Stories

As he reached the door of her house, where he was in plain danger of falling back into sin, he felt himself pushed back by an unseen force, and suddenly found himself the whole length of the street away, standing before his own door. He understood clearly that Mary had saved him from his ruin.

Then the scene changed: the woman appeared robed as a queen and surrounded with light, and the child shone like a sun. He took the flowers and scattered them over her head. She understood at once that these were Jesus and Mary, and fell down to adore them, and the vision ended. Domenica later took the Dominican habit and died in 1553 with the reputation of a saint.

Then the Blessed Virgin began to sing with such sweetness that the monk lost his senses and fell face down on the ground. When the matins bell rang and the monks gathered, Thomas was missing; they searched his cell and the rest of the monastery, and at last found him in the garden, seemingly lifeless. When his superior commanded him to tell what had happened, he came to himself and, under obedience, recounted all the favors the Mother of God had shown him.

Fifteen days later Alexandra's soul appeared to St. Dominic, beautiful and shining like a star, and told him that one of the greatest reliefs for the souls in purgatory is the rosary said for them, and that as soon as those souls reach paradise they pray for whoever offered them these prayers. With that, St. Dominic saw her happy soul rise in triumph to heaven.

From then on he lived an exemplary life, went to India to preach the faith, passed from there to Japan, and at last had the grace of dying a martyr for Jesus Christ, burned alive.

At these words the lawyer fell to his knees and begged the friar's help. The friar reassured him and ordered the devil to leave the house without doing any harm, allowing him only, as proof that he had truly gone, to break a piece of the wall. No sooner had he spoken than a hole was torn in the wall with a great crash. The lawyer changed his life, and we may hope he held to his new course until death.

Benedetta faithfully did as she was told, and one day Jesus himself appeared to her, showed her the book, and said, "See, your sins are wiped away. The book is white. Now write in it acts of love and virtue." Benedetta did so, lived a holy life, and died a holy death.

Beatrice went back into the monastery, took up the religious habit again, and, grateful for Mary's mercy, lived the rest of her life like a saint. Before she died she told the whole story, to the glory of Our Lady.

At this wonder the people shouted, "Pardon, pardon," and he was pardoned. He went home, lived an upright life ever after, and was always devoted to Mary, who had saved him from both a temporal and an eternal death.

Theophilus went back to the church, and there, three days later, he died in peace, with thanks to Jesus and his holy mother on his lips.