Wednesday, March 21, 2007
What a huge grace I received today.
I don’t normally go to doctors and that is because I am
usually in excellent health and even if I develop so much as a cold, I never
experience it like others but it passes quickly. Thank God, because I hate going to doctors.
Some months ago I had received the compunction of sensing
that Padre Pio was praying to Jesus for me and Jesus
was hearing the prayer, and specifically so I would not get cancer in my right
breast. I didn’t know what it could mean – it wasn’t a dream but at the same
time it wasn’t anything concrete either. So I disregarded it.
And I started for a reason I cannot explain entirely to go
and spend the night in perpetual adoration chapels a couple of times a week,
depending upon what I could manage. I’m
glad I didn’t disregard that, and it would have been easy to do that because I
don’t have time to sit in a church and pray.
I’m a daily communicant, but that is about all I can manage in terms of
formal prayer in a church. Any other
prayer I would happen to say, I have to say on my way from one place to another. And I have very long days more often than
not, so that when I get to the chapel, I’m too tired to do any serious praying,
although I make the attempt. Certainly,
those staying only an hour fall asleep and I certainly did while staying the
entire night. I have injuries in my body
that will never heal, and so I really should be in bed when I sleep. It wasn’t comfortable, but I can’t explain my
perception of the benefit I derived from being before the Blessed Sacrament for
a few straight hours. Even though it
seemed foolhardy to me, I heeded that compunction and did the vigils. I had to think about it, if it was something
that was done or not, and in fact not too long ago, churches were open day and
night. And certainly people did personal
vigils, sacrificing their physical comfort to obtain a grace or make reparation
to God. I know of people who would make
such sacrifices that now seem to be unheard of, for instance, standing or
kneeling through the whole mass rather than sitting, or not sleeping in one’s
own comfortable bed but rather sitting up in a dank or drafty church for as
long as tolerable. It might not have been
the norm anymore, but it was certainly not something that was unheard of, at
least not in the days when we didn’t have the problems we do today. And so I took that up regularly, as often as
possible.
While at the chapel once, during the night, I had a dream
about my right breast, that it was gone, and had a stitch over the area. But it was just a dream and I disregarded
it.
At another time, I received another
compunction, and this time it felt like appropriate fear that I should
really go to the doctor and get myself checked, in general, the way people
normally do especially when they’re getting older. Or else, I might allow something to develop
that could be avoided. This was
reasonable and so I finally heeded it although it took months for me to act on
it.
After the mammogram, I had returned to my doctor because I
had fallen and needed to follow that up, and he told me that they called him
and said I needed to go back and gave me a script. I also received a certified letter that I had
to sign for, asking me to make another appointment because they had found
something in my right breast, and they needed to look further. The letter reassured me that such findings
are usually benign and not cancer, but they had to see me.
I made the appointment for March 21, 2007. The week before the appointment, on March
12-13, 2007, I had been again in the chapel all night. On the way there, I felt like I was preparing
myself for something that might have been inevitable, possibly chemo or
whatever goes with finding something in the breast and, of course, I hoped that
it would not be necessary at all. When I
left the chapel in the morning, however, I received the compunction that the
cancer had been removed because I had sat in the chapel. I disregarded it and still went for the March
21, 2007 appointment.
They gave me another mammogram and then upon reviewing that,
also required an ultrasound. The
technician administering the ultrasound came back confused after a little while
and told me that there was nothing, not benign, not cancer, not anything at
all. Nothing. Whatever they had seen that caused them to
ask me to return for further mammography and ultrasound was gone.
I was so happy I embraced her. And as I got dressed I cried with
relief. Normally, I would have gone
straight to do my work from whatever interruption such as a doctor’s
appointment, because I have more to do than I can physically handle, but this
time I didn’t. I was near the Shrine and
so I got on the bus and went there a couple of hours before the noon mass. I don’t normally enter by the door at the
bookstore, but this time I did. And I
heard the Neapolitan dialect being spoken and looked inside the bookstore and
it was a movie playing, “Padre Pio,
My mother had received a healing from Padre Pio too, when she was a young woman. She had developed a large abscess right
between the cheek of her buttock and the top of her thigh, which she tried to
hide in the foolish hope that it would pass because she feared doctors. Eventually she had a lot of trouble walking
because of it and her mother insisted on seeing what was there and was shocked
at this bruised looking hard abscess eating away at my mother’s already
chicken-skinny legs. So her mother
called for the doctor and the night before she was operated for it, she cried
and prayed to Padre Pio all night. And the following morning, she was able to
extend her leg. The abscess was
gone. All that was left was a dimple,
and it never came back. (The doctor was
quite angry at having lost his fee after making the trip to do the operation.)
Thank you all for listening.
Now I don’t have to go to get it removed or chemo or anything. I can’t express my gratitude to God enough
and to Padre Pio for his prayers.
In Jesus Mary and Joseph,
Anna Maria Agolli