do miracles occur? - practice

Arguing the philosophy of miracles is one thing, claiming to have observed them is another. And who better to report on healing miracles than qualified doctors? (See miracles happen for some background, and heart starting action for a well-reported example.)

The World Christian Doctors Network (WCDN) compiles case histories of apparent miracles, and presents them on its website, and at its annual conferences. It recently held its 2009 conference in Kiev, Ukraine.

Many cases of apparent miraculous healing were reported at the conference, including a documented case of an Australian man who had been given only a short time to live because of recurring skin cancer which had "metastasized" to his chest and lungs. But after attending a christian healing prayer meeting, "tumor regression started" and after further prayer his skin cancer disappeared, and a CT scan showed the lung cancer had gone as well.

The same Aussie doctor also told of how she had been revived after being "dead" for 45 minutes, an occurrence she regards as a miracle because she suffered no brain damage.

what are we to make of this?

For many christians, these stories are easily believed, but sceptics (which includes some christians) can always find reasons to disbelieve - perhaps the documentation is deemed inadequate, perhaps the event occurred but was a fortuitous but natural occurrence, or perhaps they just simply cannot believe because of their scepticism.

It seems to me that we have to at least accept that some miracles appear to have occurred, and resolutely maintaining that none of these events are actually miracles seems contrary to the evidence. But these events raise other questions, such as "if these miracles really did occur, why doesn't God do miracles happen more often?" I wish I knew the answer to that one!