6 August 1945. The Feast of the Transfiguration. World War II. The first nuclear bomb in human history fell on Hiroshima, Japan, a mere 20 kilotons, whereas today the normal size is 5 megatons – 2,500 times more powerful. The total planet inventory today can wipe out humankind 100 times over.

At Hiroshima, the “tiny” atomic bomb vaporized everything within a radius of more than a mile — buildings, people, trees. Some 200,000 were killed instantly, millions died slowly after from the radiation. A tiny church five blocks from ground zero was miraculously untouched, the lone edifice standing tall amid the rubble. There, six Jesuit priests who prayed the rosary every day, survived – William Kelinsorge, Pedro Arrupe, Klaus Luhmer, Hugo Lasalle, Hubert Kleslik, and Hubert Schiffer. Arrupe later pioneered Ignatian Spirituality.

Such is the power of the rosary, a message from the Blessed Virgin that praying the rosary gives protection from disasters.

Punta Maria.

Borongan in Eastern Samar faves the mighty Pacific. If “Yolanda” devastated Tacloban and the entire Samar eastern seaboard, why was Borongan spared, immune from the super typhoon? It was a miracle, similar to that at Hiroshima. A sister of the Religious of the Virgin Mary (RVM), whom I met during my visit there, related to me this story, a folk legend.

A passenger boat connected Borongan to the scattered nearby islets. In the 1950s, a mysterious lady, hugging her baby, a stranger to the people, boarded the passenger boat. At the first islet, she refused to go down. People asked where she was going. She just smiled and pointed to the sea. Finally, at an islet, now called Punta Maria, named after the legend, she disembarked and was never seen again.

The next day, the residents were surprised to see a statue of Mama Mary with the Baby Jesus on the beach. They gave it to a parish priest in Borongan. Was it the Virgin with the Baby Jesus guised as a peasant woman?

The statue was named Our Lady of Nativity. The incident catalyzed a new fiesta. Every 8 September, the birthday of Mama Mary, the statue is brought back to Punta Maria, welcomed by its residents.

They then all go on a pilgrimage to Borongan in a flotilla of dozens of pump boats to accompany the statue back to its home in the parish church. I heard the roar of the engines even before they appeared on the horizon. Later, street dancing was introduced to the fiesta. It is a smaller sea version of the feast of Our Lady of Penafrancia.

When the earthquake of 7.8 on the Richter scale devastated many churches in Bohol and Cebu, not a single house or building in Borongan was destroyed.

When I visited Punta Maria, I prayed the rosary with about 20 people crowded in a tiny chapel. Just like the Jesuits at Hiroshima, they pray the rosary every day. That is their weapon against disasters.

An old woman told me that when Yolanda came she saw three tsunami-sized waves from her balcony facing the ocean. She simply closed her eyes and prayed. When she opened her eyes, she saw the waves split and move to the sides. The people of Borongan did not know about Yolanda. They felt the strong winds, but only discovered later that the rest of Samar and Leyte, especially Tacloban, were devastated. The “Borongan miracle” was a sequel to the “Hiroshima miracle.”

The intimacy of the folks at Punta Maria and the Jesuits at Hiroshima with the Blessed Virgin was based on the power of the rosary prayed every day.

“When you cross turbulent waters, I shall be with you. In the wild rivers, you shall not drown. When you walk through fire, you shall not be burned. No flames shall consume you, as I am with you always. For I am the Lord, your God, your Savior, the Holy One. For you are precious and glorious in My eyes, and I love you.” (Isaiah 43:2-8).

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