IT'S A MIRACLE

When was the last time you took notice of the air you breathe? How often do you appreciate the beauty of the sun rising from the east? Have you ever thanked a jeepney driver who labors hard to provide a functioning transport system in our community? Have you ever thought of the farmers and factory workers sweat their brow to deliver the food on your table? Probably seldom if not at all. There are hundreds of things and persons in our life whom we have taken for granted for they have always been there. We miss their importance in our lives for we have grown too familiar with them. Worse is, we have belittled the valuable role they play that enable us to live our life with ease. 

More than the constancy of these things and persons in our life, our belief on what is significant allows us to identify those that matter in life and those that are worthy of our attention and praise. Only the grand and pompous often qualify to our category of significant and important; the superstar who has millions of followers, an event that captured the eyes and ears of people all over the world. They who have changed the world in an impressive manner matters for most of us, not the simple, not the silent. We appropriate great value to the sublime and take little notice of the mundane. But truth be told, in many ways than one, the ordinary contains an extraordinary beauty when carefully discern.  

Someone once asked me, “Why don't miracles happen today; miracles like those in the Bible when the sea is parted into two, five loaves of bread are multiplied, when one can walk on water; miracles like levitation, stigmata, dead brought back to life?” In the post-modern era, when all knowledge needs to be verified by tangible evidence, a man long for Biblical miracles, healing miracles, apparitions, Eucharistic miracles etc. that can bridge his knowledge with that of the God. Why then these miracles cease when they are most needed by some to verify their belief in God? But do miracles really not happen today?

The word “miracle” comes from the Latin word “miraculum” meaning an object of wonder. Miracles leave us astounded, amazed as they unfold before us. They make us wonder. Miracles do happen today as our world is replete with wonderful things and persons. What is lost is our capacity to wonder through the unassuming and modest way. We dismiss a lot of wonderful things and persons God has gifted us with, as ordinary and simple, not wonderful. We long for the magnificent, the grandiose spectacle. That is how we expect a miracle to be. Miracles are not extraordinary in the first instance. They are first and foremost work of God. And that makes them extraordinary. This should be enough reason to leave us in awe and wonderment; miracles as works of God. Unfortunately, we have given God the responsibility to show us miracles the way we want them to be, more than us taking the responsibility of discerning the thousands of miracles he performs in our life, even in the simple and ordinary.

God fills our world, our life, and our very own body, with miracles; miracles that often occur through unpretentious ways. Our familiarity with these may prevent us from recognizing them as gifts from God. The recovery of our capacity to wonder, even just for the air we breathe, will enable to experience miracles in this modern world. 

Wonder His marvelous work. It’s a miracle!

MIRACLES ARE NOT ENOUGH

Time and again, we hear stories of “miracles”: a statue of the Blessed Mother shedding blood, a dancing Santo Niño, an image of the Sacred Heart that appeared on a wall, incredible healing powers, and even apparition of the Blessed Mother to her supposed visionaries.

As in many rural areas in the Philippines, our barrio was not spared from the occasional supernatural wonders that descended among us mortals. I remembered Sadik who became an instant celebrity in our barrio, even before Facebook. Sadik was a simple farm boy. He once helped us in preparing our rice paddies. Nothing was really especial about him, until one day our barrio woke up with a wonder boy who can diagnose and heal sick people. Sadik became a healer. He was able to restore the health of many ill people. He received his power to heal from Christ, so he claimed. For a time, Sadik gained followers, as his fame reached our neighboring barrios. He and his followers distributed white handkerchief believed to be potent talisman against any evil that would try to harm the person in possession of it. In a monotonous and unexciting barrio like ours, before the era of reality shows in a 24/7 cable TV, the story of Sadik provided an entertainment, a kind of interlude. Soon his miraculous fetes failed, so was his fame faded away, and so too our entertainment. We were backed to our simple rural life.   

Miracles may entertain us for a time, but they are not enough to save us. Ours is a faith sustained not by miracles but by the love of God made manifest through the cross of Christ. It is this Cross that saved us, saves us, and will save us. In the gospel (Lk 9:43-45), after Jesus’ transfiguration and deliverance of an epileptic demoniac, He prophesied his impending suffering and death: The Son of Man is going to be handed over into power of men. It came as reminder to his disciples about the true mission of Christ. Though sadly, they failed to understand the place of suffering in the framework of salvation. Miracles are easier to understand. Wondrous marvels are great to behold. But who likes suffering, more so death? Instinct says, avoid pain, it might lead you to your death.

To be a Christian is to follow Christ not only through his three years of healing and preaching ministries in Galilee and regions of Israel, but more importantly in his last days in Jerusalem.  Christianity is an invitation to enter our own Jerusalems and embrace our own crosses. We are not to remain in Cana, Samaria or in other comfortable place where water turns into wine, where bread are multiplied. A great life awaits us in our Jerusalems.

Miracles are not enough to bring us to heaven. It is only through the Cross of Christ, present in our own crosses, that will save us.

Who would still like to follow Christ in Jerusalem?