In December of 2022, I was diagnosed with cancer—stage four. 

I had no faith. I wasn’t practicing. I was born Catholic, baptized Catholic, 12 years of school. I never practiced after we got out of school. My entire family was away from the faith for a while.

Diagnosis happens. I’m looking for answers, and I start looking for whatever felt good. It led me to some Protestant denominations. I found them unfulfilling. 

I prayed to God. I asked for an answer to some questions I had in my spiritual life. I asked to have a deeper faith. I don’t know if I specifically asked for the truth, but I received the truth. It called me back to the Catholic faith.

I was led to Our Lady. I began a devotion to the miraculous medal, and from there, I started researching Marian apparitions, the most famous ones—Guadalupe, Fatima, and then Medjugorje came up.

Upon the original diagnosis, we had done the surgeries and chemo to keep it at bay.

Then I had a recurrence. The cancer came back nine months later. I wasn’t a candidate for immunotherapy. Because of where it reoccured, like all over the place, surgery was off the table. My only options at this point were basically chemo and palliative care, so keep you comfortable, basically until death. That’s kind of how it works. But chemo is supposed to be a cure. 

My parents, being the great parents they are, wanted me to get immunotherapy that I couldn’t get in the United States. It was in Cancun in a place affiliated with M.D. Anderson in Texas. We applied. I was approved in the initial application so we had to expedite me getting a passport. My passport had expired so I had to get a passport as quickly as possible. I got it within a week or two weeks. 

In the meantime, I had to send my scans to the people in Mexico and have them look it over to make sure that they could get enough of a sample. We get the results back that I was no longer a candidate. They couldn’t get enough of a sample of the cancer to be able to do what they do.

My folks were very bummed about that. It didn’t bother me too bad. It was a lot of money, money I didn’t have, and they were going to be helping a lot with it. It’s money that really they don’t have either. You’re grasping at straws trying to stay alive. 

That weekend, my wife and I and the kids stayed at their house. They live in the city, too. It was just kind of a get away from our house. 

I scheduled to meet with Father Mike for spiritual direction. I had never met him in my life, but he’s a pastor at our church. The only time he could meet was after the Mass at 10 a.m. on a Sunday. I said, “That’s fine. I’ll make it to that Mass and we’ll meet after.”

That morning, we woke up. I was eating breakfast with my parents, and I was telling them about Medjugorje and explaining everything that had happened. They had never heard of the place.

I was very hot and cold towards Medjugorje, went up and down on all the research. I wasn’t sold on it. I said, “It’s interesting. It wouldn’t be the first place I would go. I’d like to see Guadalupe. I’m looking for healing. Maybe, Lourdes.” But I said it’s interesting. 

We went to Mass that morning and Fr. Mike in front of the whole parish said, “I am headed back to Medjugorje. Grab your passports. I want to take you with.” I looked at my wife and I’m like, “What are the odds that this morning we’re talking about it and I just got a passport?”

I met with Fr. Mike, and I was able to ask him what turned him on to Medjugorje. This is his third trip. He told me his story and I said, “I’m going.” We had the meeting to get the pilgrims together, and that next day I booked. 

In the meantime, I had to meet with my oncologist about what we were going to be doing going forward as far as my health goes, expecting that chemo was the only option. According to the test they ran, my DNA changed to where I could get immunotherapy in the United States. 

So in two weeks, the passport that was originally going to be going to Mexico was used to go to Medjugorje. And I still received the immunotherapy anyways.

We don’t know if it’s working, but I think I’m supposed to be here, you know what I mean? They say that you’re called, and I think that was a pretty loud call. That’s what got me here. 

Everyone at home is praying for a miracle. They even did a post, basically a Facebook post, talking about this trip for me. I mean, you know, I’m here for healing, but mostly to find answers to questions. Having peace of mind is more important than a clear bill of health. You tend to have answers to questions in peace of mind and in your heart. That’s what I’m looking for more than a physical healing, however, I’ll take the physical. I’ll take it. 

I haven’t really had a care, or very many cares, since I’ve been here. I came here in a state of grace. I got confession out of the way before we came, and I still participated while we were here, but I wanted to maximize all the graces that I could get from the second we hopped off the bus.

I’ve noticed that it didn’t take long to feel the peace. The faith of everybody here is infectious. There’s something in the air, almost like the joy you would get if you went to Disney World. You can’t see it. You can’t touch it, but it’s something that you can sense. You know that it’s good. Everything here is good, at least that I’ve experienced. 

I had a lot of questions about this place, and you’ll never get the answers to your questions online through a computer screen because half of what you read on this place is dragging it through the mud. It’s easy to be a keyboard warrior and tell your fellow Catholics the dangers of this place. I just urge people that you’ve got to go. I mean, you have to go. It’s only good. 

I’m not even convinced that every comment online is an actual person, with AI and bots. As far as people’s opinions go, people are afraid of things that they don’t understand.

The story of this place is so odd. Instead of stepping out and trying to understand it and accept it and give it a chance, it’s easier to knock it down and discourage people from it because it suits you. It all comes down to pride and ego.

I think it’s okay for us Christians, Catholics in particular, to have a fascination for places like this. If you went here and didn’t even seek out the stories of the visionaries or any of that, you would still have a great experience here, whether it’s confessions or Daily Mass.

And we’ve had experiences. Somebody had a rosary turn gold, but what’s funny is I saw it with my own eyes and I wasn’t super excited. That wasn’t the reason why I came.

You can’t lie. Signs are cool. Miracles are cool. We’re physical beings. We’re attracted to things like that, and we’re attracted to spiritual things. We long for a spiritual connection. To see something in our physical world and know that there was a spiritual interaction there, it’s fascinating. But I don’t think we should be here only looking for signs.

What’s your biggest takeaway from this place?

We need to spend more time in reverence to the Eucharist. 

This may be an unpopular opinion. I think when we walk into Mass, we need to remember that we’re in the presence of Jesus, and that includes the message of spending 10 minutes before Mass contemplating what is about to happen, and then spending that extra time after thanking Jesus for the sacrifice that He made. 

I think in a lot of the messages Our Lady is pointing to having more reverence for her Son in the Mass. 

Have you had a highlight? 

I had this weird thing in Mass where I had this idea of being a deacon. I asked Jesus, I said, “If that’s what you want me to do, then obviously I’m going to need a healing.” I don’t like to be an ‘if, then’ prayer person. I know it’s wrong, but it was like, “If you do this for me, then I’m going to thank you for the rest of my life in that way.”

I kept it to myself because it appears that I’m trying to make deals, and I don’t want it to be like that. I want this to be a me and Jesus thing. Then I walk in for lunch, and a pilgrim in our group goes, “You’ll never believe what happened. I had this vision. It was you, and you were a deacon, and there was like 30 kids there.” 

I didn’t say that to anyone. Like, I wouldn’t even go home and say it to my wife. This has to play out before I can go tell somebody like, “Hey, this is crazy, but Medjugorje…” I don’t know.

Another day, we were eating. It was the same day I had that idea. And I keep asking like, “Okay, I need more confirmation.” I’m sitting there, and we have four deacons on this trip, and I’m sitting with all four of them. All of a sudden, I looked and was like, “Wait a second, I’m at a table with these guys.” 

I don’t know what the future has for me. 

This [in Medjugorje] is the way life should be. I’m not saying everything’s perfect, and I’m just here on a pilgrimage. I don’t know what daily life is here. But it sure seems more laid back than home. Back at home, we’re so busy. At home, you go to work and you work with people that don’t share the faith, and it’s hard. It’s hard to be the guy that wants to be devout and have to worry about weird looks or maybe comments behind your back. I know we’re not supposed to care about things like that. The simple things, like making the sign of the cross and praying in a restaurant at home with your family, and you feel, not guilty, but judged. 

And you know what? Maybe nobody’s even judging you, but you still have it in your own head so it might be you being your worst critic. But here you can kneel right in the middle of the street and nobody’s even going to bat an eye, like, “Yeah, there’s my brother.”