WHY OUR LADY
20TH CENTURY - 1981 - OUR LADY OF MEDJUGORJE
MEDJUGORJE, HERCEGOVINA
OTHER TITLE: Our Lady Queen of Peace
VISIONARIES: Ivan Dragićević (16), Vicka Ivanković (16), Marija Pavlović (16), Ivanka Ivanković (15), Mirjana Dragićević (16), Jakov Čolo (10)
NUMBER OF APPARITIONS: Tens of Thousands
FIRST APPARITION: June 24, 1981
LAST APPARITION: On-going
APPROVED: Not Yet Approved
“Dear children! This is a time of grace. I am with you and anew am calling you, little children:
return to God and to prayer until prayer will be a joy for you.
Little children, you do not have a future or peace until your life begins with a
personal conversion and a change to the good.
Evil will cease and peace will begin to reign in your hearts and in the world.
Therefore, little children, pray, pray, pray.
I am with you and intercede before my Son Jesus for each of you.
Thank you for having responded to my call.”
SUMMARY
On June 24, 1981 of the 20th Century, Our Lady began appearing in Medjugorje first to one visionary, then another, and finally to six different visionaries. In response to the visionaries’ random questions, the essential words of Our Lady’s message, consistent with her messages at her other apparitions, were rather simple: A return to God, faith, prayer, fasting, peace, and reconciliation.
Initially each of the visionaries would receive daily apparitions from Our Lady. However, at this time, only two of them (Vicka and Ivan) still have daily apparitions. Ivanka only has one apparition a year on the 25th of June. Marija has one apparition per month on the 25th of each month. Jakov has one apparition per year on Christmas. Mirjana has one apparition per year on her birthday (March 18th).
Over the years, Our Lady has given thousands of messages to the visionaries, for them to give to us. The messages given to Mirjana, Marija, and Ivan have received the most publicity and greatest distribution. Websites are available where these messages can be viewed.
Our Lady has given the visionaries at Medjugorje ten Secrets. Not all of the Medjugorje visionaries have yet received all of the Secrets. In previous apparitions at La Salette and Fatima, Our Lady also gave Secrets to the visionaries.
The Secrets that Our Lady gave to the visionaries at Medjugorje are somewhat similar to the prophesies that she gave the visionaries at Garabandal regarding the Warning, Sign, and Chastisement.
Our Lady also gave the visionaries at Medjugorje five Stones. Just as David slew the giant, Goliath, with stones, the stones given by Our Lady are to be used in combatting the devil, Satan.
The visionaries at Medjugorje faced fierce persecution just as they had previously faced at Fatima and at Garabandal, and they faced their persecutors with strong faith and conviction just as the others had previously done. They were not intimidated.
Medjugorje and Fatima have another similarity in that the visionaries at both were given a vision of Hell. The visionaries at Medjugorje were also given a vision of Heaven and Purgatory. In fact, two of the Medjugorje visionaries were actually physically taken to Heaven, Purgatory, and Hell.
While these apparitions at Medjugorje were going on, Our Lady also appeared at Kibeho in 1981, San Nicolas in 1983, and Itapiranga in 1994. Each of these apparitions have been officially approved by the Catholic Church while Medjugorje still awaits approval.
Even though Pope John Paul II said that “Medjugorje was the continuation of Fatima”, Our Lady’s apparitions at Medjugorje are yet to be approved by the Catholic Church, perhaps because they continue even to this year (2020); and/or perhaps because they await the release of the Secrets and completion of the prophesies made by Our Lady.
Never before has an apparition continued as long as the apparitions at Medjugorje. Our Lady has told us that these apparitions will be her last.
Millions of people are aware of the Medjugorje apparitions, and likewise millions have actually gone there as pilgrims. It is important that everyone knows what Our Lady has been telling us since 1981, which is for us to convert, because our Time of Grace will be coming to an end.
BEFORE THE APPARITIONS
Christianity in Bosnia and Herzegovina
Christianity arrived in Bosnia and Herzegovina during the first century AD. Saint Paul wrote in his Epistle to the Romans that he brought the Gospel of Christ to Illyria. Saint Jerome, a Doctor of the Church born in Stridon (modern-day Šuica, Bosnia and Herzegovina), also wrote that St. Paul preached in Illyria. It is believed that Christianity arrived with Paul's disciples or Paul himself.
After the arrival of the Croats on the Adriatic coast in the early seventh century, Frankish and Byzantine rulers began baptizing them as far inland as the river Drina. Christianization was also influenced by the proximity of old Roman cities in Dalmatia, and spread from the Dalmatian coast towards the interior of the Duchy of Croatia.
Bosnia and Herzegovina, split between the kingdoms of Croatia and Bosnia, came under Ottoman rule during the 15th and 16th centuries. Christian subjects of the Ottoman Empire had "protected person" or "people of the dhimma" status, which guaranteed them their possessions and works in agriculture, crafts and trade if they remained loyal to the Ottoman government. Christians were not allowed to protest against Islam, build churches or establish new church institutions. Public and civil service were performed by Muslims.
The Kingdom of Yugoslavia was formed on December 1, 1918, from the State of Slovenes, Croats and Serbs, itself formed from the merger of Austria-Hungarian Empire territories with the formerly independent Kingdom of Serbia. Although Catholic opinion was divided in Bosnia and Herzegovina about the union with Serbia after the unification, Catholic bishops (including Stadler) encouraged priests and the laity to be loyal to the new government. In their view, in the new state Croats would have national rights and the Church would be free. When this did not happen, relations between church and state cooled and the clergy resisted the government.
The ideological conflict between Christianity and Marxist philosophy in Bosnia and Herzegovina during the Second World War and the era of communist Yugoslavia hardened into confrontation between the communist movement and the Catholic Church. Under the direction of the Yugoslav Communist Party, 184 clergy were killed during and after the war, including 136 priests, 39 seminarians and four brothers; five priests died in communist prisons
Persecution of priests, laity and the church became organized after the war, with books published linking the Catholic Church with the fascist Ustaše regime and the Western powers, to justify the persecution. The communists ignored the collaboration of 75 Catholic priests with the Yugoslav Partisans.
Faced with hostility from the Yugoslav communist authorities after the Second World War, the bishops met in Zagreb and issued a pastoral letter from the Catholic bishops of Yugoslavia on September 20, 1945, protesting injustice, crimes, trials and executions. They protected innocent priests and laity, noting that they did not want to defend the guilty; the number truly guilty was believed small.
NOTE: The breakup of Yugoslavia occurred as a result of a series of political upheavals and conflicts during the early 1990s. After a period of political and economic crisis in the 1980s, constituent republics of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia split apart, but the unresolved issues caused bitter inter-ethnic Yugoslav wars. The wars primarily affected Bosnia and Herzegovina, neighbouring parts of Croatia and, some years later, Kosovo.
St. James Church
The parish was founded in 1892. The first church was soon completed in 1897, and was very spacious and beautiful for the circumstances back then. Due to the unstable ground on which it was built, the walls began to crack and the building began to sink, so immediately after the World War I, parishioners began to think about the construction of the new church. The initial works were initiated in 1934, and were completed on January 19, 1969, when this new church was blessed. The works continued later on and everything was finished in 1980. A lot of people were questioning why such a big church was built since the parish was relatively small. It was only a year or so later that this big church became very useful when the apparitions began and the pilgrims started arriving.
Cross Mountain
When the Holy Father of that time, Pius XI, proposed that crosses be built at hills and mountains all over the world for the occasion of the 1900th anniversary of Jesus' death on the cross, one of the priests who responded to that proposal was Father Bernardin Smoljan, parish priest from Medjugorje. He presented this idea to his parishioners in January 1934, and the parish of Medjugorje embraced it with all of their hearts. The parishioners carried heavy loads on their back and in their hands to the top of the hill at that time called Sipovac and the construction of huge, cement cross was completed in less than two months.
On March 16, 1934, Father Smoljan blessed the cross and the first Holy Mass was celebrated on the top of the hill thereafter Cross Mountain. In the last three decades, this place became one of the places that pilgrims gladly visit while they are in Medjugorje. Every Friday afternoon prayer of the Way of the Cross is held there. Many pilgrims have climbed this mountain and discovered love of Jesus in His passion.
THE APPARITIONS
First Apparitions
The apparitions at Medjugorje began on June 24, 1981, when the visionaries first saw a distant apparition of a young woman in a long grey dress holding a baby in her arms on the hill of Crnica (now known as Apparition Hill). The first time was in the afternoon, the second time towards 6 pm.
The next day, the visionaries saw Our Lady nearby on the hill, and Our Lady said to them: “Praised be Jesus!” Believing that others will say they are crazy when they say they have seen Our Lady, they said: “Give us a sign!” Our Lady responded only with a smile. Mirjana believed she had received a sign as her watch had changed time during the apparition. As she was leaving, Our Lady said: “Goodbye, my angels. Go in the peace of God.”
On June 26, 1981, a crowd had gathered for the apparition and on a request from the crowd, the visionaries said to Our Lady: “Give us a sign which will prove your presence”, to which Our Lady responded: “Blessed are those who have not seen and who believe.”
On July 21, 1981, the visionaries once again asked Our Lady to give them a sign and she said yes. They they asked her how much longer she would still continue to visit them and and she responded: “My sweet angels, even if I were to leave the sign, many people will still not believe. Many people will only come here and bow down. But people must be converted and do penance.”
Over the years, there have been many more requests for signs, and Our Lady has continued to give many signs including the sun spinning, a host over the top of it, the Cross on Cross Mountain with a back drop of rainbow colors, rosaries changing to a gold color, and many more, as well as personal signs. During one apparition, pilgrims even experienced the miracle of the sun (similar to Fatima).
On August 25, 1981, a little after Our Lady prayed for peace, a large inscription appeared on top of Mount Krizevac. The word “MIR” was seen by the pastor and many persons from the village. The visionaries affirmed that the Blessed Virgin promised that there would still be many other signs as forerunners before the great sign in Medjugorje, and in other parts of the world. At Garabandal, Our Lady also promised a Great Sign. The Great Sign at both Garabandal and Medjugorje has yet to be seen.
The following description of Our Lady was prepared from a questionnaire asking them to supply answers to a number of questions relating to Our Lady’s appearance. Five of the six visionaries responded and signed their completed questionnaire forms at Humac in 1992. These five were Ivan Dragićević, Vicka Ivanković, Marija Pavlović, Ivanka Ivanković and Mirjana Dragićević. Because of circumstances, the sixth visionary, Jakov Čolo was unable to return his questionnaire form, but he agreed with what the other visionaries said, and had nothing to add to their accounts.
1. As the first thing, tell me: how tall is the Madonna that you regularly see? - About 165 cm - Like me. (Vicka) [5 feet 5 inches]
2. Does she look rather "slender", slim or . . .? - She looks rather slender.
3. About how many kilograms do you think she weighs? - About 60 kilograms (132 pounds).
4. About how old do you think she is? - From 18 to 20 years old.
5. When she is with the Child Jesus does she look older? - She looks as usual - she looks the same.
6. When Our Lady is with you is she always standing or . . . - Always standing.
7. On what is she standing? - On some little cloud.
8. What colour is that little cloud? - The cloud is a whitish color.
9. Have you ever seen her kneel? - Never! (Vicka, Ivan, Ivanka. . .)
10. Naturally your Madonna also has her own face. How does it look: round or rather long - oval? - It's rather long - oval - normal.
11. What colour is her face? Normal - rather light - rosy cheeks.
12. What colour is her brow? Normal - mainly light like her face.
13. What kind of lips does Our Lady have; rather thick or thin? - Normal - beautiful - they are more thin.
14. What colour are they? - Reddish - natural colour.
15. Does Our Lady have any dimples, as we people usually have? - Ordinarily she doesn't - perhaps a little, if she smiles. (Mirjana)
16. Is there some pleasant smile ordinarily noticeable on her countenance? - Maybe - more like some
indescribable gentleness - there's a smile visible as if somehow under her skin. (Vicka)
17. What is the colour of Our Lady's eyes? - Her eyes are wonderful! Clearly blue. (all)
18. Are they rather big or . . .? More normal - maybe a little bit bigger. (Marija)
19. How are her eyelashes? - Delicate - normal.
20. What colour are her eyelashes? Normal - no special colour.
21. Are they thinner or . . .? - Ordinary - normal.
22. Of course, Our Lady also has a nose. What is it like: sharp or . . .? - A nice, little nose (Mirjana) - normal, harmonizing with her face. (Marija)
23. And Our Lady's eyebrows? - Her eyebrows are thin - normal - more of a black colour.
24. How is your Madonna dressed? - She is clothed in a simple woman's dress.
25. What colour is her dress? - Her dress is grey - maybe a little bluish-grey. (Mirjana)
26. Is the dress tight-fitting or does it fall freely? - It falls freely.
27. How far down does her dress reach? - All the way down to the little cloud on which she's standing - it blends into the cloud.
28. How far up around the neck? = Normally - up to the beginning of her neck.
29. Is a part of Our Lady's neck visible? - Her neck is visible, but nothing of her bosom is visible.
30. How far do her sleeves reach? - Up to her palms.
31. Is Our Lady's dress hemmed with anything? - No, not with anything.
32. Is there anything pulled in or tied around Our Lady's waist? - No, there's nothing.
33. On the body of the Madonna that you see, is her femininity noticeable? - Of course it's noticeable! But nothing specially. (Vicka)
34. Is there anything else on Our Lady besides this dress described? - She has a veil on her head.
35. What colour is that veil? - The veil is a white colour.
36. Pure white or . . .? - Pure white.
37. How much of her does the veil cover? - It covers her head, shoulders and complete body from the back and from the sides.
38. How far down does it reach? - It reaches down to the little cloud, also like her dress.
39. How far does it cover in front? = It covers from the back and from the sides.
40. Does the veil look firmer, thicker than Our Lady's dress? = No it doesn't - it's similar to the dress.
41. Is there any kind of jewelry on her? = There is no kind of jewelry.
42. Is the veil trimmed with anything at the ends? - Not with anything.
43. Does Our Lady have any kind of ornament at all? - She has no kind.
44. For example, on her head or around the head? - Yes - she has a crown of stars on her head.
45. Are there always stars around her head? - Ordinarily there are - there always are. (Vicka)
46. For example, when she appears with Jesus? - She's the same way.
47. How many stars are there? - There are twelve of them.
48. What colour are they? - Golden - gold colour.
49. Are they in any way connected with each other? - They are connected with something - so that can stay up. (Vicka)
50. Is a little bit of Our Lady's hair visible? - A little bit of her hair is visible.
51. Where do you see it? - A little above her forehead - from under the veil - from the left side.
52. What colour is it? - Its black.
53. Is either of Our Lady's ears ever visible? - No, they are never visible.
54. How is that? - Well, the veil covers her ears.
55. What is Our Lady usually looking at during the apparition? - Usually she is looking at us -
sometimes at something else, at what she's showing.
56. How does Our Lady hold her hands? - Her hands are free, relaxed, extended.
57. When does she hold her hands folded? - Almost never - maybe sometimes at the "Glory be".
58. Does she ever move, gesture with her hands during the apparitions? - She does not gesture, except when she shows something.
59. Which way are her palms turned when her hands are extended? - Her palms are usually relaxed
upwards - her fingers are relaxed in the same way.
60. Are her fingernails then also visible? - They are partially visible.
61. How are they - which colour are they? - Natural colour – clean-cut fingernails.
62. Have you ever seen Our Lady's legs? - No - never - her dress always covers them.
63. Finally, is Our Lady really beautiful, as you have said? - Well, really we haven't told you anything about that - her beauty cannot be described - it is not our kind of beauty - that is something ethereal - something heavenly - something that we'll only see in Paradise - and then only to a certain degree.
Visionaries
When the Church investigates reported apparitions, part of the procedure is that it looks for evidence of the moral integrity of the individuals claiming the apparitions. The Church does not require there to be a pre-existing exceptional level of holiness from the visionaries before the claimed supernatural events begin. The Church is open-minded and always grants the possibility that God chooses whoever is His will. We see this in the earthly ministry of Jesus. The Apostles and his disciples often came from backgrounds of questionable holiness--the former lives of St. Matthew or St. Mary Magdalene, and indeed of St. Paul or even St. Peter, were hardly lives of Gospel values, but those changed lives became wonderful exemplars for true Christian discipleship.
The questioning of the integrity of the Medjugorje visionaries has been very public. They have lives in the “goldfish bowl” of public attention and have been under the public microscope for most of their adolescent and adult lives. They have been interviewed ad infinitum by any number of bishops, priests, religions, theologinas, laity, and the world’s press. The overwhelming impression gleaned by those who have had personal contact with these six visionaries is deep respect for their obvious integrity, unpretentiousness, and the down-to-earth approach to the Christian life. None of the visionaries has been seen to compromise the faith in any way. No mean feat in all these years in the spotlight!
The theology of the communications in the apparitions has likewise been scrutinized endlessly, with the visionaries emerging free from any substantiated allegation of anything being said that is in violation of Church doctrine. Substantial personal sacrifice rather than personal gain has been the repeated experience of the visionaries--often at the expense of privacy in their family lives. And, the legitimacy of their state of ecstasy as being in some form of true communication outside of their ordinary time-space experience has been independently validated by two very competent medical teams
Very often the visionaries have been taken advantage of in the manner their words and actions have been reported or interpreted. Much of the advantage-taking has to do with the secrets with which each has been entrusted taking the form of attempts to cunningly elicit from them details of the secrets or more often attempts by interviewers to foist their own interpretations of the nature of the secrets.
They are not theologians, although they do seem to have picked up a certain sophistication in this area over the years. Sometimes questions put to them, presupposing theological insight, are very unfair and often contain ulterior motives.
Each of the visionaries has been asked by Our Lady to pray for a particular intention and each speaks of their efforts in this regard quite freely and often.
Even though the visionaries’ lives in the world spotlight can seem unenviable, they appear to accept their crosses in this respect with grace and stoicism, without any resentment seemingly because the wonderful grace to have been selected by and to be with Our Lady is indeed enviable. So let’s learn a little about each of the six visionaries.
Vicka Ivankovic-Mijatovic
Vicka was born on September 9, 1964, in Bijakovici, in the parish of Medjugorje. Vicka is married, has one child and lives in Krehin Gradac near Medjugorje. Vicka has been the visionary most available to pilgrims to Medugorje, giving testimony about the apparitions almost daily from the balcony of her former home for many years. She has had daily apparitions since June 24, 1981. Our Lady has so far entrusted nine secrets to her. The prayer intention that Our Lady has asked of her: for the sick.
Vicka has suffered a lot with various ailments and has impressed many with her selfless acceptance of her suffering and here are her thoughts on suffering: “For sure suffering cannot be explained. Suffering can only lived in one’s own heart. When the Lord gives us a suffering, a cross, pain ... this is really a great gift that God gives. We understandably think: ‘How can suffering be a gift?’ But it’s a great gift! Only God knows why he gives this gift and only he knows the reason why and the time when he takes it back. It is up to us how we accept this gift. The Madonna told us that many time, when this gift comes to us, we always ask a thousand questions--she says stop asking question. It is enough to say, ‘I thank you God for this gift. God has something he wants to give me. I am ready to receive it. I ask only strength and courage so that I may carry on.’ And also the Madonna has told us, ‘You don’t know how great is the value of your suffering in the eyes of God.’ I am telling you what I am able to through my own suffering.... My suffering is a gift.... The Madonna may say to me, ‘Vicka, do this, do that’ I await (the suffering) with all my heart, with open arms. Because I want to respond to all the good that the Madonna has given to me, and with the little that my suffering is, I can respond to her love. And so I say to you, dear listeners, about suffering: today there are different kinds of suffering--there is the suffering that God gives, and there is the suffering that we make for ourselves and these are two different things, they don’t have the same value. We must try to accept that which the Lord gives, and we must give thanks and when one gives thanks for this great gift, then graces and blessings and everything come sooner. And then we should not say, ‘I’m suffering, I’m in pain.’ God knows this: accept it, don’t talk about it... Suffering is to be lived in our souls and in our hearts.”
During an interview, Vicka was asked about the Eucharist: “Vicka, can you tell us what the most important thing in your life is?”, and Vicka responded: “Yes, the Blessed Mother has led me to understand the center of my life is the Eucharist, which is Jesus, Who is God.” The interviewer then asked: “Tell us about the Eucharist.”, and Vicka responded: “The most important thing about the Sacrament of the Eucharist is that we are receiving Jesus, Who is alive. The Sacrament is really receiving Jesus. His own Body and His own Blood. What we are receiving, though, depends upon us. Are our hearts clean enough to take Him into our hearts? We must be prepared to receive Jesus alive. We must do this act consciously, knowing what it means to receive Him alive. Then we experience Jesus’ real presence within us and around us.” The interviewer’s next question then was: “How do we prepare to receive Him?”, and Ivanka responded: “Before going to Holy Mass, focus intently on Who you will be receiving. During Mass open your heart to Jesus. See Him with the ‘eyes’ of your heart. We see and experience and live with Jesus through faith. That’s why, during Mass, our faith must be very strong. The stronger our faith, the better prepared we are to welcome Him in the Holy Eucharist. We must not only listen during Holy Mass, we must really experience all the holy words of the Mass with love. That’s why, toward the end of Mass when you are receiving Jesus alive, if your heart is open. He is truly with you. When the Mass is ended and you go out of the church, you will be filled with
unspeakable joy!”
Ivanka Ivankovic-Elez
Ivanka was born on June 21, 1966, in Bijakovici, in the parish of Medjugorje. She was the first one who saw Our Lady. She had daily apparitions until May 7, 1985. On that day, confiding to her the tenth secret, Our Lady told her that for the rest of her life, she would have one yearly apparition on June 25th, the anniversary of the apparitions. Ivanka is married, she has three children, and she lives with her family in Medjugorje. The prayer intention that Our Lady confided to Ivanka: for families.
Here are some of Ivanka’s comments given to pilgrims: “Praised by Jesus and Mary. For 28 years I have been asking God the very same question: Why did you choose me? I know that I was given a great grace and also I know that at the same time I was given a great responsibility. I have accepted this as a gift, but at the same time I have been praying all the time that God gives strength to fulfill all the assignments he has for me. ...That night (June 24, 1981) was the longest night in my life. I was only 15 and I questioned myself the entire night whether what I saw was true or not. So the next day at the same hour we went back together to the apparition hill. Before we saw Our Lady, we saw the light, three times, and when we finally go to her, I cannot describe that moment of meeting with Our Lady because we felt so much love, felt so secure, so much happiness in our hearts. When we came to her, we saw this most beautiful person, maybe 19 or 20 years of age. She had a crown of stars, white veil, grayish dress, and she was standing on a cloud. She had the most beautiful blue eyes and long black hair. I knew that it was the Blessed Mother. You see, two months before that day my mother had passed away. Because I knew in my heart that this was the Blessed Virgin Mary, I asked her, ‘Mother, where is my mother?’ And she said, ‘Do not worry, my child, your mother is with me.’ Our Lady told us, ‘Do not worry. I’ll pray with you always. I’ll come tomorrow.’
.... On that day (the third day) Our Lady gave the first public message, which was the message of peace. As the days passed by, Our Lady asked us to convert, to fast, to do some penance, to pray and to go to confession and attend Holy Mass. These are the main messages of Medjugorje.
... Our Lady has given a different mission to each one of us visionaries. My mission is to pray for families. So every day I pray for families. The last apparition that I had was this year on June 25, and that apparition lasted ten minutes and Our Lady spoke to me about the tenth secret and she advised all of us to become apostles of peace and to pray for peace. Our Lady ended her message with ‘Peace, peace, peace.’ Let us be reminded in prayer. Let us pray for each other. Our Lady wants us to be in peace, not to be afraid, to know that she is there for us all of the time. Finally, when you leave Medjugorje I would like you to take peace and love from Medjugorje back to your home and to your country. Thank you all for everything.”
During an interview, Ivanka was asked: “Later on, when the secrets come to pass, will you have a role in the unfolding of them?”, and Ivanka responded: “We will all have a role in the unfolding of the secrets. That is part of God’s plan.” Then the interviewer asked: “Part of God’s plan? What do you mean?”, and Ivanka responded: “Each person on the earth will be involved in the unfolding of the secrets. God calls us all to be faithful, in all circumstances of our lives. He calls us to be faithful to His will. Through prayer, each of us knows what that is.” The final question of the interviewer was: “In light of your knowledge of all ten secrets, what would you recommend?”, and Ivanka then responded: “Pray. Always pray. Try to do good things for other people. Try to live the messages. Please ask people to take them seriously. Please accept God’s gift to us. Please do what the Blessed Mother asks of you. Then you will have great peace and joy on this earth, even in suffering. You will have heaven for all eternity.”
Jakov Colo
Jacko Colo was born on March 6, 1971, in Sarajevo. He had daily apparitions from June 25, 1981 to September 12, 1998. On that day, entrusting to him the tenth secret, Our Lady told him that for the rest of his life he would have one yearly apparition, on Christmas Day. Jakov is married, he has three children, and he lives with his family in Medjugorje. The prayer intention that Our Lady confided to Jakov: for the sick.
Jakov tells us: “Prayer is a gift from the Lord, and I can tell you it is a gift the Lord desires to give to every one of us. I have discovered that we simply have to ask; every single day we have to ask Our Lord for this gift, and then to accept it. We have to transform our prayer into joy, because none of us is capable of praying if we feel we are forced to pray. It has never happened, here in Medjugorje, that Our Lady has said you are forced to pray. She always invites us. But it is us that need to feel within our hearts the joy of prayer, peace in prayer, and then to transform prayer into joy. The prayer simply has to be transformed into our daily food. Prayer becomes the answer to what we’re looking for.
What Our Lady asks from us very often is to pray in our families, to put the lord in the very first place, and to have time for the Lord in our families. Our Lady says ‘There is nothing that can unite the family like when you pray together,’ to pray together with our children, to be an example to our children. We parents have to understand we are responsible, because every child is a gift of God, a gift that we have to help to grow, and everything starts when they are born. As our late Father Slavko used to say, ‘You parents are supposed to put the seeds of faith in your children.’ I believe that there is nothing more beautiful for a parent but to see his own child pray; when your child comes and asks you to pray together with him when you see your child going to Holy Mass, and coming back from Mass joyful, that is the most beautiful thing.
Our Lady asks us for fasting. Our Lady said once, ‘Dear Children, with prayer and fasting, you can achieve anything, you can even stop wars.’ ’ We know what we are supposed to do, but we have to ask ourselves am I doing that? For there is one very important thing in fasting; we are supposed to do it in silence with love. It is not required that everyone should know that we fast. Once we learn to fast with peace and love in silence, then we will finally start to thank the Lord for that and for everything he grants us. Even for that little slice of bread we find on our table every single day. And how much do we thank the lord? How very often do we always ask for more and more? We are never content and we never thank the lord for what we already have. We don’t ask blessings. In fact in one of her messages Our Lady said, ‘you work, you do many things, but without blessing....’ We have to remember without God’s blessing nothing works.”
“What Our Lady also invites us to do is to convert. In Medjugorje one should come for one reason, and that is our conversion, to change our lives here, to start a new life, a new life together with Our Lord and Our Lady. But the most important thing is to bring prayer into our families, into our communities. What we have to do is open our hearts, put our lives in the hands of the Lord, and to start to pray. And the Lord will do the rest.”
During an interview, Jakov was asked: “What does conversion mean to you, Jacov?”, and he responded: “When I was small, I only knew about God. I went to church, but I never rally experienced God. I went through the motions. God has to live within you. I didn’t experience that until this apparition happened.” The interviewer then asked: “How does God live within you now?”, and he responded: “I would explain conversion to mean: God living within me, and me being aware of it.”. Then the interviewer asked: “Would you say giving time to God is a way for people to begin to
experience God within?”, and Jakov responded: “That is the way to conversion--to put time aside for prayer.” And, lastly, the interviewer asked “What does our Blessed Mother want, Jakov?”, to which he responded: “She wants everyone on earth to want heaven. The Blessed Mother says the way to heaven is through prayer.”
Ivan Dragicevic
Ivan was born on May 25, 1965 in Bildren, Bijakovici, in the parish of Medjugorje. He still has daily apparitions. Our Lady entrusted nine secrets to him. Ivan is married and he has three children. With his family, he lives in the USA and in Medjugorje. The prayer intention that Our Lady confided to Ivan: for young people and for priests.
Here is Ivan on Our Lady’s call to prayer: ”We need to pray with the heart. How is Our Lady teaching us to pray with the heart? Praying with the heart means praying out of love and with love. That means praying with our whole being. Then our prayer becomes a real encounter with Jesus, a conversation with him, a meeting with him.... Our Lady wants us, in a very special way, to pray every day for three hours. When Our Lady is asking us to pray for three hours, she doesn’t want us to just spend three hours praying at one time. Our Lady is not asking us to pray just the Rosary for three hours. When she asks us to pray for three hours that includes Holy Mass, reading the Bible, family prayer, that we do good deeds, helping each other. That is truly what Our Lady is calling us for. In one of her messages Our Lady said: ‘My dear children, if you want to pray better, you always need to pray more.’
To be able to pray more is a personal decision for each one of us. But to pray better is grace, a special grace given to those who pray more.... Every so often nowadays we feel we don’t have time for prayer. We are busy. We don’t have time for even our children, for our families. Time is always a problem. But Our Lady says: ‘Dear children, time is not a problem, the problem is love. Because, my dear children if you love something and care about something, you will always find the time for it.’ But if you don’t love or care about something, you will never be bothered to even look for the time. That is why Our Lady is calling us so much for prayer. In all these years Our Lady keeps trying to take us out of this spiritual dying that this world is in. She wants to make our faith and our prayer so much stronger.”
During an interview, Ivan was asked: “Ivan, what message would you like to give us?”, and Ivan’s response was: “Tell people to pray to God with all their heart. Tell people to be confident of the love of God for all His children. Tell people to trust the mercy of God. All people in the world are being called to respond faithfully to these messages of the Mother of God. Then all people will have peace.”
Mirjana Dragicevic-Soldo
Mirjana was born on March 18, 1965, in Sarajevo. She had daily apparitions until December 25, 1982. On that day, entrusting to her the tenth secret, Our Lady told her that for the rest of her life she would have one yearly apparition, on March 18. Since August 2, 1987, on each second day of the month, Our Lady has appeared to her until July 2, 2020, at which time her monthly apparitions were discontinued. Mirjana is married, has two children, and lives with her family in Medjugorje. The prayer intention that Our Lady confided to Mirjana: for unbelievers, those who have not come to know the love of God.
Here is what Mirjana says on the responsibilities the apparitions bring: “I say it always, every time someone asks me about my annual apparition or the apparitions on the second of each month: it is as if I see the Gospa for the very first time; every time I feel the same excitement, the same joy, and --alas-- the same grief and pain when she has gone away again. Every apparition is a new, great event.... I have no idea what happens during the time of an apparition. I am often asked about this, and about the mimicry reactions in my face. Whenever I am with the Gospa, I am in a different world. I have no idea at all what I am doing during the apparition, what countenance I have. I just do not know anything about it. My happy and sad reactions were probably related to what we were talking about.
The Gospa repeats quite often that we, as devout Catholics, have a great responsibility, and that is why she asks all pilgrims to ponder over their responsibilities. There is a nonbeliever living near every one of us, even in the same house, in our neighborhood, our village or town. This nonbeliever is watching us. He notices our reactions, our example, our prayer and our general way of behavior, our lifestyle. That is why I would like to ask all pilgrims coming to Medjugorje to ponder regularly about the enormous burden of this responsibility and come to understand it. Because we are responsible for those nonbelievers and lost souls, and we are invited to cause their conversion through our example.”
During an interview, Mirjana was asked: “Many people ask whether the Blessed Mother’s appearances here at Medugorje mean that we have entered the end times? Has the Blessed Mother said anything about the apocalypse or the secone coming of Christ?” Mirjana responded: “That is part of the secrets. I would not like to talk about it.” The interviewer then said: “Should we be frightened”, and Mirjana responded: “No, not at all. I’ve seen heaven. Nothing of the earth is worth one moment of worry. We are God’s children! If people only realized how much He loves us, and what He has prepared for us, they would be filled with such peace!” Next, the interviewer asked: “Mirjana, you are often quoted as saying that people who do not convert will have terrible suffering--is that true”, and Mirjana then responded: “Yes, that is nothing new for Christians. God created us for Himself, but He gave us free will. Those who use their freedom to choose things that are not of God will suffer the tortures of children of Satan. God gives His children heaven, but Satan enslaves his children in hell.”
Marija Pavlovic-Lunetti
Marija was born on April 1, 1965, in Bijakovici, in the parish of Medjugorje. She has had daily apparitions since June 25, 1981. She for many years put herself at the disposal of pilgrims in Medjugorje, and impresses with her calmness and serenity. She has also traveled a lot, giving testimony about the apparitions throughout the world. Through her, Our Lady gives her message to the parish and the world. From March 1, 1984, to January 8, 1987, the message was given every Thursday, and since January, 1987, on every 25th of the month. Our Lady has so far entrusted nine
secrets to her. Marija is married and she has four children. With her family, she lives in Italy and in Medjugorje. The prayer intention that Our Lady confided to Marija: for the souls in purgatory.
In an interview following one of her daily apparitions, Marija gave the following responses:
“I have a relationship with Our Lady of course, but in many ways everything is as on the first day of apparitions. I feel so small, so insignificant and unworthy in the face of awesomeness, the immensity of this.”
”Yes we have (seen heaven, hell, and purgatory). We saw as in a vision--although Vicka and Jakov were taken there physically. Heaven is an immense space full of light. Not like the light on earth. A special light. The souls there were full of joy and peace. They wore pastel-colored robes--blue, gray, pink, and yellow. All were the same age; not young, not old, none fat, none thin.”
“We didn’t see anyone in purgatory. Everything was ashen gray. We could sense suffering and hear crying. Not physical suffering but spiritual suffering. Our Lady said that the souls in purgatory have much need of our prayers.”
“Well, we saw hell. I think Our Lady showed us hell to underline that it is a reality. And no soul goes to hell other than through choice. The soul chooses hell. We saw a huge sea of fire. A young, very beautiful girl went into this fire. We saw her come out looking something of a wild beast.”
“I’m more so (calm, serene) since meeting Our Lady. Above all I try to focus on the eternal life. This life on earth passes in a second’s flash. That has been for me the great change within myself. Through prayer I always try to focus on the eternal life, the real life.”
“Yes, the Holy Mass should always be at the center of our lives. The Holy Mass is something Our Lady always talks about.”
“Our Lady told me that if priests really fully understood the power of a priest’s blessing, then priests would bless all day long.”
“Yes, I believe that all the major things that happen to us happen by Divine providence. How we cope with this is up to our own free will. If we accept God’s will, then we grow spiritually.”
During another interview, Marija was asked: “Does the Blessed Mother say anything about the unity of the churches?”, and she answered: “Yes. She asks us to pray for the unity of the churches.” Then Marija was asked: “Is the use of the rosary a universal request, since it is so traditionally Catholic?”, and she answered: “Yes. It is a request from the Blessed Mother. She recommends that all people on earth pray the rosary, no matter what their religion of belief.” Then the interviewer asked: “Do you know if this is the Blessed Mother’s last apparition on earth”, and Marija responded: “Yes, The Blessed Mother said that this is her last apparition on earth, where we can touch her, see her, and talk to her.” The interviewer then asked: “Do you know why?”, and Marija responded: “After the secrets are realized, the Blessed Mother will not need to come anymore.”
Locutionaries
Jelena Vasilj nor Marijana Vasilj, the two locutionaries, were not one of the original six visionaries; but they saw and heard Our Lady in an interior way. Both girls heard Our Lady’s voice and see Her in two dimensions.
At just ten years old in December of 1982, Jelena began to hear Our Lady’s voice and see Her in an interior way, which she describes as “intense presence of Mary… an experience of the heart,” or as seeing the Blessed Mother with “the eyes of the heart.” These experiences are called “interior locutions.”
Several months later in March of 1983, Jelena’s friend Marijana Vasilj (the two are friends but are not related) began to see Our Lady interiorly as well. Marijana saw Our Lady interiorly for the first time on March 19, 1983, but didn't hear Her voice until October 5, 1983.
Our Lady soon asked the two girls to bring together other young people within the parish who would respond to her invitation to join in a prayer group that Our Lady would lead through Jelena and Marijana. Jelena and Marijana’s messages are different from the messages of the other visionaries as they specifically relate to the teachings and guidance of this group who committed themselves to living intensely the messages of Our Lady and to be used by Her for Her purposes.
As both girls were young, the prayer group stayed together for many years, being assisted by Father Tomislav Vlasic and Father Slavko Barbaric. Eventually, after graduating from secondary school, Jelena came to the United States to attend Steubenville University, and later a University in Rome, while Marijana married and settled in a village near Medjugorje. Their interior locutions began to diminish until they eventually stopped altogether.
Jelena Vasilj
The messages of Our Lady through Jelena continue to give support and guidance to people around the world who seek to understand from Our Lady how to live a profound spiritual life. Among the most powerful words given by Our Lady to Jelena are the consecrations to the Heart of Jesus and the Immaculate Heart of Mary given on November 28, 1983.
Jelena once asked Our Lady if she could know the ten secrets. Our Lady replied to her with these words: “I do not appear to you as to the other six because my plan is different. To them I entrusted messages and secrets. Forgive me if I cannot tell you the secrets which I have entrusted to them. This is a grace which is for them, but not for you. I appeared to you for the purpose of helping you to progress in spiritual life and through your intermediary I want to lead people to holiness.”
In 2005, Jelena answered some questions put to her by Sister Stefania Consoli for the Echo of Mary magazine. Here are just a few of those questions and answers:
So what is the correct attitude to assume when we suffer: “There are three possible approaches. The first is when a person feels he is crushed by suffering and seeks to resist and fight back. In this case, the person becomes aggressive, even unbearable, for those around him because he wants at all costs to control his own life. The second option is to feel so crushed as to become passive. The person refuses to cooperate and becomes depressed. The third option is what I would call a type of “dance” where it is necessary for the person to collaborate. In this dance you feel yourself being carried up by God’s energy: the source of this energy is not yours, as it is God who leads. You, however, are not passive, not a puppet being pulled around by God. An interaction takes place. I think suffering must be lived thus, as a dance together with the Holy Spirit. He inspires you, shows you the steps, and you--through following him--express an act of will. This way, suffering need not be lived as something destructive, or as a defeat. It is important that we neither resign ourselves nor want to impose our will on our lives, otherwise we would find ourselves fighting against God.”
Mary often refers to suffering as something to be lived as an offering to God. Man, though, is afraid of suffering. In a world that teaches us to avoid and even anesthetize it, the words of Mary come to counteract this ida, they come as a medicine. What would you say?: “I recently read a book by Benedict XVI called Maria, Chiesa Nascente. A lot of its expressions are still impressed in my mind, and I want to use them to say what I’m thinking. You know, without Mary the Church would be nothing more than an organization of persons, and peoples, who try to make a project work. Mary, instead, helps us to understand who the Church really is. She is the Church-bride, the Church who listens, the Church who in a certain way subjects herself--even though this word is not very popular today. In short, the Church is aware of being betrothed to Christ, not an autonomous Church that’s ‘in business’. That is why Mary at Medjugorje asks us above all to learn from the Bridegroom, to let ourselves be led by Him, as she did. In this perspective Mary becomes the central figure in the life of the Church. Yes, and without Mary our spirituality would risk being mere activism. Only she can teach us to pray. These days prayer is in a crisis, as is listening with the heart to God. So it is right that she should come to teach us again. Without Mary we cannot be what we ought to be! So rather than “doing” prayer, perhaps we should learn something from Mary’s way of being. She is a sign of what each of us should be before God. I think it is a great injustice eto be deprived of Mary. We need her.”
Do you have a word for the Church of today?: “I strongly feel the universality of the Church. I think that we have a very big family and that we can’t close ourselves up in our own little family. I am a mother of children, but I see how they share my same destiny, which is to be a part of this big family. So the word you ask for is: Love!”
Marijana Vasilj
Despite being one of the two Medjugorje locutionaries, Marijana is a modest, self-effacing young woman, and is not well-known among pilgrims. She was married on November 27, 1993, and has three children.
In 2009, Marijana answered some questions put to her in an interview by Father James Mulligan in Medjugorje. Here are just a few of those questions and answers:
Could you remind us how the inner locutions began for you?: “The inner locutions started three months after they began for Jelena. This happened for the first time on March 19, 1983. I was praying with Jelena in a small prayer group for the three months previous and then, together with Jelena, I saw Our Lady in an interior way. I heard Our Lady’s voice for the first time on October 5, 1983. I was twelve years old. During the locutions I did not see Our Lady physically, but if I can explain it this was: I saw an image of Our Lady in the way we see people in our dreams. Above all there was the very strong feeling of Our Lady’s presence. In the beginning, actually for the first few years, Our Lady spoke to me daily. Then it was three times a week when she was giving messages to our big prayer group. After this I would hear Our Lady from time to time, up until 1991. Since that time, I have not received any messages from Our Lady.”
If you had to isolate one point in Our Lady’s locutions, what would it be?: “It is difficult to stress one particular thing or one particular moment. Everything that Our Lady has said has such great importance for all of us--and I mean each one of us. Our Lady wishes to guide us to her Son, Our Savior Jesus Christ.” That’s one point it seems to me that needs to be “isolated” as you asked.
Priests
“Our Lady always asks us to always pray for our priests.” In Our Lady’s message of April 2, 2007, Mirjana said that: “Our Lady added: ’Your shepherds need your prayers.’ Our Lady blessed all of us, and all religious articles, and once again emphasized that she gives her motherly blessing. But the greatest blessing is the blessing from the priests.”
It is awesome to be a pilgrim at Medjugorje, and to see at times forty, fifty, or more priests unselfishly giving their time to participate in Mass or hear confessions for hours at a time. At communion time the priests leave the altar and spread out to give hundreds of pilgrims communion during the evening mass. It really is beautiful to see.
There are two priests that deserve special mention in this booklet because of their unselfish service to the Medjugorje community and to the thousands of pilgrims that come there. The first priest, Father Slavco served the community in the early years of Our Lady’s apparitions at Medjugorje., and the second priest, Father Petar Ljubicic, is serving the community in these remaining days of Our Lady’s apparitions at Medjugorje.
Father Slavco Barbaric
Thanks to his knowledge of the main European language and despite his numerous obligations in different parishes, Father Slavko put himself ceaselessly at the service of Medjugorje pilgrims from the time he finished his studies and came back to the country in 1982. He was officially sent to Medjugorje in 1983.
Father Slavko’s books have been translated in twenty languages and more than 20 million copies have been printed in the whole world. He published also numerous articles in various publications. He was editor of the St Francis’ Bulletin in Capljina, collaborated in Krsni Zavicaj, Glas Mira and the Radio “Mir” Medjugorje. He gave unceasingly conferences for pilgrims, animated adoration of the Blessed Sacrament, veneration of the Cross, the rosary up the Apparition Hill, the Way of the Cross on the Mount Krizevac, where he finished his earthly life. He animated annual meetings for priests and youth, in the prayer house of the Franciscan province “Domus Pacis” he animated “Fasting and prayer retreats”. The destructions of the war inspired him to found and lead an institution for the education and care of the young, the “Mother’s Village”, where more than 60 persons have found their home (war orphans, children from separated families, unwed mothers, elderly abandoned persons and sick children). If there was a man who loved children, it was Fr. Slavko. Children loved him in return: they always gathered around him and he knew always how to gather them – just like Jesus! His psychotherapeutic formation and education allowed him to work with drug addicts in the Community of the Cenacolo, founded by Sister Elvira, mostly in their house in Medjugorje, “Campo della vita”.
He oriented the help received from the whole world in two directions: “Foundation for children of deceased defenders” who died during the war, and “Foundation of friends of talents” to help students.
Father Slavko traveled throughout the whole world, spreading the message of peace and reconciliation of Our Lady. He was the soul and the heart of the peace movement born in Medjugorje. He had wonderful gifts: knowledge of languages, facility of communicating with people, education, simplicity, care for human beings in need, inexhaustible energy – one could not believe that one single man could have it, diligence, and above all piety, humility, charity. He prayed and he fasted a lot, he loved Our Lady with a childlike love. It was, in fact, the essence of his life: through prayer and fasting to take souls to God through Mary - the Queen of Peace.
Father Slavko died on November 24, 2000 at 3.30 p.m. After the Way of the Cross, that he animated usually every Friday on the Hill of Krizevac for parishioners and pilgrims, he felt some pain. He sat down on a rock, then lay down on the ground, lost consciousness and gave his soul over to the Lord.
Father Petar Ljubicic
Father Petar was born on October 28, 1946 in Prisoje, Tomislavgrad. In 1967, he entered the Franciscan Order in the province of Herzegovina, and in 1972, he was ordained a priest. He studied theology at Sarajevo and Koenigstein. He was parish vicar in Vitina, Tihaljina and Seonica, and from 1984 to 1995 in Medjugorje. After leaving Medjugorje, he was serving in the Croatian Catholic Mission in Switzerland. He is author of several books about the events at Medjugorje. During his stay at Medjugorje and later, he took part in numerous prayer gatherings organized by Medjugorje pilgrims all over Europe.
Father Petar is the priest chosen by Mirjana to reveal the Ten Secrets. Mirjana has stated that Father Petar does not have the choice whether to reveal the secrets or not. He has accepted this responsibility and must fulfill it.
According to Father Petar: “I know that the first three secrets are related to Medjugorje. The first two secrets will be a warning and a great warning. It will confirm to the world that Our Lady appeared in Medjugorje and the seers were telling the truth. The third secret will be the indestructible sign that many souls will address, and the other secrets will most likely be earthquake events that will shake the world and invite many to turn and fear nothing. I suspect that every day we are getting closer to discovering the secrets of Medjugorje.”
On October 28, 2020, Father Petar will be 74 years old. The average age of a male in Bosnia is 74-75 years old. Therefore, it can only be presumed that the revelation of the ten secrets of Medjugorje must not be far off!!!
Secrets
At Medjugorje, Our Lady gave the children ten secrets, but not all of the children have received all ten of the secrets. Very little is known about the ten secrets, though we do know that some of them have to do with chastisements for the world. Here is what is known about the secrets:
1. Mirjana knows all ten secrets and the day and date of their release. She has been given the responsibility of revealing them to a priest of her choice who will then reveal them to the world. She chose Father Petar Ljubicic. Ten days before the first secret is to take place, she will give Father Petar the scroll/parchment containing the ten secrets. During the ten days, Father Petar, along with Mirjana, is to spend the first seven days in fasting and prayer. Three days before the event takes place, Father Petar is to release it to the world. At the proper time, he will then be able to see and read the second secret, and the third, etc., according to the schedule of Heaven, Mirjana has said that Father Petar does not have the right to choose whether or not to release the secrets; he accepted the mission and has to fulfill it according to God’s will.
2. Mirjana explained that the first secret will break the power of Satan and his followers whom the Blessed Mother told her have been given tremendous powers never available to them before. After the first secret is revealed, these powers will never be given to them again.
3. Only Mirjana knows the second secret and has not revealed anything about it.
4. The third secret has been described by all six visionaries as a permanent, indestructible, and beautiful sign on Apparition Hill at the site of the first apparition of Our Lady.
5. Before the visible sign is given to mankind, there will be three warnings to the world. The warnings will be in the form of events on earth. Mirjana will be a witness to them and her witness will be a confirmation of the apparitions and a stimulus for the conversion of the world.
6. After the first admonition (warning), the others will follow in a rather short time. Thus, people will have some time for conversion. That interval will be a period of grace and conversion.
7. After the admonitions (warnings), the visible sign will appear on the site of the apparition in Medjugorje for all the people to see. The sign will be given as a testimony confirming the apparitions and in order to call people back to faith.
8. After the sign appears, those who are still alive will have little time for conversion. For that reason, the Blessed Virgin invites us to urgent conversion and reconciliation. The invitation to prayer and penance is meant to avert evil and war, but most of all to save souls.
9. The ninth and tenth secrets are serious. They concern chastisement for the sins of the world. Punishment is inevitable, for we cannot expect the whole world to be converted. The punishment can be diminished by prayer and penance, but it cannot be eliminated.
10. Mirjana says that one of the evils that threatened the world, the one contained in the seventh secret, has been averted thanks to prayer and fasting. That is why the Blessed Virgin continues to encourage fasting and prayer: “You have forgotten that through prayer and fasting you can avert wars and suspend the laws of nature.”
Scroll (Parchment)
For the first 18 months, Our Lady came to Mirjana every day. Then on December 23, 1982, Our Lady appeared to her as usual, and told her: “On Christmas Day, I will appear to you for the last time.”
On Christmas Day, December 25, 1982, Mirjana said that Our Lady gave her a precious gift. Our Lady told Mirjana that she would appear to her once a year, on March 18, for the rest of her life. March 18 is Mirjana’s birthday, but, according to Mirjana that day was not chosen because of her birthday.
Mirjana said: “Only when the things contained in the secrets start to happen will the world understand why she chose the 18th of March. The significance of the date will be clear. She also said that I would experience some additional apparitions. She then held out something like a roll-up scroll, explaining that all ten secrets were written on it, and that I should show it to the priest I choose when the time comes to reveal them. I took it from her hand without looking at it.’
Our Lady then said: “Now you will have to turn to God in faith like any other person. Mirjana, I have chosen you; I have confided in you everything that is essential. I have also shown you many terrible things. You must now bear it all with courage. Think of me and think of the tears I must shed for that. You must remain brave. You have quickly grasped the messages. You must also understand now that I have to go away. Be courageous.”
After Our Lady’s departure, Mirjana said: “I realized that I was still holding the scroll she had given me. Having always seen Our Lady as a physical being, it seemed natural at that time to take the object (the scroll) from her hand, just as I would from anyone. But now that the apparition was over, I was awestruck to see the scroll still with me. How did that happen? I wondered. How am I holding an object from Heaven? Like so many observances over the previous 18 months, I could only explain it as a mystery from God. Beige in color, the scroll was made of a material akin to parchment--not quite paper and not quite fabric, but perhaps something in between. I carefully unrolled it and found all ten secrets written in a simple and elegant cursive handwriting. There were no decorations or illustrations on the parchment; each secret was described in simple, clear words, similar to how Our Lady originally explained them to me. The secrets were not numbered, but they appeared in order, one after another, with the first secret at the top and the tenth at the bottom, and included the dates of the future events.”
Regarding the Secrets, Mirjana said: “I cannot divulge much more about the secrets, but I can say this---Our Lady is planning to change the world. She did not come to announce our destruction; she came to save us, and with her Son, she will triumph over evil. If our Mother has promised to defeat evil, then what do we have to fear?”
Stones
One lovely day in the history of Israel, the figure of Goliath came forth. He was a strong man, proud and invincible. Although Israel was incapable of imagining how it might defeat such a strong warrior, the Lord knew how to do it. He chose a young boy, a shepherd named David. The Lord told him to gather five stones in the river and face the giant. Trusting only in God’s help, David went forth; he defeated and killed Goliath.
Our Lady has suggested that, like David, we put five stones into our sack in order to overcome the atheism that surrounds us, that paganistic mentality that is being disseminated and seems invincible. These gifts, the five stones, have not been given to us as a gratuitous perfection, but in order to develop our spiritual potentialities, to cause the growth of the seeds, which will sprout forth if they fall upon fertile soil.
Neither we nor the Church are capable of conquering materialism on our own. Our Lady has appeared in Medjugorje to declare that this is possible. The five stones that we must place in our sack are Prayer, Fasting, the Mass, the Bible, and Confession; these stones are the true medicines that restore us to health once again, the way through the Red Sea, leading us to the shore where we find peace. With these simple weapons we overcome the world.
Prayer
Prayer is the first weapon in our knapsack. We must begin praying now so that we may be transformed and raise ourselves up with others as well. Priests, parents, everyone, must pray. Prayer is a gift and a principal weapon given to the Church. The Church is neither an idea nor a political party; it is a family that prays, a family that loves.
Our Lady wept when she appeared upon Krizevac, because Christians no longer pray. Her tears are a medication for us; they fall upon our heart made of stone in order to transform it. Our Lady tells us that to pray means to live as the Church lives. Let us take the gift of faith in the presence, love, and providence of God. It is developed if a family prays together, if we learn to live with the Lord. He who prays knows how to love; he who loves knows how to pray. Many families no longer live love because they no longer are united in prayer.
Our Lady insists upon prayer, especially the Rosary, in order to transform the world. The Blessed Mother continues at Medjugorje to ask all people on earth, of all religions and beliefs, to meditate on the life of her Divine Son Jesus each day by praying all fifteen decades of the Rosary. The fruit of such prayer, she reminds people, is enlightenment, which brings peace in the heart, peace in the families, peace in cities, peace in nations, and peace in the world. The history of nations where the Rosary is prayed by the population demonstrates that peace and prosperity are fruits of the Rosary.
Prayer groups have been requested by the Blessed Mother. She asks that all people on earth form prayer groups as a personal spiritual support system in these times. The Blessed Mother has even given the rules for the prayer groups.
Per Our Lady: “You know, dear children, that God grants special graces in prayer....I call you, dear children, to prayer with the heart. Without unceasing prayer, you cannot experience the beauty and greatness of the grace which God is offering you.”
Fasting
The second gift, another stone in our sack, is fasting: from cigarettes, from television, from an evil thought, from a negative project, and from food. Fasting demonstrates our individual capacity to love and affirms that we are important for everyone. Fasting is medicine and a sacrifice. With fasting egotism is defeated. He who knows how to fast is capable of hearing his neighbor, of being available for others, and of understanding how to love the entire world. He who fasts sees himself and others truthfully and is aware of how to cleanse his inner self. Our weakness is nothing if we possess the ability to love. Even our own physical sufferings, if offered to the Lord, are a gift.
The Blessed Mother has requested all people on earth, of all religions and beliefs, to fast voluntarily on Wednesdays and Fridays for world peace. During the Bosnian war, people of all beliefs, from all over the world, fasting from non necessities themselves, sent money, food, clothes, blankets, and medical supplies to share with the less fortunate caught in the war. If people learn to fast for the love of God and one another, no one on earth will do without. All will have enough.
Per Our Lady: “Fast strictly on Wednesdays and Fridays. The best fast is on bread and water. Through fasting and prayer one can stop wars, one can suspend the natural laws of nature....Works of charity cannot replace fasting .... Everyone except the sick has to fast .... To all who wish to ask me questions I will answer: There is only one path--prayer, strong faith, and fasting .... Pray for the gift of love, for the gift of faith, for the gift of prayer, for the gift of fasting.?
The Mass and Eucharist
The Eucharist is the third stone. In May, Our Lady admonished us, “You do not know how to live the Mass.” The Mass is not simply a rite; it is a mystery and a gift of the Lord. It is a sacrament which cannot be comprehended without humility. We are unable to celebrate the Mass without a humble heart, which casts aside the garment of pride. The white garment of the priest is a symbol of humility and of liberation from sin.
In the Mass the Incarnation occurs, the transubstantiation of the bread and wine. This is also a sign of our transformation: from death we are brought to life. The Mass transforms the Christian, transforms the Church, because with the Mass Jesus is offered completely to the Church. The Mass is the origin of the Church, the Mystical Body. The Mass-Sacrifice renders the Church a holy family.
In the Mass one is born again if one’s own life is placed upon the altar as a sacrifice, in the manner of Jesus. We are the drop of water poured into the wine; the Church is united with the Blood of Jesus. Therefore we must not just listen to the Holy Mass but live it. Without the Mass the Church does not exist; without it the Church is an orphan.
Per Our Lady: “Mass is the greatest prayer of God. You will never be able to understand its greatness. That is why you must be perfect and humble at Mass, and you should prepare for it. May the Mass, the most exalted and powerful act of your prayer, be the center of your spiritual life.”
Bible
The Bible which illuminates the path in the dense fog of ideologies is the fourth stone for the Christian of today. In our homes, we know where the salt is, where the flour is, and where to find the sugar in the kitchen. But where is the Bible in our home? When do we read the Bible with our family?
The Bible is not one of many books, it is the Christian’s flag. Deprived of the Bible, the Christian is no longer the same person. The Bible is born from the heart of the Lord; it is His Word. Therefore it must remain in first place within the family. It must be set in a place of honor, and that place must be sacred for us. It must be the source of our prayer. The Bible illuminates the Christian’s walk amid doubt and conflicting ideologies today.
The only international language that binds people together in peace and abundance is the sacred Word and will of God. The Blessed Mother at Medjugorje asks all people on earth to read the sacred books daily and allow their meaning to be realized in the behavior of daily living.
Per Our Lady: “Dear children, today I call you to read the Bible every day in your homes and let it be in a visible place so as always to encourage you to read it and pray. Every family must pray prayers and read the Bible.”
Reconciliation
Confession is the fifth stone. Our Lady requests monthly confession of us. The purpose of Confession is not to recount one’s actions; it is not a psycho-analytical session. It is a sacrament and a source of peace with oneself in the meeting with the Lord. In Confession we obtain the peace of the Lord so that we may transmit it to others.
The Blessed Mother warns all people of all nations: “Hurry and be reconciled.” The Blessed Mother asks people to quickly make peace with one another and with God. A sacramental way for those who are able is sacramental confession, a means of starting life over again with a clean slate. The Blessed Mother tells the world at Medjugorje that the giving and receiving of forgiveness is the only path to peace.
A proud person does not know how to confess; humility leads to confession and conversion. To confess well we must prepare ourselves with fasting and prayer. The proper attitude is that of opening ourselves up before the Lord: “I have brought you my heart. Transform it for me, and give it back to me renewed.” This is what occurs in Confession, which is both a sacrament and a mystery.
Per Our Lady: “Pray, pray! It is necessary to believe firmly, to go to confession regularly, and, likewise, to receive Holy Communion. It is the only salvation. Monthly confession will be a remedy for the Church in the West. One must convey this message to the West. If confession does not mean anything for you, really, you will be converted with great difficulty.”
Apparition Hill
The Hill of Podbrdo (Apparition Hill) is the place where the Medjugorje events started. It is on this hill that Our Lady first appeared to six children back in 1981. Along the steep, rocky path that leads from the houses there are 15 bronze reliefs which represent the joyful, sorrowful and glorious mysteries of the Rosary. The Statue of Our Lady, Queen of Peace, at the top of the hill, was placed there for the 20th anniversary of the apparitions and it marks the Apparition Site.
Blue Cross
There are in fact two blue crosses at Medjugorje - an upper and lower - located at the base of the hill known as Podbrdo or Apparition Hill. The upper blue cross is the original location; the lower blue cross was erected not too many years ago to accommodate Ivan’s prayer group. It is at the lower blue cross where Our Lady appeared to Mirjana during her monthly apparition on the 2nd of each month. The last of these monthly apparitions to Mirjana occurred on June 2, 2020.
The pilgrims vouch for the power of prayer and peaceful atmosphere to be found at the Blue Cross. Countless apparitions and healings have taken place there over the long history of the Medjugorje phenomenon.
Heaven, Hell, Purgatory
At both Medjugorje and Fatima, the children were shown a vision of hell.
Two of the Medjugorje visionaries, Vicka and Jakov, were physically taken to Heaven, Purgatory, and Hell. They are the only two human beings in the history of the world who were physically in body, taken by the hand by the Holy Virgin Mary, to Heaven, Purgatory and hell. The other visionaries were shown a vision of Heaven, Purgatory, and hell. Our Lady told the visionaries that many people do not believe that Heaven, Purgatory, and hell exist and that She desired the visionaries to be witnesses of their existence through their experiences. All six of the Medjugorje visionaries have said that there are no words to describe the beauty of Heaven and if we knew what awaits us in Heaven, there are no difficulties or trials that we experience that won’t be worth eternal life in Heaven.
At Fatima, the first secret of Fatima was the vision of hell that the children received from the Blessed Virgin during the July apparition. The mysterious lady moved her hand and rays of light streamed out, opening what seemed to be a sea of fire in the ground, and the children saw a powerful, yet brief vision of the suffering of souls in Hell, tormented by terrible demons. The children would never doubt the existence of Hell, since they had seen it. The first secret was a vision of Hell but is especially related to a crusade against Hell. The three children had a special hope that allowed them to sustain the vision of Hell. In the very first apparition, Mary had promised to take them to Heaven. So, they knew — even as they saw the poor souls suffering the torments of Hell — that they were far beyond the reaches of the Evil One and his army of demons. They would be granted the bliss of Heaven but were still troubled by the state of those poor sinners who would be condemned to Hell.
AFTER THE APPARITIONS
Medjugorje on the Web (Internet)
Our Lady’s Messages
Here are two ways to retrieve all the messages given by Our Lady over the past 39 years. And, they can be filtered by key words, which is a wonderful opportunity to get a better understanding of why Our Lady has been appearing at Medjugorje, and what she has been trying to tell us.
On the internet, the address for the messages is: https://www.medjugorje.org/olmpage.htm/
From the App Store there is an App named:The Medjugorje Web, inc.. This app is really good and easy to use. It is suggested that readers go to the app and enter the following keywords, which are used frequently by Our Lady in her messages, to see what she has been telling the visionaries, and us, at Medjugorje: Prayer, God, Conversion, Rosary, Satan, Heaven, Forgiveness, Reconciliation, etc. Feel free to try other keywords, or phrases, to again see what Our Lady wants us to hear such as: Time of Grace, Heavenly Father, Motherly Heart, etc.
Live Access
There is a wonderful app named Marytv.tv (https://marytv.tv/), where can be seen live activity at Medjugorje including Apparition Hill, Cross Mountain, and at the Church. Please keep in mind the difference in time between the USA and Medjugorje as follows: Pacific - 4 hours; Mountain - 5 hours;
Central - 6 hours; Eastern - 7 hours.
STATUS OF APPROVAL
The criterion for judging the truth of a private revelation is its orientation to Christ himself, in that it doesn't lead people away from Jesus, but urges them toward closer communion with Christ and the Gospel.
The writings of St. John of the Cross emphasized that God said everything he had to say in Jesus Christ -- in his one and only son and Word. "Any person questioning God or desiring some vision or revelation would be guilty not only of foolish behavior but also of offending him, by not fixing his eyes entirely on Christ and by living with the desire for some other novelty," the saint wrote.
According to Pope Benedict XVI the church never requires the faithful to believe in apparitions, not even those recognized by the church. Church approval of a private revelation, in essence, is just the church's way of saying the message is not contrary to the faith or morality.
To help bishops determine the credibility of alleged Marian apparitions, the Vatican had translated and published procedural rules from 1978 that had previously been available only in Latin. The "Norms regarding the manner of proceedings in the discernment of presumed apparitions or revelations" were approved by Pope Paul VI in 1978 and distributed to the world's bishops, but never officially published or translated into modern languages.
More than 1,500 visions of Mary have been reported around the world, but in the past century, only nine cases have received church approval as worthy of belief. Determining the veracity of an apparition falls to the local bishop, and the Vatican's doctrinal congregation established the norms to guide the process. Granting approval is never brief, with some cases taking hundreds of years. Visionaries and witnesses must be questioned and the fruits of the apparitions, such as conversions, miracles and healings, must be examined.
According to the norms, the local bishop should set up a commission of experts, including theologians, canonists, psychologists and doctors, to help him determine the facts, the mental, moral and spiritual wholesomeness and seriousness of the visionary, and whether the message and testimony are free from theological and doctrinal error.
A bishop can come to one of three conclusions: He can determine the apparition to be true and worthy of belief; he can say it is not true, which leaves open the possibility for an appeal; or he can say that at the moment he doesn't know and needs more help. In the last scenario, the investigation is brought to the country's bishops' conference. If that body cannot come to a conclusion, the matter is turned over to the pope, who delegates the doctrinal congregation to step in and give advice or appoint others to investigate.
The alleged apparitions at Medjugorje in Bosnia-Herzegovina are an example of a situation in which the country's bishops requested the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith to intervene. In that case, the congregation established an international commission in 2010 to investigate the claims of six young people who said Mary had appeared to them daily beginning in 1981. The apparitions purportedly continue and thousands travel to the small town each month to meet the alleged seers and to pray.
The apparitions at Medjugorje have not yet been approved by the Catholic Church. Over the years, the Church’s position, and that of the local hierarchy, re these apparitions have not been particularly favorable, even though Pope John Paul II declared on February 24, 1990, that “Medjugorje is the spiritual center of the world”.
Likewise, the position of Pope Francis has also not been particularly clear. But, in a very positive move, he assigned Archbishop Henryk Hoser to Medjugorje as first his “envoy”, and more recently as the “Apostolic Visitator for the Parish of Medjugorje”,
On December 7, 2017, it was reported by Aleteia News that Archbishop Henryk Hoser, Archbishop Emeritus of Warszawa-Prague, in his role as Pope Francis’ envoy to Medjugorje, said the following: “It still falls to the pope to make final decision on commission’s report about veracity of reported apparitions. The devotion of Medjugorje is allowed. It’s not prohibited, and need not be done in secret”.
Formerly, pilgrimages to the site were not to be organized by official Church groups, though the faithful could make them privately or through other organizations. Now, the stance on officially-organized pilgrimages will open. “My mission is precisely to analyze the pastoral situation and propose improvements,” the archbishop told Aleteia News, about his assignment at the shrine in Bosnia and Herzegovina, which has attracted millions of people since Marian apparitions reportedly began there in 1981.
“Today, dioceses and other institutions can organize official pilgrimages. It’s no longer a problem,” explained the archbishop, speaking to us from his residence in a Warsaw neighborhood. “Pope Francis recently asked an Albanian cardinal to give his blessing to the faithful present in Medjugorje,” he added.
“I am full of admiration for the work the Franciscans are doing there,” the Polish prelate reported. “With a relatively small team-there is only a dozen of them-they do a huge job of welcoming pilgrims. Every summer they organize a youth festival. This year, there were 50,000 young people from around the world, with more than 700 priests. There is a massive number of confessions. They have about 50 confessionals, which are not enough. These are very deep confessions,” he said.
“This is a phenomenon. And what confirms the authenticity of the place is the large amount of charitable institutions that exist around the sanctuary. And another aspect as well: the great effort that is being made at the level of Christian formation. Each year, they organize conferences at different levels, for various audiences (priests, doctors, parents, young people, couples …)”
“The decree of the former episcopal conference of what used to be Yugoslavia, which, before the Balkan war, advised against pilgrimages in Medjugorje organized by bishops, is no longer relevant,” he said.
There are other cases of locations of apparitions, like Kibeho, in Rwanda, where the diocesan bishop agreed to allow the devotion, and then continued the analysis for the recognition of the apparitions. The archbishop revealed that the conclusion of the Commission for the analysis of the apparitions of Medjugorje, which Benedict XVI had entrusted to Cardinal Camillo Ruini, appears to be favorable.
“What I find touching is that all the seers have turned to family life,” Archbishop Hoser reflected. “In our day and age, the family is of enormous importance. All of them have a family. Those who were teenagers at the time, are already grandmothers; 37 years have passed! But this decision will have to be made by the pope. The file is now at the Secretariat of State. I believe the final decision will be made,” concluded Archbishop Hoser.
On May 31, 1918, Pope Francis appointed Henryk Hoser as “Apostolic Visitator for the Parish of Medjugorje”.
On January 19, 2020, Pope Francis made the decision to authorize pilgrimages to Medjugorje, which can now be officially organized by dioceses and parishes and will no longer take place only in a private capacity which as had so far been the case. The announcement was made by the Apostolic Nuncio Luigi Pezzuto in Bosnia-Herzegovina and Archbishop Henryk Hoser, the Holy See's Special Apostolic Visitator during Mass at the parish shrine which has become a destination for millions of pilgrims,
The "ad interim" director of the Holy See Press Office, Alessandro Gisotti, responding to journalists' questions about the announcement, specified that : “The papal authorization must be accompanied by care to prevent these pilgrimages from being interpreted as an authentication of known events, which still require examination by the Church. Therefore, care must be taken to avoid creating confusion or ambiguity from the doctrinal point of view regarding such pilgrimages. This also concerns pastors of every order and level who intend to go to Medjugorje and celebrate or concelebrate there even in a solemn way".
The Holy See’s Press Office explains, “the mission of the Apostolic Visitor has the aim of ensuring a stable and continuous accompaniment to the parish community of Medjugorje and to the faithful who go there as pilgrims, and whose needs require particular attention."
CONCLUSION
God, our Heavenly Father, gave us our free will to use as we please. He also gave us the Ten Commandments to influence our actions. He gave us His Son to open the gates of Heaven for us. He has allowed Satan to test our resolve, discipline, and commitment. And, finally, He has given us Our Blessed Mother, and the Mother of His Son, Jesus Christ, to clarify for us all that we have already been told, and need to know, in order to get the Heaven. She even took two of the Medjugorje visionaries to Heaven so that they could see that indeed there is a heaven and also see its beauty and majesty. She also took them to see Hell and Purgatory.
At Medjugorje, the Virgin Mary has displayed, since June 24, 1981, the Power, Wisdom, and Merciful Tenderness conferred on her by the Adorable Trinity. She has caused miraculous things (signs) to occur. She has given thousands of beautiful messages as our loving mother to guide us in our journey to our eternal life. Our Lady’s message of June 2, 2016 was both beautiful, and concerning: ”... Many of my children do not see and do not hear because they do not want to. They do not accept my words and my works, yet through me, my Son calls everyone. His Spirit illuminates all of my children in the light of the Heavenly Father, in the unity of Heaven and Earth, in mutual love - because love invokes love and makes works more important than words. Therefore, my apostles, pray for your Church, love it and do works of love. No matter how betrayed or wounded, it is here because it comes from the Heavenly Father. Pray for your shepherds so that in them you may see the greatness of the love of my Son. Thank you.”
And she has given us prophesies in the form of secrets that are very, very serious. According to the visionary Mirjana who knows each of the secrets, the events prophesied within these secrets will be happening soon, for sure within her lifetime (Mirjana is 55 - in 2020), and also within the lifetime of Father Petar (who is 74 - in 20210). Since these secrets/prophesies are so serious, everyone should be made aware of these prophesies.
Regarding the secrets, Mirjana said: “I cannot divulge much more about the secrets, but I can say this--Our Lady is planning to change the world. She did not come to announce our destruction; she came to save us, and with her Son, she will triumph over evil. If our Mother has promised to defeat evil, then what do we have to fear?”
According to Mirjana, the events predicted by the Blessed Virgin are near and she proclaims to the world: “Convert as quickly as possible. Open your hearts to God.”
SOURCES
http://www.medjugorje.hr/en/medjugorje-phenomenon/detailed-description/
http://www.medjugorje.hr/en/medjugorje-phenomenon/apparitions/
https://www.patheos.com/blogs/mysticpost/2017/11/13/the-five-stones-of-medjugorje/
https://www.medjugorje.com/medjugorje/medjugorje-visionaries/jelena-a-marijana.html
https://cruxnow.com/global-church/2017/03/bishop-stops-publication-revelations-argentine-medjugorje/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Catholic_Church_in_Bosnia_and_Herzegovina#History
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Breakup_of_Yugoslavia#Death_of_Tito_and_the_weakening_of_Communism
https://www.vaticannews.va/en/pope/news/2019-05/pope-authorizes-pilgrimages-to-medjugorje.html
https://marytv.tv/bishop-mostar-duvno/
https://www.ncronline.org/news/vatican/vatican-publishes-rules-verifying-visions-mary
Roses in December Mary’s Garden of Miracles, by Dom Forker; Our Lady of Medjugorje
Meetings with Mary Visions of the Blessed Mother by Janice T. Connell; Medjugorje, Bosnia: since 1981
A Guide to Apparitions of our Blessed Virgin Mary - Part I 20th Century Apparitions by Peter Heinz; Medjugorje, Yugoslavia
Queen of the Cosmos - Interviews with the Visionaries of Medugorje by Jan Connell
Virgin, Mother, Queen - Encountering Mary in Time and Tradition by Robert L. Fastiggi and Michael O’Neill
Medjugorje - What’s Happening by James Mulligan
My Heart will Triumph by Mirjana Soldo