St Charbel heals a mentally ill man from Ehmej, Mount Lebanon.
St Charbel lived the last 23 years of his life as a hermit in purity, obedience and humility which he practiced with the utmost love at the St Peter and St Paul hermitage in Annaya, Mount Lebanon.
At the hermitage St Charbel prayed, meditated and attend mass daily, read the bible and scriptures daily, performed manual Labour daily, lived a life in poverty, ate one meal a day which were scraps from the other hermits and monks, carried out penance, practiced corporal punishment, chained himself, mortification of the body, slept on goat’s hair and used a timber log as a pillow which laid directly on the ground, slept less than five hours a day and observed strict silence in order to be as close to God as possible.
God rewarded St Charbel for his continuous commitment and service to him and blessed St Charbel with many talents, graces and filled him with the Holy Spirit which enabled St Charbel to perform many miracles when he was alive.
In the small village of Ehmej in Mount Lebanon lived a mentally ill man who gave his parents and village a great deal of pain and distress to the point were they could not take care of him anymore. So his parents called a few men from their village to take him to the monastery of St Maroun in Annaya, Mount Lebanon to get a blessing from a monk and hopefully make him better from his mental illness.
The men struggled with great difficulty to bring the mentally ill man to the monastery to obtain a blessing from the monks because he was resisting with superhuman strength. Eventually the men managed to bring the mentally ill man to the monastery but he refused and resisted to go inside the church.
Father Charbel (St Charbel) saw what was going on outside the monastery and so he approached the group of men and said, “what seems to be the problem here” the men replied, “the parents of this mentally ill man wanted us to bring him to the monastery to obtain a blessing from a monk and to hopefully heal him from his mental illness because his parents can not take care of him anymore”.
Father Charbel (St Charbel) calmly turned to the mentally ill man and said, “Hello my dear friend, come and follow me inside the church”. The mentally ill man gradually calmed down and humbly followed Father Charbel (St Charbel) inside the church. Once inside the church, Father Charbel (St Charbel) politely asked the mentally ill man to kneel before the altar and tabernacle. Father Charbel (St Charbel) then proceeded to pray over him, read a small passage from the bible and then gave him a final blessing. As soon as Father Charbel (St Charbel) gave him the final blessing, the mentally ill man immediately stood up, hugged and thanked Father Charbel (St Charbel) for making him normal again.
The man walked back outside the church to the village men who were waiting for him and to their amazement they see and hear the man look and speak perfectly normal to them. The village men praised, hugged and thanked Father Charbel (St Charbel) for healing the mentally ill man.
When the men arrived back to their village, the man’s parents cried with joy and happiness that their mentally ill son had become normal again and would not cause them any more grief and heartache. The man later married and had a large family in Lebanon.