Bill Briggs's Blog

(Sunday Denver Post - Books page)

Writer Bill Briggs wrestles with a "miracle"

By Kevin Simpson
The Denver Post
POSTED: 02/20/2011

The first word that came to his mind was "surreal."

Denver journalist and author Bill Briggs has been a colleague, pal and Wiffle Ball nemesis for more than 20 years. Now he was my interview subject on the topic of his recently released book, "The Third Miracle." And it felt a little funny to both of us.

Friendship and professional ethics precluded my actually reviewing his book — a nonfiction examination of one man's coming to grips with a medical anomaly that, in the eyes of the sisters at the convent where he worked, constituted a miracle cure that could catapult their founder to sainthood.

But familiarity has some advantages. How else could our conversation eventually wind around to our shared affinity for man's best friend and its function as invaluable literary sounding board?
We sat in the living room of his Washington Park bungalow and chatted about the writing process — he has this thing about texting — that produced a book whose narrative arc skyrockets over a landscape of faith, medical science and the inner workings of the Catholic Church.

Q: So how did you come to write about miracles?

A: I was writing "Amped" (his first book) and was basically procrastinating. There was a newspaper article in the Rocky Mountain News, with a headline that says something like, "Vatican to judge Denver miracle." I grew up in the Catholic Church, going every Sunday till I was 18, but I wasn't aware of this process, and it just fascinated me. That story pulled me into the whole idea of doctors and priests working together. I thought that's a rare collaboration of these two elements that so often distrust each other. Because that Denver case was still active, the archdiocese folks couldn't talk to me. But I pitched the idea of a book on this topic to my agent, and he said, "I love it. We just have to find the right narrative."


Q: And you found a recently completed examination of a miracle in Indiana.

A: What cinched it for me was I called the man at the center of the whole thing, Phil McCord, and five minutes into the conversation I was hooked because he kept talking about how he just couldn't accept what had happened to him, how the nuns had been saying it's a miracle, but he's sitting there thinking, "Why me?" I thought that's the perfect tension for this book — the guy in the middle of the case, who the nuns need to close out a 100-year deal, isn't sure about the fact he's been allegedly cured by God.


Q: Was it the subject of miracles or the personal story that appealed to you most?

A: My whole strategy going in was to write a book that was completely journalistic, that offered enough paths for readers to follow on either side to make up their minds — either the cynics or the believers. But my intent was to tell a good story, just like we did for 20 years at The Denver Post, except now I could have 100,000 words to do it.


Q: Did you believe in miracles?

A: I really didn't have an opinion. I thought this is fascinating, and in terms of my beliefs, I think I'm a lot like my protagonist — he's more grounded in reality. But I keep this small part of my brain open to any possibilities, to the idea that we just don't know everything.

It's a really obvious question that comes up: Has this changed your faith? I'm not in a place where I want to talk about that yet because I want readers to decide what they believe. But you don't spend two years looking into a mystical topic without it kind of seeping into your brain and forming some opinions.

Q: So what was the hardest part of telling this story?

A: The only part I wrestled with was how to end the book. I don't want to give away too much, but basically what happens to Phil McCord — I really struggled whether to put it in the book. The more I thought about it, the more I thought the deep irony of what ultimately happens to this guy is really a cool part of the story.


Q: There's a definite sub- theme revolving around women in the church. Was that something you set out to explore?

A: It wasn't something I consciously thought I'd address, but it became more and more apparent that this thread was there from Day One, with the nuns who came over from France to launch this convent. That same topic kept emerging as I talked to the sisters about the dissent within the order, how some didn't want to go through with (canonization) because they didn't want to deal with the boys in Rome.


Q: Your background is in a newsroom, where reporters constantly bounce ideas off colleagues. Was this a lonely process for you?It was a happy, lonely experience. I think once I got digging into it and began writing as I was reporting, I just became more and more sure I was making the right choices. But the best part was closing the laptop and taking Jessie, my dog, for a walk. The story was just sort of rolling in my head. I'd text myself when I had ideas.


Q: You texted yourself?

A: My memory's horrible, and I didn't want to forget that nugget about the narrative, or about a certain person in the book. The writing you do when you're not writing is, to me, the best writing. You know it's completely consumed you.

I got into an online conversation with some other writers about the importance of having a dog when you write a book and how important it was to have something to do that doesn't require any brain activity but allows you to just wander around and think about your book. Walking a dog is perfect.

Q: You're the first author I've encountered who refers to his canine as "secretary."

A: She's 11, and I want to get started on my third book because I don't know how much more help she can give me. It's amazing. You talk about the solitary art form of writing a book, and to me, my dog is who I'm bouncing my ideas off. I've had many walks with her, thinking about the next page . . . while picking up a pile of poop.

Kevin Simpson: 303-954-1739 or ksimpson@denverpost.com

To hear an interview I did with Colorado Public Radio, head to the address below...

Enjoy.

(Note: this is not a direct link to the interview rebroadcast; Goodreads won't allow that. But it's easy to get there via this address...)

http://www.cpr.org/category/colorado_matters#load_article|The_Path_To_Sainthood

Back to the highways to push the book.
This is the best - and most surreal - part of the author biz, which is mainly such a solitary job.
Doing readings and signings is a total rush. Which is a little surprising because I've never been one to enjoy being the center of attention. The spotlight - you can have it if you need it. Take as much as you want, in fact. But my conversations with audiences at my readings have been so interesting. Very fun and lively.
The surreal part? Going into total shill mode. So not me. I'm a journalist, not a publicist. While I really enjoy doing interviews about the book with any writer, TV or radio host, I'm not crazy about begging for coverage. But such coverage is so critical if you want to reach more readers - especially if you are a new author, like me. (Although I have been writing for 20 years). You have to hawk to sell. You have to sell in order to write more books.
For all the GoodReaders who have listed "The Third Miracle" to read, thank you. I think you will be surprised, intrigued and fully absorbed by the book and its nonfiction tale. I've had more than a few readers tell me this is one of those books that kept them up late into the night. Pretty gratifying to hear. But it is a terrific story - better than I even imagined when I began writing and reporting it. Honest. The story - which I thought was good going in - deeply surprised me the more I dug into it. (I dug a lot). And in case you're on the fence about whether or not to buy this book, after my reading/signing and some media in Denver, "The Third Miracle" reached No. 5 on the Denver bestsellers list.
See: more shilling. Anyway...
My upcoming event schedule: Nashville on Feb. 1, Atlanta on Feb. 3 and Raleigh on Feb. 4. If you are in those cities, would love to see you at the signings.
Don't make me beg. - Bill

What is the price of sainthood?

As high as $1 million.

From long, splashy PR campaigns held in the candidate’s home parishes to legal fees and travel expenses paid to globe-trotting miracle investigators to, ultimately, the gargantuan celebration ceremonies held in St. Peter’s Square, gaining eternal veneration in the Catholic Church is big business.

Even the pope gets a cut. During canonization masses in Vatican City, representatives of the new saint often climb a long flight of stairs to hand an offering to the pontiff – many times, a large check.

All of these costs, and all of these payoffs, have long been accepted pieces of the pageant-like process. But it’s also fair, I think, for the faithful and the skeptical alike to ask: Couldn’t this money be better spent on aiding people in need? Isn’t that one of the core callings of Christianity and other religions – help thy neighbor?

As I disclose in “The Third Miracle,” some sisters at the Saint Mary-of-the-Woods convent and college near Terre Haute, Indiana opposed the century-long sanctification push for their foundress, Mother Theodore Guerin. Many of the dissenters felt the cause was an unwise use of the order’s funds. (The convent’s treasurer refused to reveal to me how much money the sisters had ultimately invested to see their matriarch sainted). But to help pay for Mother Theodore’s campaign, the sisters set up a separate fund into which local parishioners and alumni of college dumped their dollars for decades.

Today, contributions for many sainthood causes are solicited through websites launched to publicize the campaigns. In Wichita, Kansas, modern fans of Father Emil Kapaun are seeking his canonization. Father Kapaun was a U.S. Army Chaplain who served in the Korean War and who was eventually captured. He spent months in a prison camp ministering to other men of many faiths before the priest died of a blood clot in 1951. On the website supporting his sanctification, a line reads: “If you would like to help with this cause for the Canonization of Father Kapaun, please go to the You Can Assist Page to make your donation by Credit Card.” It also notes that donations can be mailed to the chancery office in Wichita.

While researching my book in 2009, I visited the Rome headquarters for the sainthood cause of Pope John Paul II. In a cramped office, a small band of workers sorted envelopes containing urgent prayer requests, tales of miraculous cures and, sometimes, money sent from distant lands.

The team also published bi-monthly issues of Totus Tuus (Latin for “Totally Yours”) – a magazine jammed with articles and photos of the late pontiff’s humanitarian efforts. (Annual subscriptions were priced at $17). In addition, the staff operated a website trumpeting the late pope’s cause.

Funding that nerve center has often been an expensive venture. In 2007, for example, the office exhausted its entire yearly postal budget after the website was bombarded with thousands of requests for John Paul II prayer cards, each embedded with a piece of a white cassock once worn by the pope.

Franciscan Brother Chris Gaffrey, a Totus Tuus translator, told the Catholic News Service in March 2007 that it cost $5 to mail just one prayer card and a copy of the magazine overseas. And without a boost in donations, the office could not meet demands. The comments sparked stern media criticism that the people behind John Paul’s cause were selling relics – something the Catholic Church does not condone. The Diocese of Rome quickly issued statements reassuring all Catholics that the prayer cards were “completely free” and that “relics absolutely cannot be bought or sold because they are sacred objects.” However, the diocese also mentioned: “it is possible for those with the means to make a free-will offering to support the cost of printing and mailing.”

During my tour of that same business hub, I noticed a rectangular piece of paper taped to a closet door. As I leaned closer, I noticed it was a personal check, sent from someone in Macon, Georgia, and made out “direct to the pope.” The amount: $20.
The Third Miracle: An Ordinary Man, a Medical Mystery, and a Trial of Faith

The architect of the “Saint Factory” is today a mammoth step closer to that sacred threshold. But for Pope John Paul II – one of Catholicism’s superstars – will that divine title be tainted?

Very possibly, say some Catholic observers who point to both John Paul’s prolific saint-naming pace and - far, far darker – the clergy pedophilia scandal that erupted and spread under his watch.

Sex and sainthood. What a mix.

First, the latest news: An alleged miracle tied to John Paul – the cure of a French nun with Parkinson’s disease, (the same malady that afflicted the Polish pontiff) – was this week affirmed by Vatican medical and theological experts, according to Il Giornale, an Italian newspaper. The nun, Sister Marie Simon-Pierre, was diagnosed in 2001 at age 42. Hand and leg tremors soon prevented her from driving and inhibited her ability to write. After John Paul died in 2005, she began praying to him for healing. Two months later, her symptoms vanished.

Recently, speculation swirled in Rome that Sister Marie had relapsed – or that she perhaps suffered not from Parkinson’s but from a similar condition known to come and go. Ultimately, however, the Vatican’s miracle jury validated her rejuvenation as a supernatural gift from John Paul.

Now, thanks to the late pontiff’s own controversial, saint-making reforms, John Paul may be canonized faster than any person in Church history. In 1983, he unleashed a swift saintly assembly line by halving the number of verified miracles required for sainthood – from four to two. The pope contended he was streamlining the process, making it more collegial, less expensive and more productive. In short, he sought to use saint-naming as an evangelical hammer, to sell the Catholic faith to new lands by sanctifying worthy people who had lived in Asia, Africa, South America and North America.

It was a marketing coup for the Church. John Paul ultimately named 482 saints during his papacy – more than the number declared by all the popes in the last 500 years combined. Some journalists and theologians soon dubbed the Vatican the “Saint Factory.” Critics argued that his reforms “watered down” what should be an exhaustive, pristine path to sainthood. By the end of his life, John Paul had added an average about 18.5 names per year to the saintly roster. In contrast, Pope Benedict XVI has canonized 34 people since 2005 – a little more than five per year.

For John Paul to reach sainthood, a second miracle must be linked to the late pope after he is beatified – a Catholic ceremony that celebrates the first approved miracle. One Vatican City journalist has already predicted that John Paul’s beatification bash will occur in St. Peter’s Square on October 16, 2011 – six years and six months after his death.

By Church rule, no canonization cause is supposed to begin until a candidate has been dead for five years. The idea is to allow time for cool, careful analysis of the saintly contender’s life and virtues. But for Mother Teresa (who was beatified six years and one month after her passing), John Paul waived that formal waiting period. Pope Benedict later did the same favor for his predecessor.

As I wrote in “The Third Miracle,” John Paul’s thirst for saint-naming stoked the ire of many Catholic traditionalists. Not long before John Paul died, Brother Michael O’Neill McGrath, an American author and illustrator of books on saints, said of the pope’s 482 canonizations: “While they’re good people, I’m sure, they’re not terribly inspiring. We’re not going to spend a lot of time offering prayers to obscure French founders of orders ... What kind of an inspiration is that?”

As John Paul today roars toward that same sublime designation, the torrid speed of his canonization campaign is drawing fresh grumbles. But many of those pundits are urging caution based on claims or concerns that he horribly mismanaged the Church’s clergy sex abuse crisis and its Episcopal cover-up.

In the National Catholic Reporter, Michael Sean Winters wrote: “This is madness. After years of being frustrated at the slow pace with which the Vatican embraces change, in this one instance where haste could spell disaster, they appear to be rushing."

In the same publication, Jason Berry asked: “How could John Paul II, a pope who showed brilliant moral vision in the face of Soviet communism, ignore the pedophilia allegations…?”

My book covers the sainthood cause of Mother Theodore Guerin, a 19th-Century French nun to whom a medical miracle was attributed in 2001. The recipient of that supernatural cure – according to the Vatican – was Phil McCord, a caretaker at Mother Theodore’s convent and college near Terre Haute, Indiana.

Earlier this week, a Terre Haute newspaper columnist asked me a provocative question: Would Mother Theodore have reached sainthood if not for John Paul’s “Saint Factory?”

The answer: John Paul’s new rules definitely did not hurt her. But the question itself illustrates how some people now question the objectivity and authenticity of modern Catholic saint-naming.

It’s a little like Major League Baseball’s recent muscle-bound binge of sluggers who pumped their stats with performance-enhancing drugs. Almost every star from the 1990s and 2000s will always be shrouded in a shadow of doubt: Were they juicing? Where they legit?

Similarly, John Paul’s papacy may be forever viewed as Catholic sainthood’s steroid era.

Ten years ago this morning, January 4, 2001, a half-blind handyman awoke in his Terre Haute, Indiana house. He shuffled into his bathroom. He raked his fingers through his gray beard. He glanced into the mirror – and then he froze.

What he saw staring back stunned Phil McCord. Later, when the nuns called it a "miracle," that word would trouble Phil – and it would continue to vex him for years. He thought: A miracle? Really? What did I possibly do to deserve that? Why me? Why not the kids with cancer in the hospital down the road? How will I ever I repay this debt? Does this mean I must do something different with my life? These were the questions – and this was the internal tension – that eventually drew me to this tale.

Just one day earlier, on a whim, Phil had wandered into an ornate basilica at the college and convent where he worked as head of maintenance. At Saint Mary-of-the-Woods, Phil mended the old boilers, the aging pipes, the ancient rooftops, everything. He had settled into a fourth-row pew, alone in the sanctuary, choked with anxiety. Then Phil did something quite rare for him. He prayed to God. That had not been his intent when he strolled in.

Phil was raised in the Baptist faith but, 50-some years later, he wasn’t particularly devout. He was a man of science. An engineer. His fundamental philosophy: seeing was believing. As his wife liked to joke, the only times Phil sat in that chapel were to attend funerals for the nuns. Phil was, however, in some pain, facially disfigured and he couldn’t see a thing from his right eye. All those problems had surfaced abruptly three months earlier when a routine cataract surgery didn’t go so routinely. He had tried multiple eye drops prescribed by his doctor. None soothed his fire-red, half-closed, swollen right eye. So inside the basilica, he decided to have an informal chat with God. He felt he was out of options. A sports coach at the college, Phil tossed a spiritual Hail Mary pass.

He asked God not for a cure, but for the strength to simply go through with a grisly eye operation that doctors had deemed his only chance at regaining full vision. The procedure terrified Phil. A surgeon planned to slice out his diseased right cornea and replace it with a cornea freshly harvested from another person – a dead person. McCord was a man who could rebuild or retool anything. But the transplant and its many possible, gruesome complications left him mired in dread. The born fixer was contemplating not fixing his eye.

After he explained his situation to God in what he later called an “incoherent” and “rambling” appeal, he decided to ask for some extra help from the convent’s founder – Mother Theodore Guerin, a French-born nun who had died in 1856, 16 years after launching the Catholic outpost in the Indiana wilderness. Her body was buried beneath the church and her presence could be seen all over campus – in paintings, signs, posters, and other memorabilia. As Mother Theodore’s present-day employee, Phil likened his prayer to asking the boss for a favor: “If you have God’s ear, if you could exercise that on my behalf, this would be a good time. If you could help me get through this, I would appreciate anything that you could do for me.”

At the mirror the next morning, Phil immediately noticed that his long-drooping right eyelid had returned to its normal position. The pulsing redness that caused everyone to describe the eye as “angry looking,” had eased to a gentler shade of pink. His vision remained cloudy. But as he had slept, the watery heaviness that caused the right side of his face to sag had disappeared. So had the ache. He dashed into his bedroom to ask his wife, a nurse, if the eye looked better to her. It did, she said. It definitely looked better.

Phil never put sequence of events together until he visited his transplant surgeon a few weeks later for a scheduled pre-op exam. The doctor was equally surprised at the state of the right cornea.

“What did you do?” the doctor asked.

“What did I do?” Phil responded with a bit of an edge. He had done nothing. Then he remembered.

“Well, I just said a prayer.”

“Well, it worked,” the doctor said.

“Is this unusual?”

“Oh yeah, very unusual.”

The doctor could not explain it. No doctor would ever offer a solid, scientific reason for the spontaneous improvement.

The transplant operation was cancelled. Weeks later, a simple laser zap removed a thin layer of film that had grown on the artificial lens a doctor had implanted in his right eye during the cataract removal. (Such cloudy layers are common side effects of cataract removal). The vision in Phil’s eye was instantly crisp and clear – for the first time since he was a little boy.

Now the whispers at the convent gained volume: “Did you hear about Phil? … Have you seen his eye? … It’s a miracle! … This is what we’ve been waiting for!”

When Phil had accepted the job as maintenance chief a few years earlier, he didn’t know he was walking into a remote hub of miracle-hungry nuns. Since the early 1900s, they had been hunting for two Vatican-approved miracles to see their founder, Mother Theodore, elevated to sainthood. Two verified miracles carried out in the name of a saintly candidate: that’s what the Catholic hierarchy required in order for a person to be canonized. The first miracle in Mother Theodore’s name had been investigated and authorized by the pope in 1997. Now, the inexplicably healed right eye of the convent’s own handyman might help deliver the final prize.

But Phil wasn’t so sure about all the miracle speculation and chatter. Sure, he was happy that his cure might help the sisters realize a century-long quest. He liked them, liked what they stood for, and he was willing do whatever they asked to help affirm the alleged miracle – including submitting to additional physical examinations. In his head, however, those old questions rumbled and reverberated: “Why would God pick me – of all people - for healing? I’m just an ordinary guy.” He didn’t even attend church regularly.

The real question was this: When Church investigators later convened a tribunal to assess and judge his healing – when the priests who ran that secret court eventually asked Phil to place his hand on a Bible and swear to tell the truth – what would he say?

His mysterious cure could help his co-workers and friends – the sisters - bask in the most joyous day of their lives. His tale could lead to a pope-validated miracle and sainthood for Mother Theodore.

But in a windowless, basement room in downtown Indianapolis, when the priests finally stared across a long table at McCord and asked him, point blank, if he believed in miracles, how would the engineer respond?

Learn more about “The Third Miracle” at my author website: http://www.facebook.com/AuthorBillBriggs
The Third Miracle: An Ordinary Man, a Medical Mystery, and a Trial of Faith

An umbrella. A kayak. A bike.

A cap. A wine chalice. A pair of dark sunglasses.

This trove of papal ‘relics’ – toys and trappings once belonging to the late Pope John Paul II – is luring hundreds of thousands of pilgrims to Monterrey, Mexico, an often-brutal place plagued by drug-related murders. Still, each day, the faithful flock in from nearby Mexican villages or from southwestern U.S. cities. Some come in desperation.

Many are ill, a few deathly so. But a few have claimed that standing near the sprawling spread of artifacts has spurred swift, unexplained cures within their bodies. This is according to Guillermo MacLean, head of Villacero Foundation, the group behind the 150-piece exhibit.

One woman nursing debilitating pain in her arm approached the umbrella, kayak, sunglasses and other sacred souvenirs, MacLean told a journalist two weeks ago. She pressed her body against a bronze replica of the late pope’s hands. She prayed for the ache to vanish. And it did, MacLean said. The woman, he added, later returned to and offer a personal thank you to John Paul for ending her “suffering.”

In Monterrey, believers might say, the miracles are so bright, you’ve gotta wear shades. But when it comes to Church dogma, this is murky space.

Within the Catholic faith, relics are tiered in three layers. First-class relics are said to be pieces of the body of a saint or of a dead saintly contender: typically hair or bones. (John Paul II is currently a candidate for sainthood). Second-class relics – like those in Monterrey – are items the saint or would-be saint used in life: a book, a pen, a spoon. Third-class relics are typically scraps of linen or other cloth that have been placed directly against first-class relics.

I have a third-class relic – a memento from my two years spent researching “The Third Miracle.” It is a small pink ring of woven linen once placed against a bone from the corpse of Mother Theodore Guerin, foundress of a Catholic college and convent in Indiana – and later a candidate for sainthood. I accepted the relic in 2009 as a gift from a nun at the convent. “This is not magical,” she warned sternly. “This is not a lucky charm.”

I listened while tucking the relic into my wallet. And I’ve kept it there ever since – like a lucky charm. Sorry, sister.

In December 2010, I was pulled over for speeding in the Colorado mountains. While standing beside my Jeep, the state trooper asked to see my vehicle registration. As he watched, I pulled a fat clump of credit cards and old receipts from my wallet. I peeled through the mess piece by piece, searching for the requested document. I smiled when I came across the relic, which happened to be pressed against the registration. The cop let me off with a warning.

As I explain in “The Third Miracle,” Catholics have for centuries plucked body parts from saintly candidates during special – or, some might say, gruesome – exhumation ceremonies. (The worship of relics also spans Buddhism, Hinduism, Islam and other branches of Christianity – as well as much of secular history.) Catholic doctrine clearly states, however, there is no inherent power in these pieces; they are merely meant to be stored as tangible reminders over which the faithful can pray. That’s the official stance from Rome. That doesn’t stop many believers, however, from trying to tap some magic. Like the ill folks in Monterrey.

As I describe in my book, when the body of Mother Theodore was unearthed from a cemetery and reburied in a church shrine shortly after 1900, several relics were collected from her body, including four of her fingers, a rib bone, and something that surprised the sisters who were inspecting the 50-year-old remains – her brain.

Inside the dead nun’s skull, the sisters saw what appeared to be her brain – “as fresh and entire as if death had just occurred,” according to convent exhumation records. This discovery defied science: watery brain tissue dissolves weeks or months after death. Three doctors – including one non-Catholic – were summoned to the convent to examine and probe the lump of tissue. One doctor peered at slices of the brain under a microscope. All three experts, according to convent records, later stood before a notary public and gave sworn affidavits in which they “marveled” at the brain’s condition.

Rules are rules: Catholics strictly maintain that relics do not contain any supernatural or curative force. No alchemy. But in 1907, the nuns in Indiana decided to borrow the brain of their foundress for, they hoped, a dash of supernatural medicine. On December 20, the nuns placed the 50-year-old organ against the leg of Sister Mary Alma Ryan. Her foot had been badly burned by a hot water bottle during a botched operation months earlier. Due to the severity of her injury, Sister Mary Alma had not been able to walk since the surgery. But after the brain was momentarily rested on Mary Alma’s scalded skin, the foot quickly improved to a point where she could navigate campus with the aid a special shoe, convent records show.

My lead-foot luck? I figure I merely caught a pre-Christmas break from a cop who was, just maybe, in the holiday spirit. The scorched foot of that Indiana nun? Convent archives show that her fellow sisters firmly believed Mary Alma’s restored stride to be something “miraculous.” Unofficially, of course. The Vatican never investigated.

And in Monterrey, thousands of pilgrims are streaming daily – many to soak up a small dose of what they believe to be the inherent magic in a dead pope’s collection of curios and playthings.

You can see much more about "The Third Miracle" at http://www.facebook.com/AuthorBillBriggs

The Third Miracle: An Ordinary Man, a Medical Mystery, and a Trial of Faith