Who is this Archangel who lives, for a while, with men?
This Archangel reveals that he is “one of the seven holy angels who stand before the light of the Lord and are in His presence” (Tb 12:15). The name “Rafael” means “God heals”.
Saint Raphael is presented to us, above all, in the Book of Tobias, in which two significant cures occur through his intercession: the restoration of two people, one in his physical dimension and the other in his spiritual dimension.
The Cures
The Holy Scripture tells us that Tobit, an honorable, pious and God-fearing man, became blind, and due to this illness he could no longer work; then, he remembered money that he had deposited with Gabael, in Rages, a city in Media, twenty years earlier (cf. Tb 5:4). He told his son Tobias the fact and sent him to that city to receive the money (cf. Tb 4, 1ss). However, Tobias, who lived in Nineveh, in Assyria, as he did not know the way (cf. Tb 1, 10) to Media, entered into an agreement with his father, to look for someone trustworthy to show him the way. He met Raphael and arranged the details of the trip with him, but without knowing that he was an angel (cf. Tb 5:4).
During the trip, the two camped on the banks of the Tigris River and captured a fish that served as food for them that night. Rafael asked Tobias to keep the gall, heart and liver of the fish, so that these substances could serve as medicine (cf. Tb 6,5-9).
Upon entering Media, Saint Raphael leads Tobit’s son first to the city of Ecbatana, to find Raguel and his daughter Sara, both relatives of the young man, as, according to the tradition of the time, Tobias would have the right to marry Sara for be her closest relative. However, Tobias questioned the archangel: “I heard that she was already given in marriage to seven men, and they all died in the night. When they were about to approach her, they died” (Tb 6:14).
Rafael reassures him, telling him to burn the liver and heart of the fish over the embers of incense, so that the smell would drive away the demon that killed the girl’s husbands (cf. Tb 6, 17-22).
Pray:
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The presence of Saint Raphael brings:
– Physical healing (of Tobit’s eyes);
– Spiritual and liberating healing (in Sara);
– The manifestation of Divine Providence: in the material and natural sphere (rescue of Tobit’s money and indication of the right path) and also, in the supernatural sphere (protects them from dangers), it provides graces beyond our poor expectations (Tobias did not imagine that would meet Sara on the trip and would marry her).
For this reason, Saint Raphael the Archangel is considered the bearer of God’s Healing, and is also recognized as the chief of guardian angels, patron saint of travelers, angel of providence, who watches over humanity. Something interesting to note is that Rafael is the only angel who spends some time with men.
Let us ask Saint Raphael the Archangel for the cure of our blindness, whether physical or spiritual, the restoration of our health and the liberation from all the work of the evil one in our lives and everything else we need. And let us be prepared for everything else that the Most High has in store for us. Wherever this servant of the Lord works, there are always conversions, transformations and lives surrendered to God.
Saint Rafael Archangel, pray for us!
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