David, The story about your sister alone sounds pretty rough, but I'm glad to hear she recovered! About your father, I am sorry for your loss. I lost my grandparents on my father's side a few years ago and it was a pretty awful, drawn out and tragic affair for both of them. Now, I really dread the day my own parents get sick
As a general comment to the miracles topic, I sometimes think calling stuff miracles sort of cheapens nature or reality. I'm not so much talking about people surviving overwhelming odds, that's fine although I do agree with Dave a bit in that it can underestimate the human spirit a bit, but .. Stuff like the existence of stars or the emergence of life are not really miracles. While surviving tough odds may be a really unlikely event, I think the emergence of life on our planet considering it's placement, size and the presence of water etc. was basically inevitable. Assuming life emerged once and then all life descended from that one event (doesn't have to be true at all), if that event hadn't happened when it did, I believe it would've happened on a later occasion anyways!