Sign up to receive new OnePeterFive articles daily

Email subscribe stack

Is Nigeria Experiencing a Marian Miracle?

ce0e8fb2b00acdf27f4f3a29a3478ba2

I told you last month about Bishop Oliver Doeme’s vision of Christ in the adoration chapel, telling him that Boko Haram could be defeated with the Rosary:

Bishop Oliver Dashe Doeme, head of the Diocese of Maiduguri in Nigeria’s Borno State, was in a chapel praying before the Blessed Sacrament last December when, he says, something extraordinary happened: Jesus Christ appeared holding a sword, which He offered to the prelate.

According to Bishop Dashe, the moment he took the sword from Jesus’ hands, it transformed into Rosary beads. He then heard Christ repeat three times, “Boko Haram is gone.”

The bishop recalls, “I didn’t need any prophet to give me the explanation. It was clear that with the Rosary we would be able to expel Boko Haram.”

Yesterday, the Radical Catholic blog observed a fascinating coincidence. Or is it?

Fast-forward one month, and the position of Boko Haram in Nigeria appears to have all but collapsed. Gbenga Akingbule, reporting for the Wall Street Journal, describes the sudden and surprising turn of events:

Boko Haram has abandoned so many hundreds of kidnapped women and girls recently that Nigerian officials tasked with bringing them back into society on Sunday said they were looking to open a second rehabilitation camp, a nod to how fast the tide of abductions has reversed. In the past few weeks, as troops from Nigeria and surrounding countries have punched deep into Boko Haram territory, soldiers said they have rescued about 1,000 women and girls, hostages the Islamist insurgency left behind. They include about 275 that army pickup trucks brought into the city of Yola on Saturday night and 260 rescued on Sunday.

Of course, Boko Haram has not been thoroughly defeated, and the Christians of Nigeria are still undergoing horrible trials and tribulations. But I cannot help but be reminded of the words once spoken by Blessed Pope Pius IX:
Pius IX Rosary

There’s no way to say for certain, but countless people read the story of Bishop Doeme’s vision. It was, as Radical Catholic noted, the recipient of “coverage on nearly every major and quite a few minor Catholic news outlets and blogs”.

This week, we published an article advocating for a Novena to Our Lady of Fatima for the conversion of Muslims. It is one of our most-shared stories ever published, with over 16,000 shares on Facebook alone in just the past three days. In the wake of the ISIS attack in Texas this week, the timing seems as though it could not have been more appropriate. Christians want to fight back.

This is how they can.

Our Lady has told us, again and again, that the Rosary is a weapon. “The only arms which will remain for you will be the Rosary and the Sign left by My Son. Each day recite the prayers of the Rosary … I alone am able still to save you from the calamities which approach. Those who place their confidence in me will be saved.”

Keep the pressure on. Mary and her Legions are unstoppable – and the Rosary is more powerful than most of us can comprehend.

Popular on OnePeterFive

Share to...