A Baldwin Park priest’s unexplainable recovery from an Achilles tear in 2017 has led to the canonization of a new saint.
Last month, Pope Francis recognized by decree that the recovery of the Rev. Juan Manuel Gutierrez was the result of a miracle thanks to the intercession of Pier Giorgio Frassati.
In 2017, Gutierrez was playing basketball in Camarillo with fellow seminarians while he was working toward becoming a priest.
On Monday, Dec. 16, during a news conference at St. John the Baptist Catholic Church in Baldwin Park, Gutierrez said emergency room doctors initially said he had likely suffered a pulled muscle, but an MRI later revealed a tear in his Achilles, which would require surgery.
After learning of the extent of the injury and recovery time that he was facing, Gutierrez said he was inspired to ask Frassati to pray for him as part of a multi-day prayer ritual.
Frassati died at 24 and was known for work bringing comfort to the poor, suffering and hungry, according to the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops.
While praying on one of the days, Gutierrez said he started to feel a warm sensation around the area of his injury.
“From that day on I just never thought about my injury again,” Gutierrez said. “I stopped wearing braces, I just didn’t feel I needed them.”
During a pre-surgery doctor’s visit, the surgeon, according to Gutierrez, couldn’t find the tear after multiple tests.
Archbishop of Los Angeles Jose Gomez introduced Gutierrez Monday and said Gutierrez was ordained as a priest two years ago and Gutierrez now serves as associate pastor at St. John the Baptist Catholic Church in Baldwin Park.
“His doctors could not explain it,” Gomez said of the recovery. “Of course miracle is a word that gets overused in our culture and it is not well understood.”
Gomez said an intercession is not done by praying to saints but by a person asking a saint to pray for them.
In 2020, Monseigneur Robert Sarno retired from a position in the Vatican Dicastery for the Causes of Saints and had taken a position at St. John’s Seminary in Camarillo teaching causes of canonization. Gutierrez brought the story of his recovery to Sarno who immediately thought it was worthy of an investigation.
Sarno spoke virtually during the news conference from New York and walked through the process of investigating a possible miracle.
Sarno and Gomez put together a tribunal composed of priests and deacons. Sarno said Gutierrez’s case, like other cases of supposed miracles, was investigated on the basis of the medical issue as well as the theological issue.
The investigation was done at the Archdiocese of Los Angeles and then submitted to the dicastery in Rome to be examined — first by the medical board to determine if there was a scientific explanation and then by the theological consultors, Sarno said.
Cardinals and bishops in the dicastery then made a pronouncement that the inexplicable recovery could be attributed to Frassati’s intercession. Finally, Pope Francis approved the studies of the investigation, declaring it a miracle.
Frassati’s niece, Wanda Gawronska, spoke from Rome during the news conference. She said her family had been working for decades to secure canonization for Frassati and thanked those who worked on securing the recognition of a miracle.
Sarno said a final approval vote for canonization is expected in February and Frassati is slated to be canonized in August.
Gawronska said the 2025 canonization lines up with the 100th anniversary of Frassati’s death.
“Los Angeles is truly a city of the angels and also a city of saints,” Gomez said. “Now we have a new saint who is watching over us from heaven.”
