THE family of a woman with stomach cancer believes she has been partially cured after visiting the weeping statue of Mary in Western Australia.
Her son, Chau Nguyen, said 82 year-old Huynh Tien Thi from Sydney was given about two months to live before they travelled to Rockingham, south of Perth, to see the statue in September.
Mr Nguyen and his mother are both Buddhists. Mr Nguyen said the cancer had spread throughout his mother’s internal organs.
The 85cm fibreglass statue weeps rose oil and is owned by Rockingham parishioner Patty Powell.
Ms Powell bought the statue in Thailand eight years ago and first noticed it weeping on March 19, St Joseph’s feast day. It wept again on Good Friday. The statue resumed weeping in mid-August and has been weeping continuously since then.
On the feast of the Assumption on August 15, Ms Powell told Our Lady of Lourdes parish priest Fr Henry Walsh, who has put the statue on display in his church.
Scientists at Murdoch and Curtin universities in Western Australia have failed to explain the cause of the tears.
Mr Nguyen said he and his mother stayed in Perth for two nights and visited the statue at Our Lady of Lourdes Church, Rockingham for several hours.
‘When we returned, the doctor couldn’t explain the improvement in my mother’s condition,’ Mr Nguyen said.
‘She is in very little pain now.’
Fr Walsh said it was a partial miracle.
‘From what I know, two of the three tumours in her stomach have disappeared,’ he said.
Fr Walsh said the number of visitors flocking to see the statue remained steady.
