In my experience, people who are not involved in alleged miraculous events will often throw support behind their veracity, because any dramatic miracle is like a point scored for the cultural group they identify with. While arguably this might have been less the case hundreds of years ago when the cultural hegemony of Christianity meant that there was less value in dramatic evidence for it, I think that the far greater prevalence of dramatic miracle claims from that period suggests that this is not the case. Plus, in those times, the site of any dramatic alleged miracle would often gain a reputation as a holy place, greatly increasing the standing of the location and increasing business through pilgrimage.