Moses found God in a burning bush, and some North Dakota churchgoers believe they saw an apparition of Jesus in the form of flame at an Easter Vigil mass in March. Amateur photographer Paulette Osborne captured the photo of the burning Easter candle at Holy Spirit Church in Fargo taking the shape of the a cloaked man on March 31, and, while she is cautious about using the term “apparition,” she admits to being wowed by the image.
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“You have to be careful because an apparition has to be thoroughly researched and approved by the [Catholic] Church,” she told KFGO radio station. “I mean, it’s a beautiful symbol of the evening and it was so appropriate for that Easter Vigil service. It really cannot be called an apparition.”
As Osborne explained, she began snapping pictures that the vigil mass after noticing a crowd of people gathering around the flame. She told KFGO that her series of pictures shows the fire growing from a small white dot to the roaring fire in her now-infamous photo.
“The first picture is all dark with a small little white dot. And this was the seventh picture,” she said. “They had blessed the Easter candle and were entering the church and they were ready to light everyone else’s candle and so I looked at the fire and it was just so pretty.”
While she knew she had “pretty” shots, she didn’t know the power of what she had on her hands until a few days later when she was flipping through the film and couldn’t believe her eyes.
“I said, ‘wow,’ and then I called my husband and said, ‘come here, look at this picture.’ And he came over and went ‘wow,’” she recalled. “And we both thought it was such a beautiful image, so I took it to our class on Tuesday night and showed the slideshow of all the pictures in the evening.”
Her fellow churchgoers agreed, and the Fargo Catholic Diocese even published the picture in its New Earth magazine. The caption acknowledges the photo’s likeness to the risen Christ but stops short of calling it an apparition. As KFGO reported, the diocese shared the photo because of its relevance to the celebration of Easter but does not claim the image is an apparition.
Regardless, Osborne is happy to know her spur-of-moment snap is bringing joy to so many around the world. “I don’t know why I’ve been given that picture,” she concluded, “but it’s spreading the light and so much love and faith.”
(H/T: Christian Post)