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By Bobby Ross Jr. | Religion Unplugged

OKLAHOMA CITY — María Ruiz Scaperlanda is looking for a miracle.

More specifically, she’s seeking a miracle that can be attributed — and authenticated — to the intercession of Blessed Stanley Francis Rother.

That’s the final step for Rother — the first person born in the United States to be declared a martyr by the Catholic Church — to become a saint.

“I want everyone to know that we need a miracle,” said Scaperlanda, 66, the promoter of Rother’s canonization cause and author of “The Shepherd Who Didn’t Run,” a 2015 biography of Rother. “There’s a lot of people out there who need a miracle, so please do it through his intercession.”

As Oklahoma City Archbishop Paul S. Coakley told me in 2023, the Catholic Church’s process for confirming a miracle is “very rigorous.”

“It could be a long while,” Coakley said then. “It may never happen, for all we know, because we can’t predict how God is going to act.”

For her part, Scaperlanda is hopeful that “American Martyr: The Stanley Rother Story” — a new feature-length documentary narrated by actor Martin Sheen — will expose Rother’s story to more people. 

The film premieres in theaters Aug. 25 and 26 in English and Aug. 27 in Spanish.

An Oklahoma farm boy who grew up to become a priest, Rother spent 13 years as a missionary to Guatemala. He died in 1981 at age 46 when three masked assassins entered his rectory during that Central American nation’s civil war.

I first wrote about Rother in 2001 during my time as religion editor for The Oklahoman. In 2017, I did a Religion News Service feature on the love for “Father Stan” in his hometown of Okarche, Oklahoma, and covered his beatification ceremony. And in 2023, I reported for The Associated Press on the dedication of a $50 million shrine in Oklahoma City that honors Rother.

Scaperlanda and her husband, Michael, the Archdiocese of Oklahoma City’s chancellor, both served as executive producers of “American Martyr.” 

I talked to the Cuban-born author and journalist about her work to promote Rother’s cause. These highlights from our interview have been lightly edited for clarity and brevity:

Read the full column.

This column appears in the online magazine Religion Unplugged.

Photo provided by Archdiocese of Oklahoma City