Just days after their dramatic rescue, some of the Chilean miners returned to where it all unfolded to offer prayers of thanksgiving:

About a dozen of the miners rescued in Chile returned to the San Jose mine Sunday for a private ecumenical service with friends and family.

The miners and their families made a pilgrimage to Camp Hope to sing and pray together, bringing some closure to what many believe was a miraculous event.

Omar Reygadas, the 17th miner to be rescued, said he came to see where his son kept a vigil while he was trapped underground.

“I have always said the true heroes are the families who stayed here and the faith that they had,” he said in Spanish.

Many miners said their fight for survival brought them closer to God — and to the brink of despair.

“The worst for me was thinking I would never see my family again, that I would never hear them, touch them,” Reygadas said. “And that I had no way of telling them that I was alive and OK down there.”

There’s much more at the link and here.