Praying For Miracles

I am so excited to tell you about the miracle we just experienced. First of all, I want to thank everyone who has been praying for my father. The prayers are working. Wait till you hear what just happened...

My Dad Is Dying A Very Slow Death

My dad has been in home hospice for two years now. He's very sick and dying. I asked him when I saw him back in May (the first time I had seen him in years) if he was happy and if he was comfortable. He said yes and yes.

By the way, it’s not the virus — he’s just old and he has been sick for a long time.

He has cirrhosis of the liver, which the doctor said was not caused by alcoholism. My dad was a bad alcoholic when I was a child, but he quit drinking when I was 18.

He was driving drunk, coming home from a bar late at night, and he had a bad accident. He said he almost killed someone.

The police threw him in the drunk tank and that night an angel came to visit him and told him he had to stop drinking. He hasn't had a drop to drink since that day.

He joined AA, worked his way through all the steps, and one day, he got on his knees and made amends to me for all the pain he had caused me.

Alcoholism Is A Nutritional Deficiency

Anyway, the doctors said it couldn't be the alcohol that caused the liver cirrhosis, because he hadn't had anything to drink in over 30 years. They said it was all the sugar he was eating. He used to keep candy in his nightstand and eat it in the middle of the night.

Of course that makes sense because they say alcoholism is a nutritional deficiency. Bill W., the guy who started AA, said it was a deficiency of B vitamins.

I guess that's what makes you crave the alcohol. And if you can't drink, you crave carbs and sugar.

Julia Ross also writes about this in her phenomenal book, The Mood Cure, which I am always recommending to everyone.  She says alcoholism and drug addiction are a deficiency of nutrients you need to produce "feel-good brain chemicals" like serotonin and dopamine.

You can find The Mood Cure and read or listen to it on Scribd, which is my favorite app to listen to audiobooks and read ebooks. If you use my link to join Scribd, you will get a free membership for 60 days and I get 30 days free, so it helps me, too. After that it's only $9 a month for unlimited ebooks and audiobooks.

Why I No Longer Use Amazon Links

By the way, just so you know, I used to always recommend books on Amazon – I was an affiliate with them for 13 years.

However, I will no longer refer anyone to Amazon because they cancelled me a a few months ago. I got an email from them saying my affiliate links were being pasted on Russian websites.

I have no idea who is doing that – probably some deep state operative or troll. Of course it is not me posting these links – I don't have access to any Russian websites.

I wrote to Amazon Associates and told them that if they don't reinstate my account, I will purse legal action. Just another one to add to the list of Big Tech companies I will be suing because they tried to cancel me: Google (Alphabet), Pinterest, Facebook, Patreon, and now Amazon.

The Last Time I Saw My Dad

I went up to visit my dad this past summer and we watched a Trump rally on TV. He was still lucid then, talking, laughing, smiling.

We also went through all of his photos and scrapbooks so I could take them home with me.

I also signed up for Ancestry.com so I could work on our family tree.  

Nobody else in our family did the genealogy, and if I don't do it, his family history will be lost. He was an only child and both his parents died decades ago.

I had never seen a lot of the photos he gave me.

Including the photo below of my grandparents, Florence and Chester, children of Polish Catholic immigrants in Toledo, Ohio.

I never knew how beautiful my grandmother Florence was when she was young. I only saw her when she was older, like in the photo below of my parents wedding.

Back in Dallas

I hadn't seen my dad in months and I had plans to go to the Clay Clark Reawaken America Tour in Dallas this past weekend. (I'll be writing a post about that soon. Make sure you subscribe to my email updates – it's free.)

I called my stepmother when I got into town but she told me my dad had stopped speaking and making eye contact. She said he's been like this for a couple weeks.

Suddenly, she burst into tears, saying she had to go. I didn't even get a chance to tell her I was in town.

Prayers For My Parents

I prayed for them both, and asked others to pray for them at the conference. I'm a big believer in prayer, especially intercessory prayer (when we pray for others, and ask others to pray for us).

I especially wanted to pray for my stepmom, because she's all alone with my dad. He's been dying for two years, unable to walk or even get out of bed. She has been so good to him, feeding him, making sure he is comfortable.

It was her who pulled him out of the hospice where they weren't even feeding him or paying any attention to him. She told them she was taking him home – and she was able to arrange for at-home hospice.

Surrender to God

Anyway, I was sad that I wasn't going to see my father while I was in town. But I prayed, gave it up to God and said thanks.

And what do you know – my stepmom called me on Saturday morning at the conference. She apologized for hanging up on me. I told her I was in town and would love to come see my dad.

So I went over there on Sunday morning. He never opened his eyes or saw me. But I believed he could feel my presence and I felt like he could hear me on some level.

I prayed the rosary over him. I brought my bottle of holy water, too, and I put some on his forehead.

My dad was raised Catholic and went to Catholic school with nuns. He went to Mass every morning throughout his childhood. So I thought maybe he would enjoy hearing the rosary.

And to be honest, I thought there would probably be a miracle. I didn't want to jinx it by saying I knew we'd have a miracle. But something in my heart told me it would happen.

I have had a few amazing miracles by praying the rosary and asking the saints to pray for me. So I knew something would happen.

Why Intercessory Prayer Works

I really believe that when we pray together in groups of 2 or more, it is much more powerful.

I think this has a lot to do with our covenant with God, which is all about family, which I cover at the end of this post.

Our family is not only here on Earth, but it is also in Heaven. When we join together and ask God to help us, it is so much more powerful in my experience. I don't know why.

Maybe it has something to do with the fact that we feel more confident knowing that others are praying for us, and they are on our team.

I do know that Jesus told us to do this:

“Again, truly I tell you that if two of you on earth agree about anything they ask for, it will be done for them by my Father in heaven. For where two or three gather in my name, there am I with them.” (Matthew 18:19-20)

This is what is called "intercessory prayer" – when we pray for others or we ask others to pray for us or with us.

This is what Catholics do when we ask saints to pray for us. We don't pray to the saints; we ask them to pray for us. This is an important distinction.

Intercession of The Saints & The Church Fathers

If you are hung up on intercession of the saints, I promise to write a longer post about that soon. The bottom line is, as I said, we don't pray to them, we ask them to pray for us. So it is not worshipping idols.

In the meantime, please go read this article on the Church Fathers website: Intercession of the Saints.

The earliest Christians, known as the "church fathers," were all practicing what are now considered to be Catholic (as opposed to Protestant) traditions, including intercession of the saints, infant baptism, and other "Catholic" stuff.

They also believed that abortion is a sin, marriage is a sacrament, only men can be priests, and they believed in the real presence of Jesus Christ in the Holy Eucharist, purgatory, apostolic succession, and the authority of the Pope.

Here's a description of who the church fathers were:

"The early Church Fathers fall into three basic categories: Apostolic Fathers, ante-Nicene Church Fathers, and post-Nicene Church Fathers.

The Apostolic Church Fathers were contemporaries of the apostles and were probably taught by them, carrying on the tradition and teaching of the apostles themselves as their direct successors. Examples of Apostolic Fathers include Clement and Polycarp.

The Ante-Nicene Fathers were those who came after the Apostolic Fathers and before the Council of Nicaea in A.D. 325. Irenaeus and Justin Martyr are Ante-Nicene Fathers.

The Post-Nicene Church Fathers include Fathers after the Council of Nicaea, such as Augustine, John Chrysostom, Jerome, and Eusebius." (Source)

My Prayers for My Dad & Stepmom

I asked God to please take him at the right time, in His (God's) time. I asked Him to help my stepmother move on and start her new chapter in life after my father had passed. I asked Him to give everyone peace and comfort.

And I asked Saint Joseph and Mother Mary to pray for him and to pray for my stepmom – for the best outcome.

After I prayed for my dad and stepmother, I played some Catholic choral music on my phone.

And I sat with my stepmom in the kitchen and we talked for a long time like we always do. We talked about books we were reading and politics and food and recipes.

Gratitude and More Prayers

I drove back home to Austin that afternoon and before I went to bed, I asked my friends on Signal and on Telegram to please pray for him and for my stepmom.

I said: "Please pray for my dad to have a peaceful, easy transition. And pray for my stepmom’s next chapter.  She is sad to lose him but she is optimistic and happy and at peace. She is an inspiration to me."

I also wrote on Telegram about what I am grateful for.

Because I believe when you focus on what you are grateful for, you can surrender your worries and allow God to work in your life.

This is what I wrote:

I am grateful that my stepmom takes such good care of my father. If it weren’t for her, he would have starved to death alone in a nursing home.

I’m grateful he is soon going to be in Heaven with Jesus and his mom and dad and all the saints and angels.

I’m grateful for all the good things in my life, and my family, and all the good people around me.

I’m grateful I got to see him and pray the rosary for him. He doesn’t open his eyes anymore, or make eye contact or talk.  But I believe he heard my voice and he felt my presence.

Gratitude is the feeling you feel when you know your prayers have been answered. And I think when we let go and surrender in gratitude, God can answer our prayers.

Miracle Morning

This morning, when I woke up, I heard back from a number of people on Telegram and Signal and they all said they were praying for my dad and stepmom.

By 9 am this morning, my stepmom called. Right then, I knew we were going to find out the answer to our prayers.

I braced myself, almost sure she was going to say he had passed over in the night to Heaven. But she said, "He  is talking again." I was stunned.

She put him on the phone and he said, "Hi, Ann." He talked to me on the phone for several minutes and he knew who I was. I told him I had prayed the rosary for him. I said, "This is a miracle."

I asked him if he wanted me to come to visit him again next weekend. He said, "Oh, sure."

I told him I'd bring him some ice cream, too. He's just like a little baby now, eating pureed foods and wearing a diaper.

Family is the Covenant

This is why baptism and marriage and last rites are sacraments in the Catholic church.

Scott Hahn writes about the family as covenant. I really recommend reading his books, including Rome Sweet Home and The Fourth Cup and others, but in here's a short introduction to Scott Hahn and his theory of family as our covenant with God. This is really what led him from Protestantism to Catholicism.

The bottom line is this: we are born into a family and we die with our family. We need each other.

You can't survive without family as a baby. You need someone to feed and protect you. You also can't survive when you die without family. You need someone to look after you when you are frail and can't walk or feed yourself. You need someone to bury you when you die.

If you don't have family, you always have the Catholic church. This is why priests and nuns don't get married or have children. The church is their family.

And for all the people out there who don't have family – the homeless, the abandoned – they have the church, too.

And this is why I go to church. I want to be there for others who need prayers. I want to be there for others who need family.

Because we all do. We all need love and we all need family.

Do You Need Prayers?

Guys, I really believe this experience with my dad is a miracle.

The word miracle comes from the Latin word miraculum "object of wonder" (in Church Latin, "marvelous event caused by God"), from mirari "to wonder at, marvel, be astonished," figuratively "to regard, esteem," from mirus "wonderful, astonishing, amazing."

I am so grateful for all the prayers from everyone. Thank you. And I'm grateful to the saints and angels in Heaven for praying for us.

And most of all I am grateful to our Father in Heaven.

If you are having challenges right now, I encourage you to pray. Pray for your loved ones, even when things seem hopeless. It really does make a difference.

And if you need family or friends right now, I will pray for you. If you need healing or food or shelter or comfort, I will pray for you.

If you need prayers, please leave a comment here or on Telegram and I will pray for you. I will also ask the saints to pray for you.

God bless you all.