Published: August 30, 2006 11:15 pm      

A vision of the Virgin Mary in Lockport

LOCKPORT — A Harvey Street woman claimed on Wednesday that she heard the voice of the Virgin Mary and has seen visions of the Mother of God in the trimmed branches of a maple tree in front of her house.

Antonia “Toni” Filipertis, 84, a devout Catholic, comes to tears when she relates the story which began about 2:30 p.m. on Tuesday. Her family firmly believes her.

Neighborhood children and adults see and wonder. Several teachers from John Pound Elementary School came across the street to take a look. Principal Roberta Donovan could not swear to the apparition but said, “I could see a figure on one and on the other one I could see a cross.”

What is the figure? Filipertis, a native of Poland who met her husband at the Lady of Czestochowa Shrine, is sure it is the Virgin Mary.

Michael Sneed, 10, who lives around the corner on High Street, said, “The small one looks like a cross and the big one looks like someone, holding their heart like this (hands across chest). It’s weird.”

Some have seen even more.

“I saw a glow last night from out window from over here,” said Kristina Crawford, 10.

Toni Filipertis began crying twice when she recalled the vision and Mary’s instructions. She was about to get the car out of the garage in order to take her daughter to a doctor’s appointment Tuesday when she heard a voice behind her.

“The voice, she told me to look on your tree,” she related in a Polish accent. “I come out and parked the car in the front and I look on the tree and I don’t see nothing.”

Filipertis said that Mary’s voice was very soft. “She said, ‘Look at your tree. I’m in three places,’ and she was in three places .... And I look in this branch and she was very clear.”

Three stubs of three branches had pictures on them.

“Of course, I was thinking it was a joke, because my son he all the time bring something. I thought maybe somebody hang the pictures,” she said.

That was not the case.

“Last night, she (Mary) told me, because I am sick, I don’t have to go outside. She wants me and look through my window and pray to her. I look through the window. She was so beautiful.”

“She had a white vale and blue dress and she looked so beautiful,” she added as she began to cry.

It is the second time members of the family have seen a vision. Twins James Filipertis and Dorothy (Filipertis) Fitzgerald saw the Holy Family — Mary, Joseph and Jesus — in the sky on a clear night in 1960 when they were 7 years old. They were with their grandmother.

“I believe my mother,” said Jim, who is retired from Delphi. “I’ve had to live with this my entire lifetime. I have to believe. When I was 7, I saw the apparition. It was a clear night with stars. Figures were moving in front of the moon. It was Mary, Joseph and Jesus. My sister and I swear by it.”

Dorothy Fitzgerald remembers seeing the vision with her brother and grandmother. “We saw Jesus up in the sky. We thought it would come back. Now it’s out on a tree. We saw the whole thing up in the sky. It was gorgeous.”

Tina and her husband came to the United States in 1951 with one child. Dorothy and Jimmy were born in 1953.

Tina worked as a waitress in Denny’s and was an artist. Most every room in her pale yellow home has examples of her work. There are family portraits, the Pope, landscapes and Lockport sites.

“Mary Mother came to me and told me pray to her,” Tina said. “She told me she wants me to paint pictures of the tree with her. I can not do this because my hand shakes and she told she would help me.”

Antonia “Toni” Filipertis, who had been very sick and a patient in a hospital and nursing home, plans to paint the pictures.

“It’s a neighborhood of hardworking people who look out for each other,” principal Donovan said.

Neighbor Tammy Mehnke offered, “I would say the Lord is looking over her. He’s protecting her.”