Hello, World!
Hope Youth Fest 2025
It was Hope's Youth Fest 2025, the very first major youth event in Our Lady of Hope Retreat center in Chatawa, Mississippi.
Standing tall on the stage in his vestments, with the sun laying low in the sky at his back, Deacon Michael Parker conducted the symphony of prayers professed by a line of graceful Sisters standing with their backs against the stage facing the over 30 girls who had come down to proclaim their calling to the consecrated life.
As the litany came to a conclusion, the girls returned to their respective groups on the hill amongst the crowd of 600. Then, Deacon called the boys who felt a tugging to enter religious life, and about 10 of them got up and headed down the hill to the front.
Right before all of this, I prayed for a visible miracle. I said, "Lord I know you can do this give us something visible and big, like a flock of doves flying by or something to fall in the pond behind the stage. We'd love to see it."
In all honesty, my camera was getting heavy after a long day of taking photographs, and when the boys went down, I descended from the top of the hill to the center to photograph the scene.
Then Deacon said, "I have a feeling there are three more boys who are being called, y'all come on down."
Looking more like they were being pulled down, than casually descending the hill, two boys immediately walked down from my right and then the third one in a rust colored T-shirt came down from my left. Fr. Paul Gros met them in the front of the crowd and stood with his back to the stage with another priest to his left and began a prayer.
Right then, a magnificent light appeared.
It was as bright as the sun and hurt my eyes.
I have shot countless sunsets, which is always very tricky because of the danger of actually looking at the sun. This light was that bright.
I Immediately knew this was it. "Get your camera " I thought
I snapped about 7 photos of this magnificent scene.
I thought, " Well I guess I need a video for further proof. "
I grabbed my phone and began to video the end of it. Videos of the actual sun on phones are not magnificent but the light is definitely prominent and very, very bright, and so it is with this video, as well.
The Deacon closed with a prayer where he referenced a miracle of the mass, and 30 seconds later, the big light shrank and went away.
It was like a mirror reflection
But there wasn't a mirror on the stage.
I showed it to the sound mixer who had been sitting directly in front of the stage all day long, and we could not figure out what it was reflecting off of.
Looking at all the photos, later, this reflection was actually off of a tuning key or the fret of one of the guitars, which absolutely makes no sense that it could create this brilliant light.
I have probably taken over 100,000 photos and this was no normal little reflection..
Afterwards, I went straight up the hill and downloaded it onto my computer, sent it to my phone and showed it to all kinds of people at the event.
The men who were cooking jambalaya noticed that the magnificent light seemed to be coming from Our Lady of Hope in the sign behind it.
Everyone recognized that it looked like a monstrance.
The design of the rays mimicked the halo on Our Lady, and this light was clearly shining between the Deacon and the priest and upon the young men.
The next morning, at breakfast another man another volunteer, pointed out that the light was a duplicate of the monstrance on the sign right behind and directly above it.
Also, as blinding as that light was, nobody around me was commenting on it in my video.
Many of the volunteers shared that they have their own miraculous photos on their own phones.
From time to time, we receive consolation in very real phenomenon that are beautiful and unexplained.
We neither earn or control any of it.
It's just a grace, a gift.
~ Lori Carter, Photographer
