Pope Luciani, Intercessor

" Lord Jesus,

You that you have given the great joy to us of venerating

Pope John Paul as Your Vicar on the earth,

and therefore in Your inscrutable designs have made us suffer the immense pain of his unexpected death,

grant us the graces that we ask of You, so that, sure

of his intercession near toYou, we can venerate him on the

altars one day: then his goodness and humility suggested as an example for the

faithful will be a perennial invitation to translate in the life of his

teachings and to disseminate serenity and love.

Amen ".

Imprimatur

+ Msgr. Maffeo Ducoli

Bishop of Belluno-Feltre

Some graces received by Pope John Paul I’ intercession : healings, conversions, Priesthood vocations, happening whilst he was still alive and after his death

" I am a Franciscan nun of Christ King, born on Aug 27,1923. Currently I am in Tarzo (TV) in the House of rest " Villa Bianca " in order to make my convalescence that is, and will still be, long. February 19, 1983 I had been hit from a mortal cardiac infarct, while I was taking part in the retreat of the Nuns in the community of S. Donà di Piave. Since that day, I was near death several times, and I was encouraged to pray to some saint. I chose as my protector Pope Luciani. Why - you may ask me - just him? I met him when he was Bishop of Vittorio Veneto, he has always struck me, and his figure always remained in the heart, for his humility and simplicity in dealing with all, for the joy that he irradiated with his smile. One can feel comfortable whilst speaking with him. My veneration grew when he was elected Pope and when he was introduced to the loggia the same evening of the election.

As soon as I heard the news of his unexpected death, I began to pray to him, like it’s possible to pray to a Saint, and I can say that I have always been heard. After the infarct, my life hung from a thread; I intensified my prayer, sure of his aid and of his intercession, although I was serenely ready to submit to the Will of God, if He wanted me at His Home, or if He wanted to leave me here still, in order to continue doing some good. After a long discourse from some of the doctors about the gravity and the risk of an operation, to me was left the responsibility of taking the decision for the heart operation, because there would be a minimal possibility of success, in affirmative case. I took advice from my Superiors and relatives: not all them seemed to be favorable. Then I decided, with serene confidence in the many prayers that were elevated to God the Father through the intercession of Pope Luciani. October 20, 1983 I entered into the operations room in Padova, carrying with me a little card of Pope Luciani. The operation, directed by Prof. Valfrè with his team, lasted approximately six hours: I was operated on to open my heart. A good part of the heart was removed, at least the most sick part (it was said), but it was executed double by-pass aorta-coronary. After the operation, three days in the resuscitation room passed, without my knowledge of being in this world.

I remember that the morning of the third day I woke up and a kind nurse gave me the card of Pope Luciani so I could kiss it and then I did not see it again. After a while, the chaplain came and he gave me Holy Communion . With great joy for having Jesus in me, I realized I was still alive: the prayers had been heard, and I thanked God the Father, the Blessed Virgin, and the beloved Pope Luciani. At noon they carried me to cardiology,: everyone in my room was happy for me. But I did not succeed in finding my card of Pope Luciani. I asked my sister Nun, who assisted me, to go to see where it had gone to . She found the nurse of the resuscitation room: she was asked and she answered her : " the image of Pope Luciani we have hung here, because, as it helped your sister, it is of aid also to others, and with his smile it scatters many blessings on who invokes him ".

Since then, I have had several complications, but I have never lost my spirit sure that if Pope Luciani had not let out me alive from the operating room, I would not be alive at this moment. I was then carried from the hospital of Padova to that of Treviso, to be able to recover, according to the advise of Prof. Valfrè. November 9, the nurse of Tarzo came with the car and she accompanied me to take me to the hospital of Treviso, in the cardiology unit, where I had many necessary tests, even for a problem inside the stomach, since it seemed to be an ulcer, but all tests were negative.

November 25, I was also released from this hospital and with great joy I returned to Tarzo, in Villa Bianca. The nurse who had come to take me, arriving at the house, exclaimed: " You know, I would never have believed about taking you back here alive. " " But when I have prayed to Pope Luciani – I answered with much serenity – I was sure, and, after having left the operations room alive, I have not thought of dying, even if I saw a continuous 'coming and going' of nuns and relatives around me. On June 24, at Crea de Spinea, where my brother is parish Priest, a thanksgiving Mass was celebrated; all my relatives were present who had prayed with me and for me and also friends and numerous persons from the nearby towns. The Eucharist was lived like a joyful thanks to God that donates to every creature a life in order to do some good. Now I know that with this heart, repaired, but that he has started again its activity, I can live, even if I am not fully efficient : I calmly pass my days, with the help of fraternal charity. In our house in Tarzo, every day we have Eucharistic Adoration. I do not have words in order to express my thanks to the beloved Pope Luciani and to all those who have prayed and have helped me to trust in prayer and to abandon myself totally to the Will of God ".

I allow myself to communicate to that respectable Center my relative testimony to one extraordinary healing.

Towards the end of June 1985, my brother Mr. Rino Pinaffo, resident with the family in France, in Confouleux 81800 Robenstans, telephoned to the brother Priest, don Aldo Pinaffo, parish priest of Crea of Spinea (VE), that his brother-in-law, Mr. Jacques Albenge Zaching, was in the hospital in serious conditions with a certain diagnosis of a malignant tumour in the head. The surgeons were very uncertain on the wisdom of performing an eventual operation, due to the gravity of the situation. The brother perceived to us, also on behalf of the wife and the four sons’, the dramatic truth. He asked with trust, that I and the nuns of Villa Bianca in Tarzo (TV) would pray to Pope Luciani , so that, for Pope Luciani’s intercession, from which I am convinced myself to have received a great grace, he could also find comfort and healing. I wrote him immediately, exhorting him to pray with confidence to Pope Luciani and I sent him a postcard with the photo of the Pope inviting them and the other relatives to say a 'Pater Noster', 'Ave Maria' and three 'Glorias', trusting in his intercession. My other sister, a Nun, who was in Rome, went to Pope John Paul’s grave to pray that the surgical operation would be successful. On the eve of the operation, as it was written to me, I knew that one of the surgeons had been withdrawn asserting that Mr. Albenge, even if he was operated on, would have had only a few days of life; the other surgeon was very uncertain about what to do. While from every part there were prayers, the doctors decided themselves in favour of the operation, which lasted five hours. They found a bag of blood and, in the brain, the tumour that it was not possible to remove, only in part, in order not to damage vital parts. Before informing the wife about the negative success of the operation, she was given some sedatives. The situation was very serious : the husband would have lived only some days. The tumour, I repeat, was malignant, neither it was possible for it to be taken completely out because, as I have said, being localized in extremely delicate parts and vital of the brain, the sick man would have died during the operation.

Eight days passed, with plenty of worry and anxiety. The doctors underwent the sick man to all the clinical controls. With great surprise and astonishment of the relatives, the doctors informed us that Mr. Albenge appeared completely recovered because there was no more trace of the tumour . Therefore he was sent back to his house. In September of the same year, my brother don Aldo went to see him, and he found the relative in his workplace! A thanksgiving Mass was celebrated for the grace obtained by the intercession (I am absolutely convinced) of Pope Luciani. All the relatives were present. Towards the middle of January 1986, another test was made on Mr. Albenge. The doctors, stating the confirmed healing, were astonished: " How can he be well recovered, without having undergone some radiation ?". I must add that in the first days of May, Mr. Albenge was still undergoing examinations of the case that confirmed the complete healing. The family wishes to convey their thanks to so many people who have prayed for the healing of the relative, and they wish with living hope that Pope Luciani can be, as soon as possible, elevated to the dignity of the altars.

Mr. Jacques Albenge Zaching is now 56 years of age, and he is perfectly recovered. He continues his life working the fields.

" Mrs. Emilia Aresca Tiberti, inhabitant in Castelnuovo Calcea (Asti) in Via Valleggia 19, had suffered for several years from serious pains in her back, so much so that she was prevented from doing her usual housework. The doctors' cures were not useful to stop her suffering, indeed, the problem was aggravated. The orthopedic Head physician of Nizza Monferrato Hospital visited her. She underwent x-rays, and all kinds of tests and treatments, she had to carry the orthopedic bust, but all without any improvement. The Nizza Hospital conserves her clinical folder, that it can be consulted.

The Holy Fathers' burial day, the lady went with emotion to the celebration of the funeral rites. Among her pains during all the development of the sacred function she did not stop to pray to him to be able to get the relief her pains in this way : " Oh you, Pope Luciani, so close to Jesus, Jesus listens to you; I have not deserve it, but if you say it... ".

At night in bed she continued praying , until, tired out, she fell asleep. At dawn, she woke up, she felt light; she did not feel any pain. She was astonished! She tried to get out of her bed, but she had to be sure with great emotion that every pain had disappeared. Since that day September 29, 1978 until today October 8, 1984 the disease has absolutely disappeared.

Now the lady always continues praying to Pope Luciani; She celebrates a Mass for his death anniversary every year, she often makes offerings, when she can, for good works in honour of the saintly Pontiff.

The favoured woman would have much pleasure if her grace was published in the magazine " Humilitas ", to honour the beloved Pope Luciani.

The undersigned Salesian Chaplain Priest from Monferrato Nizza Hospital, who has collected all this said above verbally from the same lady, attests to the honesty of the same person and therefore the truth about all that he has heard from her and it is reported here.

" My name is Andrea, I am 18 years and I am a seminarist of Ravenna, very attached to the memory of Pope Luciani’s figure. In 1978 I was 10 years and for the election of a Pontiff I paid the typical attention of a boy of that age, that is, I followed it with a certain disregard. One thing struck me deeply and it was the greeting that the neo-elected one gave to the world the day after the election. I do not know well because, perhaps the smile, perhaps the strong veneta cadence when speaking, perhaps the great goodness and humility that gushed from the way of moving of John Paul I, but those words were printed in my mind and in my heart and just today I remember them very well. I felt an extreme happiness for what it had happened, happiness that increased to the thought of being able to see and feel that man for who knows how much time.

Albino Luciani was one flashing light suddenly illuminating on the figure of the papacy, after the grey of the last years of Paul VI (besides a greatest figure of the contemporary Church, very highly -esteemed by me). Well, to my eyes, those of a boy of hardly 10 years, the unexpected passing of that man, who had become for me something more than a person to respect or to see only in TV or on newspapers, was nearly a trauma; from then on was born a thirst in me to learn biographical particulars, curiosities, signals on the life of a man who had fascinated me so strongly, but that much too soon the Lord has removed from all of us, almost as if we were not worthy to deserve a grace so large.

My interest for Pope Luciani has then carried me to increase the horizons of my search, to extend to other personages unknown directly for me from which I had heard as for example two other Popes, former Patriarchs of Venice, as S. Pius X and John XXIII.

Since then has continued the road that has carried me to the vocation to sacerdotal life, that even now I cover with much enthusiasm and conviction. Therefore I love to remember the roots of my choice, sunk just in Albino Luciani’s figure, in those 33 days that, if little or nothing they have meant to the eyes of many, they have been enough to leave behind us an image by now surpassed of the Pontiff’s figure, opening the doors for new times, until quite interrupting the ancient sequence of Italian Popes, also that no more justified.

This one as historical level, without taking into account what the election of John Paul I has operated in so many, but many persons ". (...)

" To the Glory of the Holy Trinity : Father, Son and Holy Spirit and honour of His faithful servant: Albino Luciani - John Paul - I write:

In August 1984 I had news that my sister, Libera, had to undergo a surgical operation because she suffered from neoplasia of the tube. The disease was manifested serious and of uncertain nature. In my painful surprise I felt myself pushed to pray to " Pope Luciani ". Every day I prayed to his image with much faith; and a thought began in me: Beloved Pope Luciani, make me see that you have credit before God by obtaining " grace " for Libera; and I prayed... My sister underwent the operation, underwent all the assessments and cures (painful and humiliating) with laudable serenity, optimism and force of mind asking, stimulated by me, the protection of Pope Luciani together with her relatives, especially her husband.

After some months she was subjected to an agreed operation " an exploratory laparatomia " in Monza, by Prof. Mangioni; she exceeded with respectable normality, remaining fifteen days in that hospital, alternating clinical examinations. Before leaving the hospital, with her husband, she awaited the results with much serenity, mixed with anxiety... And the Professor came with the " response ". He looked very pleased and, putting his hand on her shoulder, said: " Dear Madam, although the doubts, the perplexities, the uncertainties, I’m surprised, I must say that the assessments turn out negative; but you... who is praying for you?

I cannot describe the feelings she had at that moment, except that they were expressed in an explosion of crying; but she knew very well and she had no doubt that Pope Luciani had obtained the grace for her, and she had already promised to go to his native town " Canale D' Agordo " to thank him, a promise that she carried out on August 6, 1986, approximately after two years. For me the words of the Professor are the answer of the " credit " that Pope Luciani has before God. Because of that, with confidence in him I pray to him in mine and other people's necessity. Pope Luciani is indeed the smiling Pope and I am pleased to call him : transparency of God! "

" I am a 25 years old girl from Buenos Aires, Argentina. I am living as a student in San Benedetto del Tronto for ten months. Last week when I was in Vittorio Veneto for a visit, I saw a copy of " Pope Luciani-Humilitas " magazine. Today I have finished reading it and I felt touched. I want to tell you I love Pope Luciani very much and I consider him just as a saint. He has changed my life. For years I did not go to church, from when I finished elementary school. When I saw him on TV for the first time, I felt greatly touched because I had never seen a Pope so sweet, amiable, smiling. On September 16th, 1978, Saturday evening, I felt called to go to Mass, but I did not want to go. Eventually, when I could oppose this 'call' no longer, I went to Mass.. I see in this fact that the Lord had the intention of using Pope Luciani to make me return to the Catholic practice that I have no longer abandoned . Now I see that there is a center dedicated to promoting his figure and I can say that the Lord has listened to me. I have prayed a lot that something was made like that. And I thank the Lord. I always try to study his figure, to read all the books that I can find. I also join with the wishes of Sr. Maria Cecile du Sacre Coeur from France and to all those people who wish the same : to see some day his Cause of Beatification introduced which would greatly benefit the Universal Church. Although, I ask always the Pope Luciani’s intercession as if he were a Saint. I celebrate the Holy Mass every year in his memory and for his Beatification in Buenos Aires (every September 28th ).Four years ago, I had the grace of being able to go to his native town, Canale D' Agordo, and now I ‘d want to know the Pope Luciani Center in order to see your work. I hope to be able to do it soon ". (...)

NOTE : The author had been on a visit to Pope Luciani Center on December 24th, 1986, before the publication of the letter in Humilitas.

(...) " Today, rethinking with calm to the contacts I had with him, I don’t know how I couldn’t realize in what way he has been able to demonstrate towards me so much love and good will. The first true contact with don Albino I had was in Belluno, back in 1943 when, having free time from my engagements in the office, I collaborated for " L’ Amico del Popolo " and I was provincial correspondent for " L’ Avvenire d’Italia ". He met me at Piazza dei Martiri and he told me: " I have read your first articles on our Catholic daily paper and I am pleased with you. The only thing, you know, in my personal opinion, how it would play well if you, signing yourself, you put the Christian name first, and then the surname." But the lesson I have learned it from that beginner I was. Since then my contacts with him were very rare and just for this even today I am amazed for what I am about to write :From September until ending November 1961, I was sent urgently to the Padova hospital for a surgical operation, but a not benevolent destiny forced me to bed for three months because of two bronchopneumonias due to post-surgical complications. From a medical consult result : not hopes of survival, so much that the voice had scattered a little bit everywhere and everybody expected from a moment to the other the announcement of my death.

But then the Bishop of Vittorio Veneto Luciani hadn’t forgotten me, and twice I saw him at my bedside and when I told him that I wanted to die at home, with a sign of the Cross on the forehead and with the words "God has helped me in the past sufferings and He will also help you surely", he said goodbye to me smiling. At the end of November, I went home in order to end my earthly days, but " incredible dictu ", after three days I was at Falcade, the fever that always oscillated on the 40 degrees, disappeared completely and at Christmas I worked in my hotel atmosphere, as nothing had happened. That is like that on December 28th a bus arrived also that carried Nuns and nurses from the Padova Hospital, came purposely to Falcade in order to see if truly I was still alive. I remember that, while the group was led to the dining room, a nurse at a low voice (but I have heard very well), told to a Nun: " Is that one at the bar Mr. Fol’s brother ?" And she : " No, no, he is who was dying in Padova ". (...)

I am Antonietta Dall’Agata. I was born born at Godega (TV) on February 26, 1930. I belong to a Secular Institute and I have lived in Vittorio Veneto for 22 years, at a diocesan House, where I take care of tailoring for ecclesiastics. I met Pope Luciani when he was Bishop of this city. I have also made cassocks for him, since he was a Bishop until he was a Cardinal: black cassocks. I know that in Venice he wore his predecessors' red cassocks.

His Homilies at Vittorio Veneto Cathedral, so simple in shape and so full of doctrine and convincing weight, filled me up with the spirit of joy. In the few words that he told us when I emitted the first vows (we were three novices) he said: " Even if the house burns and from the window you see all dark, you do not have fear. Throw yourselves down : a lovely Father attends to you with open arms ".

Msgr. Luciani often gave examples from the life of St. Francis of Sales and St. Teresa of the Child Jesus, and from their writings.

For many years, I have suffered from arthritic pains, neuritics and lately also arthrosis. On September 29, 1978 I was at the Civil Hospital of Udine since three months, waiting to undergo a surgical operation because of two disc hernias. Towards 8.00a.m., two nurses came to prepare me. " What a shock - they said to me - the Pope has died ! ". I kept my tears in order not to create difficulty to my transport in operating room: for a long time I was myself unable to move, as though paralysed. I observed the serious faces of the doctors and heard their whisper of surprise and displeasure for the Pope’s death. When I woke up, after the operation, I considerably perceived the presence, close to my bed, of the Pope in white cassock and mitre, who said (I do not know how): " Force and courage ". The doctor thought that, after the operation, I would remain immobilized, in bed, for all my life. When I made my first steps, the others came to my room and they were amazed. Still today they say to me : " How do you manage to walk ? "

I think this fact is due to Pope Luciani. In spite of the situation of suffering in which I find myself for the conditions of my health and the continuous pains, I still succeed in moving myself, although with difficulty and with the help of an orthopedic stick, and to carry out my activity as a dressmaker.

" I am an 85 year-old lady, very ill, resident in Gaeta, a widow for many years and of strong faith.

I want to explain to you my case, and briefly the story about how the facts have happened so that you can estimate how much of what is 'miraculous' you can find in what has happened to me. Seven years ago, my daughter, Maddalena, already suffering for a long time from a mystery illness, went to the hospital in Rome to have some tests. For six long months, the doctors have tried to characterize the illness that affected her, until, at the end, after a mistaken angiography, my daughter fell in coma.

Then one of my grandsons, a cardiologist, told the other doctors there wasn’t anything that could be done and there was no more hope for her. In fact, my daughter did not eat any more and she was reduced to weigh not even forty kilos. To me, as I remained in Gaeta, the relatives didn’t say anything, but my mother’s heart understood that it was the most serious case and then, crying with desperation and entrusting to the Madonna, I found between my hands a small newspaper. From a page of it, Pope Luciani watched me smiling and then I gave to him my desperate tears praying to him to intercede before the Madonna. Then I heard his voice within me that told me with sweetness : ‘It’s me, be calm !’

The same day in Rome, my daughter began feeling well because of dialysis, improving, and operated on finally for a feocromocitoma on a kidney (in fact, she was born without the right kidney), she then recovered quickly. Now, thank God she is well. Regarding what I have written above, I would like to speak to someone in order to add all that I cannot write, but to explain to words to a competent person ".

(...) " I allow myself to tell you a small grace that my mother has received from him. Some years ago, she had felt like a burning pain that was unbearable, because of the crushing of a nerve between cervical vertebras. She has medical treatment without a successful outcome and she had to undergo a surgical operation. In the meantime, I prayed to Pope Luciani for his intercession . And so, after a little time, in spite of the bad condition of her vertebras, she has no more pain. I think that the Lord wants Pope Luciani as a distributor of His graces.

(...) " I have never had the luck of meeting Pope Luciani in person, but I have followed all the speeches that he made in television from the election until the funeral, and I can say I can already consider myself a very lucky person, specially in order to have seen and felt his first and memorable talk with the crowd, best to say, with " old friends ", of that magnificent August 27th , ten years ago.

With that talk he made me understand soon, not only to me but to all the world, how he was familiar with everybody, simple and, first of all, humble and that his unmistakable smile had entered into every man’s heart. I thought that his Pontificate would have lasted much longer and perhaps one day I would have met him and spoken to him, but instead the good God wanted things different and called to Him the humble and amiable servant after thirty three days of Pontificate defined as " space of a smile".

I cried a lot on the morning of September 29th , when I knew from my grandmother that Pope Luciani was dead, but as soon as I was grown up, I consoled myself with the words of St. Augustine " We do not have to cry because He has taken him from us but be glad because He has donated him to us ".

From the years that have passed, I mean, from 1978 until today, I have seen in me a kind of inner maturation that pushed me to a greater devotion and total confidence towards the most dear John Paul I, to such a point that I began praying to him so much, because my mother had convinced herself not to let me enter a seminary (1986), because she just did not want, to such a point to apply me at a school against my will.

Two years have passed and little by little I saw a true and just an inner change in my mother : now she nearly goes to Mass every day, she receives the Communion, she prays and I have made her make also friendship with my most dear Bishop.

This year, without telling her anything, it was her who told me to enter the Seminary, and she was regretful because she hadn’t done it two years before. In order to obtain this result, I have had to pray so much to Our Lord, by the intercession of Pope Luciani and now I am in the Seminary to follow my Vocation.

Recently I have gone (on August 12th) to pray at his grave to thank him for what he has done for me, and for what now he will continue doing. The only wish I have would be to go and visit Canale D' Agordo, Venice and your Center, but next summer perhaps I will be able to make this journey. Every day, after the Praises and the Vespers, I always say the prayer that Pope Luciani has taught us: " Lord, take me as I am, with my imperfections, with my mistakes, but make me become like You wish ". I would want that this testimony (even if unworthy), was published (also reduced by you) in the great " Humilitas " magazine, in order to make people know how much I love and pray to the dearest Smiling Pope.

" I am a teacher of Letters and Deputy Head near the Medium School of Carate Brianza but, first of all, married happily and the father of four children. More than eight years ago, we met the Bishop of Belluno during a holiday at Falcade. To my wife, then waiting for our first son, he told us to trust on John Paul I, mothers in wait protector. This did not strike us much then.

At a distance of fifteen months, our second child was born (a girl) and, for both the pregnancies, my wife was forced to have absolute rest during the first trimester for threat of abortion. After some year, we wished for a third child, but after a long period of waiting, my wife had a spontaneous abortion. Remained pregnant immediately, she newly was forced to rest and then victim of a big haemorrhage that, as the curing gynecologist said, like those of the hospital where she was immediately sent, it was a sign, if not of abortion having already happened, imminent abortion and surely unavoidable.

In the hospital, she had another two haemorrhages and, at that point, with pain and nearly deprived of hope, it returned to my mind Pope Luciani, to whom I asked with all my heart his intercession together with my wife. Since then, she did not have any haemorrhages and on April 25th ,1991 Paola Maria was happily born. Absolutely unexpected, in Spring of this year, my wife was again pregnant .Confirmed the pregnancy, I was also preoccupied for the most possible complications (happened in all the previous analogous situations), prayed from the heart for Pope Luciani to intercede for the mother and the child’s health. Such a prayer then lasted for all the nine months and - for the first time without some problem - on November 25th Giovanni Paolo Maria was born. Because of the gratefulness that we nourish towards " paternal and maternal " Pope Luciani ‘s intercession, I felt iobliged to tell you these facts ".

My dearest, respectfully, I allow myself to tell you some graces received from Pope Luciani.

On August 26th , 19 78 I was listening to my radio in order to satisfy my Catholic curiosity. I applauded with joy on learning that His Holiness, Pope John Paul I, had been elected to the Papacy. The news about his death a month later deeply struck me. I found in this Pope an exceptional Christian quality and so, after his death, I began praying to him. As a widower, father of five children, I had a problem with the two elder ones who were falling into a pagan life-style, abandoning the Catholicism. Then I invoked the man whom I already consider a Saint and these two boys have returned to their Christian life. Another time I had falsely been accused in a court and all the neighbors believed that I would not have known how to defend myself. Then I turned to John Paul I and was acquitted since the first audience.

"I wish to tell you a small (or big!) fact happened here in Heliopolis where I carry out my apostolate. A mother of eight children was in a coma for a week due to meningitis. She was assisted by her mother, a Christian. She was about to die and I cried more than her dear mother. In the evening, I said in prayer to Pope Luciani: " Listen, you can see this mother, I can’t. Think about it ! This grace will never be recognized to you, but you are humble and this, I know, you don’t mind".

I put the Pope’s medal into the woman’s handkerchief. In the morning, I met the night-duty Nun. I was afraid to ask how is she. She looked at me and teld me that by then she was about to die. " Luciani, think about it ! ", I prayed within me. At 7.30 I went running and the woman’s mother came to me: " Nun, she has woken-up, speaks, has had a little drop of water and she is well! ". We cried together with the Lord and Pope Luciani ".

" Who writes is a 21 year-old girl. I am Sonia and I am from Caorle, a town in Venezia province.

Last year I was on a summer holiday at Alleghe and so I had the chance to visit Canale D' Agordo and to get in touch with the wonderful person of Pope Luciani.

I was pushed to write a meaningful episode which happened to me in November 1996. I was alone at home, in the morning, when a stretcher-bearer from the ambulance telephoned me: " We are carrying your father to Mestre hospital, there was a road accident, but be calm, everything will be all right ". When the call had ended, I cannot tell you what condition I was in, first of all because I hadn’t anyone to comfort me and help me. Above my bed I have hung a small picture of beloved Pope Albino, and so that morning I asked him to protect Dad and not to let anything bad have happened to him. From that moment on, I calmed myself; I knew I was not alone, because I had received Jesus in the Eucharist that same morning during the Holy Mass and then because I spoke with my good Pope, and he gave me courage and peace.

Several hours later, they telephoned me from the hospital : Dad’s car, in which he was going to Venice to work that morning, had been in the middle of the road, because of the brakes which had not worked at that moment, it had not succeeded to stop at a stop. At that hour (8.30 in the morning) the traffic was very intense; miraculously, a truck only touched Dad’s car, while two cars had fully crashed into it, destroying the car completely.

My Dad didn't even have a fracture due to the accident, only some contusions, and recovered perfectly with a little rest at home.

Everyone who has come to learn about the dynamics of the accident, has said that it has been a miracle. I know to whom to attribute this miracle, to him, the Pope who still smiles in Heaven to those who invoke him in prayer.

For this I have written you, to thank Pope Luciani for what through his intercession Jesus has granted me, and besides I would want to put all my family and my beloveds under the beloved Pope Luciani’s protection. I consider him my beloved friend, I always feel him close to me and I often speak with him ". (...)

(...)"I still met Pope Luciani at " Stella Maris " in Venice and I had the chance to have some beautiful chats with him. I'll come to the point : some time ago, due to the judgment of the University Professors, I should have been operated on for a rather ugly sickness; but Mother Superior prayed together with me to the beloved Pope Luciani and I think that for his intercession before Who everything is possible : I returned to the University Professor and he told me: " By now, the x-rays are good and we don’t see the need for any surgical operation ". I do not want to exaggerate but for me Pope Luciani has been close to me and he is a Saint, a great Saint ".

Mrs. Alicia Ruiz Gima, from Buenos Aires, has told me the story of one of her cousins' conversion : Rodolfo Tortoriello, then 29 years old, who wasn’t a practicing Catholic. He became an Engineer in 1978. He and a friend decided to tour Europe, and there they rented a car. They started from Spain, then went to France. They arrived in Italy when Pope Paul VI died, and drove South and they returned to Rome to see the ‘fumata’ (smoke) announcing the election of a new Pope. So they were able to see Giovanni Paulo I on the day of his election. They continued on their travels towards Florence, Venice, the beaches. The two boys just wanted to have fun. Instead, things change for Rodolfo. They returned to Rome the day after Pope Luciani’s death. Rodolfo was in Saint Peters' and he queued in order to visit the body after waiting a long time . He had seen many, people crying and realizing the feeling of them being abandoned. He also started crying. He had felt something strange and he has said that it was one of the few times in which he had cried. He felt a big sorrow, sadness for John Paul I. Rodolfo was touched by the Pope’s smile and face. He couldn’t explain the sorrow he felt, he did not know how to explain it. Afterwards, his conversion arrived.

" In Italy, Emilia Aresa had suffered for years pains at her back in such a way that she wasn't able to carry out her housework, and none of the consulted doctors had been in a position to find a solution. She was present at John Paul I’s funeral and in tears she prayed: " Pope Luciani, you who are so close to Jesus, pray for me and give me the healing or, at least, let me be enough well to be able to do my houseework. If you speak to Jesus He will listen to you... ". Next morning, when she got up, every pain had disappeared and it did not appear any more.

" On January 2000, on the cruise where I have worked, an administrative Officer had had a kind of ictus (it was said due to work excess). His wife came to me, crying (she also worked there doing administrative work) and saying that her husband had been sent to hospital on board and he couldn’t move; he had no reactions. I told her I would pray for him. So, once I finished my duty at the information desk, I went to the chapel to pray to God through Pope Luciani’s intercession for the healing of this work colleague. Next day, he was recovered - as though nothing had happened to him. When I met him again I told him who had helped him ".

"Here, in the USA, a mother, pregnant with her third child, had serious complications; so many that doctors told them that, there was no hope not only for the baby, but she would also die if she did not abort. She refused. She was sent a small piece of Pope Luciani’s white cassock, together with the prayer for his beatification. To the great astonishment of the doctors, a beautiful boy was born; they had never seen such a positive result, they expected to find complications. So they decided to point out the case to specialized medical magazines. The child, whose name is Davide Matteo Giovanni healthy Paul is healthy, now, happy, he has an irresistible smile ! ".

What I am about to tell you might please you, but sure it will also give consolation to those who have suffered not less for your unexpected departure from this " valley of tears ". And you know well that, next to your relatives and your direct and faithful collaborators, there are many humble persons in every part of the world who love you a lot and they continue talking to you.

Some days ago I have met a worker from Lendinara (a town in Rovigo province, where you had stayed and where I have begun my pastoral service more than thirty years ago), Italo Carità, 52 years, married and with a 20 years daughter. The Parish priest, don Vittorio, and sister Anna, introduced him to me. They both were convinced in finding before something extraordinary. This gentleman was famous as an exceptional " Priest-eater " (his own words), upset blasphemous and fully indifferent to every religious callback. Mrs. Graziella, his patient wife and devote person, after the first years of the wedding and pregnant with a daughter, had given up the idea of leading the husband on the straight way. When Paul VI died, with the conclave coming - and sure you will know more than us - the news of your election to Saint Peter’s Chair was disseminated : at that moment, Mr. Italo reacts with heavy, unpronounceable expressions, a lot that the wife, after having said her joy for the election of our Patriarch of Venice, decides to return on the argument never more.

But, in the following days, starting from that conversation with the crowd he made on Sunday from the logia of Saint Peter : (... Yesterday morning, I was going to the Sixtine ...), in that house of via Trento, exactly at Lendinara, something strange was happening: Mr. Italo watched the television news, listened to this new Pope who spoke simply ... Until when, hardly after a month, there was the incredible news of his death. At the hour of lunch, the television news showed the images and the comments about that smiling Pope who was already dead.

Italo was eating and, beside him, there was the wife, pregnant and next to the big event. They say together what happened: while the images of the public audience were being shown, that one of the Pope with Daniele Bravo, the Roman boy of fifth elementary school, who helped the Pope in the explanation of the Action of Charity - suddenly, Mr. Italo burst into tears, he covered his face and remained like struck by lightning of the spirit, changed and turned like a sock, I mean, converted instantly.

Now, more than twenty years later, we arrive to learn about all this and we find in his house a large John Paul I’ portrait; since then every year he went to Canale D' Agordo to say thanks and his Christian community testifies a miracle long-lasting in the time.

You know well that I would never have allowed to myself to speak with name and surname about such a delicate fact, if the interested one had not prayed me to do it, to honour the truth and edification of others. Rethinking on what had happened, I was wondering if it has not arrived the moment to include, in the Causes of the Saints, the instantaneous miracles that happen, not so much in the body, but in the spirit. Because, even now if you will hide behind the doors of the Paradise, I think that changing the head and the life of people in the direction of the Gospel was the goal of your all existence. And just for this, you will be happy.