The July/August issue of Share International carried a story about the crosses of light appearing on windows in the community of El Monte, in southern California. On 10 June 1988, video producer Frances Robinson
began a documentary on the phenomenon. The completed film includes an interview with Benjamin Creme in which he says:

"The crosses are manifestations by the Christ. They are radiating spiritual energy into the surrounding area and they are part of the signs, for those who have eyes to see... one of the many signs of His presence in the world.

In this way the Christ is making known that He is in the world and very soon will appear before the world. My Master told me in April that very soon the Christ would manifest crosses of light all over the world in such numbers that they would draw enormous attention.

People would not be able to understand their source but there would be so many it would not be possible to ignore them. People would see that they represented something very important that had a significance altogether unusual in the world."

In the article that follows, Frances Robinson describes her experiences interviewing those in whose homes the crosses have appeared, and recounts the effects the crosses have had on their lives.

The crosses of light appearing in El Monte, 10 of which we have documented in the video, seem to have produced some unusual effects and to have had a powerful impact on the lives of many in this community. These crosses appear on a window when there is a light source on the other side, whether it is a light bulb, a candle, a flashlight, or the moon.

The cross is not actually on the window, although it appears to be so. But when you go up to the window and look through, you actually see the cross inside the room itself or outside in the yard, depending upon whether the source of light is inside or outside.

Most of the people we have interviewed about the crosses in their homes are very devout, and most of them are quite poor. Typical was the family of Magdalena de Paulo Robledo, who has five children and lives in a tiny twobedroom home. There are regular weekly prayer meetings now in the Robledos' little house at which the participants pray for Christ to appear to them.

Those who attend say they feel the spirit strongly in the room. Laura, a teenager who had tried to commit suicide and had been a real problem to her family, came to see the Robledos' cross. She stayed for several days and attended the prayer meetings. Everyone prayed for her and she started praying, too.

"I feel like another person," she says. "It's another life for me. I've changed... I used to be a real meany to everyone... Before, I didn't want to help anyone. Now I want to help everyone. I've changed with kids, with my parents. I feel happy and I feel better. I believe in myself and I have hope."

The Robledos, as well as several other people we interviewed, said they notice markedly increased communication between families, resolution of conflicts within families, and a deep peace and strong unity among the people which has never been there before.

The second cross in El Monte appeared at the home of Jesus and Sylvia Pinedo. Sylvia told us she believes it is a sign from God that Christ is returning. Their bathroom window has two panes of glass: in one the cross is present; in the other, there is nothing. Her husband, Jesus, bought and installed both panes at the same time himself, and neither has ever been replaced.

In his mother-in-law's home across the street he also installed the same glass from the same company, but no cross appears.

An employee of the glass company came to inspect the Pinedos' cross. He went back to the shop and, with his boss, conducted every kind of light experiment with every kind of glass the company carries. The boss concluded, in no uncertain terms, that producing a cross out of the glass was "impossible". And yet, there it is.

The Pinedos say there have been long lines of people to see their cross with a wait of as much as two hours. In fact, says Jesus Pinedo, one woman came four blocks on her knees, praying for peace. Sylvia Pinedo told us about a man who came every day to see their cross and every day went home to look at his own bathroom window, hoping to receive a cross himself.

Then one day he came full of excitement to Sylvia: "A cross has finally appeared in my window!" He was ecstatic.

The same thing happened to Rosa Samaniego. Then, after her wished-for cross appeared, she washed the window to show that there was nothing on the glass itself, and threw some water onto it. As she looked at the cross through the wet glass, eyebrows and eyes appeared, just over its cross-arms.

The process is repeated whenever an onlooker asks to see this phenomenon. As one visitor told us, "We think this is Jesus Christ looking out at all the people." While photographing this image we noticed that a third eye also appears just over the top of the vertical line of the cross.

According to Alicia Samosa Sileski, who has crosses in two of the windows of her front door, a blind man and a crippled woman, both full of faith, went into the bathroom to see one of the first crosses. When they emerged, they were healed and filled with great joy. She said this event was also reported on television.

Another woman had advanced cancer and was preparing to enter the hospital for surgery. Then a cross appeared in her daughter-in-law's window. The two had never gotten along well, but now they were filled with
love for each other. When the mother-in-law went in for her surgery the doctor said, "I cannot explain it but there is no need to operate: your cancer is gone."

The family is getting the necessary documentation together to have this happening declared a miracle by the Catholic Church. Although we have not been able to obtain an interview with the priest of the local church, several people have told us this story about him.

The priest, eager to share the miracle with those attending his church, asked permission of one woman who had a cross on her window to remove the glass from the window and take it to the church. But the cross would not appear there. He tried every kind of light source, even the sun; he took the glass into all the rooms of the church.

Still, no matter what he did, he could not get a cross to appear on the window. However, when a different piece of glass was reinstalled into the original window opening in the woman's home, the cross reappeared. A neighbor commented, "Obviously the cross wasn't meant to be in the church. It was meant to be in that house."

Ian, our cameraman on this project, brought a skeptic's eye to the process. So we purchased samples of different kinds of glass and videotaped him shining a flashlight through them to see what image would appear. The effect was either a diffused round light or a geometric square shape, but not a cross.

Then a week after we began the work he called me and said, "Well, I seem to have a cross in my bathroom window in Burbank!" This is the first cross we have heard of so far outside the Spanish-speaking communities. As a student of physics, Ian says, "I am not sure if my house was singled out for any sign or any message. All I know is I can't explain if it's just the glass or not. I'm trying to find some rational explanation for all this."

As it happened, the next week he moved out of the house, and I went over to see this Burbank window again. A woman with three children was in the process of moving in that day. Ian had not told her about the cross, so she had not even looked at the window. We showed her how to find the cross by moving to the other side of the light source, and there it was.

She thought it was very beautiful and told us she had heard about the El Monte crosses and that miracles had been happening in the lives of people who had come in touch with them: "God knows I could use one! My husband had an accident and was in a coma and now has brain damage. Then last week my house burned down."

I plan to return in a couple of weeks to see if they too have a miracle as a result of their cross of light.

© Share International

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