Green Bay bishop approves apparitions
CHAMPION, Wis. (CNS) – Bishop David L. Ricken of Green Bay has approved the Marian apparitions seen by Adele Brise in 1859, making the apparitions of Mary that occurred some 18 miles northeast of Green Bay the first in the United States to receive approval of a diocesan bishop.
The Dec. 8 decree on the apparitions’ authenticity comes nearly two years after Bishop Ricken opened a formal investigation. On Jan. 9, 2009, he appointed three theologians to study the history of them.
“They are all theologians with a particular concentration and expertise in the theology of the Blessed Virgin Mary,” said Father John Doerfler, vicar general and chancellor of the diocese. Although the three theologians were not named by the diocese, Father Doerfler said two of the three are internationally recognized and they have “general experience in examining apparitions.”
Brise, a Belgian immigrant, was 28 when Mary appeared to her three times in October 1859. The first appearance took place while Brise was carrying a sack of wheat to a grist mill near Robinsonville, now known as Champion. A few days later, Mary appeared to Brise as the woman walked to Sunday Mass in another town, and again on her way home. When Brise asked who the woman was, Mary responded, “I am the Queen of Heaven, who prays for the conversion of sinners and I wish you to do the same.”
She told Brise to “gather the children in this wild country and teach them what they should know for salvation. Teach them their catechism, how to sign themselves with the sign of the cross and how to approach the sacraments.”
Brise devoted the rest of her life to teaching children, began a community of Third Order Franciscan sisters and built a school next to the shrine. She died on July 5, 1896, and was buried in a small cemetery just east of the chapel.
Father Doerfler, who serves as the shrine’s rector, said official recognition of the apparitions affirms “the mystery of God’s providence.”
“He has had the Blessed Virgin Mary appear here. I do not know the reasons why,” he told The Compass, Green Bay diocesan newspaper. “All of this ... has to do with God’s plan to bring people to salvation through his son Jesus Christ.”
Visionary claims questioned from early Christian times, book says
VATICAN CITY (CNS) – The very idea of Marian apparitions has been met with skepticism within the church from early Christian times, a new book shows.
The 1,600-page Italian edition of the Dictionary of “Apparitions” of the Virgin Mary lists more than 2,400 claims of people alleged to have seen Mary, as well as the consequences of such announcements. Only 15 of these have been officially recognized by the church.
“The apparitions are not seen with the most benign eye by the church,” said French Father Rene Laurentin, a co-author of the book.” Apparitions are the least scientifically studied, the most hidden and most controversial of all theological subjects.”
Father Laurentin worked for more than 50 years on the catalog at the request of bishops and the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. The goal, he said, was “to put to rest the many misunderstandings and confusion” surrounding visionary claims.
But new diagnostic techniques and modern psychology can help at least in eliminating the claims of people suffering from hallucinations or other pathologies, experts said at a Dec. 13 news conference.
Advanced brain imaging tests show that a specific part of the brain is active during ecstatic experiences, said Dr. Tonino Cantelmi, professor of psychiatry at the Pontifical Gregorian University. Researchers are now saying “that there may be something that is not psychologically explainable,” he said.
By Sam Lucero
From December 17, 2010 issue of Catholic San Francisco.
