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Show WONDERS OE BILOCATION Bilocation Generally Understood St. Francis Xavier on His Way to China In a Hurricane He Invokes the Holy Name His Cheering Prophecy In Two Boats How It Might Happen The Sceptic's Crux Many Inexplicable Inexplic-able Natural Phenomena. (Foreign Cor. Intermountain Catholic. I am here this morning in the Mexican city of Tlaxcala. It is exactly 9 :15 a. m., August 3. Xow suppose, for the sake of elucidation, I entered, at precisely the same time and day, your editorial room, sat down and spoke to you and disappeared bidding you 'good-bye." Would you not be ready i to testify on oath that at 9:15 a. m.. August 3, Oswald Os-wald Crawford was in your office? But those of my . j hotel in this city will swear that at that hour, day and date I was in Tlaxcala. To be in a given place at a particular time and an exact representation of the same person in . another place at the same time; to be not the double of the same person but the comparison to be seen very sensibly and distinct!..- in ShipIuT.te." this, it .ippiars to me ii what is meant by bilocation in its general sense. It is, as it were, the ghost of a living person, seen abroad while the same person is at home. In these . severe complications known as the "Acts of the j Canonization of Saints" are found incontrovertible " examples of bilocation. ' The Catholic church is wisdom itself visible to us under a sensible form, and this is her language t spoken in thp office of St. Francis Xavier in the j Roman Breviary: "He had the gift of bilocation, : he wrought wonderful miracles while living and in death his body triumphed over putrifaction in vita sua fecit monstra, et in monte mirahilia operatus . est; mortuum prophetavit corpus ejus." BILOCATIOX OF ST. FRAXCIS XAYIFR. The fact I am now about to record is to be found ? in the "Vie de Saint Francis Xavier. by Pere Bou-hours Bou-hours second volume of the Avignon, ed. 117. Let me introduce this wonderful example of bilocation bilo-cation by a statement made, in the preface to his remarkable history, by the author: "Xo miracles were ever examined with greater care or were subject to., a more crucial test than j those presented for the canonization of St. Francis." Fran-cis." Early in Xovember, 1571. Francis Xavier entered en-tered the straits of Korea on his way to preach the gospel in China. One morning the ship rode into one of those fierce and continuous storm3 which i carry fear to the hearts of seasoned mariners. A hurricane swept the decks, carried away the sails, tore out the ship's masts and threatened the de- i struction of vessel, crew and cargo. Then Francis fell upon his knees in prayer, and presently the sea went down and the ship, water-hogged, floated help- ' ' less. A number of the ship's crew got out the long I boat and began to tow her to the nearest land. The ! storm once again broke over them, their tow-line , snapped and the dingy swept out to sea. The temp- jj est hardened to a hurricane, but Francis "invoked ! , the Holv Xame of Jesus and by the five wound , . I that Jesus received for us on the cross brought him to save them." As he prayed the hurricane passed beyond them. The sailors on the ship were now ! overwhelmed with sorrow for the fate of their com- : . I p. nions lost in the storm. , Then said Francis to them: ''Be of good cheer, my friends, before the expiration of the third day, the daughter will rejoin her mother." Their water- ; ,1 logged wreck, for two days, rose and sank with the ; j waves and yet no boat returned. In vain they j scanned the horizon and saw no speck afar. - They ! were yielding to dispair when again Francis cheered their drooping spirits: "Have courage, my friend.-', trust in God, I tell you they are returning to us." Then he retired to his berth and fell upon his knees once again in prayer. Presently the "lookout" shouted. "They are com- ing," and every eye took in the rowing men. I A CRY OF JOY. Welcomed the returning men, who reaching the I side of the ship, mounted and were embraced af- I fectionately by their rejoicing companions. When i f the hand-shakings and congratulations were over, 1 the quartermaster swung the davits to lift the jolly . ' j boat on deck. "Wait, wait," cried one of the re- turned sailors, "the holy priest, where is he, he ha3 J not come aboard, look in the boat ; he may be sleep- ' f ing there." f The sailors, who stayed with the- ship, hearing t the man and his companions thus express them- selves, said: "The poor fellows are out of their I (Continued on Page 5.) WONDERS OF B1LQCAT10M. (Continued from page 3.) minds from long suffering aiui stan-ation." But in A-ain they tried to disabuse the minds of the returned re-turned men of their delusion by pointing to the empty dingy and by assuring them that Father I Francis Avas uoav on board and had, at no time, left j the ship. To the amazement of those on board, the crew of the dingy asserted and reiterated that from ' morning till night and from night to morning j Francis was with them for three days. "Xo, no,"! they exclaimed, "we fiad no fear of perishing or of j being lost; in spite of the rush of the hurricane; AA-e had no fear, for the holy man Avas our pilot and j told us Ave would be saved." This is the case as recorded in the life of St. Francis Xavier, as presented and accepted in the process and canonization of Francis Xavier, as ! proA'ed by the sAvorn declarations of the men of the ship and of the rescued men of the dingy. It remains now to reconcile this incontestable fact Avith our reason and Avith our faith.- And Ave do so by proclaiming that, either on the ship or in the long-boat, an angel of God, for three days, assumed as-sumed the- voice, the form and dress of Francis, and so complete and perfect Avas the personification personifica-tion that it Avas impossible for IIUMAX EYE OR EAR To perceive the duplication. Francis, by whose holiness of life and feiwent prayer the wonder was accomplished, was not, at the same time, on the. ship and in the long boat It is possible that, when in his first csctatie prayer in his cabin on the ship, he saw clairvoyantly the angel of the long-boat (his duplicated self) in the midst of the drifting men and was assured by an inward voice that the men would be saved. When he Avent on deck he carried with him the diA'ine assurance that all wrould be: AA-ell and Avith this certitude he fearlessly announced to the ship's crew their oavii safety and the return j of those whom thejr thought to be lost. EXPLANATION OF STRANGE PHENOMENA AHoav me, even though I may invite Aveariness: to enlarge someAA-hat on the phenomena of biloca-tion. biloca-tion. I knoAv that for those, unfamiliar with mystic literature, prodigies of this order are as contradictory contradic-tory to their established opinions and as puzzling to the mind as are the man-els of trignometry, the action of electric forces, the instantaneous change wrought on certain liquids by the infusion of a rc- actif, the plutonian theory of the imperceptabh' rising of mountains, or the incandescense of the globe, to the undeA'eloped mind of the shecpherder. I am convinced that, in this age Avheu Satanism assumes as-sumes an alluring and most seductive guise, it is avcII for those who haA-e the time and resources by their side to gi'e some attention to the strange manifestations of occult science as presented to us earlv in the morning of the twentieth century. Tlaxcala, Mexico. |