The miracles of San Martín de Porres Most known are: his almost clairvoyant knowledge about the procedure or medication necessary to treat a disease, the instantaneous healing of patients both in person and with the use of the gift of bilocation and his famous ability to communicate with animals.
An example full of humility, devotion to God and total selfless dedication to help the poor and evicted, San Martin de Porres, the first black-skinned saint of the American continent, spiritually touched an entire people in his time. Their veneration has been extended throughout the Catholic world.
He is also known as the saint of brooms and is considered the patron saint of the poor, people of mixed race, racial harmony and social justice.
Miracle Events of San Martín de Porres
1- Bilocation
Although the gift of bilocation can not be called a miracle in itself, the mere fact of being in two places at once and interacting to some degree in both calls attention enough. Given the personality and fame of San Martin de Porres it was easy for the people of the time to assign a divine nature to this ability.
It is said that Fray Martin was seen several times in places like Mexico, China, Japan, Africa, the Philippines and perhaps in France; Knowing that he always worked from the monastery and never left Lima.
San Martin wanted to be a missionary but did not fulfill that dream, but that did not prevent him from appearing mysteriously to the missionaries when they were going through some difficulty during their services in distant lands.
Being inside the convent and without having keys of the locks, it is said that he visited serious patients directly in their beds, giving them consolation or curing them. The people of Lima wondered how he could go through closed doors, to which he graciously replied:"I have my methods to get in and out."
Some stories
Mexico
A friend of the merchant of Fray Martin came to visit him before going on a business trip, asking him to pray for his success. When he arrived in Mexico, he fell ill. In the middle of suffering he remembered his friend Fray Martin and suddenly appeared at his side.
She took care of him and prescribed a medicinal drink for him to recover quickly. Already enjoying health, the merchant went to the city to look for his friend to thank him thinking that he was visiting Mexico.
He sought him in the Dominican monastery of Mexico, in the archbishop's house, in hotels and inns all over the city without finding him. It was only on his return to Lima that he understood the nature of the miracle.
Asia
A native of Peru also had a face-to-face conversation with Fray Martin being in China, specifically in the customs office. In the conversation he received a detailed description of the friar on the location of a Dominican brother who lived in Manila who had also known mysteriously in the Philippines.
France
Another story tells the story of a patient suffering agonizingly from erysipelas and was reluctant to dislike the friar's treatment, which was the application of rooster blood to infected skin. Fray Martín said it was an effective way to alleviate his pain by adding that"I have seen it be used successfully at the Bayonne hospital in France."
Africa
One of the most substantial cases of the friar's bilocation comes from the account under oath of a man named Francisco de Vega Montoya, who claimed to have seen him in North Africa while he was a prisoner of war in Barbary.
He saw the friar many times attending to the sick, giving them support, dressing the naked and motivating the prisoners not to fall in their faith. After recovering his freedom he traveled to Spain and then to Lima.
Once there he went to the monastery of the Dominicans to seek Fray Martin to thank him for his labors in Africa, to which the friar asked him not to mention his presence in Africa to anyone.
Due to the stories that circulated among the brother brothers of the Order about the bilocation of Fray Martin, Francisco finally understood that what he lived were supernatural visits of that holy man and began with enthusiasm to tell the people the grace of the miraculous works of the Friar in Africa.
2- Healing of the sick
His skill and fame as surgeon and healer was well-known. Determining whether his works of healing were acts of an expert physician or miracles of a holy man has been difficult, since the recovery of the sick in the stories is always consistent with immediacy or speed
On many occasions, with his mere presence, the suffering of a patient disappears. He once cured a priest who was on the brink of death by a severely infected leg. Another account tells how he cured a young student of the order, who injured his fingers, so that he could continue his career until the priesthood.
This type of miracles also happened quite a bit with the use of bilocation. A common phrase spoken by the friar at the time of his healing act was"I heal you, God saves you".
3-Clairvoyance
According to the accounts, this gift, most of the time, went hand in hand with his miraculous cures. In spite of having knowledge of medicine, it was quite impossible to believe that he would always accurately correct the medicine or treatment to be used to cure a disease.
It was common to see him approach a person who was secretly under pain and advise him what to do, drink, and eat to improve his health. He could even arrive with the necessary medicine and necessary materials to attend to a needy, without this having even warned of his state or request any remedy.
With the use of bilocation it is also said that it prescribed exactly what the patient needed to be cured. Then he would simply disappear and the patient miraculously recovered by following the treatment to the letter. It is believed that he knew the moment of his death accepting his departure in peace.
4- Communication with animals
As with bilocation, communication with animals is not the miracle itself. It was what he was able to do with this gift that really counts as a miracle. It is said that once made a dog, a cat and a mouse eat the same dish without attacking each other.
On one occasion novices brought a pair of bulls to the monastery. When they began to quarrel, the friar managed to calm them and even managed to make them eat together. He asked the older bull to allow the younger to eat first as was the custom within the order.
Another episode talks about an infestation of rats in the monastery. Fray Martín spoke with the rodent population in the garden telling them that he would bring them food once a day if they promised to stay out. From that moment the monastery did not present more problems of rats.
Miracles after his death
By the time of his death, on November 3, 1639, he was already a character fully recognized and loved in Lima. His veneration began almost immediately and the accounts of his miracles as a holy man circulated throughout the country.
The collection of these stories was initiated in 1660 by the archbishop of Lima to make the request for beatification, but the colonial structure of society did not allow it. It was for 1837 that the prejudices of the time were surpassed and his beatification with Pope Gregory XVI materialized.
Pope John XXIII elevated the friar Martin de Porres to the church altars in 1962. This long awaited canonization was sustained by two miracles that were taken as indisputable intercessions of Martin.
The Miracle of Paraguay by Dorotea Caballero Escalante (1948)
A 89-year-old woman was given a few hours of life after an intestinal blockage and a severe heart attack. The family then started the funeral arrangements for the next day. His daughter, who was in Buenos Aires very disconsolate, prayed tirelessly to Martin de Porres for his mother's health.
The next night, unable to sleep, he got up at two o'clock in the morning to pray the complete rosary, asking above all to return to see his mother alive in Paraguay. When he returned he found his home full of happiness.
His mother had improved miraculously at the precise moment of his prayers and prayer of the rosary at dawn. In two or three days old Dorotea stood and healed as if nothing had happened.
The Tenerife miracle of Antonio Cabrera Pérez (1956)
A child of only four and a half years suffered from his severely injured left leg. He had gangrene and his fingers were blackened. After a week, the boy thundered yellow and the doctors urged the amputation.
A friend of the family presented a relic and an image of Martin de Porres to the mother. She passed both objects over the child's leg and left the image between the blackened fingers.
Both mother and son prayed to Martin de Porres not to have to amputate. The prayers were accompanied by the hospital's nuns and by visitors.
After two days the leg regained its natural color. 23 days later Antonio returned home and after three months was able to use a shoe again and play football with his friends without the greatest feeling of discomfort.
The life of the friar
Martin de Porres was born in Lima on December 9, 1579, in the colonial Viceroyalty of Peru; Illegitimate son of a Spanish nobleman and a liberated Panamanian slave girl. From childhood he showed sincere devotion to God and a very humble and kind heart.
He learned medicine from the time of his barber-surgeon mentor since he was ten years old. This way allowed him to get in touch with many patients in the locality, developing an empathy for the people that ended up becoming his vocation to the death bed.
He wanted earnestly to enlist as a religious man in the church, but his status as an illegitimate and mixed-race son would not allow him to do so. His only option was to enter as a"donated"in the monastery of the Dominican Order of the Holy Rosary in Lima.
He was placed in the infirmary thanks to his previous knowledge of medicine and his sincere and compassionate dedication to the sick, which he continued to perform efficiently until the end of his life in the sixties. He became a friar of the Dominican Order at the age of twenty-four.
References
- Worst Dengler Giorgio (2013). Big Miracles, Not Tall Tales. Dominican Journal. Retrieved from dominicanajournal.org.
- Aquinas & More. St. Martin of Porres, the Saint of the Broom. Retrieved from aquinasandmore.com.
- Mysteries Marvels Miracles. Saints - Bilocation. TAN Books & Publishers. Saint Miracles Blog. Retrieved from catholicmystics.blogspot.com.
- Two miracles through the intercession of St Martín de Porres. Retrieved from prayers4reparation.wordpress.com.
- Zajac Jordan (2016). Of Mice and Martin. Dominican Journal. Retrieved from dominicanajournal.org.
- Dorcy Jean Marie (1983). St. Martin of Porres. Dominic's Family. Tan Books and Publishers. Dominicancontributors Friars website. Retrieved from opsouth.org.
- New World Encyclopedia (2016) Martin de Porres. New World Encyclopedia Contributors. Retrieved from newworldencyclopedia.org.