In previous newsletters, we have recalled that when a small number of (humanly speaking) defenseless Christians transformed a pagan world into a Catholic Christian civilization, three characteristics of those early Christians primarily effected the transformation: 1) their supernatural Faith; 2) their supernatural Charity; and 3) the Miracles worked by the members of the Mystical Body of Christ which confirmed the supernatural origin of their Faith. In the life of St. Benedict, for example, we read of the fearsome barbarian warlord Totila who was brought to his knees by a miracle of St. Benedict. According to one account:
In autumn of 542 AD, while the Goth King Totila was passing through Cassino en route to Naples to attack it, he decided to test Saint Benedict because he had already heard of his gifts and charisms. As a consequence, Totila sent his squire dressed as a king to greet the monk; but Saint Benedict soon unmasked him. When he finally met Totila, he warned him with a dire prediction: “You have hurt many and you continue to do it, now stop behaving badly! You will enter Rome, you will cross the vast sea, you will reign for nine years; however, in the tenth year, you will die.” And that is exactly what happened.
Totila before St. Benedict
What was true of the evangelization of the pagan Roman Empire has continued to be true of later successful works of evangelization. St. Francis Xavier converted huge numbers of pagans to the Catholic Faith in India, and there is no doubt that his miracles played an important part in his success. Many resurrection miracles have been recorded in the canonization processes of the saints during the last eight hundred years, but few saints have been credited with raising as many souls from the dead as St. Francis Xavier, as described in this account:
St. Francis Xavier (1506-1552)
In the streets of Mutan, Francis met a funeral procession bearing the body of a youth who had died of a malignant fever. According to the custom of that area, the body had been kept for 24 hours wrapped in a shroud. Like Jesus with the widow of Naim, Francis pitied the bereaved parents; they pleaded with him.
The saint knelt down, raised his eyes to Heaven, and prayed to God for the lad's life. Then he sprinkled the covered corpse with holy water and ordered the funeral shroud cut open. When the body was visible, Francis made the Sign of the Cross over it, took the youth by the hand, and bade him in the Name of Jesus to live.
The youth rose up alive, and Francis gave him to his parents in good health. The crowd marveled and praised the holiness of Francis. The youth's parents and friends, in gratitude and memory of the deed, erected a great cross on the spot and held a festival there.
At another time, St. Francis was preaching at Coulon, near Cape Comorin in Travancore at the southern tip of India opposite Ceylon (Sri Lanka). This was a seaport, a rough town where many Christians dishonored their name. Francis, while preaching in the Portuguese church there, felt baffled and stymied by the wall of obstinacy he met in his hardhearted listeners.
Now it happened that a man had been buried in the church the day before. St. Francis stopped preaching; he prayed to God to honor the Blood and the Name of His Son and to soften the hearts of the congregation. Then he directed a few men to open the nearby grave of the man who had been buried the day before. He had prayed in tears, and now he accompanied his directions with the burning words of holy eloquence. He told the congregation how God was pleased even to raise the dead in order to convert them.
When they opened the tomb and brought out the body, it was already giving off a stench. On Francis' orders they tore apart the shroud-to find the body already beginning to putrefy. Francis expressed his desire that they should all take note of these facts. (They could hardly escape them!) Then the saint fell on his knees, made a short prayer, and commanded the dead man, in the Name of the Living God, to arise.
The man arose-alive, vigorous and in perfect health! The onlookers were filled with awe. Those who needed it fell at the saint's feet to be baptized, and a large number of people were converted because of this miracle.
The two miracles above were accepted by the auditors of the Rota as resting on incontrovertible evidence from two witnesses, Emanuel Gaga and Joam Audicondam, as well as from one "dead" person himself. These great miracles led almost the entire kingdom--except for the king and a few of his courtiers--to become Christians within a few months.
St. Francis Xavier (1506-1552)
We Will See an Abundance of Miracles
I will return to this theme again and again, because I am convinced that as the Catholic Faith is once again proclaimed far and wide on the foundation of the true doctrine of creation, we will see an abundance of miracles as confirmation of Our Lord’s delight in our willingness to proclaim the Catholic Faith, whole and entire. I have been confirmed in this conviction by the testimony of my friend Lani Randall who is a firm believer in the true Catholic doctrine of creation and whom I introduced to our readers in a previous newsletter. In this newsletter I would like to acquaint you with the wonderful work that Lani is doing to help our persecuted Catholic brothers and sisters in Pakistan—where “the Lord hears the cry of the poor” and miracles occur on a regular basis. Lani describes the birth of her apostolate in this way:
Over a year ago, the Lord has connected me to two beautiful Pakistani Catholics who've worked together for over 12 years to help their persecuted brothers and sisters in Christ. One is a young lady named Kanwal Lazrus, who started an orphanage back in 2011 because Our Lord Jesus Christ told her to do so, and she was obedient. Unfortunately, she lives in Canada now as she was caught evangelizing and was persecuted by Muslim men who almost killed her. Her parents sent her to Canada to stay with relatives and she is still living there after having moved over five years ago. She longs to see her parents again but does not feel safe enough to go back just yet. Her brothers and parents help run the orphanage that she started and she sends money when she can to help support them.
She introduced me to her friend and mentor, Atif Jamil Pagaan, who is a Catholic human rights attorney. Atif and his wife, Fahkra, have three children and are parishioners of Holy Rosary Catholic Church, located in Waris Pura Faisalabad, in the Punjab region of Pakistan. Holy Rosary is located in the Diocese of Faisalabad under Bishop Inderyas Rehmat. Atif has a unique story to share. He grew up very poor and when his father passed away, Atif was desperate to continue his education instead of go to work as a child laborer. Young Atif, only eight years old at the time, decided he would ask the priest of his local parish for help. Atif chose to knock on the priest's door every day until he'd answer him, and finally, the priest opened his door to Atif on the 15th day. That day changed his life as the parish priest took him under his wing and agreed to educate him...and feed him burgers from time to time, per Atif's request!
Years later, Atif graduated law school as a human rights attorney for his people, who are heavily persecuted for their Catholic faith. The police and judicial system in Pakistan is traditionally corrupt as it's a Muslim government, and unfortunately, their government encourages persecution of Christians (mostly Catholic), who make up roughly 2% of the population and who are treated as second class citizens. Their laws towards Christians are unjust, especially their blasphemy law which was created to falsely accuse Christians of disrespecting their prophet Muhammed without question. Many Muslims have been known to accuse their Christian neighbors or co-workers of blasphemy for no good reason other than to retaliate against them and to kick them out of their neighborhoods and places of employment. This has caused much persecution as the families of these falsely accused victims must leave their homes and go into hiding to save their lives. This costs money, too, which inflicts severe hardship, as many of them are very poor.
Mariam’s House
Atif and his lovely wife Fahkra, who is a very devoted Catholic wife and mother, have three children. Atif and Fahkra started Mariam's House as a shelter home to raise up families who've been negatively impacted by persecution. Mariam's House provides shelter, food, and skills training to help families escape generational poverty -- especially those who work as slave laborers in brick kilns. There are families --women and children especially-- who are exposed to unhealthy and harsh working conditions in the brick kilns, and sadly, some are raped in the process, and many times they are deprived of medical needs.
Mariam's House has also been a home to rescued Catholic/Christian girls who are abducted by older Muslim men who have sold them into slavery or forced them into marriages where they are raped and tortured. The countless number of young girls who fall victim to these older men are between the ages of 13 and 17. Atif spends the majority of his time working on such cases to file police reports and find these girls, only to rescue and restore them to the courts that sometimes return the girls to their families, and sometimes don't as they claim that some of the girls are now officially Muslims and belong to their husbands (some are too afraid to speak up in court). Atif has been very good at recovering many of these girls and convincing the court to return them to their families. Many end up in Mariam's House for extra help and support, but more trauma counseling is needed. I've been doing a lot of healing prayer over video chats with Atif translating when necessary and by the grace of God, we've seen much physical and emotional healing take place.
In addition, many of these young girls are from very poor families as the majority of the Christian community are very poor. Atif will donate his services and work pro bono in many cases because he wants to help free these young girls. His life is threatened almost daily as he's had to move his family more than three times in the past few years to escape death threats and make sure his wife and children are safe. It's a very difficult and emotionally taxiing position to be in, but his faith is SO strong as he witnesses countless miracles!
Right now, Mariam's House receives donations from a non-profit organization called All People Free. The founder lives in the U.S. and while he is not Catholic, he was called by God to help Atif and Fahkra. He is very faithful in his monthly donations for food and resources. However, the funds are limited and Atif and Fahkra also have a vision to expand what they're doing to include a Peace Center (a peaceful place for tortured victims of religious persecution). The Catholic diocese in his area does contribute financially to help aid Atif in his cases when necessary, but again, these funds are very limited.
I do what I can to donate as much as possible, and have been fundraising locally with people I know, but I believe God is calling me to officially start a ministry and have a separate account for funding this work. This work is SO important to the Lord, and to Our Blessed Mother Mary, as they want their Pakistani children free from all slavery! My goal is to put together a presentation to start visiting Catholic Churches to raise awareness so together, we can help show our love and support to our Catholic brothers and sisters!
Two Catholic Nurses in Pakistan, Falsely Accused of Blaspheming the Koran
“The Lord Hears the Cry of the Poor”
I want to share a testimony about two beautiful Catholic nurses who were falsely accused of blasphemy. We had a miracle happen when they were first arrested, and Atif called me for prayer. I prayed with him over the phone and as I prayed, he told me God gave him a vision during the prayer, that the law of the lower court would be changed within two months. Usually, cases like these would take years to resolve, but in two months a trial was started—and that was a miracle!
There was another instance where a 13-yr old girl was abducted and forcibly married to a 43-yr-old Muslim man who forced her to convert to Islam. Police did not register the complaint by the parents, so the girl's mother came to Harmony Foundation to get some help, and Atif got involved and was able to register the complaint with police. They raided the man's house and recovered the young girl, and after medical examination, she was found to be two months pregnant. The culprit was sent to jail and got released after five months, and then attacked the girl's mother by shooting her five times in the lower back. Thankfully, by God's grace, the mother survived but needed several surgeries. After sending money for the mother's multiple surgeries, she came home with only a cast on one leg, and pain in that leg. So, I was able to connect with her through Atif using What's App video calling, and I did some healing prayer with her. Atif called me two weeks later and said the mother's pain was gone and once the cast came off, she was FULLY HEALED! I also prayed for emotional healing from all the trauma for both the mother and her daughter, and I blessed the baby (who happened to have the same exact birthday as mine!) -- this is not a coincidence, but I believe God wanted them to know that He loves them as He (with our Blessed Mother's intercession) healed them both so the young girl did not lose her mother! GLORY TO GOD!!! And we were able to send them money to relocate them to another house so they could not be found by this man again.
There are more miracles like this one, including a Muslim mother of five children who witnessed the love of her Catholic neighbors and decided to convert. When her Muslim husband found her praying to Jesus, he tried to kill her, so she fled with their children. Atif sent me a picture of her and her children, one of the little ones did not even have clothes on, he was completely naked because she had to leave immediately for her safety so we raised money to help find her a temporary shelter (Atif could only keep her at Mariam's House for a short time as it endangered the other residents).
Another big miracle is little Komal, a beautiful 9-year-old girl who was riding public transportation with her parents around Christmas time two years ago for the purpose of buying her a dress for Christmas. The little girl was SO happy to have a new dress that she jumped off the bus and as she ran to her house, a truck hit her and crushed her legs. By the grace of God, Komal survived but her legs and feet were severely damaged. So, Atif got involved as the parents had to sell their home to pay for multiple surgeries to restore her legs and feet. As of now, after several surgeries, she still can't walk, and the father ran out of money to help her. I've prayed for her healing over video call and God provided money through a generous donor who offered ongoing therapy services. The therapist said her muscles will not atrophy since we are continually providing therapy and he believes with braces, she can walk, and that's another expense we are praying for. However, I believe with all my heart that God can restore her legs and feet. The generous donor also shared Komal's story with the children in his Sunday school and these children all drew pictures to encourage Komal and prayed for her, sending her love notes (I had forwarded pictures of these children with their drawings to Atif for him to share with Komal and it made her day!). We are continuing to pray for Komal's full healing and restoration of her legs and feet, as we know NOTHING is impossible for Our Lord Jesus Christ!
Here is another miraculous testimony of God's love for His children. Atif met a young man who works as a slave laborer in a brick kiln, whose sister was sold into prostitution. The young man was very oppressed and hurting, he could barely look at me on the video call. He wanted to get out of working in the brick kiln so he could focus on rescuing his sister, so Atif called me to pray for him and his situation. As I prayed over the phone, the young man had a vision and heard God tell him that he'll be set free from the brick kiln by next year. His countenance changed and he was SO, SO happy! God gave him peace about his sister, and while he was too emotional to share details, he just kept smiling and thanking me for praying! It was beautiful to see such an immediate turnaround in his demeanor, as hope was restored! I've had experiences where I've prayed for kidneys to be healed and backaches to leave, along with other physical ailments and I've witnessed the Holy Spirit heal them immediately! It's truly an honor to witness God's love at work like this!
A Peace Center in Pakistan
Atif's vision of a Peace Center will bring peace to our wounded and broken brothers and sisters in Pakistan. They will experience healing of soul, spirit and body through healing prayer, and rehabilitation through legal help and trauma and grief counseling. Medical needs can be addressed as well. It will bring them hope and relief! There also needs to be more financial support for legal fees, travel expenses, relocation of families to safe housing, utility expenses, and other basic expenses. There is more to discuss, but this is just a picture of what more can be done if we partner together to bring peace and healing to this part of the world.
Blessings In Christ through Our Lady of the Rosary,
Lani Randall
In the near future we hope to help Lani set up a fundraising page through our friends at LifeSite News, at which time we will share a link to the page with all of our readers. There is no doubt that Lani’s firm faith in God’s Genesis revelation supports her faith in His power to work miracles here and now. As you join with me in praying for the success of her work for the persecuted Catholics in Pakistan, please continue to trust God to grant miracles of body and soul in answer to our prayers, as we work together to help restore the true doctrine of creation as the foundation of our Faith.
Yours in Christ through the Immaculata in union with St. Joseph,
