I was miraculously healed: bishop attributes his healing to another Spanish prelate

The Bishop of Córdoba (Spain), Bishop Demetrio Fernández, has explained how he was on the verge of dying from an “incurable disease” from which he was healed through the intercession of the Archbishop of Valencia, Bishop José María García Lahiguera “overnight ”.

Mons. Fernández was ordained deacon on May 5, 1974 and priest on December 22 of the same year, a day he chose because it celebrates Saint Demetrius and it was his father’s birthday.

Therefore, there are five decades of pastoral service that have motivated the commentary in his weekly letter. The Bishop of Córdoba remembers how that day it was cold “with fog from the morning” in Toledo, where he was ordained a priest, and until the afternoon in Puente del Arzobispo, his hometown, where he celebrated his first Mass.

Destined to the parish of El Buen Pastor in Toledo, Mons. Fernández gratefully remembers his ministry: “How happy I have been, since those first years as curate with Don Justo Rey my parish priest, a good parish priest.”

The bishop asks his parishioners to help him thank God “for this great gift to me and his Church,” and emphasizes that he is aware of how God has used his life “to bring many closer, to console others.” , to encourage everyone to continue along the path of holiness.”

A year bedridden

Beyond the good memories, Bishop Fernández shares that not everything has been “rosy” in his priestly life: “It has not been like that, thank God,” he adds.

During his second study stay in Rome, in 1981, the bishop fell seriously ill: “I contracted an incurable illness, which left me bedridden for a full year. I had already been a priest for nine years, I was 33 years old, and I prepared myself for death, which was imminent.”

The treatments of a doctor, Dr. Pozuelo Escudero, allowed him to gradually recover over the years “until, through the intercession of the venerable José María García Lahiguera and the prayer of his Oblate daughters, I was miraculously healed overnight. It was September 27, Saint Vincent de Paul,” shares Mons. Fernández.

Bishop García Lahiguera was Auxiliary Bishop of Madrid (1950-1964), Bishop of Huelva (1964-1969) and Archbishop of Valencia (1969-1978). During the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939) he founded the Congregation of the Oblate Sisters of Christ the Priest. He also participated in the Vatican Council II.

After his death, Cardinal Antonio María Rouco Varela opened his cause for canonization in 1995, which was admitted by the Congregation (now dicastery) for the Causes of Saints in 2002. Pope Benedict XVI declared him venerable in 2011.

An experience of “joyful preparation for death”

The Bishop of Córdoba describes the situation of his illness as “a strong experience of helplessness, of prostration, of being stripped of all future plans, of joyful preparation for death.”

That year, lying in bed, he understood “as never before and forever in the midst of illness that my life was all for the Lord, because I felt He was as close and affectionate as ever,” he details.

“It was a marriage on the Cross that has definitely marked me,” the prelate emphasizes.

Since then, his vision of the moment of leaving for the Father’s House was transformed. “I look at death with serene desire, with the joy of meeting the love of my life, Jesus Christ my Lord. And this desire relativizes all other suffering.”

“I can say by the Grace of God that I have found the love of my soul precisely in the shared Cross, his and mine for the redemption of the world,” he adds.

As a final balance of the 50 years of priesthood, Bishop Demetrio Fernández explains that the best has been “the ordination of 75 priests in Córdoba, in addition to another 15 in Tarazona, diocesan and religious. That is a crowning moment for a bishop.”