap in his neck and groin.

''When he went to the nuclear medicine department and they put the tracer in, he was lit up like a Christmas tree. It was quite advanced, stage four Hodgkin's lymphoma,'' said his mother.

A friend organised novenas (nine-day prayer cycles) to Mary MacKillop at St Ambrose's Catholic Church in Woodend in 1999 and 2000, but nothing changed at first. For Mrs Simpson the turning point came one night in 2000.

''That night I thought Jack was going to die. He seemed to be in the last stage, with the breath rattling. I thought, 'You can't keep fighting forever, you have to surrender', and I said, 'If you want him, God, you can have him'.''

Read More: MacKillop's Untold Miracle

Catholic Officials to Investigate Claims of Second Newman Miracle

CNS STORY: Catholic officials to investigate claims of second Newman miracle

The following story is from the Catholic News Service:

By Simon Caldwell

Catholic News Service

LONDON (CNS) -- Catholic officials are investigating claims that a severely deformed baby was born in a perfectly normal condition after the child's mother prayed to Cardinal John Henry Newman for a miracle.

Andrea Ambrosi, the Vatican lawyer in charge of Cardinal Newman's cause for canonization, has revealed in a BBC program to be broadcast Sept. 18 that he hopes the inexplicable healing may be the miracle needed to canonize Cardinal Newman as Britain's next saint.

Pope Benedict XVI will beatify Cardinal Newman at a huge open-air Mass in Birmingham's Cofton Park Sept. 19, the last day of his four-day visit to England and Scotland. However, a second miracle is needed to name the 19th-century cardinal as a saint.

"I am about to leave for Mexico City precisely because that could be the miracle for his canonization," Ambrosi said in the documentary -- "Newman: Saint or Sinner?" -- excerpts of which were released by the BBC Sept. 9.

"We are in a very preliminary phase," he added. "I cannot say anything yet, but this shows how the cardinal answers these prayers."

Former British government minister Ann Widdecombe -- who, like Cardinal Newman, was Anglican before becoming Catholic -- will present the television program. She told Catholic News Service Sept. 13 that the alleged healing occurred after prenatal scans revealed that the unborn baby was "severely deformed."

The doctors, she said, were convinced they could do nothing to help the fetus, but the mother, a devout Catholic, insisted on going through with the pregnancy.

"The child was born perfect following the mother praying to Newman, and scientists can't explain it," said Widdecombe.

Father Richard Duffield, provost of the Birmingham Oratory, confirmed in an e-mail to CNS that "an investigative tribunal into a further miracle ... is about to open in the Archdiocese of Mexico City."

"The reported miracle took place after the formal announcement of Newman's beatification (in July 2009)," he said. "This means that if it is found to be genuine it would be eligible for consideration as the second miracle necessary for Newman's canonization. It is expected that witness statements from those concerned and from the medical teams will be ready to send to Rome in early 2011.

"The process of investigation needs to be very thorough, and we should be cautious," he said. "But it is always exciting to hear reports of Newman's intercession and the evident devotion there is to him all over the world."

U.S. Deacon Jack Sullivan of Marshfield, Mass., whose healing from a crippling spinal condition in August 2001 was the miracle that allowed for Cardinal Newman's beatification, will read the Gospel during the beatification Mass.

Pope Benedict has waived his own rules to preside over the ceremony rather than sending a Vatican delegate to conduct the ceremony.

Cardinal Newman was an Anglican theologian who became a Catholic after first founding the Oxford Movement to try to return the Church of England to its Catholic roots.

END

Pope Benedict's Trip to England an Outreach for Reunion and Beatification of Cardinal Newman

Rev. C.J. McCloskey

Beyond the Beatification of Cardinal Newman: Pope's Trip to England an Outreach for Reunion - International - Catholic Online

The photograph and following excerpt is posted on Catholic Online:

By Father C. John McCloskey III
Wall Street Journal - online.wsj.com

What is most intriguing about Benedict's upcoming visit to England is its ecumenical significance. He has made a remarkable offer to members of the Anglican Communion throughout the world to be received into the Church, singly or in whole congregations, bringing with them their liturgical traditions and even their pastors and bishops.

CHICAGO, IL (Wall Street Journal) - This month Pope Benedict XVI will travel to England for an unprecedented state visit to the United Kingdom, meeting with the Queen at Balmoral Castle and giving an address to Parliament. The occasion for this historic event, however, is not church or international politics-although political issues will doubtless be touched upon-but the beatification (the penultimate step towards sainthood) of John Henry Cardinal Newman.

Newman, whose long life spanned most of the 19th century, was perhaps the greatest religious figure of the last 200 years of British history. Converting from Anglicanism to Catholicism at the age of 44, he wrote cogently and beautifully under both religious affiliations, and was a lightning rod in the passionately argued religious controversies of his time, such as infallibility of the Pope or the legitimacy of Anglicanism as the state church.

Valuing his religious influences as a thinker and evangelizer of the highest caliber, Pope Benedict has made an exception of his thus-far universal practice of not participating in beatification ceremonies. Hence, his trip to Great Britain.

En route to this honor were the standard ecclesial steps: the examination of Newman's life and writings; a declaration that he had lived a life of extraordinary virtue; and official approval by doctors and theologians of a miraculous cure after prayers that Newman would intercede with God on the sufferer's behalf.

The miracle in question holds special interest for Americans, being the recovery in 2001 from a debilitating back condition of the Massachusetts lawyer and deacon Jack Sullivan. His cure was a very modern "media miracle" provoked by a series on Newman on EWTN, Mother Angelica's Catholic broadcasting network. At the end of each episode, a prayer card for Newman was displayed on the screen. Mr. Sullivan prayed for the long-dead cardinal's intercession before God for a cure. The rest (following rigorous medical and ecclesial examination) is now history.

Although Newman was a devout and humble man of great personal warmth and sensitivity, it is difficult to think of him apart from his public career. The author of seminal books of theology and philosophy, such as "The Development of Doctrine" and "A Grammar of Assent," he also dashed off the greatest autobiography in English, "Apologia pro Vita Sua" (a media sensation in his time), in a matter of weeks after personal attacks on his honesty.

Newman's experience in helping found what is today the University College of Dublin inspired his extended argument for a classical liberal education, "The Idea of a University." He also wrote novels of religious conversion and hymns still sung in both Protestant and Catholic churches, such as "Lead, Kindly Light."

He also won early (and continuing) renown as a brilliant preacher. The atheist novelist George Eliot memorized the whole of one of them, "The Second Spring," and would recite it at the drop of a hat at private salons.

As a young and ardent Anglican priest, Newman and like-minded others originated the "Oxford Movement" in an attempt to revive the ancient doctrines and zeal for the "old religion" in an increasingly liberalizing Anglican Church. From the early 1830s up to his conversion to Catholicism in 1845, Newman battled the yielding spirit of Anglican toleration for indifferentism, which manifested itself in the belief that one religion was as good as another.

When his arguments were rejected by his Anglican superiors and he came to believe that his continued membership in the Church of England separated him from what he had now come to regard as the true Church, he converted to Catholicism and was ordained in Rome. Returning to England, he settled in Birmingham, where he founded the Oratory of St. Philip Neri, from which came the famous Brompton Oratory in London.

Newman died in 1890 popularly considered a saint. Over a century later, the Church is vindicating this judgment of the people of the U.K. and the whole English-speaking world. Pope Benedict's decision to preside over Newman's beatification reflects his love and respect for a fellow theologian whose work he has studied from his seminary days, and whose influence on the Second Vatican Council made him perhaps the most influential theologian on the council, even though it was meeting more than 70 years after his death.

Read More: Catholic Online

Archbishop claims to have been healed by Virgin Mary

Our Lady of Penafrancia

Bicol’s ailing archbishop claims to have been healed by Virgin Mary - INQUIRER.net - Philippine News for Filipinos

The following excerpt appeared on Inquirer.net

By Shiena Barrameda
Inquirer Southern Luzon

NAGA CITY, Philippines -- Archbishop Leonardo Z. Legaspi has claimed that he has been healed of his tumors by the Lady of Peñafrancia, an image of the Virgin Mary long venerated by many Filipino Catholics for miracles.

Legaspi made the declaration on Monday during a press conference organized by the Archdiocese of Caceres at the Archbishop’s Palace here in the city.

He said he had been suffering from the tumors in his lungs but last Saturday, his physician was astounded to find no more traces of the nodes or tumors.

He said the tumors were first spotted by his doctors in January 2009.

The tumors had caused him to undergo two sessions of chemotherapy and had kept him in turmoil until he almost lost all hope of getting well again.

Legaspi said he was initially found to be afflicted with stage three lung cancer and was advised to undergo surgery in Manila in 2009. However, the doctors found him unfit for the operation, putting him under chemotherapy instead.

“We were not prepared for the good news. I was even shocked when he said it,” Fr. Wilmer Tria said in a phone interview.

Tria, one of the heads of the Madrigal Foundation, was also present during the press conference.

“At first, we were just discussing the role of the media to avoid unnecessary publicity, which we got last year after a priest was punched during a procession. Then, he (Legaspi) suddenly said that he is healed now. He’s no longer sick of lung cancer,” Tria said.

According to Tria, the Archbishop admitted that he never asked for the miracle himself. Instead, Legaspi was thought to have given up on his medication and had altogether stopped taking his pills and capsules required for his chemotherapy.

“He dropped the medicines a month after starting them because he seemed to find it harder to live with them. He even got out of his liquid chemo last February due to discomforts. He literally left all chances of medical healing and prayed to live long enough to see the tercentenary celebrations, nothing more,” Tria added.

Fr. Andrew Recepcion, executive secretary for the central committee of the tercentenary celebrations, and also among those who heard the happy announcement, confirmed that the archbishop did not ask to be healed and attributed this miracle to the collective prayers of all the people who surrounded him.

“He believed that it was a gift from “Ina" (the name given by Bicolanos to the Lady of Penafrancia). Something that he never expected to happen,” says Recepcion.

Read More: Inquirer.net

Woman Healed through Intercessory Prayer made to Mother Teresa

Mother Teresa Clipart

The following article appeared on The Times of India

A Miracle Revisited Every Day

By Subhro Maitra


KHOANAKOR, DANOGRAM, SOUTH DINAJPUR: Monica Besra does not need an occasion to remind her of the angel who would be saint. Pottering about her shabby hut, feeding her goats, stacking hay, she keeps murmuring Mother Teresa's name under her breath. It's her life's chant.

After all, she owes her life to the mother. Each day for Monica begins with a 'pronam' before the Mother's statue. It ends there as well.

The 40-something mother of five says she was cured of an abdominal tumour by Mother Teresa on September 5, 1998 the first anniversary of the the Blessed nun's death. It was recognised as a miracle by the Vatican in 2002 and led to the beatification of Mother Teresa, a step closer to possible canonisation. Monica was even taken on a tour of Vatican City in 2003.

Monica knows that the world is celebrating Mother Teresa's centenary. She does not mind that the glitter has not reached his rickety shack in Danogram, some 375 km north of Kolkata. She has been invited to one such event, though. "On the 28th of this month, there will be a special prayer for Mother Teresa at Alampur Church. Our sisters have asked me to attend," she said. "I have to go. I cannot miss an opportunity to pray for her," she said.

Monica was first admitted to Balurghat hospital with tubercular meningitis on June 11, 1998. In August, she was diagnosed an ovarian tumor. "I was in great pain. I was so weak that the doctors were afraid I would die on the operating table. They told me to return after three months. I felt so helpless," she recalls.

Her sister Kanchan took her to a Missionaries of Charity home in Potiram village, about 50km from her home. On September 5, 1998, the sisters held a special mass. That evening (Monica remembers her pain was particularly severe), two sisters placed a tiny aluminum medal blessed by Mother Teresa on her stomach, prayed over her and tied it around her waist. She dozed off but woke with a start at 1am on September 6.

"I remember the time clearly as my bed was next to a wall which had Mother Teresa's picture and a clock. I felt my stomach and was stunned to realise that the lump was gone," she said. When she told the sisters of the miracle cure in the morning, they immediately informed the church authorities in Kolkata, who instituted an inquiry into the miracle. The probe lasted from November 1999 to August 2001. In December 2002, Pope John Paul II officially attributed the miracle of Monica's healing to Mother Teresa.

This miracle' also led her to convert to Christianity. "Earlier, we worshipped Marangburu, like other Santhals. But Mother led me to Christ." Tears well up and she chokes on her words. "I often dream of Mother. I see him walking before me, leading the way. What would have happened to my children if I had died then? It was Mother's blessings that saved me and my family."