‘If it weren’t for Rhoda Wise, there would be no EWTN,’ O’Neill noted. ‘So it’s quite a connection.’
As the canonization cause for American mystic and Servant of God Rhoda Wise took a major step forward this month — clearing a key milestone at the Vatican as formal documentation on her life and virtues advances before the Dicastery for the Causes of Saints — the stigmatist’s deep connection to EWTN cannot be overlooked.
Michael O’Neill, who is also known at the “Miracle Hunter,” shared fascinating details about the connection between the possible saint and EWTN foundress Mother Angelica. Speaking on EWTN Radio, the author of They Might Be Saints said:
“Rhoda Wise has been passed away for some decades now, of course, but she was one of these people who had the most mystical phenomena surrounding her of anyone in American history, in my opinion.”
Born in 1888, Wise was an Ohio housewife and convert to Catholicism who gained national attention after reporting miraculous healings from severe ankle injuries and cancer in 1939, as well as bearing the stigmata from 1942 to 1945. Wise’s Canton, Ohio, home still draws hundreds of weekly visitors seeking healing,
