healing of cancer in the pelvis

What evidence would it take for you to believe a miracle had occurred? Do you think it would make a difference if it happened to you?

Lisa Larios didn't even know she had cancer. But when she found out she could walk again without pain, she certainly believed it was a miracle.

Recently I wrote about a book written by a doctor and medical researcher who had followed up on evidence for ten people who had apparently been miraculously healed. Here is one story from the book.

Lisa was 12 years old when, in 1972, she began to feel pain in her right hip, which became so bad that she was unable to walk. She was diagnosed with a tumour that extended 7 cm into her hip, clearly visible in X-rays and confirmed by several medical opinions. A course of radiation and chemo therapy was recommended, and one chemo dose given before the family cancelled the treatment because the first injection made Lisa so sick.

Medical advice was that the single does would have had an insignificant effect, and so it proved, with Lisa still being in severe pain and unable to walk.

A family friend recommend the Lisa's mother take her to a healing meeting conducted by Kathryn Kuhlman, a somewhat colourful christian healing evangelist. The friend fasted and prayed for a week for Lisa's healing. Lisa, unaware that the cancer had not been removed, went only to please her mother, and sat in a section reserved for those in wheelchairs or on crutches.

During the service, Lisa felt a warm feeling in her stomach, and Kathryn Kuhlman said someone in her section was being healed from cancer and should stand up. Lisa, against her mother's wishes, stood up and was able to walk without pain for the first time since the problem had appeared.

Lisa was X-rayed several times after than, and it became clear that something strange had indeed occurred. Further X-rays were taken and reviewed by several doctors, and it became clear that Lisa's hip had been fully restored and the cancer was gone.

Before and after X-rays of Lisa Larios' right hip. The darkened section near the arrow in the first picture is the cancer, and the white in the same area in the second X-ray is healthy bone.

It seems clear that Lisa's healing occurred while she was attending the healing service, and it is difficult believe that it occurred simply be the power of suggestion, as Lisa wasn't aware she needed healing. Something quite amazing occurred, and the fact that this followed prayer for healing is surely not coincidental.

It is difficult philosophically and scientifically to make categorical statements about miracles. Spontaneous remissions do occur without, apparently, any prayer. Many prayers for healing are not answered. I have looked at the evidence in can prayer help healing?, which is based on the findings of medical studies which I have summarised in intercessory prayer and healing.

I have tried to follow up Lisa's later life, to see if the healing continued, but I have so far been unable to find anything more.