KNOCK - Is the Miracle of the Dry Gable True?
The above picture from 1880, the year after the "apparition" is interesting. The
exact spot where the Virgin stood at an apparition site is extremely important
to Catholics. It seems safe to assume that as the witnesses of the apparition
would have been consulted the statue of Mary does indeed mark the spot though it
seems to be higher up than the Virgin would have been. But you can be sure it is
positioned over the spot. The statue is of our Lady of Lourdes. It has not been
noted how similar the Knock virgins pose was to statues of Our Lady of Lourdes.
Both are depicted as looking up to heaven and praying with hands parted and held
up to the chest. The statue depicted is a fair size and would pass for life size
if it were not for the people standing beside it if you are standing where the
photographer stood. Remember the witnesses stood at a further distance away
though a couple went close briefly and observed that the entities were statues.
Could it be that somebody put statues at the gable? Did somebody put a crown on
a statue of Our Lady of Lourdes and plot it at the gable with a light shining on
it which would have made it look more mystical? Imagination played a role and
always does. The Church recognises this and says that even if an apparition is
real and believable that does not mean that everything said by the witness is
necessarily true. It is possible that a statue of Mary and St Patrick (mistaken
for St John) was used. A witness however stated that the St John image resembled
a statue of St John at Lecanvey.
On the night of the 21st of August 1879 the Virgin Mary flanked by St Joseph and
a bishop thought to be St John the Evangelist and an altar with a lamb and cross
on it allegedly appeared on the gable wall of the Parish Church for a few hours.
Fifteen people witnessed the vision including a child of five (page 60, The
Evidence for Visions of the Virgin Mary).
The people saw white images. The witnesses referred to them as statues. Nobody
saw them coming or going. The witnesses claimed that they all left the vision
and that when they came back to the spot, there was nothing to be seen there
only the rain battering against the gable.
The witnesses left depositions. We know there would be at least small errors or
exaggerations in the depositions. The only thing that stands out as miraculous
is the allegation that the grass below the apparition and the gable wall were
dry despite the long and heavy rain going in that direction.
The notion that the gable was miraculously sheltered from the torrential rain
going in its direction has grown in importance among believers in Knock.
It is deployed to refute the notion that the images were phosphorus cut outs.
The rain would make the paint run.
It is deployed to refute the notion that if a light beam was used to keep the
phosphorus bright and to make it look brighter the beam would have been
interrupted by the rain.
It is deployed to refute the notion that the whole vision was simply a trick for
it was produced by magic lantern or projector. It is surmised that the light
beam again would have been interrupted by the rain.
But the miracle of the dry gable is a hoax.
It is claimed that the ground below the vision was dry.
The ancient witness who supposedly said the ground was miraculously dry below
the apparition would have wet hands. Her hands were already wet so how reliable
was her discovery that the ground was dry? If you expect the ground to be dry
and your hands are wet then you will think the ground is dry. Perhaps a shelter
that wasn't seen was attached to the wall by the hoaxer to keep the phosphorous
figures dry? Or was a sheet of glass used and a light source used to project
images on to it or to light up images already on it? Did the glass protect the
ground from the rain?
Bridget Trench, was that witness.
Her real testimony is succinct and so bare it is useless but it goes,
LIVES IN THIS PLACE. ON THE EVE OF 21 AUGUST A PERSON SICK SENT FOR HER THAT SHE
MIGHT SEE HER. SHE CAME THAT EVENING TO THE CHURCH [SOMETHING ERASED]. SHE WAS
IN THE HOUSE OF THE SICK WOMAN. SHE CAME BY THE ROAD AND SAW GREAT LIGHT. SHE
ENTERED AT HER RIGHT HAND. SHE LEFT HER HAND ON THEM. SHE SAW ST JOSEPH AND THE
BVM AND ST JOHN AND THE ALTAR AND THE LAMB. THEY WERE NOT STANDING ON THE GROUND
BUT PROBABLY TWO FEET ABOVE THE GROUND.
She said the vision was probably two feet above the ground. This does not give
us much confidence in her reported claim that she went up to the vision and
examined the ground below it carefully.
The Church tells us, that she tried to touch
the Virgin’s feet but there was nothing there. However she never made such a
claim. Her testimony was rewritten by fraudsters. Anyway suppose the testimony
as we have it in the popular books really is authentic. Her hands just touched
the wall which suggests that the image of the feet was on the wall and not in
front of it. She felt the ground below the vision and it was dry despite the
torrential rainfall that was happening. But we are not told if she just touched
one part of the ground so she failed to prove that she hadn’t touched a part of
the ground that was sheltered from the rain beating against the gable by the
people being in the way of the rain. Or perhaps the long grass had protected
the ground from getting wet.
She was soaked to the skin so how could her wet hands tell her for sure the
ground at the gable was dry? It would be a natural assumption to make that if
the Virgin was at your gable in the rain that no rain would fall there. As our
memories reconstruct the past rather than record it maybe she imagined the gable
was dry in the days after the event. She never mentioned the lamb or the altar.
But this may have been due to her assertion that her attention was all on the
Virgin Mary.
The images were said to be standing on the tips of the grass. It was no wonder
she found the ground dry under the grass for it might have sheltered the ground!
If they were real statues then we have another explanation for the dry ground!
Was the gable itself dry?
The gable being dry during the apparition is supposedly a miracle. The witnesses
said it was an extremely dark night. If that is true then how did they know the
rain was hitting the gable after the vision ended?
The only real indicator of a miracle in Trench's revised account is how the wind and the
rain going in the direction of the gable didn't affect it. It was reportedly dry
as was the ground at the gable. Nobody else, in a deposition, said that the rain
was in the direction of the gable. It is strange that the priests didn't seek
corroboration for her claim. Perhaps she didn't make the claim or she was
mistaken. Why did some of the other witnesses claim that the images did not get
wet instead of saying the gable was dry?
The dryness of the gable could be explained by the fact that it may not have
been raining all the time and the wind could have dried the gable. No testimony
says it rained all the time except one. Hill says, "For the space of one hour
and a half we were under the pouring rain ; at this time I was very wet ; I
noticed that the rain did not wet the figures which appeared before me, although
I was wet myself; I went away then." Perhaps the rain did wet the gable and
changed direction and the wind dried it.
Judith Campbell said, "Though it was raining, the place in which the figures
[ORIGINAL SAYS statues] appeared was quite [this quite is significant - it
indicates that merely that the area should have been wetter than what it
appeared or than what she expected. It undermines the claim that the area was
completely and miraculously dry] dry." She does not mention if the gable was
dry.
Mary Mc Loughlin said she and others stood at the gable of the school house -
see picture. Bridget Trench's alleged testimony claimed that the rain went in
the direction of the gable which miraculously stayed dry. If the rain had really
been in the direction of the chapel gable Mc Loughlin would have sheltered on
the other side of the school house. A few liars among the witnesses makes liars
of them all for they refused to expose the liars.
The vision only occupied a small part of the large gable. It would seem
unnecessary for God to stop rain touching the gable except where they were
standing. And if this was an insubstantial apparition, then what would God
go to the trouble for of keeping it dry when it can't be drenched
anyway?
We must remember that if God keeps a
non-material vision dry that does need it then that is a bigger
miracle than the supposed sight itself. It is only human bias
that wants to find wonders in sights and sounds. They miss the
bigger puzzles.
The fabricated Trench testimony agrees, " It was raining very heavily at the
time, but no rain fell where the figures were, I felt the ground carefully with
my hands, and it was perfectly dry. The wind was blowing from the south, right
against the gable of the chapel, but no rain fell on that portion of the gable
or chapel in which the figures were." So it is claimed that there was rain
falling on the gable albeit part of it.
Margaret Beirne reportedly testified, "It was pitch dark and raining heavily,
and still there was not one drop of rain near the images." This does not ask for
a miraculous explanation. Had she considered it wonderful she would have
elaborated that the rain was in the direction of the images. If you view the
original transcript of her testimony, that sentence is in it but strangely
omitted from the published account given by McPhilpin. Was it because she was
denying it publicly? It had to have been. It was however in Sullivan's version.
The assertion attributed to Bridget Trench, "The wind was blowing from the
south" meaning against the gable from her fabricated testimony contradicts the
assertion of Mary Beirne to The Weekly News of 1880 that there was no wind. Why
was the wind lied about? The reason must have been that if there was rain it was
not in the direction of the gable and the wind was invented to explain how the
gable should be wet. The wind was invented to direct the rain at the gable.
Trench's fabricated account IS THE ONLY ONE THAT STATES THAT THE RAIN SHOULD
HAVE HIT THE GABLE! THERE IS NO EVIDENCE THAT THE GABLE SHOULD HAVE BEEN WET.
WORSE, THE REAL TRENCH TESTIMONY DOES NOT MENTION RAIN AT ALL! IF THE RAIN
SHOULD HAVE BEEN WETTING THE GABLE THE WITNESSES WOULD HAVE SAID INSTEAD OF
SETTLING JUST FOR SAYING IT WAS RAINING. THEY DO NOT SAY THERE WAS ANYTHING ODD
ABOUT THE IMAGES STAYING DRY OR APPEARING TO. AND NOBODY SPENT MUCH TIME LOOKING
AT THEM CLOSE UP - NEARLY EVERYBODY KEPT FAR AWAY SO HOW CAN THEY BE SURE?
There is no reason to hold that any of the gable was really dry in the sense
that it kept dry despite the rain going at it.
What about the figures being dry?
The rain not falling on the figures is seemingly impressive. It would look that
way if one couldn't get close enough. And some of the witnesses did see flashing
lights like tiny stars. Sounds like rain catching the light-source causing the
apparition.
Hill - "the upper parts of the crown appeared to be a series of sparkles, or
glittering crosses".
Mary Beirne "On the body of the Lamb, and around it, I saw golden stars, or
small brilliant lights, glittering like jets or glass balls, reflecting the
light of some luminous body".
Margaret her sister says, "I saw an altar there ; it was surrounded with a
bright light, nay, with a light at times sparkling, [THIS HIGHLIGHTED PART IS
NOT IN THE ORIGINAL BUT PERHAPS SHE STILL SAID IT] and so too were the other
figures [statues in the original manuscript - ORIGINAL "AS WELL AS ALL THE
STATUES"], which were similarly surrounded." The light source then was clearly
affected by the rain.
Images made of light would not get wet naturally! If glass was protecting the
images that would explain why they looked dry.
Was the man, Walsh, who was out on his land in the dark and saw the light at Knock Church in the distance telling the truth? Would he have been out if it were that wet? He was sixty five years of age and said it was "raining heavily". But did he? We do not have his original script.
It is a miracle how when the elderly Mrs Campbell needed assistance for she fell at her door that the whole group of witnesses had to run to her. Her daughter Judy was at the gable and she only needed at least one other person to accompany her. The story is not very coherent or plausible. It looks like an excuse for why everybody left the gable. There is something nobody is being told.
The myth in the pro-Knock books is that she was dying. But in fact she lived for several weeks after the supposed apparition so she was probably not as sick as the people made out.
To end the hoax, you needed to get the
witnesses off site. It is no wonder there was nothing there
when they came back...
Conclusion
The miracle of the dry gable at Knock is nonsense. When so many lies have
appeared after the vision and because of it it makes us wonder how much of the
apparition story itself is true. We do not know for sure if the rain wet the
gable or how long it rained or even if it rained much. We must remember that the
story of the heavy rain battering the gable suits those who want to deny the
image was a painting or a magic lantern or some other kind of hoax.
BOOKS CONSULTED
The Apparition at Knock, The Ecumenical Dimension, Eoin de Bháldriathe, Data
Print, Athy, 2013
Margaret Anna Cusack, The Nun of Kenmare, by Catherine Ferguson CSJP, Gaelbooks,
Co Down, 2008
Knock The Virgin's Apparition in Nineteenth Century Ireland, Eugene Hynes, Cork
University Press, Cork, 2008
Knock: Some New Evidence. The British and Irish Skeptic, Berman, David. Vol 1,
no. 6, November/December 1987
Knock 1879-1979, Rynne, Catherine. Dublin: Veritas Publications, 1979
Looking for a Miracle, Joe Nickell, Prometheus Books, New York, 1993
Our Lady of Knock, John MacPhilpin, Tom Neary, London: Catholic Truth Society,
1976
Our Lady of Knock. William D Coyne, New York: Catholic Book Publishing, 1948
"Papal Visit Resurrects Ireland's Knock Legend." The Freethinker (October 1979).
Reprinted in The British and Irish Skeptic 1, no. 1 January/February 1987
The Apparition at Knock, A Survey of Facts and Evidence, Fr Michael Walsh, St
Jarlath’s College, Tuam, Co Galway, 1959
The Apparitions and Miracles at Knock, also Official Depositions of the
Eye-Witnesses. Tuam, Ireland, 1880. 2d ed. Dublin: M. H. Gill & Son, 1894.
Mother of Nations, Joan Ashton, Veritas, Dublin, 1988
The Book of Miracles, Stuart Gordon, Headline, London, 1996
The Cult of the Virgin Mary, Michael P Carroll, Princeton University Press, 1986
The Evidence for Visions of the Virgin Mary, Kevin McClure Aquarian Press,
Wellingborough, Northamptonshire, 1985
The Thunder of Justice, Ted and Maureen Flynn, MAXCOL, Vancouver, 1993
The Wonder of Guadalupe, Francis Johnson, Augustine, Devon, 1981
Why Statues Weep, Editors Wendy M Grossman and Christopher C French, The
Philosophy Press, London, 2010
Venerable Archdeacon Cavanagh, Liam Úa Cadhain, Knock Shrine Society, Roscommon
Herald, Boyle, Roscommon, Ireland, 2004
