JENNIFER GARNER AS MIRACLE MOM

“I believed in miracles before the movie, and I continue to believe in them,” says Jennifer Garner, who plays Christy Beam in the upcoming movie Miracles From Heaven ( opening March 16), based on Beam’s 2015 best- selling book. “Who knows what happened? For some reason, that little girl is OK. Why not see it as something incredible and special— a reminder of the possibilities of life?”

Garner also believes in heaven. “Why would we rob ourselves of believing?” she asks. “Why not believe in heaven?”

The actress says getting to know the Beams changed her in “a really good way. I was so touched on so many different levels,” says the mother of three, who is in the process of divorcing actor Ben Affleck. “I was touched by who Christy is as a mom, and how fierce and incredibly loving she is.

“And when you talk to Annabel, there is nothing in you that can think, Oh, she’s just

saying this for attention, or She’s just saying this out of her silly imagination. She’s not. She’s such a smart, bright, very self- aware little girl who is so calm and not hysterical at all about this experience that she had, that you would feel ridiculous not to take what she says at face value.

“Her heart is open to possibility and to wonder and to things happening that no one would expect. She has the faith of a child in the most beautiful way,” says Garner. “It’s not something she’s ever questioned or doubted. She hasn’t needed to wrestle with it. Her faith was a big part of what got her through the worst of her disease.”