Posted on 02/22/2010 10:08:49 AM PST by NYer
"I am not a saint, I am a sinner" says Giovanni Vecchio as he snips at a customer's hair in his barber's shop in a side street of a workaday Rome suburb. "But I have known a saint." He pauses, scissors in mid-air. "In fact, I have cut his hair".
If - or when - the late Pope John Paul II is canonised, it will be in part thanks to Mr Vecchio. Over 30 years ago, when the barber's shop he worked in was near the Vatican, a Polish prelate called Karol Wojtyla wandered in, sat down, and had his hair cut. He became a regular customer.
Mr Vecchio had no idea who "Father Karol" was, still less that he was to become "papabile". "He told me once he was bishop of Krakow, but to me they were all priests. I called them all Father".
But the encounter changed his life: last year, when he was entering hospital in great pain for a hernia operation, he saw a black and white photograph of John Paul II as a young man hanging at the entrance, and "our eyes met". Shortly afterwards, he was discharged. The hernia - and the pain - had miraculously disappeared.
The "barber's miracle" does not form part of the case for beatifiying John Paul - expected in October - for which the miracle most likely to be approved involves a French nun cured of Parkinson's disease after praying to John Paul. Nor can it be considered for the second "medically inexplicable cure" required for canonisation, since that must take place after beatification.
It has, however, been recorded by the Congregation for the Causes of Saints as evidence of the reverence and devotion toward John Paul.
(Excerpt) Read more at timesonline.co.uk ...
"I went downstairs the next morning, walked out of the door, and there on the pavement, rolled up as if someone had just thrown it away, was a small devotional image of John Paul II as he appeared on the balcony that day in 1978. I found another one just the same on New Year's Eve, and another on a fridge magnet someone had thrown away. Now explain that."
Do people pray to the Pope? I thought they prayed to God.
We pray THROUGH the Pope. It’s the same as asking your big brother to intercede on your behalf to ask for a favor from your father. Or, asking a friend to recommend you for a job because your friend is close with the person hiring.
We ask “St. So & So” to take up our cause with any of the three persons of God — God the Father, God the Son, or God the Holy Spirit for a Blessing.
How can a dead man hear you?
Wonderful story. Thanks for posting. I had the good fortune to attend a Field Mass with the Pope in Canada in the mid 1980s. As we were leaving to make our way back to our bus, my friend and I (impatient at the slow, shuffling crowd), moved a barricade asside and ducked around the back of the altar in order to walk faster. We ran smack into Pope John Paul II getting into his Popemobile. We were so startled that we bowed our heads and mumbled “Thank you”. He gave us a wave and a big smile, hopped into the vehicle, and away he went. I’ll never forget his piercing blue eyes.
Faith.
Are you Christian? Do you pray the Creed? Do you mena it? Obviously not if you have to ask that question.
"He is not the God of the dead, but of the living."
This is a common question caused by the ambiguity of the word "pray" in modern English. It means in this context, "ask," In the King James Version of the Bible you can look up the phrase "I pray you" in a Concordance, and find it used 30+ times, but not implying at all that one is speaking to God.
It's used here to mean "Ask for intercessory prayer," as we often ask others to pray for us.
Which reminds me of a funny story. Once I was having lunch with two lady friends; one was married, and her husband, a nicely-aged Italian who learned his rather formal English many years before in Britain, was also present.
As we arrived at the table, the husband said to me, "I pray you, be seated." I looked up a little wryly and said "Pray?"
One gal joked,"He thinks you're a goddess!"
But the elderly gentleman's wife immediately added, "He's almost blind, you know!"
Matthew 22:32
"I am the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob... God is not the God of the dead, but of the living."
And again,
Luke 20:38
"For he is not a God of the dead, but of the living: for all live unto him."
LOLOLOLOL! Pray (in the context you are using it) is very Shakespearean. Sometimes I think that every wise, or clever, comment came from either the Bible, or from Shakespeare. :)
The Book of Common Prayer, the Bible (whether KJV or D-R), Shakespeare, Marlowe, Sidney . . . . the list just goes on and on. They all drank from that same fountain of eloquence.
You can confirm this by tracking down a copy of C.S. Lewis's volume of the Oxford History of English Literature. He gives tons of examples.
The correct response is, “Gramercy, good sir!”
I pray to God that He keep the Pope safe from harm. :)
Gramercy! I like that,I do!
Always fun to out-courtesy the courteous.
An’ a great big ol’ thankee to you, too, beaucoup!
If “the creed” ain’t in the Bible, I don’t pray it or say it.
Jesus teaches us how to pray in the Bible and it does not include praying to dead people.
I believe it is heinous that anyone would try and steal the Glory and Honor of God by praying to a dead human being.
Bodleian, do you consider dead those whom Jesus says are living?
Jesus spoke with these, who have passed on and yet are living.
Matthew 17:3
"And, behold, there appeared unto them Moses and Elias talking with him."
How can we do wrong if we follow His example?
Please understand, too, that the "Communion of Saints" is a Biblical teaching,since it is the union of those who are "in Christ" in one body, the Body of Christ. This is taught very beautifully by Paul.
Romans 12:5
"So we, being many, are one body in Christ, and every one members one of another."
Neither we nor those of the faithful who have gone on before us, are dead cells and organs in a half-dead Christ. We all are living members, who have a living connection with Him, and with one another.
Just like I have a living connection with you.
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