A full recovery for Lincoln student facing death; her church says it’s due to divine intervention

LINCOLN, Neb. (KLKN) – “We believe in the power of prayer. We believe in the reality of miracles, unexplainable from science, from medicine.”

Monsignor Thomas Fucinaro is a priest at the Cathedral of the Risen Christ School in Lincoln, where 11-year-old Mila Nguyen attends.

Before learning that Mila had become ill and would be leaving school right before Holy Week in March, he says he saw her as an academic superstar who was kind to all.

Her absence would be felt by all, like classmate Cecelia Pease, who says she couldn’t believe the news.

“You always know these things can happen, but you don’t expect it to happen to you. The only thing you could do is pray,” she said.

Medical experts feared Mila was headed towards death.

“Her own immune system was attacking her blood and her brain,” said Msgr. Fuchinaro. “We feared that we were going to lose Mila, and she just simply wasn’t responding.”

Filled with faith, church leaders around her encourage Mila’s family, classmates, and the large Vietnamese community she’s in to simply keep praying.

“In that hospital room at Children’s hospital, was the whole gamut, children, little children praying and 90-year-old elders in the community, and praying the chaplet of Divine Mercy, praying along with the family,” said Msgr. Fuchinaro.

Prayers were also sent by Mila’s classmates.

“We started making spiritual bouquets right when we first found out she was sick,” said Pease.

Boys Town priest Msgr. Guild has also been praying for Mila, encouraging those around her to pray through the intercession of Father Flanagan, a specific prayer for miracles.

Almost as suddenly as her sickness began, her symptoms began to go away.

“We began to see really later in Holy Week some signs that, you know, of some progress; the little signs of assistance,” said Msgr. Fuchinaro.

Then shortly after Easter, during a time Catholics celebrate God’s healing powers, more improvements could be seen.

Doctors could not quite explain it.

“God has other plans,” said Msgr. Fuchinaro. “Each day brought with it more signs of hope, more signs of healing and progress.”

Mila began to eat, talk, and pray, even sending her school principal an audio clip reciting biblical scripture.

Msgr. Fuchinaro says it’s possible Mila could return to school before the end of the year, and he’s not worried about her academic track.

He says her sister, Myra, brought Mila her textbooks, and she was assigned two teachers while at Madonna in Omaha.