Did you say “miracle”?
A miracle is discerned
It is difficult to define in a definitive way! a supernatural phenomenon. From a Catholic point of view – but each religion has its miracles – to try to define what a miracle is is to confront a long Christian theological and apologetic tradition, which goes back to the Gospels, at least, and reaches as far as to us through the Fathers and Doctors of the Church (Saint Augustine, in particular, then Saint Thomas Aquinas). If the definitions of the miracle evolve over time, we should not be surprised: the description of the supernatural is done with the language specific to each era, and according, also, to the evolution of knowledge of nature as well as theological study on the nature of God, and the way in which he acts and is present in the world.
A miracle, before being a definition, is a phenomenon, an “extraordinary fact where one believes to recognize a divine intervention, benevolent, to which one confers a spiritual significance. (Dictionary Le Robert). It is therefore necessary, in order to speak of a Christian miracle, that the principle of divine intervention in the world, in man, be accepted. An attempt at definition will then focus on the way in which God intervenes, but also on the reasons for which he intervenes, the conditions in which he intervenes, and the meanings that men can - or must - give to a supernatural intervention, if recognized. One of the central questions being, of course, the criteria for discerning the miracle:
- what is ordinary: extraordinary?
- how can one say that such a fact, recognized as extraordinary, is probably the result of divine intervention?
good and bad supernatural
We have always been concerned with judging miracle workers, in particular because a miracle, by implying the intervention of a superior or external force which modifies the order of things, may be considered by the public authorities, including religious, as an attack on order, even a threat, mainly when they cause popular emotions: think of the first reactions of the authorities in the event of a Marian appearance. With, for the religious authorities, an additional task: it is up to them to unmask false prodigies, or evil spirits, even the work of the Devil, given that miracles - or their counterfeit - can be indications of witchcraft, possession , or manifesting the power of evil natural forces.
In the Christian world, the criterion of discernment is the conformity of phenomena with the divine Word: "Examine everything with discernment, retain what is good" (1 Th. 5, 21) We will also remember this famous saying of Pascal: "The miracles discern the doctrine, the doctrine discerns the miracles” (Pascal, Pensées, 832-803)
Development of investigation procedures
The progressive formatting, between the XNUMXth and XNUMXth centuries, of the processes of canonization, led to a formatting of the procedures intended to make miracles a criterion of holiness. Not that, in the eyes of the Church, the saint is considered a miracle worker, but because the miracle designates the saint, a sign given by God to show men that he is in favor of the holiness of the one of his servants.
Before canonization, therefore, miracles can be used to attest to the reputation of holiness of a servant of God (and not his holiness). After having proclaimed the heroic virtues of a servant of God, the Church studies some of these so-called miracles, to know if God decides in favor of his servant.
In modern times (Prospero Lambertini, 1734), the focus is on two questions, which still remain today at the foundation of canonical investigations when it comes to the recognition of miracles in the context of a canonization process:
- Is the event attested by reliable witnesses?
- Does it remain unexplained according to the knowledge of the time? It is here – here only – that the event falls within the scope of the scientists' investigation. If we take the example of physical healing, doctors will wonder about:
1. the nature of the disease (the diagnosis of the disease and its incurability)
2. medications that have been taken
3. the instantaneous and complete character of the cure
4. the “final” nature of this healing
Medical experts are not asked to comment on the possibility or even the reality of supernatural intervention. Moreover, it is not because the medical experts will have concluded that there is a fatal organic disease, instantly and definitively cured without the help of medicine, that the Church will proclaim the miracle. Experts are summoned to attest to the extraordinary nature of the event. It is then up to the Church to discern the supernatural.
Indeed, it is necessary to add to the technical study of the fact that of the link with the religious dimension of the event: for a miracle to be attributed to a sanctuary or to a saint, one must be able to prove that it happened produced within the framework of an invocation, the addressee of which must then be determined.
The process of discerning the miracle does not aim to decide between God and man, or God and nature because “one can never say exactly what is not of man in order to deduce from it what would be of God alone. (XL-D., col. 266)
Moreover, this approach goes against the idea of “the faith that heals” (Charcot, 1897) “The Church performs the miracle in the name of its faith, thus committing believers to proceed like it. It is not faith that produces the miracle, it is faith that recognizes it. The link is not only necessary, it is said to be real. (XL-D., ibid.)
God, miracles and nature
Is the miracle an object of science?
It has long been sought to distinguish, in extraordinary phenomena, the action of God from the action of man or nature, to then question the way in which God interacts with nature.
From the XNUMXth century, questions about the possibility of miracles, or the ways in which the supernatural is inscribed in the world, refer to broader questions about the existence of God, or about the nature of God. Catholic apologetics, that is to say the writings aimed at defending the Catholic faith, are then based on the idea that a miracle is observed, and that, starting from there, God imposes himself on men with obviousness. .
However, this argument overlooks the phenomenon of unbelief, which nevertheless grew throughout the XNUMXth century. Most apologists then consider the unbeliever as a being of bad will, who blinds himself so as not to be struck by divine power. From this point of view, Thérèse is a precursor, since she acutely felt, from the depths of her night of faith, that an unbeliever could be one... in good faith.
At the same time, the principle of the totally objective character of the miracle is not without repelling certain minds within the Church itself, who consider it as violence done to the faith. The philosopher Maurice Blondel tried to go beyond this aporia in his Lettre sur l'apologétique (1896), by insisting on the need to take into account the meaning of the miracle: for him, the miracle is a sign of a religious order, which is addressed to the religious man, and not to the scientist or the philosopher. “Miracles are therefore truly miraculous only in the eyes of those who are already mature enough to recognize divine action in the most habitual events. “, he concludes. His proposal was, at the time, poorly received by the institution, but it reopened the way to a theology of the sign.
Subsequently, when the miracle was no longer instrumentalized in a perspective of defense of the Catholic faith, it became possible to get out of the opposition between God and nature.
By endeavoring to think of the miracle within the general framework of Revelation and, particularly, starting from the Incarnation and the Resurrection, one can discover that "God does not supplant man but completes his activity so that a miracle happens. »
The miracle reveals the unity of God with man
From this perspective, the miracle reveals God's unity with man. The miracle passes through human gestures: prayer, pilgrimage, physical contact with water (from Lourdes, for example), oil (having burned in front of an image), a relic, a statue, an image . It passes, more spiritually, perhaps more fundamentally, through the full and entire participation of man in the divine project: "in all truth the miracle concerns only the poor, on the miracle-working side as well as on the miraculous side, because one must agree to to be invaded by God. »
In this perspective, we will be able to examine with attention the proposition of Father Xavier Léon-Dufour according to which the miracle is, in the eyes of Christians, "nothing but a manifestation, more surprising than usual, of the relationship which unites God and his creature in a state of misery. »
This synthesis is inspired by the work of Xavier Léon-Dufour, sj, recognized specialist in the miracles of Jesus.
Reference is made in particular to his article “Miracle” published in the encyclopedia Catholicisme
(Xavier Léon-Dufour, “Miracle”, Catholicisme, t. IX, Paris, Letouzey and Ané, 1982, col. 252 – 269.)
Antoinette Guise
