The Catholic News Agency (CNA) is reporting that the Congregation for the Causes of Saints has informed Bishop Richard Garcia of the Diocese of Monterey, California that further investigation into the life of Mrs. Evans is permitted.
Born in 1904, Evans was raised a Mormon and was married in the Mormon temple in Salt Lake City. However, the marriage ceremony, which is a closely guarded secret in Mormonism, disgusted her.
In her account of the experience Cora wrote, "I was a true loyal Mormon at the hour of entering the temple, but nearly a confirmed atheist when I left the temple building after the marriage ceremony."
She and her husband Mack were married with no ring, no flowers, no music. She found the entire ritual to be a farce and thought Mormonism was a sex-oriented, polytheistic religion based on fear, secrecy and unholy oaths. After this experience, "I was without a God and religion, but had gained a very wonderful husband," she wrote. "As I looked at him and learned to love him more and more I resolved to help find a God for him."
The experience launched her on a 10 year search for the truth. During this time, she began to read the Bible, finding it much more comforting that reading the Book of Mormon. She studied almost every religion except Catholicism because of the deep prejudice that had been instilled into her about the Church from her early childhood.
On December 9, 1934, she was listening to the radio while sick in bed. A Catholic priest came on and preached about the Blessed Mother. Too weak to get out of bed and change the station, she listened to the whole show and was incensed that any religion would approve of worshiping a woman. She contacted Father William Vaughn at a nearby parish to demand an explanation. He came to her home to give her a personal explanation. Father Vaughn explained the role of Mary in the Church, the Trinity, and other Catholic truths.
His explanations answered many of her questions and dislodged the prejudices that had been taught to her in her youth. She also realized at this time that the "angel lady" she had seen at the age of three, a vision she was never able to understand, was actually the Blessed Virgin Mary.
In reflecting on his meeting with Cora, Father Vaughn later wrote, "She had become disillusioned with the L.D.S. religion. She declared that she was systematically studying all religions. The first session with Mrs. Evans was a long one and we talked of many things including the Holy Trinity. The L.D.S. religion has a very pagan approach to the Trinity and the Catholic teaching in its total spirituality is especially hard for them to grasp."
These meetings between the two led to more lessons which Cora's husband eventually began to participate in. Even though the Mormon elders desperately tried to dissuade the couple from entering the Church, the two became convinced that Catholicism contained the truth they sought. They were baptized along with their two children in 1935.
"She was especially attracted to the teachings of the Blessed Sacrament and the Blessed Mother. Her life became centered on the Blessed Sacrament and she began spending time in prayer at the church. In her subsequent apostolic work she spoke of these two favorite teachings with much greater depth than I had taught her," Father Vaughn said. She went on to become a great mystic who had visions of Our Lord who commissioned her to introduce the faithful to devotion to Christ in His Mystical Humanity. This devotion calls upon the faithful to live with a heightened awareness of the indwelling presence of Jesus Christ in their lives and calls them to daily spiritual and Sacramental communion.
Bishop Garcia has appointed Marianist Father David Schuyler to take testimony of approximately eight eye witnesses, including Evans’ daughter, as the Cause continues. It will also involve a theological review of Evans’ writings and a historical commission will collect relics and other materials. Upon completion of these investigations, a dossier will be prepared and sent to Rome.
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