- Tue Mar 24, 2009 5:00 am
#124522
Hi,
I think Our Lady did a lot of good work with people involved in the IRA. A few years ago, my aunt who is a nun based in a convent in Northern Ireland, travelled down to visit us in the South of Ireland with a friend. This friend was the most fascinating man I've met. He told me of his story. He was heavily involved in the IRA during the height of the troubles and was on the run from the British for years. He killed many British soldiers and the way that he put it was that he was a man full of anger and hatred that was eating away at him. He was responsible for training the top IRA snipers. They would practice up in the hills. He told me that they had to get their accuracy pin-point from a distance of one or two miles away. They used to focus on a church that was situated about a mile or two across the countryside. Outside this church was a statue of Our Lady. That was their training target. If they could manage to just graze this statue with a bullet, a cloud of white dust would blow into the air and they would know that their shot was successful. This was their training!!
Many years later, this same man, while on the run and hiding in the South of Ireland, came across a monestary in Co. Waterford. He was climibing a bit of a hill and happened to come across a statue of Our Lady. The hill was steep so in order to keep climbing, he put his hand on the statues foot (Our Lady's foot) to pull him up for better balance. All of a sudden, while his hand was on the foot, the foot became alive. He said he could feel the skin and the foot moving like a normal persons. In shock, he let go and fell a little bit. But from this moment on, he converted. He truly believed in God and took this as a sign that although he lived a terrible life of voilence and killing, God still loved him and wanted to convert and save him. Today, this same guy practices his religion devoutly and is truly a man of God.