By Susan Brinkmann, OCDS
Staff Journalist
Eleven year-old Jake Finkbonner, who nearly died five years ago from a flesh-eating infection, says he went to heaven during his ordeal and talked to God.
ABC News affiliate KOMO in Seattle is reporting that Jake, whose miraculous cure is being investigated by the Vatican as being the result of prayer to Blessed Kateri Tekakwitha, said that the incident occurred while he was gravely ill after being infected by a rare flesh-eating bacteria that had entered his body through a cut on his lip.
On this particular day, his parents, who are Catholic, were praying alongside his hospital bed. His body suddenly felt so light he felt as though he could almost “lift off.” It was during this moment that he had a spectacular vision.
“I was able to look down at the hospital. I saw my family. And then I went back to the house where I saw my family,” he said. “The only thing is, I didn’t see myself.”
Jake said God was sitting in a high chair and was very tall.
“He wasn’t the size of a normal person,” he said.
Jake said he also saw deceased relatives – his uncle and his great-grandmother – as well as angels.
Because he was having so much fun, he asked God if he could stay, “but he said that my family needed me and everybody else down here – and he sent me down here and he sent me back down.”
After he woke up, he told his mother what happened.
“I remember him just laying there in the bedroom in the hospital bed and he sat straight up and said ‘I’ve been raised,'” Elsa Finkbonner remembered. “And I said, ‘Where?’ and he said, ‘To heaven.'”
Jake’s ordeal began six years ago in his hometown of Ferndale, Washington, when he was playing basketball and cut his lip on the rim of the basket. Within 24 hours, his face had swelled so much he was unrecognizable. His parents rushed him to the hospital where doctors discovered that he had been infected with a rare, flesh-eating bacteria known as necrotizing fasciitis. It had entered through the cut on his lip and began eating away at his face. For two months, doctors at Children’s Hospital in Seattle kept him in a coma as they worked aggressively to beat the odds and save his life.
But his condition continued to decline to the point where his parents realized he was on the verge of death. They called in Rev. Tim Sauer to give their son the last rites, and it was this priest who suggested that they pray to God through the intercession of Blessed Kateri Tekakwitha. Father Sauer told KOMO he thought of Blessed Kateri, a Native American who lived more than 300 years ago, because she also suffered from a disease – smallpox – that disfigured her face. Because Jake was suffering similar facial scarring, and was part Native American himself, he thought it was a perfect fit.
On the same day that a relic of Blessed Kateri was given to the family, the bacteria stopped spreading.
“I think it’s a matter of a miracle,” Jake told KOMO.
Now, five years later, Vatican officials are investigating the case to see whether Jake’s recovery was a miracle. If so, it could put the beloved Blessed Kateri on the road to canonization.
Thus far, Jake has undergone dozens of surgery to repair the damage to his face and is doing remarkably well.
To those who are facing life-threatening illnesses, Jake says: “Don’t be scared at all. Either way, it will be a good way. If you go to heaven, you’ll be in a better place – if you live, you’ll be back with your family.”
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Photo of Jake Finkbonner is by KOMO 4.
