The Eucharistic Miracle of Santarém

Maria Riley shares her experience venerating a Eucharist miracle on her pilgrimage in Portugal.

This past November, I had the privilege of traveling on a pilgrimage to Fatima, Portugal. I anxiously looked forward to seeing the site where Mary appeared to the three shepherd children more than 100 years ago.

My time in the city of Fatima was not short on graces and a deep connection with Mary and her Son. However, the most amazing part of my pilgrimage was not while I was in Fatima, but rather in a small, unassuming church where we stopped on our way from Lisbon to Fatima.

Our group journeyed to a city called Santarém, which is about an hour outside of Lisbon. The overcast, misty day did nothing to dampen our spirits, because we were privileged to celebrate Mass at a church that was once called Saint Stephen, but now known as the Shrine of the Holy Miracle. Within it, we gazed upon and venerated a Eucharistic miracle.

Amazingly, hardly anyone on our pilgrimage had heard of this Eucharist miracle before reading our itinerary. I wish everyone did! When you learn about miracles like this, it can convince even the most doubting hearts of the True Presence of Jesus in the Eucharist.

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In 1266, a woman desperate because her husband was terribly unfaithful, consulted a sorcerer who asked her to steal a consecrated host. The woman agreed. At the Church of Saint Stephen, she received the Eucharist on her tongue, and then removed it and wrapped it in a linen cloth.

As she fled from the church, the Host began to bleed, enough that others thought her hand was bleeding. Shocked and scared, she ran straight home and hid the Host, still wrapped in the cloth, in the bottom of a wooden trunk in her room.

That night, she and her husband were woken by a bright, gleaming light streaming from the trunk. She quickly confessed the truth to her husband, and they both knelt in awe and adoration before the miracle along with angels.

The following day, the husband and wife, having had a complete conversion, told the priest at the Church of Saint Stephen so the Eucharistic miracle could be returned to its proper place. The Host, which bled for three days, was placed inside a beeswax pyx and locked in a tabernacle.

I was overcome with awe and humility in the presence of Jesus in this visual, tangible form. #catholicmom

About 100 years later, another miracle happened. When the priest opened the tabernacle, he found the wax pyx had burst into tiny pieces and the Blessed Sacrament was enclosed in a crystal pyx. Miraculously, this same preserved Eucharist was the one my fellow pilgrims and I venerated on the way to Fatima.

During our Mass, the beautiful tabernacle remained open, and we gazed upon this miracle throughout the liturgy. After Mass, we approached the Eucharistic miracle and could see the blood and remains of the Host that has been perfectly preserved for more than 750 years. Incredible!

I was overcome with awe and humility in the presence of Jesus in this visual, tangible form. I have always known and believed in the True Presence, but the opportunity to see with my earthly eyes brought me spiritually to the feet of the cross in a new way.

I pray that as I continue in this life I am able to retain the awe I experienced as a gift from the Eucharistic miracle in Santarém. At each Mass I attend, my mind draws back to that church, and I ponder that what my own priest holds in his hands and offers to me is that same Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Jesus. Such a gift! I am profoundly grateful to be Catholic.

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