Goines On: Miracle in Paris

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When Goines was in Paris in April, he witnessed – and was even able to access his camera in time to photograph – a miracle so powerful that he had, in the ensuing months, once or twice considered going to church again.
    Goines had been so struck by the restoration of a blind man’s sight that he showed the photograph to several friends the same day, one of whom was a devout Catholic and asked Goines’ permission to share it with his priest.

    The friend’s priest was also mightily struck by the miracle caught on camera, and he even pointed out that the existence of the photo was itself a miracle, in that there just happened to have been a perspicient observer on site with a camera.
    The priest immediately showed the photo to his bishop, who was even more struck – there having been so few miracles lately – and he shipped the photo off to the Vatican, along with the information about its taking, which included Goines’ identity as the photographer. The Vatican acted quickly, assembling an investigative team to try to authenticate the miracle toward featuring it in churches around the world.
    But only last week did Goines finally hear from his Catholic friend what had come of the investigation. The friend started by admitting that his faith had been shaken by what was discovered.
    The Vatican reported that it had not been easy to locate the blind man, or the young woman whose derrière had been God’s instrument. When the search team finally located the man, and shortly thereafter the young woman, they learned that he was a pickpocket only pretending to be blind the better to fondle people’s garments without putting them on guard. And the young woman wasn’t even a virgin, although she was named Mary.
    Goines too was disappointed. For many years, as he grew older and closer to dying, he had been looking for something to revive his lost faith. And for a few months he thought this might be it.

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