Our lady full of… surprises.
An Ohio churchgoer says she captured a divine “miracle” on camera when the eyes of a statue of the Virgin Mary appeared to suddenly close.
Connie Liptak was at the Basilica of St. John the Baptist in Canton on Friday when she said a sculpture of Our Lady of Fatima on display during a world tour closed and then reopened its pious eyes, according to FOX 8 Cleveland.
“I knew it was a miracle because I had been looking at them all morning,” said Liptak, who snapped a photo of the moment. “They’re really closed. I mean, you can really see her eyelashes drooping.”
A digital photograph of the alleged phenomenon appears to show Mary with her eyelids closed and her mouth slightly more open than the statue in its original form.
True believers have long attributed miracles, including healings and astral phenomena, to the same sculpture – the International Pilgrim Virgin Statue of Our Lady of Fatima.
“We know she cried 15 times,” the statue’s caretaker, Larry Maginot, told the broadcaster.
But Rev. David Misbrener, pastor of the church in Ohio, said he does not believe it was a natural disaster.
“I’m a little skeptical about such things, and the church is very cautious about such things,” Misbrener told the Canton Repository. “With a camera, anything can happen.”
However, he added: “In my opinion, if it has benefited someone mentally or physically, it has served its purpose.”
The statue, which shows the praying mother of Jesus near a small village in Portugal, was commissioned in 1947. Today it travels around the world and is exhibited in Catholic churches.
Liptak’s image of apparent blinking has yet to be analyzed by a digital photography expert.
