(OSV News) — A Missouri woman diagnosed with lung cancer told OSV News that Pope Leo’s diagnosis with the same disease has helped strengthen her own Catholic faith amid her illness.

“The fact that I shared such a diagnosis with the pope — I’m kind of touched,” said Lisa Koester. “I felt like I wasn’t alone.”

The 64-year-old Koester, a resident of Imperial, Missouri, said she’d been getting regular lung screenings for “at least eight to 10 years” as a former smoker.

Recently, she said, “they found something.” 

God’s plan amid lung cancer diagnosis

Her physician, Dr. Nirmal Veeramachaneni of Saint Louis University and SSM Health, immediately ordered a positron emission tomography, or PET, scan, which uses a radioactive tracer to detect early signs of cancer, as well as heart and neurological disorders.

Koester received the scan results in late August while spending time with her family.

“My son had just moved back from Utah and got engaged,” she said. “We were sitting in their new home and I got the results of my test, and I just started crying. My husband was crying, my son was crying, because we knew it was something. Even though it was only the size of a grape, that’s big enough.”

Koesler said that through their tears, she and her family resolved to face their cancer experience with courage.

“We just started saying, ‘These are the cards that have been dealt to us. This is God’s plan for me, and this is what we have to work through,'” she recalled.

With a localized mass detected, she said, surgery was ordered “before it spread into the chest wall.”

Facing cancer with prayer

First came a battery of pre-operative tests — and a month of waiting before entering the hospital.

Koester said “a lot of prayer” sustained her during that in-between period.

“My husband, my son, my family were great,” she said. “They stood by me. We were all going through it. This is a family issue; all of our lives are impacted.”

Having worked for a decade as a health care professional at an oncology practice, Koester knew that “it’s easy to say, ‘Don’t worry about it. Wait for the results.'”

But, she said, “You still think about it.” 

Following the late September surgery — which saw doctors remove an upper lobe — Koester learned testing had shown she had not one, but two types of stage one cancer: squamous cell and small cell, the latter of which is less common and more aggressive. 

Koester said she was advised that having two concurrent types of lung cancer is “very rare,” but added the small cell cancer, according to her oncological team, may be genetic.

Drawing deeply on faith, pointing to Pope Leo

Now, with additional tests and consultations ahead, Koester is drawing even more deeply on her faith and urging others to get regular lung cancer screenings.

“If the pope can get it, anybody can,” she said.

Koester said she is cherishing time with her family, while reflecting on the sudden and mysterious turns life can take.

“We don’t know the end of the story, and we’re in the middle of this journey,” she said. 

Cancer has brought her “even closer to God,” she said — and reminders of his presence are all around, even in the pattern of leaves in a tree near her home.

“I look out my bay window every day, and I see this face like Jesus in the leaves,” said Koester. “I know he’s here with me.”

Gina Christian is a multimedia reporter for OSV News. Follow her on X @GinaJesseReina.

The post ‘I felt like I wasn’t alone’ after Pope Leo diagnosis, says lung cancer patient first appeared on OSV News.

NEWARK, N.J. (OSV News) — Cardinal Joseph W. Tobin of Newark has been found to have a kidney mass and is scheduled to undergo surgery on Oct. 29 to remove it, according to an archdiocesan announcement.

“Testing to date indicates that the mass appears confined to the kidney, and his doctors are optimistic about his outlook,” the archdiocese said Oct. 28. “Examination of the mass following surgery will determine its nature and help guide any further treatment.”

“I am deeply grateful to the skilled and compassionate medical professionals who are guiding my care and preparing my treatment plan,” Cardinal Tobin said in a statement. “Above all, I place my complete trust in Christ our Redeemer, whose loving presence sustains me in all things. I humbly ask for your prayers and support during this time. God willing, I look forward to resuming my full duties within a few weeks after surgery.”

In its announcement, the archdiocese said it appreciated the faithful’s “understanding and respect for Cardinal Tobin’s privacy during this time.”

“We kindly ask that you refrain from contacting Cardinal Tobin, his family or Archdiocesan staff for interviews or information. Thank you for your consideration and continued prayers,” it said.

Ministry of Cardinal Tobin 

A native of Detroit and a member of the Redemptorist congregation, the cardinal has served as the sixth archbishop of Newark since his installation on Jan. 6, 2017. Prior to that he served as the sixth archbishop of Indianapolis, from 2012 until Pope Francis named him Newark’s archbishop on Nov. 7, 2016. Pope Francis made then-Archbishop Tobin a cardinal on Nov. 19, 2016.

Over the years, Cardinal Tobin has served on several Vatican bodies. In August 2010, Pope Benedict XVI appointed him secretary to what is now called the Dicastery for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life.

Pope Francis named him to the Dicastery for Bishops, the Synod of Bishops as well as the Congregation for Catholic Education and the Pontifical Council for Culture — which were merged in June 2022 to become the Dicastery for Culture and Education.

The Archdiocese of Newark spans four counties in northern New Jersey: Bergen, Essex, Hudson and Union. It is one of the smallest archdioceses in the United States by geographic area, but one of the largest by Catholic population: It has about 1.3 million Catholics out of a total population of over 3.1 million.

OSV News staff wrote this report.

Editor’s note: The Archdiocese of Newark said messages of support and well wishes for the cardinal may be mailed to: Cardinal Joseph W. Tobin, C.Ss.R., Archdiocese of Newark, c/o Office of Communications, 171 Clifton Ave., Newark, NJ 07104.

The post Cardinal Tobin of Newark, NJ, to undergo surgery for mass on his kidney first appeared on OSV News.