The Comparison Project presents a lecture by Michael O’Neill, miracle investigator, author, and creator of the website MiracleHunter.com, on Thursday, April 19, at 7 p.m. in Sussman Theater.

O’Neill will examine Catholicism’s most famous—and highly approved—modern miracle: The visions of the Virgin Mary being reported by three shepherd children at the Cova da Iria in Fátima, Portugal in 1917. These events, including the purported great “Sun Miracle” and the inexplicable healings that led to the canonization of the visionaries as the youngest saints in history, provide a perfect backdrop for understanding the centuries-old mechanisms and stringent criteria for investigating and validating claims of the supernatural used by the Catholic Church even in today’s modern world.

O’Neill, a graduate of Stanford University and member of the Mariological Society of America, was the consultant for National Geographic’s December 2015 cover story and map about the Virgin Mary, “The Most Powerful Woman in the World.” His books include Exploring the Miraculous (Our Sunday Visitor 2015), 365 Days with Mary (Salt Media 2016), and 20 Answers: Apparitions & Revelations (Catholic Answers 2017).

— Monique Rodriguez, College of Arts and Sciences