During the Second World War, my father was arrested by the Gestapo for his activities in the Resistance. He spent three years in a cell with 10 other resistance fighters in concentration camps in Germany. As a great lover of Our Lady, he prayed the Rosary often. His mother, whose only son he was, had no news of him over those years, but she was heroically trusting in Mary, and kept believing that he would return, praying rosary after rosary.
One day when my father was exhausted and starving like all his fellow prisoners, the SS in faction asked the prisoners to carry stones from a quarry to the place where they planned to build something. Each prisoner was given a stone to carry. When my father saw the stone he was given, he understood that his last hour had come, for it was impossible for him to lift it even an inch as it was so large. He also knew that if he didn't carry it, the dogs of the SS would jump on him and the guards would finish him off like a beast. He had seen this happen before.
Standing by his stone, in his distress, he looked up. He then saw a simple house close by, and on its façade was a small alcove in which stood a statue of the Blessed Mother. When my father saw the statue, he exclaimed inwardly, "Mary, save me!" At that very moment, the heavy stone became weightless! My father used to say, "It became lighter than confetti!"
Of the 10 men in his Resistance cell, he was the only one to come back alive (thanks to which I was born!). Needless to say, my father never failed to pray his rosary every day!
1 comment:
What a sad but wonderful story. He had it hard and tough but the power of rosary is something else.. amen
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