The Column with Canon Rev Dr Rod Garner Miracles are possible that defy the constraints
TIMES like these don’t encourage a belief in miracles. Most of us are feeling anxious about the drift of the country and quite a few are having difficulty getting out of bed as they ponder the state of the world.
Prince Harry has admitted recently that the duvet has its attractions at daybreak.
The pop idol, Justin Bieber, has the same problem.
Having over 100 million followers on Twitter (latest count for Bieber’s fans) clearly is no guarantee of peace of mind. Pessimism is doing very well overall and believing in unexpected possibilities for the good has come to seem either fanciful or implausible.
My own take on miracles has been under the microscope over the past few days.
Last Saturday I was in Westminster Cathedral in London as part of celebrations of the Canonisation of John Henry Cardinal Newman. A splendid and moving occasion with the Archbishops of Westminster and Canterbury in attendance.
The previous Sunday some 20,000 people from the UK had made the journey to Rome to witness the Pope’s elevation of this brilliant, caring and controversial pilgrim of the 19th Century into the eternal company of the Christian saints.
In St Peter’s Square among the huge gathering was Melissa Villalobos, a Chicago lawyer whose recovery from a potentially fatal pregnancy complication in 2013, after she prayed to Newman when she thought she was dying, was recognised by the Vatican as the second miracle required to canonise him.
The lengthy investigation of her case ran to 350 pages and was supported by evidence from many doctors with no religion.
Her own account of a deeply traumatic experience was both graphic and revealing.
Not to oversimplify, having gone through the earlier stages of a fragile pregnancy for which medicine had no remedy, she collapsed in the bathroom and knew from the extent of the haemorrhage that she was literally bleeding to death.
I have been personally present in such a situation and know something of the fear and desperation she must have felt.
In the absence of any help nearby she cried out to John Henry Newman to save her.
The bleeding stopped almost immediately and for all the earlier complications attending the pregnancy she went on to have a successful and healthy birth.
The child was present with her in Rome.
The day before I travelled to London I had met with a young nurse who had just started her career in a major hospital.
She will be dealing entirely with cancer patients of all ages.
A year earlier a clever young man undertaking PhD studies had been admitted to the hospital.
The diagnosis was very poor and he had only a short time left.
In the absence of options he was given the opportunity to take part in a medical trial of a new drug. No guarantees or promises, just the slenderest of chances.
The invitation was taken up. He is now free from cancer and looking to a future that he thought had been lost to him.
We inhabit a strange and mysterious world where sometimes heaven and earth seem to come together to dispel the encircling gloom.
We are surrounded by forces and energies of which we know little.
We can feel alone but elsewhere others are praying for our welfare and healing and, amazingly, things improve.
Against the odds or the constraints of logic, the extraordinary happens.
Canon Garner’s recent biography of Cardinal Newman, Bright Evening Star has just been rated one of the best new books on Newman by the Catholic weekly news magazine The Tablet.
It is available from Broadhurst’s 5-7 Market Street, Southport.