St. Charbel Makhlouf

Who they were

Charbel was a Maronite monk in the mountains of Lebanon who, after sixteen years in his monastery, received the rare permission to live as a hermit, and spent his last twenty-three years in a mountain hermitage at Annaya in silence, manual work, and prayer, sleeping on the ground. He died on Christmas Eve 1898, having said nothing to distinguish himself, and would be unknown except for what followed: phenomena reported at his tomb, examinations of his remains, and above all a stream of reported healings that has never really stopped, the monastery at Annaya keeps an office that has logged thousands of cases, from Lebanon and far beyond it, Christians and Muslims both. He was canonized in 1977. The most famous case, a Lebanese woman healed of hemiplegia in 1993 after reporting a dream of two monks operating on her neck, is documented in the monastery's files with the medical records attached.

Why people turn to St. Charbel Makhlouf

The tomb's record. He is asked for the hard cases, tumors, paralysis, the things doctors have stopped promising about.

How to ask their intercession

Directly, and by name. Lebanese practice keeps his devotion close to the 22nd of each month; adopt that rhythm if a monthly anchor helps persistence. ---