The making of St. Mychal

There was a time when 4-year-old Matthew Brown did not speak well. He wouldn’t respond to certain noises. He could hardly look a person in the eye. Specialists said his communication and cognitive skills were delayed. So Scott Brown prayed that God would loosen his son’s tongue. He prayed to family members long dead, to St. Nicholas and St. Joseph. And after Sept. 11, 2001, Brown began to pray to the Rev. Mychal Judge, the 68-year-old New York priest who was the first person listed as a casualty of the terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center. ”Once I started praying to Mychal Judge, the positive outcome . . . was almost instantaneous,” says Brown, 41, a Newport, R.I., firefighter, about his son’s recovery. ”For someone who was so silent and would never make eye contact with you, he’s like a different child. . . . I can’t help but to say that it is miraculous.” Nearly 3,000 people attended Judge’s funeral on Sept. 15, 2001. Mayor Rudy Giuliani was there and called the fallen fire department chaplain a saint. Now, when the image of Roman Catholic priests has been tarnished by clergy who have molested children and with memories of Sept. 11 still vivid, there is a budding grass-roots effort to make Judge’s sainthood official. Full Story