The healing of Vertigo (The Blessing of a priest), The Sacrament of the Sick

The healing of vertigo  (The blessing of a priest)

A young boy of about four years of age was suffering from vertigo attacks.  (This feels as though the room is spinning very quickly around the person. This can be terrifying experience even for an adult, so it is hard to imagine how a young child would cope with it). He used to cry out in terror: “The room is falling down”.  His mother asked every priest that they met to bless her son.  He was healed of the vertigo.

The Sacrament of the Sick

A priest was called to a nursing home to give the Sacrament of the Sick to a dying elderly lady.  After he had done that, he had a cup of the tea with the nursing home’s matron.  A few minutes later to their amazment the elderly lady walked into the room.  She was healed.

Another priest gave a blessing to a very ill patient in a hospital and the patient, much to the surprise of the priest was healed immediately of the sickness.

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Favours from the saints: A bad case of laryngitis (Saint Blaise)

Each month I used to meet with a friend.  We attended Mass at the cathedral and then had lunch at the shopping centre afterwards. On one of these occasions my friend showed up with a very severe case of laryngitis.  She told me that she had been in this state for a few weeks. I introduced her to the priest.  He gave her a blessing in honour of Saint Blaise the patron saint of throats.  I jokingly remarked to her, “You should be all fixed up now because Father has blessed you.”  We went into the church. A few minutes later the Mass began.  I was amazed to hear my friend singing the hymn in her full strength soprano voice. 

Saint Blaise is the saint who is invoked for protection against throat problems. On his feast day (February 3),  there is a special blessing.  The priest takes two candles which are held in a crossed position and places them upon the throat of the person to be blessed and invokes Saint Blaise to protect the person from throat troubles.

This story is from my book: Help from heaven (Answers to prayer), which can be read free on-line here. 

How I came to know St Philomena the Wonder Worker

In 1976 a Carmelite priest started up a club for singles. I was then twenty years of age. In early May of that year our club attended a dance some miles away. I met my husband Chris there. He joined our club. I liked him very much but he took no interest in me. He also thought that I was too young for him anyway. (There is an eleven year age difference). To make matters worse I was extremely shy. By September I had made no progress in getting his attention.

A novena was needed. I went down to a Catholic bookshop (in the Sydney suburb of Parramatta) during my work lunch hour. I asked the shop assistant for a novena to a good miracle working saint. She was very busy with customers who were picking out First Holy Communion gifts, so she pulled out a box full of prayer cards and leaflets and told me to go through it and select whatever I needed. I then found a leaflet on St Philomena the Wonder Worker. It had a novena, some sketchy information and a black and white picture on it.

The most important bit of information on it was that St Philomena was a wonder worker and that she worked miracles of every kind for people in every class of society.

I had never heard of her before, although I know now that my great aunty Rose’s second name was Philomena, so that implies that my Irish great grandmother (who had migrated to Australia) had known about St Philomena and my mother has since told me that the Church of St Brigid, which was built in the middle of the nineteenth century* which was near our home (on the corner of the street that we lived in) had at one stage had a statue of St Philomena in it. (This must have been when I was very little, or even before my birth because I had absolutely no recollection of it).

I made the novena to St Philomena in September 1976 for a boyfriend. I did not specify anyone in particular and Chris took me out to the pictures the following month on October 15. St. Philomena was fast!

We were married on December 3, the following year. In December 2007 we celebrated our 30th wedding anniversary.  We have five children (three girls and two boys).

Since then St Philomena has done a great deal in my life and I have seen her work wonders for myself and for many others.

Mary Ann Matulis

(Australia)

*St Brigid’s Church at Prospect was demolished in 1975.

Some more St Philomena items

Novena to St Philomena the Wonder Worker for the healing of autism

St Philomena chaplet  

St Philomena’s intercession for mothers and babies

Many more St Philomena topics are listed here

Would you like to join a Living Rosary? Click here for more information.

Read my book: Help from heaven (Answers to prayer), free on-line.

The powerful intercession of the Holy Souls in Purgatory for their benefactors and ways to help them.

If St Philomena has granted you a favour, please let everyone know about it by putting a comment in the comments box.  Thank you.

Prayers for the souls of deceased priests

I read somewhere the comment of a priest, that there is nothing so dead as a dead priest. What he means is that when priests die there is a tendency to canonise them immediately, because people think that such a good priest does not need any prayers for his soul. This even happens when they are alive. A priest asks someone to pray for them and sometimes the response is along these lines:  ‘Father you don’t need my prayers. Say one for me instead’.  This is simply not so.  Everyone needs prayers.

A prayer for a deceased priest 

O God, Thou didst raise Thy servant, N., to the sacred priesthood of Jesus Christ, according to the Order of Melchisedech, giving him the sublime power to offer the Eternal Sacrifice, to bring the Body and Blood of Thy Son Jesus Christ down upon the altar, and to absolve the sins of men in Thine own holy Name.  We beseech Thee to reward his faithfulness and to forget his faults, admitting him speedily into Thy holy presence, there to enjoy forever the recompense of his labours. This we ask through Jesus Christ Thy Son our Lord.  Amen.

Pray for the souls of deceased priests

Don’t forget to include in your prayers for the dead, the souls of priest.  They are often overlooked because people think that they went straight to heaven.  No doubt some of them did, but not all of them. They are human beings like us with merits and faults.

Go to this webpage for some reflections on this subject.

and also go to this page for information on the powerful intercession of the Holy Souls in Purgatory and ways to help them.

Charity for the Holy Souls in Purgatory is the best form of charity.

Embarrassing and/or funny moments at Church

Do any of you have stories to tell of funny or embarrassing things that have happened at church? I will start off by relating one of my stories.

During my dad’s requiem Mass, the priest, his cousin made an embarrassing slip of the tongue. Instead of saying: Let us stand for the final commendation, he said, Let us stand for the final condemnation!

Notre Dame University nuttiness

Notre Dame University is no longer Catholic.  They have put pro-lifers including a Catholic priest into jail for protesting the honouring of President Obama (a very abortion minded president).  Why would any Catholic university honour him? No Catholic parent should waste money sending their child there. Send your child to a real Catholic university where their Catholic faith is taught and respected.

How my family received a blessing from Pope Paul VI

In November 1970 Pope Paul VI visited Sydney, Australia.  Mum took us kids on the train to Sydney.  It was a hot day.  Lots of people were lined up along the street in front of Hyde Park. Mum took us to the front of the rows of people and earned the irritation of a lady nearby, who said that they had been there for hours in the heat. So my mother said “Lets cross the street and stand over there”.  We crossed the street and stood near the outside of St Mary’s  Cathedral.  The pope was inside the cathedral having a meeting with the clergy. Finally he came out. He was standing on the back of a ute which was driven out of the cathedral car park.  We were standing at the pedestrian lights.  No one expected the pope’s route to be there, so our family were the only ones standing there. The pope’s vehicle drove past there very slowly and the pope looked down at our family and studied our faces! We waved to him excitedly.  Then he lifted his arm high and gave a blessing to mum and to us children. (Most of us including myself, where in our early teens and were then in high school). Even today I find it hard to believe that this happened.

The story of a vocation to the priesthood

Here is the way that one man became a priest. He is an Australian who was teaching in Papua New Guinea at a Catholic school.  A native boy came to him and said: “Why you not  priest?  You talk with priests, you act like priest.”  That simple remark got him thinking and he later became a priest.

Today is Mother’s Day

Our parish priest is on holidays and we have a retired priest filling in for the month.  At the end of the Vigil Mass last night, Father gave each mother present at the Mass, a signed card (for mother’s day) with the following quote of St Therese on it:

The loveliest masterpiece of the heart of God is the heart of a mother. 

The card was decorated with roses. I was especially pleased because I have been praying to St Therese for a very important intention and that has given me encouragement regarding that matter. 

I know that Mother’s Day is a secular celebration and is also commercialized at that, but Anna Jarvis (the American lady)* who started it to honour her own mother never intended it to be that way. 

In this age where abortion has become so widespread, it does not hurt to give a genuine approach to mother’s day, recognizing the importance of mothers and babies. No pope, priest, layperson, scientist, king, queen, president**, teacher, tradesman, etc., ever got here without a mother*** yet mothers are so despised. They are supposed to go to hospital, get the baby out and turn up at their ‘real job’ in the office, in the parliament, on the board of executives etc. next week. 

Today is not only mother’s day, but it is also my own mother’s birthday. She has always liked the film: The Song of Bernadette, since it was first released in 1943 when she was a child, so I am giving her a DVD of that film. 

*Anna Jarvis was never a mother herself. (She never married). 

**President Obama your own mother Anne made sure you were born and grew up.  Let other babies be born and grown up. I send the same message to Hillary and to many other politicians and others around the world. 

***There are two exceptions to this. Adam and Eve never had an earthly mother, because they started out as adults with a lot going for them.

Saint Peter Chanel (Poem) feastday today April 28

On the isle of Futuna
Father Peter did toil,
To plant the Gospel
In hard rocky soil.

The converts were few
But the hardships were great.
The king’s son converted
Peter gained the king’s hate.

For all of his efforts
Father Peter was killed
It looked like his efforts
Would now be stilled.

But up in heaven
He continued to pray,
And the isle of Futuna
Is Catholic today.

Click here   to read more of my poems

Only a Taste of Lourdes Water

A Jesuit Father writes the following account to a religious paper :

 

The horse which was to have brought me to the railway station, fell on the slippery streets, and, so I missed my train. This was indeed very vexing as I had taken every precaution to be in time. We arrived at the station just as the train was moving off; regrets were useless, so I patiently submitted to my lot, and thought I would say my Office during the time which would elapse before the next train, which was due in about an hour. This was no easy task in a busy station, but if I went away, I did not know what to do with a large bottle of Lourdes water, which I had with me. To put it in the luggage room did not seem quite reverent, but I noticed in the corner of the waiting-room, a man, closely wrapped up, who, to all appearance, meant to sit there for several hours. So I walked up to him, and asked if he were going to remain there for some time. “Yes,” was the reply. This ‘Yes’ was uttered shortly, and signified, rather, ‘What does it matter to you?’  “Are you going to stay till eleven o’clock?” “Yes,” was the curt rejoinder. His voice sounded still gruffer. “If I leave this article here, will you look after it?”  “What is it”? he asked. “Oh, nothing very particular; but will you have, the kindness to take care of it?”

 

In a sulky voice, I at length got the reply- “Very well, leave it there.” I then went off to a quiet spot under some trees, near the station. Having finished my Office, I bought a newspaper, in order to pass away the remaining twenty minutes. Scarcely had I begun to read, when I seemed to hear a voice saying to me: “Go and see what has become of the bottle!” “Stupid bottle!” I could have said but the remembrance of its contents restrained me. I wanted to read, but the voice seemed to repeat: “Go and see what has become of your bottle!” I could stand this no longer, so I went; the man was still there, the man of the slow, rough and morose answers, but he sat with his face buried in his hands, and the tears welling through his fingers. “Oh, Father”, he said, “I will tell you all, yes all.” (How I wondered at this unexpected manner of address.) “You see that I am already an old man. I was born and baptized in the Catholic Church, and until the age of eleven, I practised my religion; then I lost my mother, and my father being already dead, I was left alone in the world.

 

Fortunately, I was in the hands of a good master, but he was a staunch Protestant, and he eventually constrained me to embrace his religion; and to please him, I became a Protestant. Later on I married, and God gave me a good Catholic wife who continually entreated me to return to the religion of my childhood; but I put it off from year to year. When you went away, leaving this bottle standing here, I was curious to know what it contained, and to try what a papist priest’s brandy tasted like, but I soon perceived that it was only water after all. As soon as I had taken a mouthful, a change came over me, I felt determined to become a Catholic once more; and I will do so immediately. So I beg of you, Father, to hear my confession.” This announcement was so strange that at first I believed the good man had been drinking something more than my water, and so I wanted to get rid of him. “We have not any time now,” I replied, “for the train will be here in a few minutes; besides, this is not the place for such things. Come to me at X.”

 

“Now, Father, now,” was the rejoinder. “I cannot come to X; do hear my confession and I promise you that I will go to church next Sunday with my wife.” “Do you know,” I asked, “where this water comes from?” “No” he replied. “It is from the miraculous spring of the Immaculate Mother of God at Lourdes.” “Well then, it is the Blessed Virgin Mary who has obtained this grace for me,” he said. Thereupon I lost no more time and before the train left, I had reconciled this aged sinner to his God.

 

The Mission Bell (poem)

The Mission Bell,

What does it tell?

To come to church and pray,

To worship Jesus,

At the start,

Of each new dawning day.

To thank Him,

Serve Him,

Praise Him,

Love Him,

To abandon every sin.

And also to let go of life’s,

Distracting noisy din.

Our humble messenger,

The Mission Bell,

Takes care of us,

And serves us well !    

Loretta Young

The following story was told by the late Father Aeden McGrath an Irish missionary priest at a talk which he gave in Sydney, Australia.  Father McGrath was in China during World War II when the Japanese Army were in the country.  The Japanese were advancing toward the area where his parish was located. The local women were terrified of what was going to happen when the Japanese soldiers arrived. They begged Father McGrath who was a very short man to protect them.  There was very little that he could do. He prayed to Our Lady for help.  The Japanese soldiers arrived.  The Japanese sergeant had a big crush on Loretta Young the Hollywood actress, who he had seen in movies. He was keen to find out if Father McGrath had ever met Loretta Young.  As a matter of fact Father McGrath had met her, probably through association with Father Patrick Peyton (the founder of the Family Rosary Crusade). The sergeant ordered his soldiers to leave the people in peace, because Father McGrath knew Loretta Young!

This is one of the stories in my book: Help from heaven (Answers to prayers). The book can be read free on-line by pressing here. 

            

Instant Art (Father Paul of Moll O.S.B.)

One of my daughters suffered from a learning disability (autism).  She was having great difficulty learning to speak.  I made up special speech books for her from cheap second hand children’s’ picture books that I brought in bulk from church and school fetes. I had exhausted my supply of the picture books on this project and wanted to make up some more speech books for my daughter. About that time I read a book about a Benedictine priest of Belgium who lived in the nineteenth century.  He was a wonderworker and a zealous promoter of the Saint Benedict Medal. One day I casually prayed to him in these words, “Father Paul of Moll, you are going to have to get me some more children’s picture books or give me some art ability.” After the prayer I went and got a large art sketch book.  There was a book in the house which was illustrated with some cartoons of animals doing human activities like cooking the dinner and mowing the lawn. The pictures in the book were small. I sat down and looked at the cartoon book and began to sketch into the art book.  I did not stop to look at the drawings that I was doing. When I finally checked my work, I was astounded to see that I had made pages of professionally drawn pictures, scaled up to large size to fit the pages. I have never had this art ability before or since. From my book: Help from heaven (Answers to prayer), which can be read free on-line at the following place:

http://missionbell.homestead.com/HelpFromHeavenBook.html

There are many stories in the book. Please have a look. If you wish to give me feedback, you will find my email address on the webpage.

The Fitness Plan

When Pat decided

to get fit,

He purchased himself

an exercise kit.

 

For a week, he worked hard,

at sit-ups and crunches,

And then he began to skip

corporate lunches.

 

After a week,

His muscles were sore.       

Pat decided to exercise

and diet no more.

 by Mary Ann (the owner of this blog)

 

Help for people who are suffering from Panic attacks

Prayer is the most important thing to help the sufferer of panic attack. I have had firsthand experience of this unpleasant condition and have also given voluntary counseling, to people who have been sent to me, by a priest friend who did not know what else to do to help people who came to him, seeking prayers and help to overcome their panic attacks.

These people did recover from the condition.  When you add prayer to the equation things improve out of sight.

 

As well as prayer, I would like to recommend to your friend the following advice.  There are many books on panic attack, however the one which I would recommend to your friend is entitled: Living with It. The author of the book is Bev Aisbett. It is published by HarperCollins Publishers (Australia) Pty Ltd.

 

A search of the Internet  will quickly locate web sites which distribute the book.  What is different about this book, is that it is actually a cartoon book with captions.  The author of the book Bev Aisbett, is a professional cartoon artist, living in Sydney.  She wrote this book, after suffering and recovering from this debilitating condition.  The visual humour in the book is extremely valuable to the sufferer of panic attack, and instructs them in what the condition really is, and the techniques which you can use to overcome panic attack.

 

Briefly the symptoms of panic attack are caused by a release of a large flood of adrenaline into the blood stream, which ordinarily is meant to protect you in dangerous situations, such as when you would flee if you saw a violent person running toward you to physically attack you, or to help you to move with great haste out of the path of a speeding car, which was coming toward you. However in the case of panic attack the body releases a flood of these chemicals inappropriately, (when there is no real danger).  However you are not sunk in this matter. There are steps that you can take to deal with the situation and be healed of panic attack.

 

I will outline some of these for you now.  If you feel the condition of panic attack coming upon you with its unmistakable symptoms of heart palpitations, sweating, shaking, extraordinary fear that doesn’t match the situation that you are in, (for example you may be just simply shopping at the supermarket, where no real danger exists), there are special breathing techniques which can be used.  Another technique is that you dare your body to unleash the symptoms upon you.  The symptoms will abate or stop completely, if you adopt an attitude that says,  “I do not care if the body unleashes the symptoms of panic attack upon me”.  The release of adrenaline in panic attacks is not able to operate when this attitude is adopted.  The more often you get on top of this matter the sooner you will recover from this condition. 

 

It has been observed that consciously switching to a calm attitude, during a panic attack, somehow enables the brain to switch off further releases of Adrenalin, thereby minimising the severity of the attack.

 

The habitual use of relaxation techniques, such as lying down and listening to soothing music or using imagination techniques, such as the imagining yourself in a very relaxed calm place such as the beach, are also useful in the treatment and management of panic attack.  It is important to replace negative and fearful ideas with the calming and positive ones.

 

It doesn’t really matter what stresses in your life led to panic attack, the important thing is dealing with it, and recovering from it.

 

The healing of migraine headaches (Saint Philomena the Wonder Worker)

A lady came to my house. She was selling cleaning detergents in support of a charity. We had a chat.  She told me that she suffered from constant migraine headaches. I asked her if she would like a book and a novena card on Saint Philomena and explained that this saint is a great miracle worker. Even though the lady is a member of the Anglican Church, she willingly agreed. A year later the same lady returned and I recognised her and asked. “Aren’t you the lady that I gave a Saint Philomena book to?” “Yes” she replied.  I then asked her if she had prayed to Saint Philomena. The lady told me that she had prayed to the saint and that her migraine headaches were healed. In addition she said that she had asked Saint Philomena to improve her ten pin bowling score and this was also granted.

Useful links 

Novena to St Philomena the Wonder worker for the healing of autism

Each person who is enrolled in this novena will be prayed for regularly by a priest at Lourdes, in France.

 

Healing of autism (Mary Help of Christians)

In the 1980’s an outdoor shrine of Mary Help of Christians was built and blessed in Sydney. Our daughter was three years of age at the time. She had severe autism and could not talk. The man who was in charge of the shrine was a friend of our family. He told us that he had a plan to hold regular gatherings at the shrine, where people would pray for specially chosen intentions. e.g. a person with cancer. He selected our daughter as the first person who would be prayed for. We willingly agreed. It was his hope that our daughter would receive a miracle healing. On the appointed day, a group of people gathered at the shrine. A Jesuit priest brought our daughter up to the microphone and introduced her to the people and explained to them that she had autism.  He asked them to join with him in saying the Rosary for her healing. At the end of the Rosary the priest asked the people to keep this intention in their prayers. There was no instant miracle that day, but in the years to come our daughter made spectacular progress.

 

Useful information 

The powerful intercession of the Holy Souls in Purgatory for their benefactors and ways to help them

 

Novena to St Philomena the Wonder Worker for the healing of autism

Novena to St Philomena the Wonder Worker for the healing of autism (held twice each month)

If you have an autistic child or know of someone with one, you might be interested in the following information.

Novena to St Philomena the Wonder Worker for the healing of autism

 

For full information on how to enrol someone in the novena and the prayers which are said please visit the webpage.

  

All the names of those who are enrolled in this novena, will be sent to the grotto of Our Lady at Lourdes, in France and in addition, the people enrolled in this novena will be prayed for at an Australian Lourdes shrine as well.