The Stigmata: Those Who Bore the Wounds of Christ

About the Book

Whether you are an atheist, an agnostic or a true believer and disciple of Jesus Christ, you will be mystified at what you learn from The Stigmata. The Stigmata examines such other worldly phenomena, one could liken it to a spiritual X-files episode. Christ’s death and resurrection was not the end, but the beginning for us all. Jesus’ agonizing suffering, sacrifice and surrender of his own life opened the gates of heaven to all those willing to follow Him. The stigmatics serve as an earthly human reminder of the Divine Jesus’ obedient, holy and sacrificial offering to us. The Stigmata is a compilation of some 657 individuals from the 13th to the 21st centuries who have incomprehensibly borne the wounds suffered by Christ. The Stigmata discusses many of the stigmatics in biographical detail. Some stigmatics are recognized saints, such as St. Padre Pio and St. Therese Neumann. Sainted or not, all stigmatics suffer in some way like Christ, bearing evidence of nail piercings to the hands and feet, the crown of thorns and sword laceration near the heart. Have there been fraudulent stigmatics? Yes, and The Stigmata discusses the fakes, separating them like wheat from chaff. Aside from the painful and bloody wounds these individuals suffer, many stigmatics exhibit other miraculous mysteries, from levitation and bi-location to reading of souls and other human impossibilities. The pain the stigmatics have endured is real, the phenomena they’ve experienced is mystical and their complete impact on the world is known only to God.

About the Author

Albert E. Graham lives in La Plata, Maryland. He graduated from Rutgers University in 1957 with a BA in history. The following year he completed Officer Candidate School in Newport, R.I. and was commissioned an ensign in the U.S. Navy. After a three year stint which included teaching Russian at the U.S. Naval Academy, he returned to civilian life. He received a Master’s Degree in Soviet Area Studies from Georgetown University (1970) while continuing to work for the Library of Congress where he became Deputy Chief of the European Division. During the course of his civilian life, Mr. Graham was also active in the Naval Reserve, attaining the rank of captain. In April 1988, he was recalled to active duty where he served as an inspector at the On-Site Inspection Agency. Captain Graham retired from the U.S. Navy in 1992. That same year he was selected to work for the Senate Select Committee on POW/MIA Affairs. In that capacity, he spent months in Russia and the former Satellite countries in search of evidence about American prisoners of war in the Russian Gulag. He helped discover some evidence of that reality over the next ten years with his work with the DOD’s POW and MIA office, giving many MIA/POW family members final closure. Upon retirement from government service in 2001, Mr. Graham entered the Diaconate Program of the Archdiocese of Washington and was ordained a deacon in 2004. He is currently serving the congregation of Sacred Heart in La Plata, Maryland. Deacon Graham has been married for 59 years to his wife Fernande and is the father of five grown children and the grandfather of eleven. He is the author of the recent book entitled Compendium of the Miraculous published by TAN Press in 2013 and Revelation, Mystical Phenomena and Divine Promises published by Trafford Publishing in 2022.