Book Reviews2 Gloria's Miracle

Oct 30, 2009

Book written by Jerry Brewer. San Juan Publishing. 256 pages. Hardcover. ISBN 978-0-9707-3997-1

Gloria's miracle was not to belong to her alone. In a moving and candidly written tale of a young heroine's battle for life, first-time author and sports writer Jerry Brewer gives his readers a play by play account of one of the greatest games he's ever covered.

Brewer, a sports columnist for The Seattle Times, won a coin toss for a story that would change his life: covering the story of a high-school basketball coach and his family of 9, struggling to beat back the odds of a deadly childhood cancer. But the Strauss family was no ordinary family, and the story – a welcome respite from Brewer's usual beat covering college sports and NFL football – would change his life forever.

Gloria Strauss had been battling neuroblastoma for 4 long years when Jerry Brewer first made her acquaintance. Her bright eyes and indomitable spirit gave no immediate indication of her daily sufferings, though Jerry would come to recognize her moments of pain and struggle in the months to come.

Before Jerry ever met young Gloria, he spent months interviewing Doug Strauss, her father. Gradually, he found himself drawn into this family's story of love. In spite of the cancer – or maybe because of it – Jerry began to recognize an otherworldly strength in this young father of seven. Doug's enthusiasm for life, conviction of God's mercy and intention to heal his little girl, and his passion for his Catholic faith were all completely foreign to Jerry – and deeply attractive.

A few months into his “friendship” with Doug, Jerry reluctantly agreed to attend one of the numerous prayer services held regularly in the Strauss family home. On Gloria's behalf, community members, high school students, fellow parishioners, and neighbors would gather for evenings of intense communal prayer, recitation of the rosary, and fervent supplication for Gloria's recovery. The evenings were richly comforting to the Strauss family but were even more powerful for those who gathered to pray with them.

“Within thirty minutes, the living room was full, plump like a buffet belly. Forty people fit where they could, fit where they could not, in kitchen chairs, in desk chairs, on the piano bench, on the floor, on the fireplace hearth, against the wall, behind the couch, atop the coffee table. They gripped their rosaries and grinned upon eye contact. Prayer warriors, they called themselves. They were here for Gloria.”

Jerry was shaken by the faith of the individuals who came to pray with Gloria. They were highschoolers, neighbors, student athletes, family members … and they believed. As he struggled to make sense of his own place in the world and questioned whether God did in fact exist, the Strauss family and their supporters were storming Heaven with prayers for Gloria's Miracle, believing wholeheartedly in God's existence … and in His power to heal their friend and daughter.

Gloria's Miracle is as much a story of one family's triumph over tragedy as it is a spiritual autobiography of the author himself. Through his reflections and observations of the Strausses, Jerry manages to capture the essence of family life, of holy family life, and of what it means to ask for – and expect – miracles.

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