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25. Miracles Certify the Marian
Apparitions
DR.
ALEXIS CARREL, like the rest of the medical faculty at Lyons, had been
derisive of the miracles that were happening at Lourdes. But for a
skeptic who was content to remain one, he made a mistake. His curiosity
got the better of him. He went in person to Lourdes.
The future winner of the Nobel prize came into
Lourdes talking confidently of auto-suggestion as the adequate cause of
all these incredible cures. He attributed their report to a craze of
emotionalism. He would see for himself. And so, among the new influx of
patients brought to the local hospital to be taken in wheelchairs or on
stretchers to the basilica, he kept a watchful eye on the one he had made
his personal concern.
She was dying. Dr. Carrel had no doubt of it.
He had thoroughly examined her at noon, found her in the final stage of
tubercular peritonitis, and gave Marie Ferrand at most two days to live.
She was only eighteen years of age. Her diagnostician felt the pathos of
so untimely a blight upon the promise of youth, but what could he do? The
disease must run its course. No natural remedy against it had been
discovered by science. The iron law of necessity could not be broken in
favor of young Marie Ferrand. The mortuary waited the imminent arrival of
her corpse.
Then a change of mood, if not of mind, came
over the eminent biologist. He had the temerity to entertain a hope
against his own conviction. It might be called a wish fathering the
thought. Or was it the grace of God working on that desire from his
heart? Anyhow, he expressed it aloud. He said it firmly: "If she were to
be cured I would never doubt again."
The sequel is well known. That very afternoon
at the basilica his prejudice against miracles met a sudden death. The
girl who was supposed to do the dying did not die. She instantly
recovered her full health. Dr. Carrel was there on the spot. He
witnessed it: the fulfillment of a hope at the expense of his academic
fixation. His diagnosis had not erred. A quick grave for Marie Ferrand
would have been the sure outcome of the disease—without the miracle. The
diagnostician had only gone wrong in his belief that no superior
intervention could do what in fact it did.
The converted skeptic, who was to write Man the
Unknown, would remain true to his word: he would never doubt again. But
before leaving Lourdes, to reassure his confidence in the cure of his
hopeless case, he paid her a final visit in the hospital that night. He
put her through an exhaustive medical test. There was not the faintest
trace of a return of the dreadful disease. Its symptoms were gone,
totally. The miracle had taken hold. It is uncertain who was the
happier, Marie Ferrand who stood by her bed with laughter on her lips, or
Alexis Carrel who studied her. She seemed a radiant embodiment of health
to her observer who was not too proud to admit a deep inner urge of joy
over his having been proved wrong. No longer would he scorn the
physicians who saw incurable patients cured at the shrine and then signed
affidavits to that effect. He was now one of them.
His colleagues at the university would not be
pleased with his admission. It would embarrass them. But he couldn't
help that. It was the truth. He would declare it so. He did. It cost
him his membership on the faculty at Lyons. His unforgiving peers voted
him out.
Their action provokes the question, how could
experimentalists who claim an open mind to every fresh bit of evidence do
such a thing? Were they not disclaiming their very claim? But that
didn't bother them, who were enslaved to the prejudice that no possible
force beyond nature could interrupt the known laws of nature. Their proof
for it? They had none. The evidence was all against the theory.
One is less inclined to find fault with these
untheological experts, who realizes that men who call themselves
theologians and are honored as experts in Scripture have equally
disallowed the truth of miracles. Rudolf Bultmann, the form critic, has
the audacity in Kerygma and Myth to write: "The miracles of the New
Testament have ceased to be miraculous." The more difficult of them, he
thinks science will in due course succeed in explaining away. He raves
on: "It is impossible to use electric light and the wireless and to avail
ourselves of modern medical and surgical discoveries and at the same time
to believe in the New Testament world of spirits and miracles." Why so?
He of all infidels should not be so tenaciously certain of it in view of
his earlier statement that "conclusive knowledge is impossible in any
science and philosophy." What nonsense! What confusion! What outrage!
Our Lord admittedly found the rejection of His
miracles an outrage. He did not perform them for the purpose of the mere
performance. He expected them to lead to a firm belief in his mission.
"Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida! For if the mighty works done
in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago
in sackcloth and ashes. But I tell you, it shall be more tolerable on the
day of judgment for Tyre and Sidon than for you. And you, Capernaum, will
you be exalted to heaven? You shall be brought down to Hades. For if the
mighty works done in you had been done in Sodom, it would have remained
until this day. But I tell you that it shall be more tolerable on the day
of judgment for the land of Sodom than for you" (Mt. 11:21-24).
The three towns stand today in ruins. Only
vestiges of Chorazin and Bethsaida and Capernaum remain to attest their
physical doom, the far lesser part of the curse. The many miracles from
Jesus which the inhabitants had witnessed did not open their minds to his
unique superiority. Yet their minds should have opened to it. Our Lord,
in giving the disciples of the Baptist a criterion by which they could
know Him to be the Messiah, went right to the point. "Go and tell John
what you have seen and heard: the blind receive their sight, the lame
walk, the lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear, the dead are raised up"
(Lk. 7:22). "These very work which I am doing," he said to the
incredulous, "bear me witness that the Father has sent me" (Jn. 5:36).
There is a dreadful finality in his word: "If I had not done among them
the works which no one else did, they would not have sin; but now they
have seen" (Jn. 15:24).
Nor does the record pretend to have accounted
for all the miracles of Jesus. But what it does include of them is meant
to foster a confident trust in him. It is meant to prove him the
Messiah. Evangelist John, admitting his omission of many other signs from
their Lord "in the presence of the disciples", does not miss the
opportunity to add: "but these are written that you may believe that Jesus
is the Christ, the Son of God" (Jn. 20:30).
A miracle, possible only to the Creator of the
natural laws, demonstrates his omnipotence. When Christ rose from the
dead, which no man of his own powers had ever done before, he proved
himself more than man. When at his mother's historic shrines he chose to
perform a vast variety and a vas number of miracles through her, he was
putting his seal of divinity on her apparitions which had taken place
there. He was advertising their importance to the world.
Medically impossible cures at the Marian
shrines require an accountant of angelic knowledge to keep the record
accurate and complete. At Lourdes alone they have reached into the
thousands. But the cures should not be given undue stress. They must be
seen perspective. Other kinds of miracles distinguish the apparitions.
The story of Fatima has its whirlabout of the sun; the story of Pontmain
its message in letters of gold written by no visible hand; the story of
Guadalupe its painting which remains after centuries of durability a
composite of miracles in one ppiece—and that an unlikely cactus cloth.
This prodigy of art, if the multiple miracle
may be called art, invites a repetition of the facts. The self-portrait,
so long ago laid on a base not able of itself to take paint and so easily
dissolvable, stays a pristine entity of rich blends in coloring. As for
the colors, they look to be pigments while they are not. And in that
profoundly beautiful face the eyes, as if they were alive, hold the
reflected images of the picture's first viewers.
These are positive miracles, which have made
the Dark Virgin the masterpiece of art and the despair of science.
What about the negative kind that time and again saved the picture from
the threat of destruction? Just as the salty Mexican climate could not
corrode or the fumes of candles could not tarnish the delicate portrait
during the century I had been left uncovered by a frame, so did the
explosion of a bomb at its base fail to do it the slightest harm. The
miraculous failure will serve to exemplify sharply, because of the
dramatic circumstances, the protection heaven was according the image of
Our Lady of Guadalupe.
The incident occurred in 1921. President
Plutarco Elias Calles, another Julian the Apostate, had been persecuting
the Faith, closing churches, hunting down priests and those who sheltered
them, and carrying on his campaign with a fury that provoked the
publication of Blood-Drenched Altars. He had not dared to
barricade the Basilica of Guadalupe, to be sure. But his frustration did
not long disturb him. Let it stay open. He knew an easier way to
disinterest the people from crowding into it from all sections of Mexico.
So it was that a hired infidel stepped into the
basilica with a large bouquet of flowers in his arms and a devotional look
on his face. He had come at an hour when but few worshippers were
present. Scarcely noticed, he walked down the aisle to the altar, placed
the blooms beneath the sacred picture, then left the sanctuary with a
smile of malicious joy. In the vase of roses lay a time bomb.
It exploded. In strict accord with the laws of
chemistry it went off. In strict obedience to the scientific timing it
blew apart at 11:30 A.M., November 14, 1921. The concussion shook the
building, rattled its thick windows into shattered heaps of debris,
terrified the worshippers in attendance. Close at hand, it jarred loose
the bolts of the picture frame, ripped out chunks of marble from the
altar, and with such force attacked the iron crucifix which stood on the
altar that it fell twisted to the floor. Yet, contrary to the assurance
of science, the explosion did not fulfill its purpose. It failed. The
painting of Our Lady of Guadalupe above the damaged altar, by a miracle of
prevention, hung untouched. The glass frame showed not so much as a tiny
crack.
The misshapen crucifix of iron, which had stood
right beneath the picture to take the full heat of the blast, is now on
exhibition in the foyer which leads from the basilica proper to the
Blessed Sacrament chapel at the right. That chapel began to attract more
fervent crowds than before. And long after the regime of the persecutor
had ended, the crowds were still coming. They came to offer reparation
for the sacrilege and to thank their Eucharistic Lord for having preserved
from such malice their treasured portrait of his mother and their own.
Daily exposition of the Blessed Sacrament became the custom, once the
tyrant Calles had gone out of power. Henry F. Unger writes as an
eyewitness: "There, often with outstretched arms, they poured out their
heart to the Eucharistic King. Clusters of small children hovered around
a praying Mexican mother, her eyes riveted on the Host. Other Mexicans
were bringing armfuls of flowers and placing them at the sanctuary
rail.." So, to sum it up, the scheme to empty the Basilica of Guadalupe
only succeeded in drawing larger crowds and intensifying their devotion to
the adorable Sacrament of the altar.
The people knew it was her Son who prevented
the explosion from demolishing the portrait of the Holy Mother. They were
rather grateful than surprised. Need the miracle surprise the faithful
anywhere? Jesus submitted Himself to Mary so completely in babyhood to
remain her eternal Child and she responded so perfectly that no intimacy
between persons, except for that within the Blessed Trinity, can even
begin to approach theirs. The mother who showed the shepherds her infant
still holds his endearment. There is nothing he would not do for her.
His tremendous miracles for her prove it.
Along with the miracles, the many known
conversions at the Marian centers belong to any equitable account. These,
in the broad sense of the term, might be called miracles of grace. They
come of God, to be willingly accepted by the recipients, always. Yet
their bestowal at her shrines, or in circumstances associated with her,
indicates that their mediatrix has influenced the divine Giver. One such,
no less noteworthy than that of Alphonse Ratisbonne, may serve to
exemplify the same quiet spectacularity of all the others. It is of
contemporary interest.
The first statue of Our Lady of Fatima was set
up in her first shrine, months before that, the sculptor who would make
the statue had no intention of doing anything of the kind. On the
contrary, he thought of blowing up the chapel. With hatred in his heart
he hurried out to the Cova da Iria to do just that. He reached into his
satchel for the bomb. He found his fingers on a rosary instead.
Surely he himself had not put the rosary
there. William Thomas Walsh suggests that his sister did. Be that as it
may, the rosary was there. And at the touch of the beads the would-be
bomber, getting back something lost from his boyhood, felt more like
praying. The desire to destroy had deserted him. He did not have the
will to execute his evil design. There had stolen into his heart a
tenderness, strange to him, yet the more welcome for having been absent
through too many years.
Repentant, ashamed, the sculptor felt he must
make amends. How? An idea flashed into his mind and he went looking for
Lucia dos Santos, who had not yet gone to the convent. He prevailed upon
her to describe in detail her heavenly Vision. He wanted desperately to
do a statue of that Blessed Lady of the Cova, in reparation. The months
passed slowly in his studio as his handiwork took shape. In time for the
dedicatory ceremony, the artist had his product ready. While it did not
reflect the reality of what Lucia had seen with an accuracy she might have
wished, it is sufficient to say that no work of art possibly could. The
statue served its purpose well, stimulating devotion to its heavenly
subject. It made its sculptor happy. And on that memorable occasion of
May 13, 290, none in the long procession of marchers could have stepped
along more jauntily than he, as the statue was carried to the Cova and
into the chapel that had been spared a loaded bomb.
But that is only half the story. The other
half of it heightens its memorability. The chapel almost did not have its
doors open to the statue. For the government determined to close the
shrine to the public, had ordered a military regiment to the Cova da Iria.
Accordingly, the first pilgrims to approach the grounds found themselves
stopped by a solid line of bayonets. They did not leave. They did not
try to break through the line. They simply stood there praying their
rosaries aloud. Their number increased steadily until there were
thousands more of them than the soldiers.
It was a huge turnout from nearby and afar,
mostly of peasants, some of them barefoot and in ragged clothes, but all
of them peaceably determined. Their mighty chorus of prayer would give
way to a mightier chorus of hymns to Mary and then return to the
recitation of the beads. So the alternating went on, gathering momentum,
never tiring, while gradually but ever more numerously the guards found
themselves singing and praying with the multitude and in no mood to use
their bayonets. By the time the statue got to the scene, it had an easy
access to the chapel. It met with a unanimous welcome.
Thus did another threat fail in the history of
opposition to Mary and her shrines. It would be an exaggeration to say
that the repentant bomb carrier and the repentant regiment had been
coerced. They had to have some will to accept the grace of their
conversion, since heaven does not force its favors against the will. On
the other hand, it would be as gross an understatement to suggest in low
key that the mediatrix of their grace showed an interest in them. It was
an intense interest. Her maternal love reached out to them, softening
their hearts, working effectually on their freedom of choice without
destroying it.
Let none of us make the mistake of
underestimating her maternal power. It can produce wonders. History
knows it has worked many a virtual miracle of grace.
It has one ready to conquer the present
rebellion against God and the decencies of man. When her conditions have
been met, Our Lady of Fatima will act. We have her word that Russia will
be converted, and should the Commissars of the time not have been informed
of her promised action, they will be awaiting a shock of disillusionment.
Possibly their soldiers or members of the secret police, who secure them
in power, will undergo the same change of heart as the armed regiment of
the Cova in 1920. Perhaps the Commissars themselves will undergo it, as
once Saul of Tarsus did.
The atheist tyranny, even when it enslaves yet
another country, is moving toward its annihilation. It has not the power
to withstand Our Lady of Fatima when her influence over a chastened
humanity will have brought about the answer to centuries of urgent prayer
for the unimpeded Kingdom of God here and now, and for the doing of his
will on earth as in heaven. The event, concluding the Fatima story, will
have fulfilled its message. It has been promised. It but awaits the
hour. Seeing through the turmoil of a war to the finish, Sister Mary
Francis of the Poor Clares sings of Mary's triumph:
Deep in the very tents of battlesmoke,
Her gentle plot is sprung; and we are doomed
To watch our terrors melt before her gaze.
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