Miracle

Amanda "Amy" Wall and her family are finally telling their story: an unexplained cure of nerve deafness in both her ears that will finally turn Philadelphia's Blessed Katharine Drexel into a saint of the Roman Catholic Church. But Amy, a button-cute 7-year-old who'll make her first communion soon, was smilingly media-shy yesterday. She hugged and clung to and whispered with her mom, whose prayers and determination made it all happen. "Before, she was special," Constance Wall declared at Sisters of the Blessed Sacrament convent in Bensalem.

IN HONOR OF "We Love Rocky Week," I want to share a story about Rocky and St. John's Baptist Church. In February, our pastor, David Powles, notified our small congregation of outstanding utility bills totaling $5,000. Rev. Powles asked for prayers to find a solution to our dilemma. Lo and behold, less than a week later, our church was contacted by people involved in filming the new Rocky movie. They paid us $600 a day to rent our church kitchen. We know the Lord works in mysterious ways, but never did we expect him to send "Rocky Balboa" to our rescue.

Why would anyone try to graft new branches onto America's favorite evergreen? The new Miracle on 34th Street looks as if a plantsman has added plastic boughs to the live Norwegian spruce at Rockefeller Center. Whether they're about angels or Santas, successful holiday movies transform doubters into believers. This is the basis of the 1947 Miracle on 34th Street, a heartwarmer that did not need to be updated, but nonetheless has been. That the remake is more consumed with leveraged buyouts and courtroom strategy than with faith and hope says something about the difference between 1994 and 1947.

A tearful Dan Reeves left a hospital yesterday, four days after quadruple bypass surgery, and called his recovery a miracle. The Atlanta Falcons coach said he had tried to ignore symptoms of a recurring heart problem, "but thank goodness I got it checked out. " During Sunday's 27-17 victory over New Orleans, the pain grew worse, he said. Team physician Charles Harrison, who normally doesn't accompany the team on road trips, happened to be at the game. "For some reason, and I believe it's a miracle, I mentioned it to Dr. Harrison.

Miracles? Miracles here, there and everywhere. Popular discussions of miracles have recently appeared in Time and Newsweek, in newspapers and periodicals of all types, on TV and radio, and in movies such as the Philadelphia-based "The Sixth Sense. " A more significant local example is the case of Katharine Drexel. A Philadelphia heiress, nun and social worker who died in 1955, Mother Drexel is nearing the end of the long process whereby a person is canonized a saint. The process hinged upon the recent official certification of two posthumous miracles attributed to her. That Mother Drexel was an admirable, compassionate and selfless woman who divested herself of her considerable fortune and made the world a better place, I have no doubt.

James McSherry, president of the Roman Catholic High School alumni association, and Paul Pincituro, the vice president, waited anxiously in the lobby of the archdiocesan offices yesterday afternoon while the school's seven trustees discussed the school's fate. So when word came that Cardinal John Krol had given the school a second chance, the two, who had organized a lobbying campaign with other alumni against the closing, were overjoyed. "We believe in miracles!" Pincituro exclaimed.

THE SPECTRUM home of the Broad Street Bullies, Dr. J and many other great athletes - may become just a memory. If its demise comes to fruition, it will be a sad occasion for many concert-goers and sports fans in the city of Philadelphia. But say it ain't so - will Ed Snider and his band of merry men really build a state-of-the-art complex for the people of the Delaware Valley with no public funding from the city of Philadelphia or commonwealth of Pennsylvania? The nerve of some people not wanting my tax dollars so they can become richer!

The first hint of trouble came as soon as Isiah Thomas limped into the press conference supported by a pair of crutches. "Will you be able to play tomorrow night?" a writer asked anxiously. "At this point," Thomas said, "I seriously doubt it. It hurts. "I guess I'm looking for a miracle. " The miracle, of course, would be if Thomas were to play for the Detroit Pistons tonight against the Los Angeles Lakers in the seventh and deciding game of the NBA Championship Series.

Here comes Veda Zuponcic, a red blur streaking through the corridors of Glassboro State College, her blunt-cut blond hair fluttering in the tail wind. She sprints past the music rehearsal rooms, waving. She nimbly sidesteps a knot of students at the turnoff for the Wilson Auditorium. As she prepares to clear the lobby, she decelerates slightly, but only to grasp a pair of hands and smile. The owner of the hands opens her mouth to speak. Too late. Zuponcic has regained her speed.

IF THERE'S one word that's overused after particularly horrendous events, it's "resiliency. " Without fail, after every awful, life-altering event - 9/11, the Newtown, Conn., school shootings, the Boston Marathon bombings - we waste no time throwing the feel-good word around. We need a happy ending - fast. So we tell ourselves that everything will be OK, that this too shall pass, because this city - Boston Strong! - this community - We are Newtown! - this child, is resilient.

Bobby Rogers, 73, a founding member of Motown group the Miracles and a collaborator with Smokey Robinson, died Sunday at his home in the Detroit suburb of Southfield, Mich. He had been ill for several years. Mr. Rogers formed the group in 1956 with cousin Claudette Rogers, Pete Moore, Ronnie White, and Robinson. Their hits included "I Second That Emotion" and "The Tears of a Clown. " Mr. Rogers and the Miracles were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2012. He shared songwriting credits with Robinson on the Temptations' "The Way You Do the Things You Do," the Contours' "First I Look at the Purse," and the Miracles' "Going to a Go-Go.

A not-so-small miracle is unfolding before our eyes. After nearly two decades in which established opinion insisted that it would never again be possible to pass sensible regulations of firearms, the unthinkable is on the verge of happening. This week, Sen. Patrick Leahy (D., Vt.), the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, is expected to announce plans to start marking up gun bills to send to the Senate floor, proposals that will include ideas put before the country by President Obama.

More than a generation after the historic "Miracle On Ice" game in the 1980 Winter Olympics, 58-year-old Mike Eruzione is parting with his iconic No. 21 USA jersey, hockey stick, and other Olympic paraphernalia. Eruzione's white jersey alone is expected to fetch more than $1 million, but some sports memorabilia experts think it could go considerably higher. Eruzione scored the sensational winning goal against the Soviet hockey team in Lake Placid, N.Y., catapulting the Americans toward the gold medal.

It was only a little hand tremor. That's what the doctors said. All kids shake a bit, get a little clumsy. Maybe 7-year-old Eli Vivian was dehydrated. Maybe his motor skills lagged a little behind those of his two older brothers. Not to worry. Not so easy - for a mother. So Becky Vivian kept watching. Everything Eli did got the mom once-over, even a potato sack race at Oaks Elementary School. While his classmates stepped into their bags and hopped away, Eli was left behind.

Orlando R. Barone is a freelance writer in Doylestown I bent down, close to my wife's ear as she lay motionless in the hospital bed. It was her second day out from the surgery that removed a devastating BB-sized tumor from her pituitary gland. "Maida, Maida, I have a question to ask you," I whispered as her eyes fluttered ever so slightly. "Yes?" Her mouth formed the word. I paused, then decided to ask the question. "What is my Apple ID Password?" The query was greeted with amazed disapproval from my four adult children.

Film New this week: Hyde Park on Hudson (***1/2 out of four stars) Bill Murray plays FDR during one fascinating summer weekend in 1939 when he and his wife host the king and queen of England, and when a distant cousin (Laura Linney) falls in love with the polio-hobbled commander in chief. A charming, wistful film. - Steven Rea Music Strand of Oaks/Buried Bed Strand of Oaks' Tim Showalter is one of the most affecting singer- songwriters of his generation. Dark Shores, Strand of Oaks' newest album, is no less character-driven, diverse, or emotionally tortured than their last two albums, Leave Ruin and Pope Killdragon.

TAMPA - Two seconds left, Eagles' ball just inside the Tampa 2-yard line, Bucs call timeout, Nick Foles trots to the sideline. Marty Mornhinweg holds up a list of what he later refers to as "plus-5, red-zone, fourth-down-to-win-the-game" plays. "He called it," Mornhinweg said. "He said, 'I want that one.' I didn't quite hear him. I said, 'Who said that? You say that?' " Indeed, Foles had said that. The offensive coordinator didn't need to hear any more. He high-fived the rookie quarterback.

As if it wasn't already clear, the Eagles confirmed Sunday that their season is beyond the point of repair. If the last hope of the hopeless, the untested rookie quarterback, can't turn things around and write a storybook ending to the season, then the Eagles will remain locked in the nonfiction aisle. And the facts there aren't pretty. Through no fault of his own, Nick Foles - the 6-foot-6 backup quarterback who had become a favorite for some fans simply because he isn't Michael Vick and because he hadn't yet failed - was forced to take part in the disaster that is the 2012 season.

NEW YORK - Aspirin, one of the world's oldest and cheapest drugs, has shown remarkable promise in treating colon cancer in people with mutations in a gene that's thought to play a role in the disease. Among patients with the mutations, those who regularly took aspirin lived longer than those who didn't, a major study found. Five years after their cancers were diagnosed, 97 percent of the aspirin users were still alive versus 74 percent of those not taking the drug. Aspirin seemed to make no difference in patients who did not have the mutations.