Faith, Lourde’s Peace, and a Physical Healing

The man knew his mother and all of her siblings, his aunt and two uncles, had aortic aneurisms and that one of his aunts, Aunt Mary, had died when hers burst. She was his mother’s identical twin. The rest of them had lived into old age, including his mother.

His oldest Son was diagnosed with the same type of aneurism. It was monitored for several years and then weakened to the point that the reparative surgery was necessary. It was about as major as surgery can get and his recovery time was the better part of two years, but it was very successful.

When the man’s heart was checked to see if he could endure the rigors of almost pain-free, seven-minutes-or-less cataract surgery, the doctor informed him about the test results, told him that he was OK for the surgery, but said that in some of the testing they had discovered that he had had two recent “myocardial infarcts” and he had an aortic aneurism.

The man was not surprised. After his wife died he knew he had had the heart attacks, but at the time of each of them he did nothing, he called no one. He had said his Act of Contrition and was fully ready to do his purgatory and be with his wife again.  (His grown children were somewhat upset that he had chosen his beloved there over life here with them). Each time after the better part of an hour, the pain had subsided and  he looked to the sky and said “Really? OK.”

The doctor said that the location of the aneurism had been discovered and that very soon additional tests and scans had to be done to determine its exact size so they could decide if the reparative surgery had to be done immediately or if he could wait some time as his son had done.

During the weeks that followed, as the additional tests and scans were scheduled and being done, periodically, every day the man blest himself with holy water from the spring at the Grotto of Massabielle at Lourdes. He began with a sign of the cross, slow like St. Bernadette did after she had seen Our Lady do so, and he would touch his chest with the water where the aneurism was when he said, “and of the Son.”

The man’s lifelong friend, Bob, had personally gotten the water from the spring some months before. Bob and the man had attended college together, worked nights at the Post Office,  and both of them had gone through ROTC and been commissioned as new second lieutenants. The man had served his required active duty time at Fort Benning, Georgia; Fort Sill, Oklahoma, Fort Bliss, Texas, and then as a combat training officer at Fort Jackson, South Carolina. Although he never served in combat, the man was awarded the National Defense Service Medal for service during the Vietnam War.

Bob served thirty years and was decorated for bravery during Desert Storm. Somehow, almost every year, he went to Lourdes for a week or two and helped non-ambulatory pilgrims enter the baths.

From the time he was a small boy, the man had a deep devotion to Our Lady of Lourdes. He was born on February 11, her feast day, and he had noticed that the nun who was the Superintendent of Santa Rosa Hospital, San Antonio, Texas  where he was born, who had signed his birth certificate, was “Sister Mary of Lourdes.” In his baby book, his mom had listed the names of three delivery room nurses – Mary, Mary, and Mary. His mom’s name was Rose Marie and his godmother was Aunt Mary. His sisters were named Mary Margaret, Rose Marie, and Mary Kathleen. Mary, his mother,  surrounded him with her namesakes.

As a young boy in the mid 1950s, he had watched the 1943 movie “The Song of Bernadette,” on his family’s small black-and-white TV. Jennifer Jones, who portrayed Bernadette, won the Oscar that year for Best Actress. The film won three other Academy awards, including best musical scoring, best cinematography and best art direction. He remembered that his favorite scene was when Bernadette appeared to be smearing mud on her face. In the movie, Our Lady, appearing in the grotto, told Bernadette to “go and wash and drink in the spring.” There had never been a spring there at the grotto. People who had gathered around to watch Bernadette, although they could not see Our Lady, thought she was crazy when they saw her getting mud on her face as she drank from the spring that had miraculously appeared.

From before he could remember, the man, then a boy, had said a prayer to Our Lady that his mother taught him: “Lovely Lady dressed in blue, teach me how to pray, God was just your little boy, tell me what to say.” Now every day he prayed to Our Lady, his Lady. He prayed with something beyond certainty, beyond faith. He prayed as a child asleep in his mother’s arms. He prayed not asking for anything. He prayed, sometimes without words, safe and content in her comfort and peace. 

One day, after all the additional tests and scans had been done, but before the results were given to the man, he was walking across his living room when he stopped still, immobile. He felt something. Later he could not describe it precisely– it was like energy, glowing unseen light, force, power, warmth all rolled into one. It came upon him and slowly moved down to his chest. For over a minute he stood there experiencing what was happening, quiet, patient, speechless, in wonder. Then it was as if all the force combined and became dense and powerful where the aneurism was. Then it subsided and moved away from him.  He stood still without moving. Not knowing why, although he was alone, he said the words out loud, “I am healed.” There was no uncontrollable exaltation, no laughing, he did not move. He simply stood there for some time in complete, utter, comforting peace. He smiled as he walked from the room.

A few weeks later, a nurse from the office of the cardiologist who was overseeing all the doctors, nurses, and technicians who were conducting the additional tests called him to set up an appointment for him to go over the results.

He sat down at a desk across from the cardiologist. There were several stacks of papers and booklets, each with his name on the cover sheet. The cardiologist said he was going to call another doctor who would be on speakerphone with them. The man was calm, unworried.  After the other doctor came on the phone, the cardiologist picked up one large file and opened it to the first page. He looked at the man and said, “There is no aneurism.” The man sat silent. The cardiologist had expected him to say something. “Let me make this clear, he said, again “There is no aneurism-the original tests documented the aneurism, its existence, its location, you had an aneurism, but now there is none.”

There was silence in the room. The doctor on the phone asked, “Did they do the calcium?” The cardiologist picked up another file and opened it. “Yes.” He scanned some test results. “He’s like a 50 year old.”  The man was seventy six.

“And the kidneys?” The cardiologist looked at some more test results. “This is a man sitting here with me who has the body of a man in his 50s.”

The man spoke. “Should I come back at some point in the future?” The cardiologist said, “Not for this. We cannot explain this. The first tests were not in error. The recent tests are correct. You are good to go.”

Outside the building on his way to his car, the man stopped on the sidewalk. He looked up, smiled, and said quietly, “Thank you, Lady.”

The man had been a lawyer for most of his adult life; but a few months later he took a position as a full time 8^th grade teacher at a catholic middle school. He has 20 students. They pray morning prayers at the beginning of each school day and he attends Mass regularly with them. He has told them about what happened and how, because of this, God has gifted him with each of them and that God expects them to help him get to heaven. He has taught them to say the “Lovely Lady Dressed In Blue” prayer.

And he has taught them to make the sign of the cross as Bernadette did – slowly, prayerfully, reverently – as she had seen Our Lady do the first time they prayed the rosary together.