A devout priest in Maryland
reported that on the feast day of Guadalupe an angel appeared during Mass in
front of him and about 200 congregants.
The priest, Father Richard
Scott, 41, of St. John the Evangelist Church in Clinton, Maryland,
started the day asking Our Lady of Guadalupe for confirmation pertaining to
a special request he had made.
Originally from Peru,
Father Scott, who says he has a special devotion to the angels ("in the
Catholic sense, nothing at all New Age") and recites the litany of angels
every day, and conducts healing Masses at a church dedicated to the Archangel
Raphael, recounts that at about 6:45 a.m. he was praying to the Virgin.
"Blessed Mother, I
know you are Our Lady of Guadalupe," he had said. "You know that I
love you very much. You are also Queen of Angels. I know I am not worthy, but
because of the merits of your Son Jesus and His Divine Mercy, I humbly beseech
you to send me St. Raphael to give me a sign that what I have heard in my heart
is from your Son."
That night Father Scott
celebrated a Mass in honor of the Guadalupe Virgin at 7:30 p.m. He says that he
had gone through the day without much further thought as to his request. "I
forgot about it," he says, "but God didn't.
"I was saying the
prayer of the faithful and I had closed my eyes and I opened them and looked up
to see the people that I was praying for and I was indirectly praying for my
special intentions and also praying for a man with cancer -- and for our
bishops that they always be filled with the Holy Spirit and faithful to the
Holy Father -- and just as I was saying that all together, I looked up and in
the back of the church, I saw this Hispanic woman who works in the parish
preparing the little kids at the time of the offertory, bringing the gifts --
they were going to present roses and carnations to the Blessed Mother
-- and right next to her I see this
young man in his twenties with light brown hair with a big picture, a big
painting in a frame, with a radiant face and around his body like an aura. He looked different -- but completely
human, nicely dressed, with corduroy pants, a shirt, a sweater, and like a
suede jacket.
"He was radiant -- the most penetrating loving eyes.
They exuded love, and he had a huge smile, as if he was my best of friends,
surprising me. He walked like he was on a mission to fulfill what God wanted
him to do. He walked up the aisle reverently but quickly.
"He was in control. Nothing
would stop him. He just came down, but he didn't do it in a way that was
pompous. He didn't float. He walked like a normal person, but quickly with this
big painting on his right side and it was like there was a light, a spotlight
on him, like an aura around his body, even though his body was normal, and
throughout the whole thing his eyes were in contact with me.
He gave reverence
to the Eucharist and to me as a priest.
"He genuflected near the
tabernacle and presented this painting. He laid it against a lectern on the
left-hand side. He was not far away from me. He went up two steps and laid it
against the lectern and he said to me, 'You have to bless it.' I did say as he
was approaching, is there anything I can do to help you.
I was shocked. Even as he said, 'You
must bless this,' his facial expressions never changed.
"There was complete
love and tenderness but he was there on a mission. I couldn't walk up to him. I
couldn't move. Something kept me from moving. I couldn't speak. All I
could do was observe and receive. Afterwards he turned around, once again
genuflected to the Blessed Sacrament, and then he went again somewhat fast down
the aisle, turned around, once again looked at me, raised up his arms to
heaven, and said with a smile, as if he was exuberantly happy, 'Amen,
alleluia!'"
It is an angel story as
there have been many angel stories but with this twist: Father Scott actually
saw the mysterious stranger disappear. Most who have angel encounters describe
a stranger who then was nowhere to be seen, but the Maryland priest actually
saw him vanish.
"After saying, 'Amen,
alleluia,' he put his arms down and I don't know how the wooden doors opened,
but as he was going down the steps, before he got outside -- there is another
set of glass doors -- I saw him disappear. He went down five or six steps and
disappeared.
I saw him disappear. He disappeared just before he got to the
glass doors. I did not see the glass doors open, and from the altar I can tell
when people leave Mass early."
Of course, we leave this
all for your discernment. So far we have no reason to doubt it and if true we
find it tremendous -- a Christmas gift.
It confirmed something
major for the priest, who says that painting was a replica of the famous
Michelangelo masterpiece, "The Creation," in which God is touching
the finger of Adam. He said there was a man in a car who had been out front
through Mass waiting to drive a relative, and the man later testified that he
saw no one enter or leave. Those attending Mass were equally shocked at the
mysterious visitors actions and way of walking.
Father Scott believes the
mysterious stranger was the Archangel Raphael. He says the painting was
expensively framed in wood with cardboard protectors on the corners. The priest
left the painting in the church for four days, waiting to see if anyone would
claim it, which no one did.
Excerpted from http://www.spiritdaily.com/Marylandangelarchived.htm
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