Healing a Little Boy

This evening, our secretary Gingging and her husband came to the monastery with their little boy Revlon who had a very high fever (40.5 degrees centigrade). They just came from the hospital and they were told to go back tomorrow for tests. No medicine was prescribed since they did not know what his ailment was. We let them stay in our guest room for the night since it was getting late and their home was 7 kilometers away. Gingging asked me if I could heal her little boy. So I prayed over Revlon and held his wrists. After 30 minutes, the fever went down to 39.3 C and he was feeling much better. He asked for food as he was famished. Several hours later, his body temperature was 37.9 centigrade.

There was a time when I did not believe in this type of healing. I believed that only doctors and their medicines can cure people. The only thing I could do was administer the sacrament of the anointing of the sick and pray that the sick get well without any expectation of physical healing. I remember feeling helpless in the presence of the sick little girl in a remote barrio and I wondered if it was possible to heal the sick as Jesus did. I wished God would give me the gift of healing. Down through the years, I have been surprised to discover that the sick could experience healing by praying over them. Of course, I don't want to spend most of my time doing this. But in cases of emergency, I cannot say no. But I don't want people to line up in the monastery or the church to ask for healing. I won't be able to do the other things that I am supposed to do - like teaching, writing, advocacy work, giving seminars, biking, etc.

My confrere, Fr. Senen jokingly refers to me as the priest with a double doctorate - a doctor of sacred theology (STD) and a quack doctor (QD).