During communion in the small Honduran village, the father noticed that there were blood stains on the corporal.

Walter Guillén Soto, the bishop of the Diocese of Gracias in Honduras, has acknowledged a new Eucharistic miracle, reports Sunday the Catholic News Agency .

On the afternoon of June 9 last year, the local Catholics celebrated Lord's Day in the El Espinal chapel in the city of San Juan. José Elmer Benítez Machado, who introduced the Mass, arrived before everyone else.

The mass began at five o'clock in the afternoon local time. When it was time for communion, Benítez opened the tabernacle and noticed that the corporal, which was folded around the ciborium, had blood stains.

"I was shocked. My first hope was: "this is the blood of Christ""

he said, adding that he suddenly didn't know what to do, so he continued to distribute the Eucharist.

He asked those present if they had seen anyone in the church before, or if they had experienced a water leak, and then told them what he had seen. The faithful confirmed that they did not see any water leaks or anyone in the area, and then asked the father to show them what he saw.

The next day, Father Marvin Sotelo and Father Oscar Rodríguez, missionaries of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, went to the site to see with their own eyes what Benítez had reported earlier. Sotelo put the corporal in a hermetically sealed plastic bag, kept it at the parish, and two days later handed it over to Bishop Guillén.

Guillén was skeptical and decided not to make a decision right away. Three months later, the bishop ordered that doctors also examine the blood. First of all

it was ruled out that the stains came from ash or animal blood,

later it turned out to be human blood, moreover, blood type AB, Rh+, which is the same as what was found on the Shroud of Turin and the miracle of Lanciano. In addition, this blood type is rare in Honduras, less than 2.5 percent of the population has it.

The expert tests also ruled out that the pattern of the bloodstains was made artificially.

Bishop Gracias then confirmed that a miracle could indeed have happened and that he does not doubt the investigations and the testimonies of the witnesses.

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