When my Mother was in the hospital often I would sit by her bed while she slept and read. I had with me a small New Testament. My version is the translation of St. Jerome’s Latin Vulgate by Msgr. Ronald Knox.

   Now-a-days we often find ourselves waiting - in a doctor’s waiting room or at the auto mechanic, and many other places. It would be good to have a small New Testament or a Book of the Gospels that fits in one’s purse or pocket. (True monk’s habits have bigger pockets!) Not only will this time spent reading make waiting less unpleasant, but little by little, one can, over time read through, the Gospels or the New Testament over and over.

   Years ago editions such as I am referring to were quite common. A Catholic bookshop or searching on the Internet should help in finding a few. Then just choose the translation you would like.

   The time need not be spent only reading. One may stop now and then and ponder what one has read. Perhaps read a passage over and over. And think of ways it applies to your life.

   If anyone sees what you are reading it will be a lovely witness. “You have forgotten the Bible” are words of Our Lady at Medjugorje that cannot be repeated too often. This would be one way to help remember the Bible.

How Powerful is it to Pray the Rosary?

By a Thankful Pilgrim

   In 1988 my daughter was very depressed.  During that time Wayne Weible wrote the book Medjugorje:The Message. This book talked about the apparition of Our Lady in Medjugorje.  I read it and found it incredibly intense and immediately I believed that our Mother comes to the earth every day.  I started praying the Rosary as She asked us to do with all my heart.  My sister brought me a beautiful rosary from Medjugorje and I prayed with it every day. 

   Since my daughter was not getting any better, I found myself in a great deal of despair. I decided to put all this sorrow in Her hands and pleaded Our Lady for help.  While I was praying the Rosary I asked Her: “Please dear Lady, I am pleading you from one mother to another; give me a sign to know if my daughter is going to be well.”  A couple of minutes later my rosary turned gold.  I knew then that this was a sign that my daughter was going to be fine.  Praise the Lord! My lovely daughter has been happily married for fifteen years and has three beautiful children and a great husband.  I am always thanking Our Lady for this great miracle. Even though my daughter lost her first child, she never became deeply depressed and has always been able to cope with her life. This is the great power of the Rosary when you pray it with your heart.

   I always wanted to go to Medjugorje to be in that beautiful village Our Lady chose for Her apparitions.  In 2003, Ivan, one of the visionaries came to St. John the Baptist Church in Sandy, Utah; I had the great privilege to be present for this apparition.  During the economic crisis of 2001, my husband lost a great deal of money because the company where he worked for 20 years did business with Enron.  We thought we were going to lose all his retirement.  Unfortunately, we had very bad advice from one of the most prominent advisers in Salt Lake City.  This company did not advise us correctly and my husband had a great deal of stock in his company.  I had to go back to work. We were advised not to touch the stock and do whatever it took to make it through these hard times.  I really gave all this to Our Lady and I asked Her to help me, I found a job, and worked there for 2 and 1/2 years. 

   One day while I was reading the newspaper, I noticed that some lawyers were doing cases for people that were advised incorrectly, especially during the Enron time.  I called them and gave them our case. Ivan came to Salt Lake while this case was going on.  For my petitions I asked Our Lady two things: one was not to send my son-in-law to any wars, since he is in the army reserves, and the other was to win the case.  I promised Her that if we won the case, some of this money will be used to go to Medjugorje and to thank Her for everything that She has given us.  Well! It all came true,

my son- in -law is still home, and we won the case ( although we did not recuperate all the money we lost). 

   In September of 2008, my husband and I went to Medjugorje to say thank you for all the wonderful blessings that we have received throughout our lives.  The first thing that I did when I landed in this beautiful place was say ‘THANK YOU, DEAR LADY” for giving me such a beautiful present.

   We had wonderful experiences during this unforgettable trip.  I got to experience the beautiful miracle of the sun.  It is absolutely amazing, and very difficult to explain.  I just know that nothing happened to my eyes when I saw the sun. I was staring at the sun and I saw a host all white and around it was the color red, then I saw different rays coming out of it in different colors, red, yellow, green, pink, it was absolutely beautiful.  When I looked at the white host it seems as if it were coming toward the earth and then it went back to Heaven.  It is amazing.  This lasted maybe 3 or 4 minutes.  My husband was blessed to experience the miracle of the smell of roses.  While we were walking on Apparition Mountain in Medjugorje, and we were praying the Rosary all of a sudden my husband said: “There is a smell of roses!”  (There are no roses on Apparition Hill.) I smelled it too.  When we came home from this trip our kids came over to our house. We opened our luggage to give them some souvenirs that had been blessed by Our Lady in Medjugorje and they noticed the smell of roses.  My kids were amazed and we feel blessed to know that all the family was able to have this great present given to us by Our Dear Lady.

   I am a constant prayer of the Rosary. I do believe that prayer is very powerful when you do it with your heart, just as the Queen of Peace asked us to do it. My husband was not really excited about the trip to Medjugorje. They asked him why he came and he said, “Because of my wife.”  Well, now he wants to go again!  I tell him to just let me know when and we will pack and take off.  I already went there and did what I promised to do and feel that I accomplished something that I thought it was impossible to do.  There is nothing impossible when you put it in the hands of Our Lord and His Mother.

Is Medjugorje Real? (Part 1)

   The following is a transcription of a talk given by Dr. Mark Miravalle at the Medjugorje Conference at Notre Dame University in May, 2008. It is very long, so it will be continued in future issues.

   For almost 27 years there have been reports of apparitions of the Mother of God in Medjugorje. Almost 27 years have also brought a multitude of questions, and in some cases, objections.  The ultimate question is – “Is Medjugorje real?” Is it supernaturally authentic? Is the Mother of God really appearing there? And I think to properly respond to that question amidst a sea of questions and objections which remain, we have to take a very serious look at the objections directly, objectively, theologically so that we can arrive at the truth. 

  So what I would like to do is to take the 5 most frequently asked questions or objections to the authenticity of Medjugorje and examine them directly and straight-forwardly. But before we do that, we need to use the criteria that the Church herself uses when the Church examines any reported apparition, and as Fr. Laurentin so well summarized, the criteria of the Church. We find three fundamental elements the Church looks at when there is a reported apparition.

   Number one – Is the message contents in conformity with the faith and moral teachings of the Catholic Church’s magisterium? Is the message sound? Is the message one with the voice of the Holy Father, because the Holy Spirit will never contradict Himself, and the Holy Spirit speaks through the Holy Father in the Body of the Church and therefore the Holy Spirit would never contradict the Church through a reported apparition. So the first criteria is the message – is it sound, doctrinally orthodox?

   Number two – Do the phenomena that are reported conform with the Church’s mystical tradition?  In other words, anything that is not explainable by nature that is reported at an event – ecstasy, potential solar miracles, other elements of potential healing - do they follow in conformity with the mystical tradition of the Church? the Church?

   Number three – The spiritual fruits – are there lasting, perduring, spiritual fruits that come forward? Because even from a false apparition there can be some initial positive fruits (someone could go back to Confession or to Mass or pray the Rosary on a weekend trip to some reported place), but, in fact, it doesn’t necessarily indicate that the apparitions are authentic. It can be the sacraments and the impetus to go there, even for false reasons. So the issue is – are there lasting, perduring, universal spiritual fruits from the apparitions.

   So, with those three general criteria in mind, I want to address five questions or objections, the most commonly raised questions or objections raised regarding the Medjugorje messages, and respond to them with theology, with the Church’s criteria, and with hard facts because as John Paul II said when he went to the University in Switzerland, “The Church never fears the truth, because in the truth you find Christ who is the Truth.” So we can boldly and honestly examine questions from a perspective of truth. If it’s truth, it reflects Jesus, and if it’s truth it will reflect the Mother of Jesus.

   The first question: What is the official position of the Church regarding Medjugorje? Would it be an act of disobedience to pilgrimage to Medjugorje before the Church has given the apparitions final and definitive approval?

   Let’s go to the facts. On April 10, 1991, the Yugoslavian Episcopal Conference made a declaration regarding Medjugorje. It is known as the “Declaration of the ex-Yugoslavian Bishops’ Conference,” in Zadar. In the statement of 1991, the bishops say the following: They do not approve Medjugorje as supernaturally authentic; they do not prohibit Medjugorje as a fraudulent apparition. They rather conclude, without saying a positive statement of Medjugorje, that the pilgrims can come, and they are to be pastorally tended to. Now, theologically this is what we call the middle category of

“non constat supernaturalitate.” Now once again, bear with me on these distinctions because they’re important for clarity and understanding what is the official position of the Church on Medjugorje. An approved apparition receives what is called “constat de supernaturalitate.” which means it consists of a supernatural origin. The third category is the prohibition category, that is, “constat de non- supernaturalitate.” That is where the local bishop says officially these are not approved, and you cannot come, and there can be no sacraments celebrated at this site. Well, there’s a middle position, and it’s “non constat supernaturalitate,” which means the Church, and here the Zadar statement, does not approve the apparitions, it does not discredit the apparitions, and people are, indeed, free to go.

   So the 1991 Zadar statement makes clear that personal pilgrimages to Medjugorje are done, can be satisfied within proper biddings to the Church. Now, on May 26, 1998, the Vatican Congregation to the Doctrine of the Faith made a statement on Medjugorje in response to a letter from a French bishop, Bishop Aubrey, and at that time the secretary to Cardinal Ratzinger, Archbishop Bertone, who is now the Secretary of State, Cardinal Bertone made a very important confirmation from the Vatican of the 1991 Zadar statement. Archbsihop Bertone, in this statement in 1998, said the following: Number one – that the Zadar statement, without approving and without condemning – is the position of the Church on Medjugorje at the present position. Number two – the statement of Archbishop Bertone stated that the personal opposition of the local bishop is his own personal position. It is not the official position of the Catholic Church, and I quote from the letter, “ that the position of Msgr. Peric is and remains his personal opinion.”  Thirdly, the statement of 1998 states once again that pilgrims can pilgrimage to Medjugorje on a private, personal, that means non-diocesan organized basis.

   My friends, this is extremely important if we’re after the facts. This is Rome; this is the Holy See, this is the Vatican Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith saying that the position of the local bishop, which is a negative position, is not the official Catholic position at this time. And we know from our Catechism and we know from our teaching that you always go with Rome. You go with the Holy See. You go with the voice of the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith. So, in answer to question one, is it an act of disobedience to pilgrimage to Medjugorje, it absolutely is not an act of disobedience. It is permitted in the 1991 Zadar statement, from the bishops of ex-Yugoslavia. It is confirmed by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith in the letter of Archbishop Bertone, May 26, 1998.

Mirjana’s Message of October 2, 2008

“Dear children, again I call you to faith. My Motherly heart desires for your heart to be open, so that it could say to your heart: believe. My children, only faith will give you strength in life’s trials. It will renew your soul and open the ways of hope. I am with you. I gather you around me because I desire to help you, so that you can help your neighbors to discover faith, which is the only joy and happiness of life. Thank you.”

Statue of St. Padre Pio in the yellow building in Medjugorje