12/27/17

Priests are the Bridge


Medjugorje Visionary: “Priests are the bridge to the coming Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary.”



im

“In the end, my Immaculate Heart will triumph.”
-Our Lady of Fatima
On a day after the Medjugorje visionary, Mirjana, received her once a month apparition, she shared with pilgrims the following words, translated immediately into spoken English, by pilgrim guide, Miki Musa:
“If anyone is really privileged for Our Lady, we can speak about our priests, because she never said what they should do. She always talks about what we should do for them. They do not need you to judge and criticize them; they need your prayers and your love, because God will judge them as they were as priests, but God will judge you the way you treated your priests.
Our Lady says if you lose respect toward your priests, you will lose respect for your Church and for your God, as well. [In] the same way, during every second of the month apparition, she always says something about the importance of priests. For example, when she gives us her blessing, she says, “I am giving you my motherly blessing, but the greatest blessing you can receive on earth is the blessing that comes from your priests. When they bless you, it is my Son, Himself, blessing you.”
She also says, “Do not forget to pray for your shepherds. Their priestly hands are blessed by my Son.” That is why I am kindly asking of you, when you go back to your parishes, show to the others how we should respect our priests. If your priest is not doing [things] the way you think he should, do not judge him around. Take the rosary and pray to dear God for him. That would be the way to help him, and not to judge, because in this world that we live in, people judge and criticize so much, but there is so little love, and Our Lady desires that what we [all] may be seen through love and not to take into our own hands what only Our Heavenly Father, God, is supposed to do.
I’m sorry I cannot share with you more of what is supposed to happen [in the future], but I can tell you one thing. We have this time we are living in right now, and we have the time of the triumph of Our Lady’s heart. Between these two times, there is a bridge, and that bridge is our priests. That is why Our Lady insists so much that we pray for them, because that bridge needs to be strong enough for every one of us to cross it–because Our Lady said, “Alongside them [the priests], I will triumph,” which means that without priests, there is no triumph of Our Lady’s heart.
Just as in her message yesterday, Our Lady said not to judge our priests and not to forget that our Heavenly Father chose them. It is one thing for me to say what she said, but the expression of her face tells much more. I would say that she meant, “How do you dare to judge, because God is the one who is supposed to do it.” How can we take into our own hands what only God Himself is supposed to do? Because if God invited the priests, God will be the judge. Who are we to do it?

12/26/17

Patrick Latta Bob Sawyer Medjugorje


Published on Apr 24, 2015



Patrick Latta incredible interview on the fruits of Medjugorje

Medjugorje: Our Lady's Annual Apparition to JAKOV

ANNUAL APPARITION TO JAKOV ON DECEMBER 25TH 2017

date: 25.12.2017.
At the last daily apparition to Jakov Colo on September 12th, 1998, Our Lady told him that henceforth he would have one apparition a year, every December 25th, on Christmas Day. This is also how it was this year. The apparition began at 2:07 pm and lasted 10 minutes. Afterwards Jakov transmitted the message:
Dear children,
Today, on this day of grace, I am calling you to ask the Lord for the gift of faith. My children, decide for God and begin to live and to believe in that what God is calling you to. To believe, my children, means to surrender your lives into God's hands - the hands of the Lord who created you and who loves you immeasurably.  Do not be believers only in words but live and witness your faith through works and through your personal example. Speak with God as with your Father.  Open  and surrender  your hearts to Him and you will see how your hearts are changing and how your life will marvel at God's works in your life.  My children, there is no life without God and that is why, as your mother,  I intercede before, and pray to, my Son to renew your hearts and to fill your life with immeasurable love. Thank you for having responed to my call.

12/25/17

Medjugorje: Our Lady's message of December 25, 2017

“Dear children! Today I am bringing to you my Son Jesus for Him to give you His peace and blessing. I am calling all of you, little children, to live and witness the graces and the gifts which you have received. Do not be afraid. Pray for the Holy Spirit to give you the strength to be joyful witnesses and people of peace and hope. Thank you for having responded to my call.”


 Prayer to the Holy Spirit
  Come, O Most Holy Spirit, come to us today. We need your love, because we desire to go on the new way to return to the Father, to take the step to the Father. O Come, Holy Spirit, You who makes all things new. Today grant a miracle in us and through us. Change our hearts. Take from us our hearts of stone and give us a new heart, a heart that knows how to love, how to pray, how to forgive. A heart that knows how to embrace the cross and recognize the will of God and carry it to the end. Come, O Most Holy Spirit, You who are our peace, come fill us with peace. You who are love, fill us with love and blessing and salvation. We are not here accidentally. We have been called, that we may be able to recognize our call and our mission. We ask You to come O Most Holy Spirit, that our masks may melt away, that our true face may be revealed before You. Come, O Most Holy Spirit, may a miracle happen today: the beginning of our conversion, the beginning of our true devotion. Come, O Most Holy Spirit pour out Your grace and Your strength on Your Church and convert us. Sanctify us. Change us. Come, O Most Holy Spirit, we are the Church united together in prayer with the Mother. As the disciples at the very beginning, united together with Her in prayer for the gift of Your Spirit, for the gift of love, that we may be freed from selfishness and hatred, that we may be freed from every evil, and that we may start to love, that we may start to forgive and to pray, that we may start to fast. Come, O Most Holy Spirit. Come bless us. Come, change us. You who are prayer, come and anoint us with prayer that we may become the Church that believes in the power of prayer. Come, Most Holy Spirit, renew prayer in us, that we may become the renewers of family prayer.Come, O Most Holy Spirit, come heal us, come bless us, come convert us. O You who anoints with Your Peace, with Your Joy, with Your Love. Come anoint us.  Fr. Jozo

Madonna and Child

This is the Madonna and Child I painted for Noel, 2017


I like to paint Jesus as a happy baby and here he is smiling and playing with his toe, something babies love to do.      He is such a joy to all of us.     Merry Christmas everyone.     

12/21/17

You Just Need to Start


STRANGER’S WORDS LEAD MEDJUGORJE PILGRIM HOME TO THE CATHOLIC CHURCH


The following is the true story of a recent Tekton pilgrim, who traveled to Medjugorje, followed by retreat with Fr. Zlatko Sudac, from Nov. 28th to Dec. 8th, 2017.
“You just need to start.”
“Excuse me?” Sheila asked, turning to the man who had spoken to her out of nowhere.
“You just need to start,” the shopkeeper repeated, and returned to his work.
Sheila’s arms prickled with goosebumps and she stared at the man as he organized souvenirs on a nearby shelf. Start what? she wondered. She sensed that the man’s words were no accident. They were meant for her, and they held a deep meaning. Now, she just had to figure out what that meaning might be.
The question continued to plague her as she went about her day in Medjugorje. It was only her second day in the town, and she still felt slightly out of her element. A fallen-away Catholic, in a place that was distinctly Catholic. Crucifixes were everywhere, and paintings and statues of Mary and Jesus decorated nearly every wall. Looking at the schedule for the next eight days read like a total immersion in Catholicism – daily Mass, countless Rosaries, opportunities for Confession, and visits with priests, religious and supposed visionaries.
The following morning, Sheila stood at the foot of Cross Mountain. She had made up her mind before the pilgrimage began that she would not climb its rocky slopes. Plagued with knee problems – and with surgery scheduled for less than a month away – walking short distances on flat surfaces was difficult. There was absolutely no way her knees could withstand the strenuous and steep ascent of Cross Mountain.
But the shopkeeper’s words continued to play through her mind: “You just need to start.” She had prayed and prayed, attempting to decipher why the man, a complete stranger, had been led to say those words to her. She watched as one of her fellow pilgrims began the ascent, her heart beating hard in her chest. There was no way she could do this.
All things are possible with Christ,” the words came, unbidden, into her mind.  She took a deep breath, stepped onto the trail, and followed the shopkeeper’s advice.

CROSS MOUNTAIN

Sheila had been raised Catholic, but left the Church when she was 19, and she’d never looked back. Disturbed by a faith that seemed to be filled with people who made her feel judged and found wanting, where the judges themselves were hypocrites, she had gone to seek greener pastures. Pastures where Christians steeped themselves in the Bible, and where going to church was an experience in being fed, with vibrant pastors who set their congregations on fire for God’s Word and His will in their lives. She’d never experienced that within the Catholic Church, and found that her faith came alive when surrounded by such vibrant believers.
Her brother had hounded her for years to return to the Church, but she wanted no part of it. Every night before going to bed, she asked God, “Lord, was I pleasing to you today?” and as long as she felt the answer to that question was yes, she knew she was exactly where she was meant to be.
When her brother told her she needed to go to Medjugorje, and on retreat with Fr. Zlatko Sudac, she resisted. Her knee surgery was scheduled for a month after the retreat! She could barely walk around the grocery store, let alone walk around the town of Medjugorje. She had a daughter and grandchildren to care for at home, not to mention all of the help that she provided to her brother and his family. How could she possibly leave for ten days, handicapped and needed at home? Not only that, did she even want to go to this explicitly Catholic place, when she had been perfectly happy apart from the Church for more than thirty years? And would she feel strange, excluded, out of place, as the only non-Catholic among so many devout Catholics?
Nonetheless, when her brother offered to send her on the pilgrimage and retreat she was willing to pray about it. She’d seen the effect Medjugorje had had on her brother decades before, completely changing his life. She’d seen the changes within her mother as well, when she went more recently. And she couldn’t deny the draw of being on retreat with Fr. Sudac, a priest who had received the stigmata. She’d heard stories of his passion, commitment, and love for Christ, and she had heard that healing graces flowed abundantly at his retreats. While Sheila had accepted the medical crosses she bore, she couldn’t deny her deep desire for healing – whether spiritual or physical – if that was God’s will for her.
She prayed about it, and woke one morning with the certainty that she was meant to go to Medjugorje. Her brother booked the trip, Sheila packed her bags, and took the first step on an incredible journey.

FINDING MARY

There’s so much peace here, Sheila thought as she walked the streets of Medjugorje. Everyone was friendly, smiling, joyful even. Just imagine if you could just take this place and make the whole world so peaceful, she thought.
What was different? Where did the peace and joy come from? Sheila looked around and saw people with their rosary beads, praying together or quietly to themselves as they walked the city streets. She saw pilgrims kneeling in prayer before statues and images of the Blessed Mother. Swept up in the tide of everyone else’s prayer, she found herself praying the Rosary for the first time since childhood, and she noticed something truly remarkable within herself.
Peace.
Prayer was nothing new to Sheila. She prayed all the time, and yet her prayers had never brought the profound peace that she
experienced while praying the Rosary. And the peace didn’t end with the final Amen, but continued into the minutes and hours that followed.
This peace was the peace of Christ, but why could she feel it more strongly here, in Medjugorje, than she had felt it back home in Indianapolis? Why was it stronger when praying the Rosary than during a powerful sermon at church? Why did the people here exude such peace and joy, when many of the devout Christians she knew still struggled against doubts and anxiety?
The realization slowly dawned: It was Mary. Mary, the Blessed Mother, called “the Queen of Peace,” who brought Christ into the world and continued to bring Christ into the lives of people throughout the world. Sheila realized that it is Mary’s entire mission – loving her Son and helping others to know him and love him. Mary truly is the Queen of Peace, bringing Christ who is Peace to the people in Medjugorje!
A mother can talk to a mother, and suddenly Sheila found herself conversing with Mary as a mother – her mother and Christ’s mother, seeking her help, her advice, her intercession. Laying her worries at Mary’s feet and asking her to place them at the feet of her Son. Having done so, Sheila was blessed with a peace and a joy unlike anything she could remember ever experiencing in her life.

COMING HOME

One of her new Medjugorje friends continued to push Sheila to go to Confession, but she resisted. God knew her sins, and she had asked his forgiveness. Why did she have to confess to a man? Finally, she caved, and went to speak with the priest who had befriended her over the last few days. He took one look at her face and said, “Let’s go get coffee.” They walked to a nearby coffee shop and the world melted away as Sheila shared her story – the judgement and hypocrisy that had caused her to leave the Church, the lack of devotion and scriptural commitment that had kept her away, her longing to be fed in a church service which no Catholic Mass seemed to meet. For three and a half hours they talked, completely unaware of the time, the people coming and going, or the scheduled activities that they missed. Sheila sobbed as she laid it all out before this man of
God and, while he didn’t answer her every disagreement and skepticism, she left with the sure knowledge of one thing: it was time to come home to the Catholic Church.
The next day, the group left Medjugorje and traveled to the Island of Krk, for a three-day retreat with Fr. Zlatko Sudac. When Father began speaking that evening, Sheila was stunned. She had seen peace, joy, and a remarkable love of Christ in many people in the town of Medjugorje, but Fr. Sudac… his love for Christ seemed to emanate from every pore. Truly, this priest has the authority of God speaking through him, Sheila thought.
The days of retreat continued to build upon the previous days of pilgrimage. Medjugorje had a hugeimpact on her, but the effect of Fr. Sudac’s retreat was nothing less than profound. Sheila finally went to Confession, and felt “clean.” She witnessed a priest, in the midst of a vocational crisis, return from a brief conversation with Fr. Sudac filled with new joy. She felt the overwhelming influence of the Holy Spirit at work among each and every one of the retreat participants, and she experienced the joy of knowing that she was exactly where God wanted her to be.
By the end of the pilgrimage, Sheila fully understood the words of that shopkeeper. “You just need to start,” he said. The next morning, she had accepted those words as a sign that she was meant to climb Cross Mountain, against all odds. Miraculously, she had climbed to the fifth station – a feat she never thought she could accomplish – and made it safely back down. But with that first start, she had also opened her heart to many other starts – believing in the love, intercessory power, and Queenship of the Blessed Mother; offering forgiveness to those who had made her feel judged in the past; coming home to the Catholic Church; and recognizing that her desire to be “fed” at church was met, not through the words of a pastor, but through the Bread of Life who offers Himself to us at every Mass in the Eucharistic Feast.
To learn more, or to register for an upcoming Medjugorje pilgrimage and Father Sudac retreat, visit ourMedjugorje page.
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12/17/17

Fr. Jozo's Prayer to the Holy Spirit





Fr. Jozo's Prayer to the Holy Spirit in Siroki Brijeg October 3, 2000

Come, O Most Holy Spirit, come to us today. We need your love, because we desire to go on the new way to return to the Father, to take the step to the Father. O Come, Holy Spirit, You who makes all things new. Today grant a miracle in us and through us. Change our hearts. Take from us our hearts of stone and give us a new heart, a heart that knows how to love, how to pray, how to forgive. A heart that knows how to embrace the cross and recognize the will of God and carry it to the end. Come, O Most Holy Spirit, You who are our peace, come fill us with peace. You who are love, fill us with love and blessing and salvation. We are not here accidentally. We have been called, that we may be able to recognize our call and our mission. We ask You to come O Most Holy Spirit, that our masks may melt away, that our true face may be revealed before You. Come, O Most Holy Spirit, may a miracle happen today: the beginning of our conversion, the beginning of our true devotion. Come, O Most Holy Spirit pour out Your grace and Your strength on Your Church and convert us. Sanctify us. Change us. Come, O Most Holy Spirit, we are the Church united together in prayer with the Mother. As the disciples at the very beginning, united together with Her in prayer for the gift of Your Spirit, for the gift of love, that we may be freed from selfishness and hatred, that we may be freed from every evil, and that we may start to love, that we may start to forgive and to pray, that we may start to fast. Come, O Most Holy Spirit. Come bless us. Come, change us. You who are prayer, come and anoint us with prayer that we may become the Church that believes in the power of prayer. Come, Most Holy Spirit, renew prayer in us, that we may become the renewers of family prayer.Come, O Most Holy Spirit, come heal us, come bless us, come convert us. O You who anoints with Your Peace, with Your Joy, with Your Love. Come anoint us.

In the last message O Blessed Mother, You say, that the one who prays, lives joy and peace and love. O Blessed Mother, here is the Church in prayer, here is the Church who desires to renew itself in prayer, firm in prayer, come to fall in love with prayer. O grant that these days may be the renewal of our prayer, of our faith through prayer, of our love through prayer, of a Christian life in prayer. Come, O Most Holy Spirit. Come, pour Yourself out upon us. The Church united together with the Mother is praying to you, You who make all things new. Grant that this Church may become new. It may become a Church of prayer, a holy Church, a sign amongst nations, your city on the hillside, your light on the way, Your Self. Come, O Most Holy Spirit. Come and pour Yourself out upon us. Our Father who art in Heaven....Hail Mary, full of grace...Mother and Queen of Peace - pray for us. Mother of the Church - pray for us. Mother and Queen of the family - pray for us. Consolation of the Sorrowful - pray for us, help of Christians - pray for us, help of the sick - pray for us, gate of heaven - pray for us. In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, Amen.

Kenny Rogers and Wynonna Judd - Mary, did you know?

12/12/17

Our Lady Calls

MOTHER CALLS


A month ago, for no particular reason, I felt a deep urgency to write a series of articles on Medjugorje to counter long-standing falsehoods, distortions, and outright lies (see Related Reading below). The response has been remarkable, including hostility and derision from “good Catholics” who continue to call anyone who follows Medjugorje deceived, naive, unstable, and my favourite: “apparition chasers.”
Well, earlier this week, a Vatican representative issued a statement to encourage the faithful to feel free to “chase” one more apparition site: Medjugorje. Archbishop Hoser, appointed by Pope Francis as his envoy to look after the cares and needs of pilgrims going to Medjugorje, announced:
The devotion of Medjugorje is allowed. It’s not prohibited, and need not be done in secret… Today, dioceses and other institutions can organize official pilgrimages. It’s no longer a problem… 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. —Aleitia, December 7th, 2017
In essence, the Vatican is endorsing Medjugorje as a shrine like Fatima or Lourdes where the faithful may encounter the “charism of Mary.”  It is not an explicit endorsement yet of the alleged apparitions to the seers. But as Archbishop Hoser confirmed, the report of the Ruini Commission is “positive.” It would seem so, according to a leak to Vatican Insider that revealed that the original apparitions have been overwhelmingly confirmed to be “supernatural”. However, “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,” said Archbishop Hoser. [1] He confirmed this in another interview with Italian publication Il Giornale, that devotion to Our Lady at Medjugorje is distinct from endorsement, at this time, of the apparitions:
We need to distinguish between worship and apparitions. If a bishop wants to organise a prayer pilgrimage to Medjugorje to pray to Our Lady, he can do it without problem. But if it is organised pilgrimages to go there for the apparitions, we cannot, there is no authorisation to do it… Because the problem of the visionaries is not yet solved. They are working at the Vatican. The document is with the Secretariat of State and must be awaited. —themedjugorjewitness.org
Sadly, even this has not stopped some Medjugorje detractors, locked in their fading arguments, to continue to judge and rail against anyone who speaks positive of Medjugorje or desires to go so. So, I am writing to say: don’t be intimidated any longer. Don’t feel you have to cower or apologize for celebrating and supporting one of the greatest hotbeds of conversions and vocations in the past century.
In a delightful conversation with Wayne Wieble last night, one of the original English speaking promoters of Our Lady’s messages, he said that parish records in Medjugorje indicate that over 7000 priests have received their vocation there (Archbishop Hoser cites a lesser number of 610 documented for sure, calling the Bosnian village “fertile grounds for religious vocations”.) I have met many of these priests in my travels, and they are often the most solid, balanced clergy I know in the Church. No, don’t be bullied, brothers and sisters. You are not unstable, emotional, gullible, or desperate if you feel a call to Medjugorje. If God is sending His mother there, don’t be ashamed to greet her. The Vatican is all but encouraging believers to do so. It’s hard to imagine, if Pope Francis or the Commission or Archbishop Hoser felt any concern that this was a demonic deception, that they would now permit “official church-organized pilgrimages” into the lion’s mouth. Mother calls. And by this, I mean Mother Church too.

THE SUPREME APPARITION CHASER
It is well known that St. John Paul II, while pope, wanted to go there. Mirjana Soldo, one of the six seers, recounts this testimony of a close friend of the late pontiff:
After the apparition, a man who had been a close friend of Pope John Paul II approached me. He asked me not to share his identity— and he was in luck because I’m an expert at keeping secrets. The man told me that John Paul had always wanted to come to MeÄ‘ugorje, but as the pope, he was never able to. So, one day, the man joked with the pope, saying, “If you never make it to MeÄ‘ugorje, then I’ll go and bring your shoes there. It will be as if you were able to set foot on that holy ground.” After John Paul II passed away, the man felt a calling to do exactly that. After the apparition, the man gave them to me, and I think about the Holy Father every time I look at them.My Heart Will Triumph (pp. 306-307), Catholic Shop, Kindle Edition 
St. John Paul the Great, or St. John Paul the Apparition Chaser? Yes, I think you get the point. This kind of condescension and belittling of those who want to be near the Blessed Mother has absolutely no place in the Body of Christ. So, for the first time in my ministry, I am going to encourage others freely: if you feel called to go to Medjugorje (or Lourdes, or Fatima, or Guadalupe, etc.), then go. Don’t go to look for signs and wonders. Rather, go to pray, to detoxify from social media, to confess your sins, to gaze upon the Eucharistic face of Jesus, to climb a mountain in penance, and breathe the air of thousands of other Catholics who are seeking their God. Yes, you can do this in your own parish, and should. But if God is inviting souls to Medjugorje to encounter the Mother, who am I to tell them not to go?
Pope Francis recently asked an Albanian cardinal to give his blessing to the faithful present in Medjugorje. —Archbishop Hoser, Aleitia, December 7th, 2017

12/7/17

Breaking News: Vatican Will Allow Marian Devotion At Medjugorje

Envoy: Vatican Will Allow Marian Devotion At Medjugorje

Henryk Hoser in 2009The Italian Catholic news outlet Aleteia reports that according to a high-ranking official, the Vatican — after decades of contemplating it, and years after a formal commission was empaneled to study it — will allow official pilgrimages to Medjugorje in Hercegovina, apparently ending years of bitter controversy.
“Today, dioceses and other institutions can organize official pilgrimages. There are no more problems,” claims the Polish archbishop, Henryk Hoser, tasked by Rome with pastoral oversight at Medjugorje, in an interview at his residence in Warsaw. “Pope Francis recently asked an Albanian cardinal to give his blessing to the faithful present in Medjugorje,” he added in the interview.
“I am full of admiration for the work the Franciscans are doing there,” he told the news outlet, according to an initial, rough translation. “With a relatively small team — they are a dozen — they do an amazing job welcoming pilgrims. Every summer they organize a youth festival. This year, there were 50,000 people from around the world, with more than 700 priests,” he added.
The prelate also notes that “Confessions [at Medjugorje] are massive,” calling them a “phenomenon.”
“They have about fifty confessionals, which are not enough. These are very deep confessions.”
“And what confirms the authenticity of the place is the large amount of charitable institutions that exist around the sanctuary. And yet another dimension: the great effort that is being made at the level of Christian formation. Every year there are high-quality congresses for different audiences, be they priests, doctors, young people or couples.”
More, the archbishop, who extensively visited and studied the site, said a decree of the former Bishops’ Conference of the former Yugoslavia, which before the Balkan war advised against pilgrimages organized by bishops in Medjugorje, “is no longer relevant.”
He cited approved apparitions at Kibeho in Rwanda and the fact that approval for devotion was granted before final total recognition, which came in 2001. Those apparitions began to same year as Medjugorje but are nowhere nearly as well-known. Devotion to Our Lady Queen of Peace at Medjugorje “is worldwide and extends to nearly eighty countries,” he noted.
MEDJUGORJE ECHOBishop Henryk Hoser confirmed that the current Vatican commission — the most authoritative ever to look at the apparitions — would be issuing a “favorable” report. That commission already has stated — in an overwhelming vote — that the first days of the apparitions, which began on June 24, 1981, are authentic. Such approval, however, is not yet official.
“What I find touching is that all seers have turned to family life,” the archbishop further noted. “At the time we live, the family is of enormous importance. All live with family. Those who were teenagers at the time are already grandmothers. 37 years have passed! ”
Still, he acknowledged that a final decision on authenticity “will have to be made by the Pope.
“The file is now at the Secretariat of State. I believe the final decision made [will be positive],” he concluded to Aleteia.
Pope John Paul II privately called Medjugorje, “the fulfillment of Fatima,” and the archbishop’s statements come during the conclusion of the Fatima anniversary year and the day before the Feast of the Immaculate Conception.

12/5/17

Spirit of Medjugorje

The First Christmas Apparition in Medjugorje
The following is used with permission from the book My Heart Will Triumph by visionary, Mirjana Soldo. This is just a short excerpt of her lengthy account of her first Christmas after the apparitions started in 1981.
Artist's impression from Vicka's description of Our Lady with Baby Jesus during the apparition, Christmas 1981
The picture shown above was taken at Vicka’s grandmother’s house in Medjugorje. The sign underneath the painting says, "Artist's impression from Vicka's description of Our Lady with Baby Jesus during the apparition, Christmas 1981." The artist is a Croatian painter named Davor Zilic.
     As Christmas day wound down for everyone else, I prepared for my apparition, and I was more excited about it than usual. After all, it was Jesus' birthday, and what mother is not filled with joy on her child's birthday? I would get to experience the apparition with the others for the first time in months.
     I joined Ivanka, Vicka, Marija, Ivan and little Jakov in the church. After praying together, we all felt Our Lady's presence. She appeared before us in a gleaming, golden dress unlike anything I had ever seen – this style was identical to the gray one she usually wore, but the fabric looked like molten metal. It radiated gold, and Our Lady herself emitted the same lustrous hues.
      Describing her dress as "golden" hardly defines it, though. There are no human words that can convey the beauty of such a color. Even the word "color" is inadequate, unless a color can be alive, and infused with emotion. I can say that my couch, for example, is a beige color, and in earthly terms I would be correct. The "color" of her dress, however, is almost like light – but an ethereal sort of light that bends, flows, and undulates according to Our Lady's movements and the feeling she wishes to convey.
     Our Lady's arms were folded across the front of her dress, which seemed peculiar until I realized she was holding an infant, just like the first time we saw her. She hadn't come again with an infant until now. I yearned for a closer look, but something prevented me from seeing the baby's face. "Love one another, my children," Our Lady said with a warm smile. "You are brothers and sisters."
     She then blessed us and departed. Regaining my senses, I was surprised to find myself in Medjugorje with the others and not at our apartment in Sarajevo. The experience was so intense that I forgot where I was. 

12/2/17

Medjugorje: Our Lady's Message to Mirjana of December 2, 2017

"Dear children, I turn to you as your mother, the mother of the just, the mother of those who love and suffer, the mother of those who are holy. 
My children, you too can be holy - this depends on you. Those who are holy are those who immeasurably love the Heavenly Father, those who love Him above all.

Therefore, my children, always strive to be better. If you strive to be good you can be holy even though you may not think so of yourselves. If you think that you are good, you are not humble, and arrogance distances you from holiness. In this peaceless world full of threats, your hands, apostles of my love, should be extended in prayer and mercy.

And to me, my children, give the gift of the rosary, the roses which I love so much. My roses are your prayers pronounced with the heart and not only recited with the lips. My roses are your acts of prayer, faith and love. When my Son was little, he said to me that my children would be numerous and that they would bring me many roses. I did not comprehend Him. Now I know that you are those children who are bringing me roses when, above all, you love my Son, when you pray with the heart, when you help the poorest. Those are my roses. That is the faith which makes everything in life be done through love, not knowing arrogance, and always ready to forgive; never judging, always striving to understand one's brother. 

Therefore, apostles of my love, pray for those who do not know how to love, for those who do not love you, for those who have done evil to you, for those who have not come to know the love of my Son. My children, I ask this of you because, remember, to pray means to love and to forgive.
Thank you."
Video of Apparition  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KqY9i2qOYQo

12/1/17

The world has decided to go into the future without God

Tivan-dragicevic-medjugorje-schonbornhe Blessed buy ativan usa Mother, according to seer,  Ivan Dragicevic says “the world has decided to go into the future without God.”

November 2017 Mr. Dragicevic had his apparition inside St. Stephen’s Cathedral. Ivan’s apparition lasted about eight minutes and afterwords Cardinal Schonborn celebrated Mass mentioning Medjugorje extensively in his homily.
Ivan Dragicevic said to the audience, to prepare for a world that is turning away from God – “The world has decided to go into the future without God.” The Virgin Mary urged all present to pray for peace and to put God in the first place in our lives. The visionary also emphasized that the Blessed Mother encourages prayer in family. Also to fast and to read the holy Gospels
Later that evening the monthly message for the world was released by Marija.
“Dear children! When in nature you look at the richness of the colors which the Most High gives to you, open your heart and pray with gratitude for all the good that you have and say: ‘I am here created for eternity’ – and yearn for heavenly things because God loves you with immeasurable love. This is why He also gave me to you to tell you: ‘Only in God is your peace and hope, dear children’. Thank you for having responded to my call.”

Irish encircle the country with the Rosary

Irish encircle the country with the Rosary, mindful of threats to life

Courtesy of Coastal Rosary Ireland
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Some 30,000 Catholics gathered at about 300 sites along the coast of Northern Ireland and Ireland to pray.

On November 26, the Feast of Christ the King, an estimated 30,000 Irish Catholics gathered at about 300 sites along the coast of Northern Ireland and Ireland to pray the Rosary.
They had two intentions as they prayed: the restoration of faith among youth in their country and the protection of human life from womb to tomb.
Courtesy of Coastal Rosary Ireland
The Rosary on the Coast initiative was organized by five Catholic friends inspired by similar events held recently in Poland and Italy.
“We were very aware of the looming threat to the protection of life in [Northern Ireland and Ireland] and the tragic decline in the practice of the faith,”said Kathy Sinnott, one of the organizers of the coastal Rosary.
Abortions are not allowed under current law in both Northern Ireland and the Irish Republic, but the laws are being challenged in both countries.
In Ireland the eighth amendment acknowledges the right to life of the unborn. However a referendum on the eighth amendment is scheduled for May 2018. In Northern Ireland abortion is illegal in almost all circumstances. However the Northern Ireland Human Rights Commission has also challenged the abortion law in court and a ruling from the Supreme Court is expected in 2018.
Sinnott and her friends began organizing the Rosary on the Coast in early October, spreading the word informally through contacts. “People seemed to instinctively know it was a good idea,” she said.
Courtesy of Coastal Rosary Ireland
Originally the goal was to get 53 groups gather along the coast — one for each Hail Mary in the Rosary. However as word spread more and more groups signed up. On November 26 there were enough groups to represent all the mysteries of the Rosary.
November 26 was chosen as the date for the Rosary because Ireland was consecrated to the Christ the King on the feast day in 1940.
Participants in the coastal Rosary were also invited to “plant” a Miraculous Medal in the ground after reciting the Rosary to protect the island.