Make Friends With the Saints Part II
St. Phanurius Miracles: Missing Car in New York City
As promised in our last post Make Friends with the Saints and Never Be Lonely, we will start sharing from our new book, The Holy and Glorious Great Martyr Phanurius the Newly Revealed.
St. Phanurius is known in Orthodox Christianity as the Saint who helps find things that are lost and helps to reveal things. These “things” are not always physical, although many times they are.
Here is the account that started this project, many years ago, of collecting first-hand accounts of his help:
MAYBE IN YOUR LITTLE HICK TOWN, BUT NOT IN NEW YORK
About nine years ago, one Sunday afternoon, I received a phone call in which my mother was very upset. My father’s car had been stolen, she informed me, and he wasn’t coming to see me. They were devastated. The car wasn’t insured for theft and it was the only one they had. I told her not to worry, if there was anyone who could find our car it was St. Phanurius. I hung up the phone and went straight to my icons and promised to bake a Phanuropita* as soon as the car was found.
A few minutes later, my sister called and by her tone I could tell she was very upset. “Mom just told me that you’re going to pray to St. Phanurius to find our car!” she said, her voice getting louder with each word. “What are you, STUPID?! Do you know how many cars get stolen in the city of New York every day and in what kind of shape the cars are in when they’re found?! And you think that by praying to St. Phanurius they’ll find our car!?!” By this time she sounded pretty hysterical so I didn’t bother to interrupt or argue. “Listen to me,” she continued in a low, deep voice, “and see if you can understand what I’m about to say: St. Phanurius does NOT work in the city of New York! Maybe he comes to your little hick town, but not to New York! Sometimes I wonder about you!” she said, slamming down the phone. I chuckled as I got off the phone and thought, “We’ll just have to show Miss Know-It-All, won’t we St. Phanurius?”
Two days later my mother called. “Start your baking,” she said. “Thanks to St. Phanurius, the police found your father’s car somewhere in the city, untouched. Not one thing was missing! And before I hang up, there is someone here who wants to say something.” It was my sister. “So,” she said, in a soft voice, pausing to clear her throat, “What exactly do you say when you pray to St. Phanurius?”
Maria Zorbas
Lowell, MA, 1992
Found on page 13 of The Holy and Glorious Great Martyr St. Phanurius: Life, Miracles and Supplicatory Canon.
*There is a tradition to bake a cake in honor of St. Phanurius, to bring it to Church to be blessed, and then to share it. This cake is known by its Greek name, a Phanuropita (St. Phanurius cake).
