WOMAN WAS CURED OF 'HOPELESS' LIVER CANCER AFTER TRIP TO MEDJUGORJE
Journey of Hope
By Maureen FitzGerald
This is written to give testimony to the love and mercy that God has for each of us, and to give all Glory to God the Father, Son and Holy Spirit and to give honor and thanksgiving to Our Lady of Medjugorje for intercession to Jesus for my healing.
In April 2022, I was surprisingly diagnosed with advanced cancer of the liver with too many tumors to count, and was offered no hope. They had no treatment, ruled out transplant surgery and I was given prognosis of only three months to live. It was then that my husband and I were inspired to call it our Journey of Hope since no hope was offered. We immediately called our Rosary group members and our family and friends to ask for prayers. It was Good Friday 2022.
One cancer center out of four offered me experimental immunotherapy. After two treatments, my body overreacted and multiple hospitalizations in June and July put me near death. In July, the cancer metastasized to my spine. Doctors again offered no hope though I reminded them of the Divine Physician being in charge. They told my husband to put me in a nursing home with hospice.
When I left the hospital in July, I went home. I could not walk other than on my heels using two canes. My nerves were damaged and I had massive edema, and was put into congestive heart failure and I was blind in my right eye. We were praying the Divine Mercy Chaplet and Rosaries daily. There were so many Rosary groups praying for me and my family, it had spread from USA to the Philippines, England, Ireland, and even underground China! It was overwhelming and so wonderful. It was like a giant blanket of prayers that covered us and strengthened us. One Rosary group sent me the Surrender Prayer Novena which I began to pray nonstop. It took me four times to pray the Novena before I surrendered my will to God's Divine Mercy.
In late August 2022, my Journey of Hope continued while going to confession. The priest listened and suggested to me that I had spent plenty of time with doctors, and maybe I needed to spend more time with God. I asked him to repeat it three times.
Two days later, my friend Julie Rasp asked us what was next. Doctors had no plans. She then asked us to go on her Medjugorje pilgrimage which was leaving in two weeks. It included Fr. Dan Powell, our pastor, who had been spiritually administering to us these past months with Communion, Confession and Anointing.
We left September 12, 2022 on our Journey of Hope which took us to Medjugorje. My husband's prayer petition was for a miracle and mine was to Our Lady for peace in my heart concerning our daughters. I asked her to take care of their hearts if God's will be to take me.
After a couple of days, I went alone to early evening Confession walking with my two canes, knowing that if I fell, a kind person from the village or pilgrim would help me get back up. The Irish priest I had for Confession listened and told me to find Father Leon and he would know what to do. I responded, "Who is Fr. Leon and how do I find him?" He told me not to worry and that I would find him. I informed Fr. Dan of my Confession and asked him about Fr. Leon. He was surprised I did not know him, but realized I was staying outside for Mass and would not have seen him. He concelebrated Mass the next day with Fr. Leon and would talk to Fr. Leon about me.
"Is anyone among you sick? He should summon the presbyters of the church, and they should pray over him" (Jms 5:14)
I met Fr. Leon after his talk outside the yellow hall. Fr. Dan introduced me and Fr. Leon (who was a physician before he became a priest) asked about my cancer. I told him, "An Irish priest sent me to you, and he also told me you would know what to do." Fr. Leon realized it was Fr. Mike who sent me. Fr. Leon asked if he could pray over me and I said, "Yes."
As Fr. Leon prayed with his hands on my head, I immediately felt this intense heat from my head going down to my spine. I closed my eyes and knew the Lord was doing something and began thanking him for what was happening. Fr. Leon blessed me and we parted. Walking with my two canes I leaned against the yellow building waiting for my husband. With my mask on, I began to smell a beautiful fragrance of roses which overpowered to the point that I took my mask off. Breathing fresh air, I looked around and saw no plants or bushes, just concrete. I put my mask back on, and the intense beautiful fragrance of roses returned. I started crying and thanking Our Lady of Medjugorje for Her intercession to Her Son.
The next morning, I felt very strong in my legs upon waking and the severe edema was completely gone. My husband helped me up in the room, and I could walk without my canes! We thanked God for this tremendous change, I could now walk and had peace in my heart.
When we got home to America, I had an appointment with my family doctor. The doctor was shocked to see me with no leg edema and no canes. He asked me what happened. I reminded him I went on pilgrimage and believed God had healed me through the intercession of His Mother Mary. He then went to see my lab work which was just done when I had returned from my pilgrimage. His jaw dropped and he started telling me my tumor marker was 1.3 (less than 3 is normal).
When I was diagnosed it was 8,000. He also told me the rest of my liver enzymes were perfectly normal. I was pleasantly stunned and amazed at God's mercy and love. He turned to me and said something happened to my body and I needed to get MRIs. He sent me to the Oncologist who ordered an MRI of my abdomen and spine. The resulting abdominal MRI showed all tumors gone except for one which was 3cm, but had been 8cm before. The resulting spinal MRI showed no tumors. We were overjoyed and amazed. The Oncologist had the cancer surgeon come to evaluate the 3cm tumor. The surgeon said he would order a surveillance scan in three months, as he could not understand the results of the recent scans and lab work.
Maureen and Michael on their pilgrimage of thanksgiving in 2023
At the three-month MRI, the scans showed all tumors were gone!!! We were so happy, and amazed at the results which cannot be explained by medical science. But as we know, nothing is impossible with God. Jesus is our Hope, Our Lady is the Mother of Hope. All thanksgiving to His Divine Mercy and Our Lady's loving answer to all the prayers that went up for our family.
My husband and I were praying and both of us felt that God's plan for us would be to promote the Divine Mercy devotion as well as give thanks to Our Lady of Medjugorje's intervention by sharing our Journey of Hope. The Divine Mercy Chaplet and Surrender Novena teach us to trust in Him and His plan for us all. We returned in September 2023 to Medjugorje as a Thanksgiving pilgrimage to Our Lord and Our Lady. We ask all who hear about our Journey of Hope to thank God and Our Lady, for we cannot thank Jesus and Our Lady enough for this healing. Along with the Rosary please pray the Divine Mercy Chaplet for all those in need of Hope.
Jesus I trust in you!!!
Editor's note: Maureen is from Lancaster, PA. For the complete testimony as well as Fr. Leon's testimony go to www.marytv.tv, Fruit of Medjugorje #538. I would like to thank Thomas Fleming, who sent me the link to Maureen's testimony after he read a prayer request I wrote for a member of our mailing crew who has liver cancer. Please keep our friend Georgia in your prayers. It is because of Georgia's liver cancer that you are reading this beautiful story of hope.
Fr. Leon's Commentary on Maureen's Healing
I'm Fr. Leon Pereira. I'm the chaplain here in Medjugorje for the English-speaking pilgrims. I met Maureen FitzGerald here a year ago, September 2022. I was giving a talk in the hall. When I came out, I was being mobbed by people, and suddenly they parted and Maureen came up with her husband, Michael. She was very emaciated. She didn't look great, she looked a bit yellow, she looked cachectic, and she didn't look like she was very long for this world. When you have cancer and you're riddled with it - she obviously had that look.
She told me about...what the cancer was, and also said that two priests had told her to come and find me. So after a short conversation, I worked it out. She meant Fr. Michael Fitzgerald [same name as Maureen's husband, but no relation], who is a lovely priest from Cork who has been living here in Medjugorje for the past couple of years. And Fr. Dan Powell, her pastor, as well, directed her to me. So when she came up and she said she had been asked to find me, my first thought was, "I don't know why." So I prayed over her. I asked her if she wanted to be prayed over. I laid my hands on her and I prayed, and when I prayed, the first thing is, I started to imagine all the tumors, where she told me the tumors were, sort of evaporating from her body. But at the same time, I thought - I actually did think - "Oh no, what will happen if she's cured? Because that'll be the end of my life!" So I said explicitly to the Lord, "Please, through the intercession of Our Lady of Medjugorje, let Maureen be cured as a proof to them that Our Lady is truly appearing here in Medjugorje." I said that explicitly. So I prayed over her.
Fr. Leon
Then a couple of days later, I was back towards the house where I live with the Franciscans, and Maureen just appeared with her husband and she looked better. She was walking a lot better and I said, "Shall I pray with you again?" And so I did. And I said the same thing again explicitly. "As a proof to them that Our Lady is truly appearing here in Medjugorje..." I've never seen Maureen before in my life before that visit last year. And after that, I didn't think I would hear from her. I do remember the look in her husband's eyes - Michael's eyes - I do remember feeling very moved, seeing what he was carrying, the burden he was carrying...
A few months later, I got an email from Fr. Dan Powell, saying, "Do you remember this lady, Maureen?" And, of course, I did. He told me that she was well, she was cured, that her blood results were normal, and the tumors had shrunk or disappeared. And then shortly after, I had an e-mail from Maureen herself, with a lot more details. And I encouraged her to send all this medical data to the Bishop here, the Apostolic Visitator, Archbishop Aldo Cavalli. So she told me this morning that she did that yesterday. I think she had a meeting with the Bishop and handed over all the medical documentation to him and told him the story as well.
It is wonderful, it is absolutely wonderful to see her well, on her feet! I have to admit when I saw [her] this year, I didn't actually recognize her. When she said, "Do you know who I am, Father?", I only knew because her pastor was standing nearby. But I didn't recognize her; the contrast was so complete, so different. It's all God's work. He's healed her, but through the intercession of Our Lady of Medjugorje, because that's explicitly what I asked for, that it should be a proof to them that Our Lady truly is here.
And I think that Maureen also feels that motherly presence of Our Lady, motherly love and care over her and her family. So we praise God for this. It's a wonderful gift. Praise God!
Gene, why do you keep printing this ridiculous nonsense?
ReplyDeleteNot a single news medium - print, broadcast or social - has picked up on this story in TWO YEARS.
Are we expected to believe that a story as sensational as this would not have been all over the news media round the world had the media been able to verify it from the medical evidence? It hasn't, and the only possible conclusion is that there is no reliable evidence to produce.
It would be very simple to do, and I suggest that you set about this task straight away - it would after all validate the bogus bollocks about Medjugorje with which you have stunk up the internet for years.
[a] produce the scans, clinical notes and testimony from Ms Fitzgerald's general practitioner, consultants and hospital records from March - July 2022. This would show that Ms Fitzgerald had been diagnosed with a terminal liver cancer which had metastasised to her spine, blindness in one eye and congestive heart failure. It would also record the medical verdict that she had weeks to live and the diagnosis that her husband should seek hospice care for her.
[b] produce the scans, clinical notes and testimony from Ms Fitzgerald's general practitioner, consultants and hospital records from September 2022 - March 2023. This would record the complete disappearance of the liver and spinal tumours, as well as the restoration of sight in one eye and the recovery from congestive heart failure.
Simple - so why won't you do it?
This post is not only stupid, it is offensively stupid. My first wife died of liver cancer, and the memory of her diminution from being a vital, intelligent, gracious and feisty woman to a scarecrow who could not bear to see her own face in the mirror is something I will carry to the grave. In publishing this kind of bogus, sentimental CRAP you are pissing on her grave. I would LOVE to kick you in the balls for publishing this piffle.
Fr. Leon Pereira, mentioned here and chaplain resident in Medjugorje, is a former medical doctor. Better placed than you Detters to comment here.
ReplyDeleteGene, why do you keep printing this ridiculous nonsense?
DeleteNot a single news medium - print, broadcast or social - has picked up on this story in TWO YEARS.
Are we expected to believe that a story as sensational as this would not have been all over the news media round the world had the media been able to verify it from the medical evidence? It hasn't, and the only possible conclusion is that there is no reliable evidence to produce.
It would be very simple to do, and I suggest that you set about this task straight away - it would after all validate the bogus bollocks about Medjugorje with which you have stunk up the internet for years.
[a] produce the scans, clinical notes and testimony from Ms Fitzgerald's general practitioner, consultants and hospital records from March - July 2022. This would show that Ms Fitzgerald had been diagnosed with a terminal liver cancer which had metastasised to her spine, blindness in one eye and congestive heart failure. It would also record the medical verdict that she had weeks to live and the diagnosis that her husband should seek hospice care for her.
[b] produce the scans, clinical notes and testimony from Ms Fitzgerald's general practitioner, consultants and hospital records from September 2022 - March 2023. This would record the complete disappearance of the liver and spinal tumours, as well as the restoration of sight in one eye and the recovery from congestive heart failure.
Simple - so why won't you do it?
So sorry to learn about what happened to your first wife Detters.
ReplyDeleteNo you are not, Gene. You haven't an atom of compassion in you.
ReplyDeleteMaybe you should contact Fr Dr Leon Periera OP about this case. He was formerly a medical doctor in the UK and he is now chaplain to the English-speaking pilgrims in Medjugorje.
ReplyDelete"I would LOVE to kick you in the balls for publishing this piffle."
Now I know you don't mean a word of this. But, I understand your anger and frustration. Most likely you are thinking: "If only my first wife would have had the opportunity to make a pilgrimage to Medjugorje."
And yes, I am saddened about your first wife's suffering and death from liver cancer. Was she a smoker Detters?
GENE
Take my first wife's name out of your grubby mouth, and mind your own fucking business.
DeleteAnd yes, I would love to kick you in the balls for publishing this pernicious rubbish whereby religion takes on the quality of fairground fortune telling and sympathetic magic - to traffic in this crap is to blaspheme the mercy of God.
And, lest we forget:
Had Ratzinger unfrocked Kiesle in 1985, the abuse of children at St Joseph's would not have continued for a further three years. That is a FACT, no matter how often you try to deny it.
Ratzinger's apology in full reads as follows [my footnotes}:
“I can only express to all the victims [1] of sexual abuse my profound shame, my deep sorrow and my heartfelt request for forgiveness. I have had great responsibilities [2] in the Catholic Church. All the greater is my pain for the abuses [3] and the errors [4] hat occurred in those different places [5] during the time of my mandate."[6]
1 ALL THE VICTIMS, Gene: victimS, plural: you can tell this by the S on the end of the word. All the victims of sexual abuse that occurred during Ratzingers time as Archbishop of Munich [1977- 1982] and later head of the Congregation of the Faith and Pope - that is, 1985 - 2013. The phrase "ALL THE VICTIMS therefore must include the victims of Stephen Kiesle between the years 1985-1988, when Ratzinger failed to unfrock Kiesle. [2] I HAVE HAD GREAT RESPONSIBILITES [see 1 above]: and one of those was to detect, root out and expel priests and others in the Catholic Church whose favourite hobby was buggering small boys and raping little girls. These GREAT RESPONSIBILITIES obviously include those children abused by Stephen Kiesle after Ratzinger failed to unfrock him in 1985. [3] THE ABUSES - these must include the abuses committed by Stephen Kiesle after Ratzinger failed to unfrock him [unless you can prove differently, Gene?].
[4] THE ERRORS - these must include Ratzinger's failure to unfrock Kiesle in 1985 and probably his failure to alert Fr Thomas Ryan that he was allowing a convicted paedophile rapist to minister to the young people in his church.
[5] THOSE DIFFERENT PLACES - except, of course at St Joseph's Church, Penole, CA, where Stephen Kiesle, still a priest, continued to abuse children during the years 1985-1988 - Ratzinger made it clear that his apology did not include this, didn't he, Gene, and you can prove that, can't you? What's that? oh, you can't? Dear me, and YOU call ME a lying tosser... [5] DURING MY MANDATE: that is, during the years 1985 - 2013.
It is clear to anyone whose mind has a greater ratiocinatory capacity than a pair of skid-marked underpants that Ratzinger was apologising for all the sexual abuse committed on his watch 1985-2013 by priests whom he failed either properly to oversee, accurately to diagnose and condignly to punish, as well as arranging for their being unable to access children and young people ever again.
"I can only express to ALL the victims of sexual abuse my profound shame, my deep sorrow and my heartfelt request for forgiveness." It's that word ALL that gives it away, Gene: I'm sorry if it's confusing. Stuff your pissy little opinions up your arse. I will not apologise for telling the truth, and I will go on telling it until you acknowledge that it is the truth. In the meantime, I continue to wait for your answer to this:
"Detters can we leave A.N. WILSON and ARIANNA HUFFINGTON behind?"
Not until you have dealt honestly with this example of your lying bastardy:
'Gene writes beautifully - something not always the case with authors of trail-blazing literary works.' [A.N. WILSON]
'I was enthralled. A new star has shot into the literary firmament. [ARIANNA HUFFINGTON]
When you are going to admit that you have made these reviews and their authors up? Make no mistake: I am going to keep on asking until you tell the truth, or I lose patience, inform Mr Wilson and Ms Huffington and let nature take its course.
"A few months later, I got an email from Fr. Dan Powell, saying, "Do you remember this lady, Maureen?" And, of course, I did. He told me that she was well, she was cured, that her blood results were normal, and the tumors had shrunk or disappeared. And then shortly after, I had an e-mail from Maureen herself, with a lot more details. And I encouraged her to send all this medical data to the Bishop here, the Apostolic Visitator, Archbishop Aldo Cavalli. So she told me this morning that she did that yesterday. I think she had a meeting with the Bishop and handed over all the medical documentation to him and told him the story as well."
ReplyDeleteFr Leon Periera
Sounds pretty convincing to me.
GENE
Nonsense.
DeleteLet us have the before and after medical data - scans, treatments prescribed, progress, prognoses and case resolution notes - from the doctors and hospitals who [a] pronounced Ms Fitzgerald terminally ill and [b] pronounced her cured.
Nothing else can confirm the truth of this yarn: and until it is confirmed by medical data it must be seen for what it is - a pack of lies, no matter how well meant.
"Sounds pretty convincing to me."
Only because you are pathologically incapable of admitting that you are wrong, you contemptible little turd.
And, lest we forget:
ReplyDeleteHad Ratzinger unfrocked Kiesle in 1985, the abuse of children at St Joseph's would not have continued for a further three years. That is a FACT, no matter how often you try to deny it.
Ratzinger's apology in full reads as follows [my footnotes}:
“I can only express to all the victims [1] of sexual abuse my profound shame, my deep sorrow and my heartfelt request for forgiveness. I have had great responsibilities [2] in the Catholic Church. All the greater is my pain for the abuses [3] and the errors [4] hat occurred in those different places [5] during the time of my mandate."[6]
1 ALL THE VICTIMS, Gene: victimS, plural: you can tell this by the S on the end of the word. All the victims of sexual abuse that occurred during Ratzingers time as Archbishop of Munich [1977- 1982] and later head of the Congregation of the Faith and Pope - that is, 1985 - 2013. The phrase "ALL THE VICTIMS therefore must include the victims of Stephen Kiesle between the years 1985-1988, when Ratzinger failed to unfrock Kiesle. [2] I HAVE HAD GREAT RESPONSIBILITES [see 1 above]: and one of those was to detect, root out and expel priests and others in the Catholic Church whose favourite hobby was buggering small boys and raping little girls. These GREAT RESPONSIBILITIES obviously include those children abused by Stephen Kiesle after Ratzinger failed to unfrock him in 1985. [3] THE ABUSES - these must include the abuses committed by Stephen Kiesle after Ratzinger failed to unfrock him [unless you can prove differently, Gene?].
[4] THE ERRORS - these must include Ratzinger's failure to unfrock Kiesle in 1985 and probably his failure to alert Fr Thomas Ryan that he was allowing a convicted paedophile rapist to minister to the young people in his church.
[5] THOSE DIFFERENT PLACES - except, of course at St Joseph's Church, Penole, CA, where Stephen Kiesle, still a priest, continued to abuse children during the years 1985-1988 - Ratzinger made it clear that his apology did not include this, didn't he, Gene, and you can prove that, can't you? What's that? oh, you can't? Dear me, and YOU call ME a lying tosser... [5] DURING MY MANDATE: that is, during the years 1985 - 2013.
It is clear to anyone whose mind has a greater ratiocinatory capacity than a pair of skid-marked underpants that Ratzinger was apologising for all the sexual abuse committed on his watch 1985-2013 by priests whom he failed either properly to oversee, accurately to diagnose and condignly to punish, as well as arranging for their being unable to access children and young people ever again.
"I can only express to ALL the victims of sexual abuse my profound shame, my deep sorrow and my heartfelt request for forgiveness." It's that word ALL that gives it away, Gene: I'm sorry if it's confusing. Stuff your pissy little opinions up your arse. I will not apologise for telling the truth, and I will go on telling it until you acknowledge that it is the truth. In the meantime, I continue to wait for your answer to this:
"Detters can we leave A.N. WILSON and ARIANNA HUFFINGTON behind?"
Not until you have dealt honestly with this example of your lying bastardy:
'Gene writes beautifully - something not always the case with authors of trail-blazing literary works.' [A.N. WILSON]
'I was enthralled. A new star has shot into the literary firmament. [ARIANNA HUFFINGTON]
When you are going to admit that you have made these reviews and their authors up? Make no mistake: I am going to keep on asking until you tell the truth, or I lose patience, inform Mr Wilson and Ms Huffington and let nature take its course.
So this lady, her husband, her GP, her oncologist, Fr Leon Pereira et al have all made this story up?
ReplyDeleteDetters you take the biscuit.
GENE
I didn't say that, arsehole.
DeleteThis lady believes that she had terminal liver and spinal cancer, heart failure and was blind in one eye, and that she was miraculously cured at Medjugorje. She is entitled to believe that, but if she wishes the rest of us to believe it, then she should supply evidence - full, authenticated medical case notes from tests to diagnosis to treatment to prognosis of imminent death to inexplicable and miraculous cure. And unless Fr Pereira has seen the authenticated before and after scans, medical notes, diagnoses and prognoses, he is in no better place than you are or I am to confirm or deny this. Nor do we have any confirmation from her family doctor or her oncologist.
And if this had really happened, and if it were possible to authenticate such a cure with incontrovertible medical evidence, how come it has not been headline news for the past two years?
It hasn't even been news in Ms Fitzgerald's local paper, let along state, national or international press, from which I conclude that no-one has been able to authenticate the story.
From which the only possible conclusion is that the story is untrue, which doesn't, of course, rule out the possibility that Mr and Mrs Fitzgerald and Fr Pereira believed it to be true.
Publishing this kind of overheated nonsense harms the catholic church you purport to support.
I suggest you contact Fr Leon Pereira at:
ReplyDeletehttps://www.english.op.org/author/leon_pereira/page/2/
"And I encouraged her to send all this medical data to the Bishop here, the Apostolic Visitator, Archbishop Aldo Cavalli. So she told me this morning that she did that yesterday. I think she had a meeting with the Bishop and handed over all the medical documentation to him and told him the story as well."
ReplyDeleteFr Leon Pereira
Sounds pretty convincing to me.
GENE