EEs/EHEs in General Record Type: Review   ID: 68
Expect a Miracle: The Miraculous Things That Happen to Ordinary People Wakefield, Dan
The "miracles" of which Wakefield writes are primarily those involving closeness to life, of refining our perceptive capacities so that we can see the miracles, the exceptional, in front of our face. He quotes Willa Cather’s "so far that for a moment our eyes can see and our ears can hear what is there about us always" (p. 6). Some of the accounts, however, are "exceptional" in the sense that they are of anomalous experiences. But he also refers to them as "extraordinary things that happen in ordinary people’s lives" (p. 251). That he is alive to the deeper meaning of such experiences is evident from his observation that "There’s a grail out there for everyone," (p. 9). He devotes the book to accounts of his own exceptional experiences and then those of persons he has met at his workshops and in his travel throughout this country and Europe. In addition to healings, these accounts are of moments of saving grace, and moments of creative insights. He begins with a discussion of the meaning of miracle, and finds that of St. Augustine the most apt: "Miracles do not happen in contradiction of nature, but in contradiction of what we know about nature" (p. 18). Wakefield is not interested in the traditional sort of miracle in which a supernatural god intervenes in human life but the more "quiet" type of miracle, such as synchronous meetings at the "right time" that provide what the person needs most to know. He describes his observations of miracles at Lourdes and at Knock, the "Irish Lourdes." There is a chapter on cross-cultural approaches to healing that result in miraculous accounts. There follow chapters on "the miracles" experienced by people he has encountered. The chapters are grouped by type of miracle: of recovery, of love, of creation, of encounter, of presence, and Everyday Miracles. He closes with an account of the miracle of writing this book itself, which he feels "came through" him, as all his books do. He relates the writing of this book to his technique of writing a spiritual autobiography.
Publisher Information:	San Francisco: HarperSanFrancisco, 1995. 257p.

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