The Rev. Antonio Elfeghali clutches his right fist as hard as he can. It is the only way he can describe what happened to his heart when he first saw 9-year-old Karim Ahmad sitting in the sun outside the boy's house in the mountains of Lebanon.
"I had never seen anything like it," he said. "He had black scabs all over his face. He was covered with insects. He had no hair, no hands. His feet were bleeding.
"I had never seen such suffering."
Elfeghali is at St. Michael's Catholic Church in Muskegon.
Karim is at his side.
They are half a world away in time and space from the day Elfeghali first saw the child.
The priest is in [Michigan] for a few weeks to do some work for the Maronite order.
Recently, he baptized the little boy who came here in July to receive medical treatment from Muskegon and Grand Haven doctors who have donated their talents and time.
It was a joyous occasion in the life of the child whose physical pain is unfathomable -- the disease has taken his hair and his fingers and is in the process of taking his toes.
It has not taken his spirit.
Out of the darkness
Karim is a boy who does not have parties, who does not get invitations to play dates, who cannot go to school because schools in Lebanon would not know what to do with him.
Karim, Elfeghali said, was living an isolated life. Shunned out of fear, ignorance, intolerance and even disgust, the child's life was confined to two windowless rooms where he lives with his parents and older brother, Nabil.
"The house is a place where animals used to be kept," said Elfeghali. "Someone is letting them live there. It has no heat."
But there are things worse than illness and poverty, he said.
"Karim had no friends. You can live with disease," the priest said. "You cannot live with loneliness."
Liz and Joe Zagar, of Laketon Township, are filling that void.
It was Liz Zagar who saw a picture of Karim on Elfeghali's Internet blog last spring, took in Karim and his mother, Ebtisam, in July and secured medical evaluation and treatment to help alleviate some of the horrors of his genetic skin disease.
Recently, there was a brunch at St. Michael's Catholic Church for Karim. There were little bags of M & Ms tied with ribbons for the guests. There was Arabic music. Guests shook his hand, hugged him, gave him kisses.
The occasion was Karim's baptism, First Communion and confirmation. He'd decided he wanted to be Catholic. He loves the Blessed Virgin who, he said, tells him "not to worry."
Ebtisam agreed to the baptism. So did his father, Younes, who remains in Lebanon with Nabil and continues to work sweeping streets.
It was magical timing that Elfeghali could be here to perform the sacraments for Karim. After all, it was Elfeghali who set in motion an outpouring of help for the boy.
Liz Zagar, who had attended an Ann Arbor retreat led by Elfeghali and was following his work in Lebanon, knew she was "supposed to do something" when she saw the picture of Karim.
It was the Zagars who raised money through a fund at National City Bank to bring the boy and his mother to America. It was the Zagars who lined up doctors to treat him. It was the Zagars who began looking for a miracle.
"There will be no cure," Elfeghali said during the sermon at the Mass at St. Michael's. "There is no cure."
"The miracle," he said, "is the love given to Karim by this family who is not rich -- not financially rich -- but rich with love."
"Karim's mother told me that she never expected to see such angels on earth," Elfeghali said.
Wrapped in love's arms
Karim, who is small for his age, is taken to the baptismal font and held during the ceremony by two of Joe and Liz Zagar's five children, Laura, 23 and David, 21.
Karim could have walked on his own and is proud that he has shoes, but the pain in his raw feet is unbearable. He asked that "Mama Laura" carry him.
With the holy water, Karim is baptized into the church.
With a white smock representing purity placed over his shoulders, he is confirmed.
He receives the bread of life -- the body of Jesus Christ, as the church teaches.
He puts his head down. His thoughts are private. The prayers are his alone.
The Rev. Elfeghali takes the child into his arms and carries him up and down the aisles.
It is a presentation. A celebration.
The choir sings: "Ask not to be consoled as much as to console ... as much to be loved, as to love."
When the Mass ends, some of the people of the church come up to Karim to congratulate him. Some put money into the pocket of his crisp white dress shirt. One woman gives him a guardian angel pin.
He thanks them with the French "Merci."
On this day, he is the center of attention. The boy of the hour. The special one.
