BRONX "MIRACLE" JOSEPH VITOLO
For a few weeks in 1945, a boy aged 9 called Joseph Vitolo claimed daily
visions of the Virgin Mary in the Bronx. The story got a lot of media interest
and became known as simply the Bronx Miracle. Many claimed to experience miracle
healings. Public interest was huge and overwhelmed the site of the alleged
visions. The Archdiocese of New York did not consider the story credible and
refused to dignify it with an investigation. It was virtually forgotten about
until Professor J.T. McGreevy of the University of Notre Dame resurrected the
memory in the 1990s.
The boy’s father did not believe him. The mother said, “My Joseph has always
been a good boy and goes to church. He never lies to me". Elements that wreck
credibility include how Mary broke her rosary beads. The witness claimed, “ They
were blue beads... and the beads broke. I couldn't... I couldn't move. I must
of... stopped me for some reason... and, ah, Our Lady stooped down, picked up
all her beads, and she says to me: "One bead", she says, "Joseph, we can't
find".
Attempts have been made to turn this into some kind of parable as if Mary was an
actress trying to make a point. Did she lose her tongue?
A spring was found but the boy to his credit denied that Mary had anything to do
with it. It shows that the spring of Lourdes cannot be considered evidence that
Mary was appearing. He said that on the night of the last vision “something
wonderful would happen.” He reported merely seeing the sky open up and there
were some random predictable claims that some saw Mary rising up into Heaven. It
was nothing compared to Fatima. He saw nothing like that himself!
Even if there had been anything strange in the sky, the fact remains that
science has been recording odd things in the atmosphere since 1887. It has to
happen that something will take place when a miracle monger is at work. Many
Catholics hold that the miracle of the sun at Fatima was a miracle only in the
sense that God arranged for nature to do strange things and was not supernatural
outright or obviously so.
Here are some relevant notes on atmospheric observations:
J.R. Kinney, "Hole–in–Cloud", Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society,
vol. 49, 1968, p. 990; H.M. Johnson and R.L. Holle, "Observations and Comments
on Two Cloud Holes over Miami", Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society,
vol. 50, 1969, pp. 157–161; P.V. Hobbes, "Holes in Clouds: A Case Study in
Scientific Amnesia", Weatherwise, vol. 38, 1985, p. 254–258
S.L. Jaki, God and the Sun at Fatima (Pickney, MI: Real–View Books, 1999).
S. Alexander, "Remarkable Optical Phenomenon", American Meteorological Journal,
vol. III, no. 10, 1887, p. 486. Compare also J. Mintern, "A Kaleidoscopic Sun",
Meteorological Magazine, vol. 58, no. 685, 1923, pp. 10–11. Moreover, the
account of the stationary sun in the Old Testament (Joshua 10: 10–13) can
plausibly be explained by a meteorological phenomenon. See D. Camuffo, "A
Meteorological Anomaly in Palestine 33 Centuries Ago: How did the sun stop?",
Theoretical and Applied Climatology, vol. 41, 1990, pp. 81–85.