Top 10 Miracles That Can't Be Explained

Greg Thomas of Montgomery, Minnesota was in dire need of a miracle after receiving a terminal diagnosis. At the age of 57, Thomas was diagnosed with Stage 4 cancer in his head and neck, and doctors told his family to begin funeral preparations. Thomas started taking long walks with his dog to calm himself and, one day, discovered an old, dilapidated church. He offered to spend the rest of his time restoring the building, only to find that as the church slowly came back to life, so did he. Just when he had finished revamping the chapel’s exterior, Thomas’ cancer reportedly went into remission. This came three years after he received the diagnosis that left him dependent on a feeding tube.

Zeitoun is a district in Cairo, Egypt that is believed to have been one of the stops Mary and Joseph made in the country while fleeing King Herod’s decree. On April 2nd 1968, two mechanics claimed to have seen a woman standing on the roof of Saint Mary's Coptic Church. Initially thinking she was about to take her own life, one of the men called for police, while a crowd gathered to watch, believing it to be the Virgin Mary. The figure supposedly vanished after some minutes but made several more appearances over the next few years. Subsequent investigations by the police and other independent bodies turned up no suitable explanations. As such, the apparitions were officially authenticated by the Egyptian government.

Originally named Alfred Bessette, this Catholic Saint was born into a poor family in Quebec, Canada. While battling terrible health conditions in his childhood, Bessette became fascinated by Saint Joseph, and later devoted his life to the Catholic Church in his 20s. Now going by the religious name of Brother André, he soon gained a reputation for reportedly healing people by blessing them with oil and offering intercessory prayers through Saint Joseph. Bessette was hounded by so many sick people at the school where he worked that the officials stopped him from receiving them. Even with such fame, he never took credit for the miracles, attributing them to Saint Joseph instead. In October 2010, Bessette was formally canonized by the Catholic Church.

Sister Agnes Katsuko Sasagawa was a Catholic nun at a convent in Yuzawadai, Japan when she reportedly began receiving a series of cryptic visions in 1973. Sasagawa, who was completely deaf at the time, claimed to have received messages from a wooden statue of the Virgin Mary, including that she would be cured of her deafness. She reported seeing the statue cry and bleed from wounds in its hands, a claim that was backed up by other nuns in the convent. Sasagawa also stated that she had developed the same bleeding wounds, known as stigmata, and years later, fully regained her hearing. The blood and tears from the statue were reportedly tested by a laboratory, and shown to be of human origin.

A woman at a Florida hospital defied all scientific odds when she mysteriously woke up just as doctors were about to pronounce her dead. Ruby Graupera-Cassimiro had gone to the hospital for a cesarean section, which went on pretty successfully. But soon after her baby was delivered, she suffered complications and began losing consciousness. All efforts at resuscitating her proved abortive as the new mother’s heart had stopped for 45 minutes. However, just as her family was brought in to say their goodbyes, Graupera-Cassimiro spontaneously came back to life. Doctors who worked to revive her said it was unlike anything they had ever seen, and have since called it a medical miracle.

Fittingly coming in at the halfway point of this list is an occurrence that has been referred to as a “half-miracle.” While in Naples in 2015, Pope Francis kissed the sealed blood of St. Gennaro, reportedly causing half of the dried relic to turn to liquid. St. Gennaro was the bishop of Naples, whose blood was preserved after he was allegedly martyred in the year 305. The Catholic faithful believe that the dried blood traditionally liquefies thrice, on the same dates every year. As this particular event didn’t occur on any of those dates, it was deemed a miracle by the Archbishop of Naples. Apparently, the blood relic had only ever liquefied in the presence of one other Pope, way back in 1848.

Right from childhood, Joseph of Cupertino had visions of ecstasy and was prone to repeated violent outbursts. In his youth, he was hired to serve in a Franciscan convent and managed to work his way up to getting ordained as a priest. His ecstatic visions only became more frequent afterwards, and many claimed that he would levitate during Mass. This was somewhat of a double-edged sword for Joseph. On one hand, he was believed to have attained the greatest height of holiness, but on the other hand, it was seen as a sign of witchcraft. Joseph was ultimately exonerated of the witchcraft claims and in 1767, he was canonized as the patron saint of aviation and astronauts, among others.

Therese Neumann was a German mystic whose life was plagued by many ailments and striking phenomena. Neuman claimed to have suffered a series of severe falls in her youth that left her partially paralyzed and completely blind. Due to her injuries, she was bedridden for a long period and seemed to have developed very deep bed sores as a result. However, Neumann soon reported that Saint Therese of Lisieux had healed her of her blindness, paralysis and bed sores on the days of her beatification and canonization. Additionally, Neumann said that she had eaten no other food but the Holy Eucharist for nearly four decades. While her many miraculous claims have received their fair share of skepticism, no verifiable explanations have been rendered yet.

This case has also been subjected to a lot of controversy over its authenticity, but as it stands, the Miracle of Calanda has defied any concrete explanation. As the reports go, 20-year-old Miguel Pellicer was a laborer working on his uncle’s farm in July 1637, when he suffered a terrible accident that wrecked his right leg. Consequently, it had to be amputated. Pellicer reportedly survived with a wooden leg and crutches, and would anoint his stump with oil every evening, hoping for some divine help. In 1640, he returned to his parents’ home where, one night, it was discovered that his leg had seemingly been restored. After a year-long investigation by the church, the case was officially declared a miracle.

In 1917, two young siblings Francisco and Jacinta Marto, alongside their cousin Lúcia dos Santos, had a strange encounter. The three children, who lived in Fátima, Portugal, claimed to have received several apparitions from the Angel of Peace, and later, the Virgin Mary. Supposedly, Mary first visited the children on May 13th 1917 and asked them to return there on the same day for the next six months. On her last appearance, thousands of people were also present, with many reporting that they had been healed of chronic illnesses after seeing the Blessed Virgin. They also claimed to witness the sun spinning in the sky. These assertions were validated when the young siblings were canonized in 2017, becoming the youngest ever Catholic saints.