The Eric Metaxas Show - John Thavis (Encore)

Episode Date: June 11, 2025

 The Vatican Prophecies, a behind-the-scenes look at how the Vatican investigates claims of miraculous events.

Noble Gold Investments is the official gold sponsor of the Eric Mataxis show, a company that specializes in gold IRAs and physical delivery of precious metals. Learn how you can protect your wealth with noble gold investments. That's noble gold investments.com. Welcome to the Eric Mataxis show. Did you ever see the movie The Blobs starring Steve McQueen? The blood-curdling threat of the blob. Well, way back when Eric had a small part in that film, but they had a cut in the movie. but they had to cut his scene because the blob was supposed to eat them, but he kept spitting him out.

Oh, the whole thing was just a disaster. Anyway, here's the guy who's not always that easy to digest. Eric the Texas! I'm here today to talk to you about the subject of miracles. Some of you know I wrote a book about that subject, but I'm not talking about my book. In fact, I'm specifically today. talking about something that in my book miracles, I said I will not deal with because it was not my field of expertise. But what I was talking about that I would not deal with then, but I will deal with write this show today now, is the question of how the Vatican, the Catholic Church, officially determines whether something is a miracle or is not a miracle.

There's a very, you might say, Baroque process that a putative miracle will go through. People who are experts at the Vatican are very rigorous in determining whether this is something that they will officially stand by as a miracle or not. I have on the line the author of a new book titled The Vatican Propheces. His name is John Thavis. He's prize-winning former Rome Bureau Chief of the Catholic News Service. He's written extensively on religious issues. He's lectured on Vatican Affairs in the U.S. and Europe won many awards for his writing. He now lives in Minnesota, and he's on the line.

John, welcome to the program. Well, first of all, I ought to have asked you earlier. How do you pronounce your last name? You got it right, Thavis. Thavis. Which is in itself a small miracle because it's a tough one. That is a small miracle. John Thavis.

What kind of a name is Thavis? We came from Luxembourg apparently long ago, and beyond that, I don't know much. Now, if somebody's from Luxembourg, what are they called? Luxembourgians? Luxembourgian. I got that right, too. So that's bong, bong, two miracles in the first 60 seconds. I think I better stop right now.

Well, you've written a book on the, as I've saying, the very subject that I specifically say in my miracles book that I'm not going to go into. Now, in the book I talk about the, you know, faith and reason and how the two are often seen to be at odds. And I say they're not at all at odds, but we've, in fact, we've got to use our reason to understand our faith more deeply. And it seems to me that that's what you're writing about in your book, the Vatican prophecies. That's exactly it. You know, the Vatican's view on all this is that God does work in the world. I mean, we can't shut God out of this world. The Catholic understanding of the world is that it is not a dualistic kind of place

where God sits in his world and we sit in ours and the two never meet. The two are constantly meeting. And the idea that God can work miracles is very much in the tradition of the Catholic Church. Where it gets interesting is that the Batagan is constantly in the process. process of vetting miracles in a very specific way, in a very specific procedure, because of sainthood causes. Okay. I was just going to say, why do they do this?

Because it's almost funny. It's like the kind of thing somebody would make up for a film, like a crazy idea of, hey, let's tell a story of how in the Vatican they've got this separate office where all these people, all they do all day long, is try to determine if the miracle happened or didn't. It sounds like a great idea for a TV series. But you're telling me... It would be a TV series, actually. Oh, it would.

It would. But you're telling me, no, no, no, no, this is real. And then the question is why. It began, really, in the 1700s, when the Vatican first set down these criteria, by which we would proclaim a person to be a saint. And by saying they're a saint, what they're saying is, these people are in heaven. We can pray to them, and they intercede for us.

and as a sign, as a kind of stamp of approval from God that we're making the right decision about this, we require that a saint have a miracle attributed to his intercession, his or her intercession. Okay, and so they wanted to make sure that it's a real miracle, not just somebody told me a story, but we're going to investigate. They investigate to a great degree, and most modern miracles are medical miracles, because in part, they're the easiest to investigate. There are doctors' records. And what the Vatican wants is for the doctors involved to say, look, there is no real scientific reason this person recovered.

We had written them off for dead. And here they are. Or recovered in some other way. And then the Vatican goes to its own panel of medical experts and says, do you agree? And then if they agree, they go to a panel of theological experts and say, was it the prayers to? to this would-be saint that you think healed this person miraculously. So it's a terribly complicated process. Well, let me ask you a little bit about your background,

because the question is, how does somebody get involved in this? Where did you grow up, and how did you get involved in this subject? Well, some would call it accidental. Some would say providential. I grew up in Minnesota, and I was a student of archaeology when I landed in Italy in 1977. What happened, would have it, I fell in love with Italy, decided to stay. And in those days of Red Brigades terrorists, there was a need for journalists.

And I got a job as a journalist and began covering Rome and then covering the Vatican full-time back in 1982. So for 30 years, my beat was the Vatican. So I knew this stuff inside out. And when I retired, I said to myself, okay, This would be a great book, how the Vatican tries to investigate and to some degree control and keep the lid on the supernatural. Well, yeah, that's interesting. People wouldn't know that the Vatican really is – they're tough on vetting miracles.

And when you say keep a lid on the supernatural, what do you mean by that? Well, okay, I explain how miracles there is this procedure. And in one sense, the Vatican wants and needs to be approving miracles because they want and need saints. But on the other hand, when it comes to apparitions of Mary or people who believe they're taking, you know, messages from God, people proclaiming new truths, the Vatican is very, very, in those cases, the Vatican does very, very quiet investigations and tries generally to keep these people out of the limelight, which is not very easy in this day and age. Well, because they think that there are hucksters out there who ought not to be representing the faith. Well, the history of the church is also the history of fraudulent claims.

Certainly there are many authentic claims, even of apparitions. We have an apparition site near Green Bay, Wisconsin now that's been formally approved. but there are many, many, many, probably hundreds of apparitions that have never been approved and that, in fact, the church has said this is not worthy of belief. And this can damage people's faith. Well, as somebody who is a Protestant or at least I'm not a Catholic, I don't go around saying I'm Protestant, I was raised in the Greek Orthodox Church, and I'm a sort of C.S. Louis mere Christian. And I'm very fond of a lot that I see in the Catholic Church, but I'm not a Catholic.

So I'm fascinated with these inner workings, the idea that there are people making these kinds of decisions, taking it seriously. That's the one thing that many people in our culture don't do. They don't take this stuff seriously. They just kind of think it's just a bunch of nonsense. But here you have very serious people taking this seriously and saying we only want to know what's true. I mean, that's basically what I say in my book. But the idea that there are experts at the Vatican, how many roughly, we're going to go to a break here, but how many roughly are involved in this?

There are probably a staff of 20 people who are involved in investigating miracles. And what are they called? Well, they're called officials of the congregation for saints' causes. Wow, that's quite a, quite a title. Well, folks, I'm talking to John Thavis, Thavis about the Vatican prophecies, a new book. This is the Eric Metaxus show. Our website is metaxistalk.com. And we'll be right back to talk more about miracles and the Vatican prophecies.

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promo code Eric. Folks, it's the Eric Mataxis show. This is, of course, Miracle Monday. And what do we do on Miracle Monday at the Eric Mataxis show? We talk about miracles. So I have on the show right now the author of a new book called The Vatican Prophecies, John. Welcome back. Thank you.

And now this is the question. How do we know if something's a miracle or isn't a miracle? Everybody's asking that question. So at the heart of it, at the heart of this procedure that goes on in the Vatican, 20 people whose job is to determine is this true, is this fake? Tell us again, what is that process? Well, generally, they will allow an initial investigation at the local level. And then it comes to the Vatican.

And that's when the Vatican moves into action outside medical experts to review all the documentation and evidence. Okay, I want to ask a question because I don't get this. How do they even determine if something is going to get the full treatment, right? That's the previous decision to say, like, we're going to investigate this because things happening all the time. There are things happening. And if it's sent up to the Vatican by a diocese, let's say in Montreal or somewhere, and the Vatican looks at it and says, okay, this looks solid, then they'll begin their own investigation.

They also send it back, and they say, look, we need more. more evidence. And that happened in a famous case, actually, in Canada, where it was sent back. It was a woman who had severe leukemia. She was given basically a death sentence by doctors. Prayers were made to a nun, a Canadian nun, and she recovered miraculously. And it was all documented, and the Vatican sent it back. It said, nah, we're not convinced. At that point, the local Canadians hired a blood expert, a hematologist, researcher, who did her own study. It was a blind study. And this woman was an atheist.

She was a non-believer. And her conclusion was, if this person's alive, it had to be a miracle. Wow. It's an extraordinary thing. But if the atheist believed it was a miracle, did the atheist change her worldview? That's very interesting, because the atheist ended up coming to Rome. for the canonization and was so impressed with what the Vatican does in vetting miracles that she went back into the Vatican archives and researched 250 years of miracle research at the Vatican.

She said it was absolutely incredible because, number one, it was a history of medical progress. It was so well documented. And number two, she did not find a single miracle that turned out to be fraudulent afterward. As for her conversion, I don't know. She said, I think she had a more open attitude. Yeah, after studying 250 like that, I think you would. Now, it's such an interesting thing for those in the evangelical world to think of this organization, this huge organization called the Catholic Church,

where they have to take these things seriously because it reflects on the church. It's not, you know, a free market system, so to speak, where everybody can say everything. And, you know, it's, there's official approval, there's official disapproval. And they have to take this very seriously, obviously. If you say that so-and-so is going to be canonized, you really have to know, can we get behind this or is this just, you know, a folk saint? I bring this up because many people listening may know about Medjugoria. Tell us a little bit about that. and where that is in this process?

That is a very complicated story. It's chapter two in my book, and it's something that began 34 years ago, six young visionaries claimed to have seen Mary and to receive messages from Mary. And where? For some of them, it's been going on all 34 years. And where is Mindiguria? It's in Bosnia-Herzegovina, so it's former Yugoslavia. So 34 years ago, something happened, and it's kind of like Fatima or Lords where, you know, millions of the faithful have been flocking there now for three plus decades looking for something.

What is happening? Are they finding something? Are some people finding something and others aren't? And where does the Vatican stand on Medjugoria? Well, the people who go there, and I've talked with many of them, I've been there myself. almost all say they've experienced great spiritual gifts, conversions in some cases, some claim other things as well, healings, et cetera, although they've never been verified. But the problem in the Vatican's view is that Medjugure involves church politics as well as simple apparitions.

How so? It turned out that the Franciscan priests who were advising these young vision, had a beef with the local bishop. They were in conflict over jurisdiction of parishes and sided with the priests over the bishop and said the bishop was wrong. That became a warning sign for the Vatican. They simply are not willing to accept the idea that Mary is going to get involved in disputes between a bishop and priests. And so that's a big question mark. And it's actually being studied right now at the Vatican. They've completed a three-year investigation, and Pope Francis is expected to issue some kind of judgment probably very soon.

I was reading something about that. I can't remember where, but it's a sticky wicket, as they say, because there are so many faithful in the Catholic Church who have been blessed by Medjugoria. So if the Pope officially comes out against it, that's going to be problematic. But if he comes out officially for it, it'll have other problems. Exactly. Well, there are still going on. And the Catholic Church is not going to say, yes, Mary is really appearing at Medjugore and run the risk of having Mary say in one of her messages next week that, you know, the Vatican's doing everything wrong. They're going to be cautious. I don't think there's going to be an up or down verdict. But I think they may ask that these six visionaries keep a lower profile. Wow. It's interesting.

I mean, it's so fascinating to me, this idea that if you've been given a spiritual gift, and I've known people with various spiritual gifts, it's a human being who's handling the gift. And human beings are fallen and can make mistakes. And so the gift might be real, God might be real in the gift, but the person can abuse it or, you know, put some English on the ball, a little spin. and the idea that one would be tempted to do that seems to be, you know, pretty much beyond the shadow of a doubt, that everybody would be tempted. That's what the Vatican looks for, the good that comes out of these things. Yeah, and in the case of Medigoria, you can imagine if there's a really bitter dispute between a bishop and a priest, you can imagine how they would be tempted to say, Mary said this and, you know, case closed. that power, the power to represent Mary in that way. And this is the kind of thing I think that evangelicals in particular have a jaundiced view of the Catholic Church because of this kind of thing.

They're uncomfortable with it. But it's so the more you look into it, the more you realize how complex it is and how it really requires our brains to try to make sense of it. Right. And that same kind of caution, as I say, is very evident at the Vatican where almost everybody, when you mentioned Medjugore, kind of steps back and shuts up. Yeah. To me, it's just fascinating. I think that the power, if you had, you know, if Mary or anyone from the other side is talking to you,

if God is talking to you, the temptation to use that power or what it would do to yourself, to your own soul. Which is why the first criterion that the Vatican uses in judging these things is humility. If they see a visionary or someone claiming a divine kind of experience who then goes off and puffs himself up or herself up or tries to profit in some way, that's a red flag. Well, it's so interesting. Just the other night on Turner Classic Movies, which is my favorite TV station or network, they showed a nun's story. Maybe you know it with Audrey Hepburn, absolutely extraordinary picture of the life of a nun in Belgium in the 1930s. And this issue of humility, the spiritual discipline of humility, I thought, I don't know if this has ever been portrayed by Hollywood before.

So fascinating. I vaguely do remember that movie. And you know what? That idea of spiritual humility is that's an ancient tradition in the Catholic Church as well. It used to be that anyone who experienced what they thought was a miracle or visions or divine messages would immediately have a spiritual advisor and would work together with that spiritual advisor to make sure that this is not just some kind of one-off celebrity event, but that it actually helps the person progress. Well, this is just rich, rich stuff. Of course, we are playing as the music as we go out, The Monkeys with Mary Mary. Unbelievable. My engineer at Kenson has a sense of humor. Yes, he does. Folks, it's the Eric Metaxis

Show. Metaxist Talk.com's the website. We're going to be right back talking about the Vatican prophecies and miracles on Miracle Monday. Hey there, folks. It's the Eric Mataxis show. I am talking about a new book, The Vatican Prophecies. It's Miracle Monday, and we're talking about miracles. The author is John Thavis. John, welcome to the program. Did I pronounce that correctly again? You got it, right. I can't believe it. Well, let me ask you a question because we're talking about lords. We're talking about Fatima. We're talking about Medjugoria. These are, you know, sort of ultra-Catholic worlds where, you know, most people who aren't part of the Catholic Church, and I'm certainly not, really don't know anything about it. I happen to know a little bit about it. But it puts me in mind of the story of Joan of Arc just because I've written a book called Seven Women. And the first woman in the book is Joan of Arc, who experiences just what we are talking. talking about. She hears voices of the Archangel Michael, you know, and I think most people would say,

what is that? That doesn't make sense to me. And yet, clearly this is part of Catholic tradition. There's a different view of this. We know Jesus in the Gospels talks to Moses and Elijah. And so it's entirely biblical that someone could talk to someone who is in heaven and who somehow represents God as Moses and Elijah do on the Mount of Transfiguration. But the story of Joan of Arc, obviously she became a saint, what, in 1920? Yeah, it was late. It was late. But did they vet her sainthood in this way, even though, you know, she dies, whatever, in the 15th? century? Yeah, it was 1400s. No, in that case, you can't really go back and ask for documentation.

In those cases of older saints, the church has a slightly different process, and it simply says, look, their reputation for holiness is so great that even without a verifiable miracle, that sometimes happens in modern times, too. Pope Francis, for example, when he canonized Pope John the 23rd recently, he went to the congregation for saints' causes and said, well, where do we stand on this? And they said, well, we're still looking into several potential miracles. And Pope Francis said, well, we don't need that. Everybody knows he's a saint. And he declared him a saint.

Pope John. Exactly. Wow. Now, Pope John was in the early 60s. Am I getting that right? Yes, he died in the early 60s. And he's the one who oversaw the Vatican. counsel. He convened the Second Vatican Council, and he was a much-beloved figure, a very holy man,

and most Catholics think he was a saintly person. And again, by saying he's a saint, really all the church is saying is they're in heaven. Well, see, that's an interesting thing for people who aren't a Catholic to understand what do we mean by the term saint? What do Catholics mean? What do other people mean? And of course, there's this official. designation of saint, which the Catholic Church makes, but those of us who aren't Catholics would say that anybody in heaven is a saint, is part of the great cloud of witnesses that Paul writes about. They're cheering us on, and they're there right now. And when we're worshiping, they're there worshiping with us as angels are worshiping with us. I think that evangelicals often

don't have that kind of a sense of the church beyond this world. So that's very interesting. But also I want to talk about, you know, Joan of Arc, of course, as I say, because she's in my book, I know a little bit more about her. But her humility is astounding if you knew nothing else about her. Yeah, as I recall, she didn't like to talk about these voices that she heard in these communications so much. She really didn't, you know, she, as I understand it, she never sought fame and the kind of fame that she ended up with. She was a very humble person, and I'm sure that counted in her favor. Well, it's really extraordinary how humble she was. And again, if I hadn't written about her, I wouldn't know all of these details.

But Mark Twain, who, you know, rather famous atheist, he said some bitter things about religion. But he wrote a long biography about Joan of Arc. He considered it absolutely to be his best work. and what an idea that somebody as jaundiced as Mark Twain could look at a life and say this is one of the finest human beings who ever lived. So I think that even atheists and agnostics, they're hungry to know what is on the other side. They are. I think it's human nature. And, you know, sometimes it takes a figure like Joan of Arc to bring it home even to an atheist. And part of that, I think, is that a lot of people actually.

don't really understand what is meant by a miracle, or they think that every miracle has to upset the laws of nature, which, you know, as I'm sure you know, back in biblical times, there really was no kind of scientific betting of miracles. There were no laws of nature that were set out. A miracle was simply something that happened that kind of stopped you in your tracks and let you know that God was communicating with you. It can be a sign. It can be some wondrous experience. And I think, after researching this book, that this happens probably far more frequently than people believe.

That is also my conclusion in writing my book that this happens endlessly, and often people don't talk about it. They keep it quiet. Really important that we talk about that. That's why we're doing that today on Miracle Monday. Again, it's the Eric Mataxis show our website Metaxus Talk. We'll be right back to talk with the author of the Vatican Prophecies about miracles. Hey folks, this is the Eric Metaxas show. We're talking about miracles with John Thavis, the author of the Vatican prophecies.

And I want to ask you, John, about the current Pope. You don't have to say the current Pope, the Pope, who is Pope Francis coming to the United States in, what, a week? Something like a week from now? Yeah, he'll be here a week from tomorrow. Well, there you go. So let me ask you, what is your view? And actually, this show is probably going to air when he's here or just a day away from when he gets here. What is your view of this pope?

He certainly seems to be something new. He's a breath of fresh air for those of us who covered earlier popes. And I was one who appreciated John Paul II and Pope Benedict. But Pope Francis is just so engaging. He's a people's pope. he speaks a language that doesn't need theological interpretation. He's human. And, you know, those are the qualities that have made him so very popular.

And I think during this trip, Americans are going to get a real view of this Pope. They're going to get to know him pretty well. And I hope Pope Francis, when he comes here, will talk about some of the things that he talks about when he's at the Vatican, which include things like miracles, his devotion to Mary, the devil, which he often speaks of. Well, that's an interesting thing. I was going to bring that up. One thing that the Catholic Church has been particularly good at is dealing with this reality

or representing this reality of personified evil, the devil, the idea that there's an office of exorcism, that this is real. Because, again, we live in a time where people don't seem to understand the reality of evil. They think that all spirituality is good, and it's not. What have you experienced anything along those lines in your own life or in your investigations as a journalist? Well, I have a chapter on exorcism, and it's very interesting because we seem to sway in this country from, you know, a kind of interest in the Hollywood aspects of exorcism. But on the other hand, I think there's a cultural movement to turn the devil into a kind and gentle person of some kind, you know, almost, well, he was a fallen angel, but, You know, a lot of us have fallen away, and maybe he can inspire us. And believe me, Pope Francis does not go for that.

For him, the devil is a cunning manipulator. He is a con artist. He is the man who will lead you down the primrose path, but always lead you into bad things. And what's interesting is that Pope Francis gets up and talks about this at least once a week. The reporters don't always write about it, but it's fascinating. Well, when you say he speaks about it once a week, I had no idea about that. What do you mean? In what context is he speaking about Satan once a week?

The Pope actually celebrates a private mass every morning. Well, it's private, but he invites people, so there are 40 or 50 people, in which he gives these off-the-cuff homilies. And, you know, the Vatican at first didn't know what to make of these or anything. So the Vatican's top officials decided we'll just ignore them and pretend they don't exist. But in the meantime, they get out. And it's almost clandestinely, you know, people are finding out this is what the Pope really thinks about these things. Well, when you say they get out, I mean, are these 40 or 50 people allowed to, you know, to capture this on their iPhones? How does that work?

Yes, they are. And some of them record them. But also Vatican Radio and the Vatican newspaper have now been. putting out summaries of what the Pope says. So these will never appear in, you know, the Vatican's version of the congressional record, which is this huge tome called Acte Apostolices. But they are the most newsmaking of what the Pope says. Well, again, let's just clarify, because I know so many people listening don't understand this kind of thing,

and I'm new to it, but to understand when people hear that the Pope is infallible, that the Catholics consider the Pope infallible, it does not mean that he can't make mistakes. It means that when he is speaking ex-cathedra, he is speaking with the authority of God. Can you explain what does ex-cathedra mean? Right. It's a symbol of the Pope's authority. So when the Pope speaks from the chair of Peter, the throne of Peter, then it's infallible. but in actual fact, infallible statements, those that have been declared in that category by popes,

there have been very few in my lifetime. So, you know, most of the time when a pope opens his mouth, he's speaking as a human being, and yes, as Pope, but as someone who can make mistakes. Well, it's kind of like the difference between when, you know, Peter, Paul, John, I almost said Ringo, but all of the people who have written scripture, they talked all. the time, everything they said was not infallible. But when they wrote scripture, what became part of the canon of Holy Scripture, you say, this is the word of God. And it's a similar thing with the Pope when he's speaking at the cathedral, which is from the chair of Peter in the

official role of speaking officially as Pope. But people think that that happens all the time, that the Pope is infallible. Everything he says is infallible, that's completely wrong. And I want people understand that that's simply not true. Yeah, in fact, Pope Francis has made news by saying more than once, look, I make mistakes. And he's made mistakes in his past, and he said I'll probably continue to make them. Well, that kind of humility is no mistake, and I'm just so glad to hear that about him. Will you come to see him when he speaks when he's in the U.S.? Yes, I will be at all the events in Washington, New York and Philadelphia. I'm very curious to see how this plays out. I think certainly it's going to be a success. I don't think there's any question. But I think he's going to challenge people. His messages are very challenging to all of us, I think, and I don't exclude myself from that either.

Well, that's the way it ought to be. So I'm speaking to John Favis about his book, The Vatican Prophecies. It is mirroring. Miracle Monday on the Eric Mataxis show, our website's Metaxistalkis Talk.com. Stick around. We'll be right back to talk about saints and miracles. Hey there, it's the Eric Mataxis show. My guest is John Favis, who has a new book called The Vatican Prophecies, where he writes about how the Vatican examines whether something is an actual miracle or not, and it's a very secretive process, highly complex evaluation system to judge the authenticity of the various supernatural phenomena that

come across their desks. John, it really is, as I said earlier, almost funny to think that there's this process. Now, I assume that there are people right now looking into miracles attributed to Mother Teresa. I mentioned earlier that in my book, Seven Women, it starts with Joan of Arc. It ends with Mother Teresa, and it's a little startling to those of us who are not Catholics to think that she's being considered already for sainthood. I guess she has been, is it canonized? What is the term before beatified? She has been beatified. She's been beatified.

They're waiting to verify another miracle. And I guess it depends on your point of view. It has been pretty, but on the other hand, you have some Catholics who ask me, what's the holdup, as if this thing should be done very quickly? Right. Well, it's a matter of perspective. And, And, of course, keep in mind that when you're investigating miracles or when the Vatican is investigating them, I should say, they're not only looking for, say, cures that cannot be explained by medical science, because that is one thing. But as one Monsignor put it to me, just because there was no human intervention that could save this person doesn't mean there was divine intervention.

That's exactly right. They're looking for prayers to a saint or to God or to Mary that actually made this thing happen. They're looking for cause and effect. And it's not always easy to pin down. You can never have scientific certainty of that, of course. But you can't have what they call moral certainty. Well, that's very interesting because I say in my Miracles book that just because something seems miraculous doesn't mean that it is miraculous. In other words, a tumor could go away.

and every doctor could say this is baffling, we don't know what happened. But that by itself doesn't prove that God did it. There could be some unexplained reason for it. We don't know. And I think we have to be honest when we say, I don't know. And I love the fact that the Vatican takes this so seriously that they are really looking at all the angles to determine whether something is true or not. Now, what kind of a miracle would have to be attributed, for example, to Mother Teresa? We've just got about a minute or so here.

But what kind of miracle? What are we talking about? Well, it could be anything. I mean, miraculous cure. There have been other rather odd types of miracles. There was one African saint who was credited with stopping a raging fire that was blowing across her hometown with high winds, and the people held up a picture of her, and the fire suddenly stopped. That was the miracle. So it's usually medical. It isn't always. Was she really scary looking? I don't know. No, the picture I saw of her, she was very smiling and very, very nice looking. Okay. Well, that's a pretty dramatic. That's dramatic. They could start to admire.

And there are some people, keep in mind, who don't want miracles or don't want to believe they were healed through miracles. Right. And that's interesting, too. The Vatican doesn't necessarily have to have the person who received the miracle be on board. There was a famous case of a German girl who was underwater for 22 minutes in 1986 and presumed drowned. She came to after her friends offered prayers to a saint. And this woman refused to come to the Vatican's canonization. She said, I want nothing to do. Wow. This is so fascinating.

My guest has been John Thavis, the book of the Vatican Prophecies. This is Miracle Monday on the Eric Mattaxia show. Thanks for joining us. Thanks, Eric. My pleasure.