A Christmas Miracle Thirty years ago
This Christmas I witnessed the blessing of a Christmas Miracle. The mystery around this miracle still remains. It was an answer to a prayer and who knows what guides the power of prayer.
My sister had five small children. Her husband spent his meager earnings at the local pub in a small southern Alberta hamlet where they lived.
My sister scrimped every year come Christmas time often making her children their Christmas present with scrap wood, old paint and whatever else she could put her hands on.
She yearned to be able to buy them nice gifts from the stores in the city but there was never enough money. One Christmas Eve, my sister and her family traveled to the nearest big city, which was over thirty miles away, for Midnight Mass.
The children were eager to see the city all decked out in Christmas lights. Homes completely trimmed in glittering lights and huge Christmas trees all dressed. These sights were so different from their own candle in the window and their Charlie Brown Christmas tree.
After mass the children sleep on the long road trip home. On their return the children were excited to see that Santa had come to their door as five pairs of new runners were lined up at the door.
With great excitement each child tried on the shoes that were closest to their size only to discover each pair fit perfectly. For the first time all five children had new shoes at the same time.
My sister told me that she had prayed at Mass early that night for the shoes that she so desperately needed for her children. To this day she does not know where they appeared from. Was it Santa or God or both? All we can say “It was a Christmas Miracle”.
