Ever experienced/witnessed a miracle?

[sohackedoff]

Have you ever experienced or witnessed a miracle? If so, please share.

My mum, a committed Christian, had ulcerative colitis. She'd had it for years and was on the verge of having a colostomy bag fitted. She received prayer and was healed.

I think (know) prayer can work but feel it is unrelated to God/Jesus/Jehovah and all to do with the people praying. I believe positive focussed energy be it by group prayer or by a healer can change/heal.
I believe we as humans have the power to do much more than we expect and has NOTHING to do with God.
Obviously every person cannot be saved - the example given of someone dying in their 90s.

I believe I met my husband from the power of prayer.

I'm a science based health care professional.

"Thank you God" perfectly sums up my feelings on God

Suggesting that someone's religion can be given a 'thorough de bunking' is VERY dismissive and rude!

Waitrose, I don't think the PP meant to be rude. It's just she is starting from a very different place from religious people: that of assuming there is no God because without evidence in the existence of something it makes more sense to start from that.

So she is seeking to find a scientific explanation for miracle rather than a faith based one.

If prayer and religion gives someone personal, spiritual comfort then good for them. Churches are beautiful, calm places.

But when people start attributing medical miracles to god it's bizarre. I genuinely don't understand how anyone can truly believe there is a big man in the sky controlling each of us, choosing who lives and who dies depending on how much they pray.

Part of my job is to be on call for the local hospital and care home to come out and say prayers with the dying. This experience has made me think very hard about what healing prayer might be. I'm skeptical,about miraculous physical cures but I've prayed at the bedside of people with advanced Alzheimer's at the request of distressed family members who didn't know what else to do and I've felt hugely inadequate in the face of such suffering. I pray, I listen to the family, I often anoint the dying person with oil and I leave wondering what that was all about. In most cases I am asked to do the funeral as the person went on to have a peaceful death.

There will of course be the usual scorn and vitriol aimed my way as if you don't believe that God exists then what I'm asked to do seems mad. At the sharp and pointy part of end of life care cAre homes and hospitals don't call in atheists when someone is dying. They call a priest. I don't know if this counts as healing as there is still death. But I've seen good deaths which I would say are down to healing prayer.

"Suggesting that someone's religion can be given a 'thorough de bunking' is VERY dismissive and rude!"

Really?

Oh, yes. I forgot. Christian privilege..........

Thegreenheart- you are providing comfort and solace for the living according to their cultural traditions. An admirable calling.

My mum's miracle was a long time ago. Her consultant simply said it could not be explained.

Just to clarify, I asked if anyone had experienced or witnessed a miracle. If you haven't then why post? Start a different thread. God bless.

If pointing out facts and scientific explanations is rude then I'll live with that. You can take comfort in the belief my rudeness will earn me eternal damnation

Why has God never cured an amputee?

He 'cures' other misfortunes, why not loss of limb?

Love the Tim Minchin song! Perfect.

I sincerely believe God answers all prayers, but sometimes the answer is No or not yet.
It can be hard to understand God's will. I don't know why there is so much suffering in the world, much of it to innocent people.
Prayer can help us to understand and accept God's will and to change our will to His and I believe prayer has enormous power.
People will pray for a person to be healed, perhaps it's a good idea to add "if it is your will" into our prayers.

SoHackedOff Asking the circumstances of the miracle is perfectly acceptable I think. Surely when you post about something that people are unsure exists you expect people to be asking for clarification. They may be doing this to debunk your theories, they may have experienced something similar and want to understand it better or they may need to find some comfort for themselves that miracles do exist in their time of need. I don't think it's your place to tell people what to post.

I believe and I've experienced some things I attribute to Devine intervention.
A surgeons skill in one instance and two couples who met against huge odds.

have none of you seen Derren Brown's Miracle
very entertaining, and astonishing!
there's no discussion, but basically he reproduces many of the 'miracles' supposedly happening at these evangelical gatherings
I think what a PP said is truest, to offer comfort to people within their belief systems is a true service and will make a real difference, to their psychological well being. Attempting anything beyond that raises all the issues raised here (and by Tim Minchin).

I was seriously injured 4 years ago. I "died" twice in the helicopter as I was being evacuated. I don't remember praying as such at the time, but I do remember feeling like it was ok for me to let go. Next thing I know, I woke up 6 days later in hospital being told it was sheer luck that I was alive and still have my right arm and leg.
When I was told the extent of my injuries and how much rehabilitation I would need, I was devastated. I was told that they weren't sure whether my ability to have children would be affected, but if I did get pregnant, then it's highly unlikely I would be able to carry to term or deliver naturally because of the damage done to my pelvis. 4 years later, I have a perfectly healthy 17 month old Dd, who was conceived naturally, very quickly and delivered naturally, and I'm 37 weeks pregnant with DC2. My babies are my miracle!

Should have said at the start of that post that I'm a catholic!

I don't know about Tim Minchin's song tbh. I mean yes it's funny and accurate but really what is the point of looking down on people?

And what is the point of calling the woman who believes a "middle class white bitch" just because she believes?

It just seems so pompous and smug. If people aren't using their religion to be cruel / invade countries then sure challenge their beliefs through debate but mocking them a la Tim Minchin is pointless and nasty.

Funny and accurate. But incredibly angry. I suspect Christians often don't realize quite how angry some of the things they do and say make non Christians. And I'm with Minchin on this one. The idea that people believe in a God who choose to cure a rich woman's cateracts while ignoring poor children dying of malaria makes me incandescent.

BertrandRussell to be fair I'm a Christian and I can't bear "those" so called Christians. The smug ones who live their blinkered little lives judging other people and think they're better than everyone. I don't know what God they believe in, because it ain't mine.

"The idea that people believe in a God who choose to cure a rich woman's cateracts while ignoring poor children dying of malaria makes me incandescent."

Come on, people who believe in God's ability to perform miracles aren't actively dismissing the plight of those children with malaria are they?

In fact charity is a key pillar of most religions.

Religion does a lot of good when it's filtered through good people.

"Come on, people who believe in God's ability to perform miracles aren't actively dismissing the plight of those children with malaria are they?"

Possibly not. But the God they believe in is.

I've never really understood praying for miracles in say, terminal cancer. I'd rather pray for a good death, peace, redemption etc.

I think maybe the miracles that do happen are not so much for the sake of the person healed, but to give others faith.

Is that why they are limited to conditions that are time limited, prone to spontaneous remission or which have a strong psychosomatic element? Or which have not had a definitive diagnosis before the miracle occurred?