Hand of God heals footballer

Concussions have destroyed the careers and the lives of some football players, but a concussion actually saved the life of Notre Dame Juggler Marco Marzitelli.

"I thank God for that hit," said Lucy Marzitelli, Marco's mother.

During a Juggler football practice another player and Marco had a helmet-to-helmet collision. The blow knocked Marco unconscious and caused a concussion, but it also revealed a dark secret.

"This started our roller-coaster ride," Lucy said.

The Notre Dame offensive tackle experienced migraines a couple of days after the hit. He slept a lot and took medication.

Three days later the pain became unbearable, and Marco checked into emergency at Burnaby General Hospital.

Lucy remembered her first miracle occurred when a nurse, the mother of a Notre Dame student, rushed Marco through the emergency. "I call her my first angel."

The doctor ordered a CT scan and found a small growth on Marco's pituitary gland. A subsequent MRI confirmed he had a pituitary tumour. Lucy started to panic. She contacted her parish priest, Father Eugenio Aloisio, of St. Francis of Assisi Parish.

"When I got the phone call from Lucy, I asked the Ladies of Mount Carmel to pray for Marco," Father Aloisio recalled.

When Marco's golf-ball sized tumour was confirmed, he was sent straight to Royal Columbian Hospital. "I didn't let go of my rosary," Lucy said.

Father Aloisio went to Marco's room later that day to bless him and pray with the family. Lucy gave Marco a St. Rita rosary she had brought back from Italy, and asked her son to pray to God for help. Marco tightly gripped the rosary until his surgery the next day.

That evening Father Aloisio returned to give Communion to Marco and his family. Marco had not eaten for four days and had drunk very little. His vision had begun to decrease.
Lucy prayed all night. "I cannot tell you how many rosaries I prayed."

Father Aloisio asked everyone he met to pray for Marco on the day of the surgery. St. Francis of Assisi parishioners joined him in prayer at the morning Mass and at their novena Mass that day. While the priest was supervising a field trip, he also asked the girls of Little Flower Academy to pray for Marco.

"I think this sustained the family and brought a lot of courage to everyone," he said.

Everyone at Notre Dame stopped to pray at noon, the time of the surgery. Students at Corpus Christi and Holy Cross Elementary also offered prayers for Marco.

Lucy was still praying rosaries when the surgeon exited the operating room. He was smiling because the surgery had been a massive success. The doctors hadn't had to cut through Marco's skull to remove the tumour, as they had initially feared. Instead, they had managed to remove the entire tumour through his nose.

"I couldn't blow my nose for a while because there would be blood," Marco joked.

"I knew at this point Dr. Navraj Heron was a wonderful surgeon, but that the hand of God had saved my son," said Lucy.

Marco's eyesight still isn't back to 100 per cent, but he is expected to make a full recovery.

"From the hit to the prayers, I know God had a hand in the process. The intervention of God through prayer is the real thing," Marco said. "It's wonderful being part of a Catholic community. We are one family."

Marco's ordeal helped him establish a more personal relationship with God. "I'll never miss church ever," Marco told Father Aloisio after the surgery.
"He's done pretty well with that," noted Father Aloisio.

"I'm closer to God; He saved me, I don't know what for, but there's a reason," Marco reflected. "I make sure I pray a decade of the rosary every night before I go to bed."
"For a kid that age, that's huge," Lucy remarked.

"Pray, and God will listen. He will come to your aid. All you have to do is trust and believe in Him."

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