Saintly ‘science’: When doctors and doubters are called upon to prove miracles

[didymus]

National Post:

Saintly ‘science’: When doctors and doubters are called upon to prove miracles

Dr. Jacalyn Duffin, a hematologist, lapsed Anglican and firm atheist, was desperate for work in the mid-1980s when she took on a small contract in Ottawa to interpret a set of laboratory slides for a colleague and write a report.

She was given no information about the patient and assumed her report would be used in a malpractice lawsuit, which is common for that kind of blind medical analysis.
Instead, her findings and subsequent oral testimony became the last piece of “evidence” of a miracle in the 200-year cause for canonization of Marie-Marguerite d’Youville, the first Canadian to be made a saint.

That an atheist scientist would be conscripted to the cause is not unusual in the complicated business of proving sainthood.

Dr. Ronald Kleinman, also an atheist, was a top pediatrician at Massachusetts General Hospital in March 1987 when he treated a little girl who was moments from death. The result of what he witnessed that day became critical medical evidence that led to Edith Stein being declared a saint.

 

[ChadS]

I remember reading a similar story about doctors in Europe that assist the Vatican in determining whether a medical cure was miraculous or natural. Although some will never be convinced, I think it adds more credibility if a doctor that is a recognized expert in a certain field with no particular religious affiliation or beliefs can say “I can find no medical or natural cause for this cure.” The skeptic will say it’s because the natural cure hasn’t been found yet, but if leading experts are stumped then the liklihood it was divine intervention it all the more certain. It also shows the Church isn’t out there throwing around the word “miracle” without some justification and proof to back up their claims, putting to bed the claim that believers just have blind faith or are superstitious fools.

ChadS

 

[reggieM]

That is a great story. Thanks.

Having witnessed a miracle first-hand, the atheist, Dr. Duffin is in a very difficult and conflicting position:

“I’m an atheist, but one who believes in miracles. I’m prepared to believe there can be more than one truth out there at any given time.”

In this case, “more than one truth” means “contradictory claims” – as where a person thinks that God (or the supernatural) does not exist, but at the same time claims to believe in miracles (because the observed evidence makes it impossible to deny the miraculous).

We should pray for her …