Sight for the Blind
An account from Limassol
 St. Nicholas Center Collection |
Around 1920, when I was a little girl, we lived here in Saint Nicholas. We were very poor. My father was a shepherd and had his own flock. One day he said he was going to cut wood. He chopped at a point in a tree and "lost his light" (he was blinded). People said he beat the "table outside that we saw" (the devil).
He visited several doctors and was not cured. He went to various churches. At the end he decided to walk from Saint Nicholas to Saint Barbara in Zakaki (now a district of Limassol). At night, in his sleep, a Saint said: "You went to all the churches and did not come near me."
"Who are you?" asked my father. And he got the reply: "I am St. Nicholas. I want you to come like this . . ." and he raised his robes, showing his feet were clean.
My father asked me to boil water and he bathed. My brother Harry and I walked him along the path. That night my father slept alone in the Chapel of St. Nicholas. The next morning we went to take him from there but we did not find him. He had become well. Saint Nicholas healed his eyes and when he woke he saw as before. He had gone home to take the flock and drive it to pasture.
We all praise God and St. Nicholas! The "old ones" had great faith, you see.
Told by Helen Ilia from Mystagogy. Used by permission.