The Guardian Angel: Lanciano and More, Unbelief & Belief

As we look into the minds eye of a doubter that came to believe because of a loving and merciful God, and a believer who believed fervently and became a victim soul for others also because of a loving and merciful God, how is it possible that 70 percent of Catholics have little or no belief in the Eucharist? Do we do all we can to bring others to the Eucharist, or do we talk about how sad it is that so many do not believe, and yet do nothing for the Lord to help those that are at great risk for eternity without the Eucharist as part of their life. If you hesitate at all, think on this question, if Jesus stood before you today, and ask you, why did you not let those I put into your path know what you know about the Eucharist? And you replied, but I felt uncomfortable, or they won't listen to me. And the Lord responded, child if you love me TRY, know that if even one says yes and turns back to me, this is a great blessing for you and for them, so please TRY.

Could you share what you have been given by God's Grace to know, not because you are so smart, but because God first loved you so that you had an opportunity to say YES to Him. Now Share, because many are blind and cannot see. Even if you can't do back flips now, imagine that because of your efforts someone is in Heaven with you and Jesus and HE looks at you (Now remember HE is God) and says, well done my good and faithful Servant, I think that you would want to do back flips across Heaven. My love and prayers in Christ. To Jesus through Mary, GregoryMary

An inscription in marble from the 17th century describes this Eucharistic miracle which occurred at Lanciano in 750 at the Church of St. Francis. “A monastic priest doubted whether the Body of Our Lord was truly present in the consecrated Host. He celebrated Mass and when he said the words of consecration, he saw the host turn into Flesh and the wine turn into Blood. Everything was visible to those in attendance. The Flesh is still intact and the Blood is divided into five unequal parts which together have the exact same weight as each one does separately.

In 1970, the Archbishop of Lanciano and the Provincial Superior of the Conventual Franciscans at Abruzzo, with Rome’s approval, requested Dr. Edward Linoli, director of the hospital in Arezzo and professor of anatomy, histology, chemistry, and clinical microscopy, to perform a thorough scientific examination on the relics of the miracle which had occurred twelve centuries earlier.

On March 4, 1971, the professor presented a detailed report of the various studies carried out. Here are the basic results:

1. The “miraculous Flesh" is authentic flesh consisting of muscular striated tissue of the myocardium.

2. The “miraculous Blood" is truly blood. The chromatographic analysis indicated this with absolute and indisputable certainty.

3. The immunological study shows with certitude that the flesh and the blood are human, and the immuno – hematological test allows us to affirm with complete objectivity and certitude that both belong to the same blood type AB – the same blood type as that of the man of the Shroud and the type most characteristic of Middle Eastern populations.

4. The proteins contained in the blood have the normal distribution, in the identical percentage as that of the serous-proteic chart for normal fresh blood.

5. No histological dissection has revealed any trace of salt infiltrations or preservative substances used in antiquity for the purpose of embalming. Professor Linoli also discarded the hypothesis of a hoax carried out in past centuries. This report was published in The Sclavo Notebooks in Diagnostics (Collection #3, 1971) and aroused great interest in the scientific world.

Also, in 1973, the chief Advisory Board of the World Health Organization appointed a scientific commission to corroborate Linoli’s findings. Their work lasted 15 months and included 500 tests. It was verified that the fragments taken from Lanciano could in no way be likened to embalmed tissue. As to the nature of the fragment of flesh, the commission declared it to be living tissue because it responded rapidly to all the clinical reactions distinctive of living beings. Their reply fully corroborated Professor Linoli’s conclusions. In the extract summarizing the scientific work of the Medical Commission of the WHO and the UN, published in Dec. 1976 in New York and Geneva, declared that science, aware of its limits, has come to a halt, face to face with the impossibility of giving an explanation.

Blessed Anne Catherine Emerich Sustained for more than 10 Years on the Eucharist

Anne Catherine Emmerich was forced to abandon the monastery in which she lived because it was being appropriated by the government. In that period, her health declined and the mystical experiences increased: she received the stigmata and had numerous visions. One of these allowed the finding of the house of Our Lady in Ephesus. In fact, according to antique traditions, it seems that Mary settled, together with John the Apostle, in this city. The miraculous aspect of the life of Anne Catherine is that for years she fed only on the Eucharist.

Anne Catherine Emmerich was born in Germany on September 8, 1774 into a family of farmers and began to work very early. Later on, a religious vocation matured and she asked to be admitted in several monasteries, but she was always rejected because she was very poor and had no dowry. Only when she was twenty-eight years old she was accepted in the monastery of Agnetenberg, where she joined the monastic life with fervor, always ready to take the most difficult tasks.

One night while she was praying, Jesus appeared and offered her a crown of roses and a crown of thorns. She chose the crown of thorns and Jesus put the crown on her head. Suddenly, around her forehead appeared the first stigmata. Later on, after another apparition of Jesus, the wounds also appeared in the hands, feet and side.

In 1811, the monastery of Agnetenberg, was suppressed. Anne Catherine found hospitality, as a housekeeper for a priest; but soon she became ill and was bedridden. Dr. Wesner, a young doctor, visited her and remained very impressed by the stigmata. During the eleven years that followed, he became her friend and faithful assistant, having also a diary in which he would transcribe her visions.

Meanwhile the nun had practically stopped eating: a little bit of water and the Consecrated Host were enough to keep her alive for years. She was very devoted to, and wrote many pages about, the Holy Eucharist: “My desire for the Holy Eucharist was so vehement and irresistible that, at night, I would often leave my cell to enter the Church... Often I would genuflect and prostrate towards the Blessed Sacrament with extended arms, and sometimes I would enter into ecstasy”. Anne Catherine always joined her suffering with that of Jesus, and offered it for the redemption of men.

The most famous biographer of Anne Catherine was the German writer, Clemens von Brentano, who wrote all her visions. Brentano compiled thousands of pages about the Blessed, many of which must still be published. In one of his most famous passages he wrote:

“Anne Catherine stands like a cross at the side of the street, to indicate the right direction to the faithful. That which she says is brief but simple, full of depth, warmth and life.

I understood everything. Always happy, affectionate, dignified, marvelous; always ill, agonizing, but at the same time delicate and fresh, chaste, tried, lucid. To be seated at her side meant to occupy the most beautiful place in the world”.