Journey Back to Eden.pdf - St Mark Coptic Orthodox Church Chicago

A TIME TO INTERCEDE 113She didn’t look any older than a week or two. He had taken herto many specialists and they had given up all hope. She could die atany moment. Actually, the baby looked more dead than alive. He toldme that she had never opened her eyes or moved her limbs or criedsince she was born. She hadn’t grown at all. It was all they could do toforce nutrition down her throat. Could I give his baby a blessing?Well, I froze on the spot. It was a very awkward situation. I hadpeople in front of me pointing to the heavens and shouting thatthey could see the Virgin Mary. I had people behind me pressing toget a blessing. I had a man, a widower, crumpled in front of me,and I had his dying baby in my arms. It was not something forwhich I had been trained in the seminary, and I really didn’t knowwhat to do. I was standing near the open doorway. The wind,which had been picking up, was whipping through the congregation,so I laid the cloth scapular of my habit over the baby to protecther from the bitter cold. To hold it down, I placed my woodenhand-cross on top of the scapular to keep it intact on the baby.That’s all I did, and I did it in a kind of automatic fashion,spontaneously, just as a means of keeping the baby warm, notknowing what else I could do. But apparently the father of thechild thought that this was some kind of special blessing, hidingthe baby under the scapular with my cross on top. He got down onhis knees and everyone else in the church, now watching us, quieted,and got down on their knees too. The whole congregationwas praying, but I was standing there, frozen. I don’t rememberpraying; God forgive me. I don’t remember saying a blessing, oreven thinking a blessing. I only remember being paralyzed.In a few minutes the people who were shouting outsidestopped shouting because the apparition had passed—an apparitionI never got to see, although I had come here for that purpose.When the people outside grew quiet, everybody inside the churchgot up. I removed the scapular and the cross from the baby andgave her back to her father. And there in her father’s arms the babyopened her eyes. She took a deep gulp of air and let out a cry! Shebegan to move her arms, and her complexion, which had beenbrown and gray, turned pink in a moment! The little man begancrying and laughing at the same time and the people in the congregation,who quickly learned what had happened, became jubilantwith gratitude and praise. Arabic ululations (their tongue-rollingsound of joy) filled the church!