Roula Bahsoun a Muslim newscaster shares her love and devotion to St Charbel
St Charbel is Roula’s Bahsoun patron Saint. Roula loves him to the point of visiting the St Maroun’s Monastery in Annaya, Mount Lebanon on the 22nd of each month to join the Procession and Mass Service to commemorate St Charbel miracle on Nohad El Shami. Roula also visits St Charbel’s tomb in St Maroun’s Monastery in Annaya, Mount Lebanon whenever she feels the need to pray and talk with him.
Roula is a practicing Shite Muslim but open to other religions and to humanity. She is Lebanese and has built her reputation by working as a reporter and presenter on both channels Douniya Al and Al Mayadin.
Roula unveils details of her relationship with St Charbel, the Saint of Lebanon, during a telephone call with Aleteia: Roula said: “St Charbel is also the patron of the Muslims, he invites us on the 22nd of every month to help us and heal us. I see a lot in my dreams. He gave me the first time, a bracelet of his right hand, saying: Keep it. I dreamed again, I climbed to the Hermitage where I found it. I lit a candle and I heard him say, Come here.”
Roula Continues, “I saw a man of great size, wearing his cassock. I immediately recognised how he closely resembled the portrait displayed at the monastery and the picture I have of him at home. St Charbel knows how much I love him and my heart rejoices every time I hear his name.”
Roula likes visiting the St Maroun’s monastery at Annaya, Mount Lebanon as she likes to learn from the master of the convent, away from the din of the world. She reverences St Charbel, kneeling, crying and talking with him. Roula says, “I can feel it, I cannot describe this feeling, I speak with him as if he were in front of me and I feel a strange tranquility.”
Roula says that “There is no God but God” was engraved on the bracelet given to her by St Charbel. She also saw St Rafqa in her dream: “I saw in a destroyed house with only one small window overlooking a nice place where people live in peace. A church and a mosque were located near the house. St Rafqa was dressed in white and brown, carrying the cross around her neck. She said: “You have to get out by the window, the window of joy.”
Roula says these dreams of St Charbel and are St Rafqa are reconciliation messages. “We must, Christians and Muslims live together in love and peace.”
Roula shares her account to send a message to readers of Aleteia, “these thousands of years, the sons of the East still kill, obscuring the message of God to them, which is a message of love and peace issued to us all, without regard to our different religions. Why do atheists live in peace and why we who have received the peace of God, are unable to live it?”
Roula continues, “The Saints have departed from this world and have experienced peace and St Charbel’s prayers healed Muslims before Christians. How then do we not understand God’s message for us?”
Roula concludes on a note of the relationship between Christians and Muslims saying, “We keep saying we want to live together but do we dare to forge a relationship with another who belongs to another religion? I find, as a Muslim, no problem to build relationships with those who profess another religion because we are all human before being followers of a particular religion”.
Here is the original article from Aleteia:
http://aleteia.org/blogs/deacon-greg-kandra/meet-the-muslim-newscaster-who-loves-st-charbel/