Америкалық киелі жаралы қыз – Одри Сантоның тарихы

American Stigmata sufferer
Audrey Marie Santo (December 19, 1983 – April 14, 2007), often referred to as Little Audrey, was a young girl from Worcester, Massachusetts, through whom miracles were purported to have happened after she suffered severe brain damage in a near drowning accident.

Audrey Santo was the youngest of four children born to Linda and Steve Santo. On August 9, 1987, three year old Audrey was playing outside in the driveway with her four year old brother Stephen. When Stephen came inside alone, Linda and her twelve year old son, Matthew, went to look for Audrey and found her face down in the backyard swimming pool. Matthew dove in and pulled Audrey from the pool, and she was rushed to the hospital. Audrey remained in a coma for about three weeks, in intensive care. According to Linda Santo, doctors recommended she be placed in an institution, but the family wanted her at home. In November, almost four months following the accident, Audrey was brought home. Audrey's father Steve Santo left the family during the weeks after the accident and came back eight years later.

The Santo family is Catholic. About a year after the accident, Linda took Audrey to Međugorje, which is a popular pilgrimage site in the then Yugoslavia, where the Virgin Mary is purported to have appeared periodically to six local Catholics since 1981. This was a difficult and expensive journey with an incapacitated four year old child, but Linda believed it would result in Audrey being healed, even bringing a pair of sandals for Audrey to use once she was restored to health. Audrey was present at one of the alleged apparitions. According to her mother, she seemed to be aware, and nodded her head as if to say 'yes'. Linda states that Audrey communicated directly with the Virgin Mary and agreed to become a victim soul. In popular, or folk spirituality, a "victim soul" is someone who willingly takes on the suffering of others. Audrey subsequently went into cardiac arrest and almost died, requiring a medical evacuation back to the United States. Her mother interpreted the child's heart failure as due to the apparition site's proximity to "the biggest abortion clinic in Yugoslavia".

After the family returned from Međugorje, numerous miracles were purported to have occurred in Audrey's bedroom and within the house. The claimed miracles in Audrey's home included icons weeping blood or oil, a bleeding statue of Jesus, blood appearing spontaneously in a tabernacle and on consecrated communion wafers, oil dripping down the walls of the garage, and the Virgin Mary appearing in cloud formations overhead. Linda Santo and a nurse have also allege that Audrey sometimes bore the stigmata, although this has never been documented with a photograph. As word spread about Audrey, hundreds of visitors began coming to pray for healing near Audrey's bedside. Eventually, the family set up visiting hours and built a window in Audrey's bedroom wall through which visitors could view her. The window was later removed by order of the bishop. A test commissioned by The Washington Post from Microbac Laboratories of Pittsburgh found that sample contained 80 percent corn or soybean oil, and 20 percent chicken fat. A Rhode Island mother also claims that an intercessory prayer to Audrey saved her choking daughter. A woman with metastatic breast cancer, Andrea Pearson, attributed her improvement to Audrey, although her oncologist attributed the improvement to a medication she had just started taking. Pearson's cancer later spread to the brain.

In 1999, the Catholic Bishop of Worcester at the time, Daniel P. Reilly, released his preliminary findings on the case. In that report, the Bishop said that "The most striking evidence of the presence of God in the Santo home is seen in the dedication of the family to Audrey." As for the purported miracles, he said "I want to underscore that any paranormal occurrences are not miraculous in and of themselves". He also stated in regard to the claim that Audrey was a purported "victim soul", "The term "victim soul" is not an official term in the Church. It was used in some circles in the 18th and 19th century when there was a fascination with suffering and death. "<blockquote>To begin to consider this notion of "victim soul" with regards to Audrey, one would have to establish a corroborated understanding of Audrey's cognitive abilities. This has yet to be done. Beyond that, one would have to determine that Audrey, at the age of three was, and presently is, capable of making a free choice to accept the suffering of others. The Bishop of Worcester, Robert J. McManus, gave official recognition to the foundation, allowing them to present their application to the Congregation for the Causes of Saints in Rome, while remaining neutral himself as to whether Audrey should be a saint. Beatification and canonization require at least two fully documented and authenticated miracles. The board of directors of the Audrey Santo Foundation asked in a web update on August 12, 2013, that "if anyone has specific knowledge of any such miracles, they must come forward [so] that the proper protocol is followed."