Modern Miraculous Cures - A Documented Account of Miracles and Medicine in the 20th Century

Francois Leuret

Description

A fascinating and detailed report on recent miracles and miraculous cures. Contents Include Letter of Appreciation from H.H.Pius XII Declaration Translator's Introduction Miracles Miraculous Cures Modern Miraculous Cures in Our Experience Miracles Associated with Holy Persons Church Procedure for Investigating Canonisation Miracles The Lourdes Medical Bureau Cures Officially Recognised as Miraculous Scientifically Extraordinary Cures not yet Canonically Recognised An Unusual Cure Daniel Kylmetis Etiology and Physiology of Miraculous Cures

Sujets

• Religion
• Christianisme
• Philosophie et théologie
• Catholic
• Christianity

Informations

• Publié par: Read Books Ltd.
• Date de parution: 28 juin 2021
• Nombre de lectures: 1
• EAN13: 9781528761475
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

MODERN MIRACULOUS CURES

MODERN MIRACULOUS CURES

A DOCUMENTED ACCOUNT OF MIRACLES AND MEDICINE IN THE 20th CENTURY

BY Dr François Leuret

formerly President of the Medical Bureau and Bureau of Scientific Studies of Lourdes

AND Dr Henri Bon

Translated from the French by JOHN C. BARRY, DCL St Andrew’s Seminary, Scotland AND A. T. MACQUEEN, MB, MRCPE St Andrew’s University, Scotland

© Leuret and Bon 1957

NIHIL OBSTAT John A. Goodwine, J.C.D. Censor Librorum

IMPRIMATUR Francis Cardinal Spellman Archbishop of New York

Thenihil obstatandimprimaturare official declarations that a book or pamphlet is free of doctrinal or moral error. No implication is contained therein that those who have granted the nihil obstatandimprimaturagree with the contents, opinions or statements expressed.

FIRST PUBLISHED 1957

Printed in Great Britain for Peter Davies Ltd. by The Leagrave Press Ltd., Luton and London

LETTER OF APPRECIATION FROM HIS HOLINESS POPE PIUS XII

I have no need to tell you how much the subject wit h which you are concerned in this volume interests the Holy Father. He has himse lf more than once had occasion to say, in his discourses and messages, what the Churc h expects men of science worthy of the name to do in defence of the Faith. He could not but extend the warmest welcome to a work in which a number of cases of mir aculous intervention, whereby God has deigned in recent times to manifest His pow er and goodness to men, are examined with all the most up-to-date technical met hods and in a spirit of true scientific loyalty. J. B. Montini,Subst.

DECLARATION

In conformity with the decrees of the Sovereign Pon tiffs and particularly of Pope Urban VIII, the authors declare that their opinions regarding facts or persons other than those whose miraculous character or sanctity has be en proclaimed by the Church, do not in any way anticipate the decision of the Holy See. They submit themselves entirely to the judgment of the Holy See, together with ever y interpretation or theory contained in their work. Since this work is a study, often covering ground l ittle or never explored before, the opinions expressed in it are the authors’ own, and are often no more than hypothetical or tentative in character.

CONTENTS

Letter of Appreciation from H.H. Pius XII

Declaration

Translators’ Introduction

 I Miracles Miracles in General Types of Miracles The Classification of Miracles

II Miraculous Cures Characteristics of Miraculous Cures Attitude of the Church and Science Modern Miraculous Cures The Study of Cures

III Modern Miraculous Cures in Our Experience Our Lady of Fatima Cure of Margarida Rebelo Our Lady of Knock Cure of John O’Grady Cure of John Kelly Our Lady of Pompeii Cure of Mother M. A. Falletta Cure of Natale Vitelli Our Lady of Loreto Our Lady of Beauraing Case of Mlle van Laer Case of Mme Acar Miracles Associated with Holy Persons Case of Helena Lobosque Case of Charbel Makhlouf Cure of Bechara Antoun Rouhana Private Cures Case of Vrouw O. H——

IV Church Procedure for Investigating Miraculous Cures Beatification and Canonisation Procedure

 V Canonisation Miracles Cure of Sister Gerard of Calvary Cure of Sister Marie-Thérèse Lesage Cure of Mother Adela Palombo Cure of Sister Maria Del Carmen Gay

VI The Lourdes Medical Bureau Origin and Early Cures Cure of Pierre Bouriette Cure of Louis Bouhohorts The Bureau of Medical Records Present Medical Organisation The Bureau of Scientific Studies

VII Cures Officially Recognised as Miraculous Francis Pascal Gabrielle Clauzel Rose Martin Jeanne Fretel

VIII Scientifically Extraordinary Cures Not Yet Canonically Recognised The File Procedure of the Lourdes Medical Bureau Compilation of the Case Histories Gérard Baillie Mme Gestas

 IX An Unusual Cure

Daniel Kylmetis

 X Etiology and Physiology of Miraculous Cures Notes Appendix1 Appendix2

TRANSLATORS’ INTRODUCTION

We should like to draw attention to the following p oints : I. Many statements will be found in this book of a d ogmatic nature—i.e. pertaining to Catholic dogma, in the strict, rather than the p opular sense. Catholics accept these because they believe that Christ our Lord gave infa llible teaching authority to St Peter and that that authority rests today with the ruling Pope. It is important to appreciate, however, that the same Church teaches that one shou ld approach her by one’s God- given reason, i.e. one should submit her claims to be Christ’s properly authorised representative on earth to the ordinary rules for a ssessing evidence. This approach should be humble and must be accompanied by a since re desire to know the truth. Catholics believe that any statements made by the C hurch, and related to faith or morals, are true because they have convinced themse lves by reason (among other things) that the Church has the right to teach thes e truths. The point of this note is that anyone inclined to regard statements of dogma, or o f natural theology for that matter, as “mystical,” “mumbo-jumbo” or “meaningless,” shou ld not do so without first reading up the questions discussed above in some competent textbook or popular exposition of the subjects. We would earnestly suggest that the activities and beliefs of a society such as the Catholic Church should not be dismissed in summary terms. Many of the most intelligent men in the history of Europe have belon ged to it; and the Church, with her long experience of the human pageant, has her reaso ns for most things. These should be given a careful hearing (or reading) by the genu inely interested individual. II. The medical translator would like to draw attent ion to the need for expansion of the medical and research facilities at Lourdes. The re is a need for money to allow for the establishment of an all-year-round staff of med ical scientists, to observe and record the enormous stream of clinical material passing th rough it, to examine, to photograph. There is need for research scholarships enabling st udents of any religious belief to work at and from Lourdes for two or three years. To illustrate this point let us assume money was av ailable for such appointments. A cure appears to have taken place at Lourdes. The re search assistant takes a full history. He is told the diagnosis of malignant dise ase was established at X Hospital (e.g. Mme Rose Martin, p. 149). Records exist at Y Hospital. The research assistant is able to go to these places, to get photographic cop ies of the relevant documents and microphotographs of the histological specimens. He talks to pathologists, surgeons, physicians and nurses connected with the case. He i nterviews all the relevant witnesses and tries to assess their reliability. He sees the patient in a year’s time and again in another year. The full report of all this is published inThe Archives of the Lourdes Medical Bureau—a document bearing comparison in appearance and typographical set-up withMedical Clinics of North Americathe or British Medical Bulletin. At Lourdes, the research assistants, under the guid ance of a well-qualified senior staff, and with full secretarial and nursing assist ance, with facilities for rapidly finding out what sort of cases have come with the different pilgrimages and further facilities for assembling these quickly, are responsible for givin g demonstrations and clinics on any disease. It is felt that an organisation of the above kind w ould make an impact on the

scientific world of which Our Lady would approve. I t would be evident that at Lourdes the standards of practice and recording were up to that expected by medical scientists all over the world. We hope this book will indicate that, in the prevailing circumstances, they are that already; that this is not widely realised is due to lack of funds necessary to build the necessary buildings, pay the necessary st aff and publish and distribute the relevant literature. III. It has recently been suggested by the Rev. L. D . Weatherhead in his book, Psychology, Religion and Healing,*that the immersion in cold spring water would brin g about cures similar to those occurring at Lourdes. We doubt if this matter has ever been statistically analysed. We know of no evidence which shows that the survival rate among moribund and seriously ill animals is increas ed by immersion in cold spring water. (It seems unlikely that any doctor would per mit the experiment on human beings.) The matter should, however, be fairly easi ly put to the test on animals. The clergyman indicates that those returning from L ourdes showed disappointment at not being cured. It might be natural to expect s ome patients to be disappointed, but in general it has not been the experience of those working there—whether medically qualified or not—that patients come back from Lourd es more unhappy than when they went. It would be unlikely that the sick should wis h to return so often, and that the numbers should have increased so hugely, if thepsyc hological effects were generally adverse. In our own experience of not a few pilgrim ages the sick find themselves spiritually better and more resigned to their cross , and the majority do not really expect to be cured. In any case, they find the journey a c hange from routine and the sun does them good. All this may well be attributed to the r elease of adrenal hormones, but it seems unlikely that as a rule the latter would brin g about a feeling of physical well- being accompanied by grave psychological depression . The mention of adrenal hormones raises the further question of how far release of these may, associated with suggestion, improve sick pilgrims’ health. It seems reasonable, as indicated above, to suppose that suc h may well be the case. But we have no knowledge of any hormone or drug capable of bringing about cures of the type experienced by Mlle Fretel or Mme Martin. In the ca se of both, the complete absence of convalescence is quite outside the usual course of events in any serious disease, as is the quite sudden recovery. In general, cases cited as resembling miraculous cu res at Lourdes do not survive close comparison.

Our translation of certain sections of the book has been very free. We have simply summarised anecdotes that sound well in French but do not translate into English happily. Some cases have been left out—e.g. one pat ient whose case appeared in the French edition objected to being in print. Other ca ses have been added. We have endeavoured always to convey the meaning of the ori ginal without substantial alteration. We would point out to the reader that some cases ca rry more conviction than others, e.g. because they are fully reported by med ically qualified witnesses. The reader should avoid the temptation to dip into the book. It should be read as a whole or not at all.

*1951 Hodder & Stoughton, London.