Devotion to Our Lady of Caysasay grew as word spread that requests and prayers to her are answered, and that through her, miracles happen. Particularly, many talked about healing miracles. Here are a few accounts gleaned from the internet, interviews and write-ups about Caysasay and Ma Cho.
Babies
Marivic Alday has been a household help in Dindo Montenegro’s family for about eight years when she got married and became pregnant shortly after. As her pregnancy progressed, a lump grew in her stomach. Doctors at the Batangas regional hospital and the Lemery provincial hospital suggested surgery to remove it. But this would mean a forced, premature delivery of the baby.
Intensely worried, Alday went home to Lian to think things over. She visited Our Lady of Caysasay, crying and praying for herself and her baby. About two weeks before the scheduled operation, the lump disappeared.
Her daughter, named “KC Rose” (after “Kay Caysasay”), celebrates her birthday in Taal every year.
A Protestant and the second wife of a senator, Dr. Susan Pineda was already in her 40s when she remarried. A fertility procedure abroad was unsuccessful. Still longing for a child, she visited the orphanage run by nuns that was adjacent to the Caysasay chapel and brought some gifts. She had heard about the Virgin of Caysasay. She prayed in the chapel and even touched the Virgin’s hand. About a year later, she was carrying a child, convinced it is the Lady’s gift. She gave birth to a son.
Mother of three boys Emily Yupangco wished for a girl. The Lady granted more than what she wished for. She had twin girls.
Cancer, critically ill
Marietta Goco was entertaining former Tourism Secretary Gemma Cruz-Araneta in her heritage house in Taal when somebody came up the stairs wailing. It was Erlinda Guillermo, who said she had been wheelchair-bound for three years. She broke her spine 27 years ago and became a paraplegic. She went to Taal and was healed.
Three years ago, a bad fall left her paralyzed once more. Several healers later, and still a cripple, she returned to the shrine, where a voice told her to walk down the three steps at the door. On the third step she was told to dance, and dance she did, happily, in front of the Virgin’s image, good as new.
A lady diagnosed with pancreatic cancer was given six months to live. She drank the water from the well of Caysasay and prayed to the Virgin. It has been two years now since her six months’ prognosis.
Many a long-distance healing has also been ascribed to the Virgin of Caysasay. Goco recounts patients recovering from serious illness after taking “the miracle water of Caysasay.”
In another case, leukemia patient Sylvia sought the Virgin’s healing intercession. Her teenage daughter Laine was skeptical. She was transported back in time to witness the image’s discovery, events and miracles associated with it since then. However, she was eventually convinced of the healing tradition and became a believer. The mother was healed in time for the celebration of the annual fiesta of the loving and healing Birheng Maria, Our Lady of Caysasay.
For diabetic Lita Manago, wounds are bad news. They do not heal properly, or might even hemorrhage. An accident left her earlobe torn in two. She applied well water from Caysasay on her wound and recovered without complications.
Protection, prosperity
Miracles attributed to Our Lady of Caysasay include the deliverance of the town from the eruption of Taal Volcano in 1754 and from the Muslim raid in the same period, the economic boom of Taal, and the prosperity of its residents.
There is also a story retold by word of mouth that happened during the Japanese Occupation of the Philippines in World War II. A Chinese in Batangas heard a voice telling him to hide. Japanese soldiers had arrived looking for husky young men. From his hiding place, the Chinese man could see soldiers’ boots, but was not discovered.
That night he fell asleep and saw a glowing figure beside him. It gave him peace and he took care of that image, which he later found out was a replica of the Ma Cho or Lady of Caysasay.
In San Fernando, there were likewise many stories of miracles. How the devotees found and bought the property where the temple now stands, how they were able to buy the adjacent lot after some years, how San Fernando was left unscathed by a series of calamities.
The earthquake of July 16, 1990 devastated neighboring areas but not San Fernando; severe floods occurred many times but San Fernando was spared; devotees sick and hospitalized were healed. The Tiu Family ascribed to Ma Cho the protection given to 2001 kidnap victim Jackie Tiu-Lomibao during her horrific ordeal and the blessings given her afterward.
(Sources: http://www.caysasay.com/Caysasay%20Home/mapaghimala.html; https://www.thepoortraveler.net/2012/04/our-lady-caysasay-shrine-taal-batangas/)
