THE MEDJUGORJE WITNESS

I have been to many different places for conferences but I never thought that one day I would come to London to give a retreat here (at the Emmaus Centre)

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I am very glad to meet some people again whom I would dare to say are the image of Medjugorje. Why do I say this? If those people did not exist, I think that Medjugorje today in this world would not be what it is. What is Medjugorje? Medjugorje is a place of prayer; Medjugorje is a place of conversion; Medjugorje is a place of penance; it's a place where people meet God again. Medjugorje is the strength of the Church, not the strength in the church, but the strength of the Church. Why? The world is already tired.

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When it comes to spiritual things and Medjugorje comes, Our Lady comes. I would say that this yeast is growing in the world, people go back to the Church, they return to the Rosary. A man is looking for himself again. I have a feeling that so many things in the Church were put to sleep and now Medjugorje represents a spring that gives a new strength.

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I know that Medjugorje won't be accepted by everyone, especially when it comes to the Church. Why? Our Lady's apparitions are not the dogma of our faith. You can still be a faithful person if you do not believe in Our Lady's apparitions, in Lourdes and in Fatima, but apparitions do help us, that we live our faith in a more profound way. So do not wonder if there are some priests who do not believe in apparitions. I know some who do not believe in God. Do not be surprised. Why? Some people became priests, they were disappointed, maybe they think today it's too late for a new beginning, that they are just an employee of the Church. You never know what is in someone else's heart, you don't know what can happen to someone, so don't be surprised at this.

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In the world there are 400,000 priests. There are 4,500 bishops. There are one billion and 150,000 Christians. I saw these statistics recently and it said that the number of Christians is growing by 1-2%. So do not be surprised if you meet a bishop who does not believe in apparitions, either in Fatima or Medjugorje.

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For me Medjugorje is very interesting. I believe in one, holy, Catholic and apostolic Church and that's the Church Jesus Christ wanted. On the other side, the Church goes slowly, the Church is observing, looking carefully at what is happening. People go to Confession, people pray, people convert, and all those are the fruits of Medjugorje, and that's the strength of Medjugorje. If I had protected Medjugorje, if I were the one to save it, trust me, it would not exist. Our Lady would have run away, but what is there is her work, and the strength of Medjugorje lies in that. Last year 1,400,000 Holy Communions were distributed there – that's the miracle of Medjugorje.

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At the beginning I did not believe in Medjugorje. I was a student at the time and for me Medjugorje was at a distance. At that time I looked at Medjugorje from a political perspective. There were problems in Poland, in Kosovo, in America. Then I thought for a while that it was the last steps of the Communists who were trying to stay in power. They wanted to create fear and make themselves stronger in that way. When I came to Medjugorje for the first time I just came to examine, I was like Thomas, I wanted to put my finger in the palm. I came to Medjugorje and I saw so many people there and they were praying. I said to myself, `let the old ladies pray, that feeling will soon be gone.' But when I became a priest and I started hearing Confessions, then, against the will of bishops and priests, conversion starts happening. People just start living different lives, that is so positive and that's what the miracle is, that's the strength that cannot be defined. You can just say that God is working. But there is something else: if you are not ready to allow Jesus and Our Lady to come into your heart, conversion will never happen. If you are not going to pray in the way that God prays, that prayer won't exist. Very often it happens that when we are praying we just talk to ourselves, we are just putting on a piece of paper our wishes. We just have to abandon ourselves to God and say, “Here I am, do with me whatever you want, and I want what you want me to do.”

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Medjugorje has been happening now for 25 years. I know all the priests who have worked there. So many priests came there from different other places, and I can really say to you that everything would have fallen apart if the Spirit of God had not been there, if that was not the wish of God and of Our Lady. If it depended on our strength, nothing would have happened there. However, you see millions of people coming there. It's really hard to say how many people have visited Medjugorje so far, we just know how many Holy Communions are distributed. One priest in America said to me, `“The Rosary was not prayed in my church at all, but since Medjugorje people started praying the Rosary. Then I was fed up looking at them praying the Rosary so I decided to start praying the Rosary with them. Now, every evening we pray the Rosary in our church.”

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What is the position of Medjugorje in the Church? We never advertised, we never actually wrote about what was happening. Not many things were published. There was a kind of rule: come and see, and I think it is very good when people come and see. I personally know that it is good and necessary to send, as often as possible, reports to the Church, so that the Church may consider in a more serious way. The Church has many difficult problems; it's not easy for the Church. Look at the Church in England, the number of Catholics. Take into consideration our human weaknesses and you will see and realize how many problems there are. We should not criticise each other, we should not criticise our priests, our bishops. What we have to do is to decide to fix that house together, as God said to St. Francis: “Go and fix my Church.” So each one of us has to go and start fixing the Church with prayer and faith.

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Look at the priesthood in South America, it's under a very big influence of the left wing, they are very burdened with different parties. In 2006 there are 1,500 less priests left in Europe than in the previous year. We are diminishing. The Provincial General of the Franciscan Order said in one of his letters, “brothers, if our order is in crisis, let us close up, let us strengthen up, let us be healed and then let us move on.” It’s the same with the Church, we have to withdraw ourselves, strengthen our orders and then move on. However, I believe that all these crises, all these problems in the Church are actually helping us, so that the flock is purified, so that we may choose a new way, that we may move on.

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I spent five and a half years in Medjugorje and we really worked hard there, hard work: Confession, prayer, Holy Mass, meeting people, talking with people, but that gave us a great amount of joy. If I had not been sent to Medjugorje I don't know what would have happened to me. Medjugorje helped me to be a joyful person, to try to understand my priesthood in the right way. Medjugorje helped me to meet all of you. Whether it helped my bishop I don't know. It's a personal attitude, a personal need. When it comes to you who have been to Medjugorje already, or maybe have heard what is happening there, I would say to you, ‘“You are the messengers, the heralds of the message: let us return to Christ.” Our Lady says to us, “My children, the joy is in my Son, the hope is in my Son, and the solution of problems is in my Son.”

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I won't say that Medjugorje should not grow in the organisational sense. When I look at what kind of crazy people were working there, I believe it's God's miracle that it goes on. In 1996 to 1998 there was me, Fr Landika, Fr Micha, the late Fr Slavko, one other priest and an old friar. Fr Micha dealt with the radio, the station of Medjugorje, Fr Slavko was up there on the hills. I had to be there in the parish in the evening, I had to pray the Rosary. I think the people were allergic to my singing, “Ave, Ave Maria!” Things were like that for years, and then we strengthened the community. I deeply believe that God was protecting all of us, God was leading and guiding us. And I know this, that a great number of people sitting here today helped a lot so that Medjugorje is what it is today. I believe that it is God's gift, and God's call.

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The initiative to pray always comes from God so that the things are good. To pray means to think in the way God thinks, to be one with him, and to act towards other people in the way that God wants. God won't punish and God always acts in a positive way. If we act together with God then we will act in a positive way as well. We have to be people of hope and people of good will, not to be cold hearted, but to be warm hearted. I have to embrace you and say to you, “I love you because God has created you.” The importance of prayer is great. Jesus went to quiet remote places and he prayed there and he says, “Go there, pray, be on your own, try to listen to silence.”

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Priests did not start living life just yesterday. Each priest has to go for a spiritual retreat. Why is that necessary? You have to leave your work, the place where you live and move aside and be on your own, and at the end, to pray. If I pray with you, if I preach to you, what about me? I also have to go to the spring and be refreshed. That's why, find some time in your life when you can be on your own: go for a walk for two days and let us try to learn how to have spiritual exercises. We all call the Pope “Holy Father” but he also needs spiritual exercises, that's why he goes to certain places.

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Medjugorje truly is a gift, and Medjugorje lives in the world of today, and from what I have seen, thanks be to God that this is so. When it comes to the opinion of the official Church you have to be wise and to understand that the Church has to make the decision to wait. For example, if you work in a company and you are a person who makes decisions, you won't make an important decision straight away. You will take some time for that, you will reflect upon it and so on. Medjugorje wants conversion and Our Lady asks for conversion, for prayer and for fasting. It is hard to fast, it's hard for me, what about you? If I could only take a little bit of ham in the morning maybe I could make it. Christians have lost the meaning of sacrifice. Look at Islam, they fast during the whole day, from dawn to darkness, they don't even take water. With us, we just don't eat meat on Friday and take fish instead. We have to fast from sin, from food, from yourself, from your ego. We have to fast from the world which today is so dirty – drugs, sex, alcohol, evil. The Fathers of the Church say to “fast from food, the world and yourself”. To fast from the world means that I don't want to take the evil that comes from it. Today evil is so close that you touch it, you can feel it, and you have to be protected. You have to build a kind of wall around yourself so that the evil does not come too close to you, and to say, “I want to live the Christian life, I want Jesus Christ to be near me.”

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You can learn a lot about Jesus Christ on your knees. You can learn so much about Mary when you pray, because prayer will change you. When you pray you will be humble. If you pray a lot you won't quarrel with your husband. Your life perspective will be different. Think of Jesus Christ, he took off his robe, took a bowl and put himself on his knees and started washing his disciples’ feet. Imagine, God is washing man’s feet, that is a sign of humility. My dear friends, time is running out, what I want to say to you is: pray, let your work become prayer. To pray, means to speak, to listen. What does God expect of me? He wants me to fast, he wants me to be humble, to fast from food to think about the poor. Jesus said that there will always be poor people. If you do not have bread to eat, it is not only this that means poverty. Imagine how many old people there are who are left alone by their children with no one to speak to them. In Vienna the elderly pay for young people to come and speak with them, and we sometimes turn the television on and watch a football match for two hours. Maybe during that time we could have gone and visited an old person and asked how he or she is. They do not need our gifts, chocolates and presents, they need our time. My mother lives in my brother's family but she is sometimes so lonely, and she is really having a good time. Imagine people who no one speaks to. So let us spend our time on good things. Let us think of those who are poor in this or that way. Christians have to go and visit one another. There are not many of you in England, but you have to be aware of your presence here. You see how beautiful it is at Christmas when we make a phone call to wish someone, “Merry Christmas” – because we are travelling on the same train, the same bus, because we belong to Christ.

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That is why, dear friends, pray, pray a lot, fast, run away from sin. If there are some sins in your life, I know you are not angels, go to Confession, reconcile with God. Forgive yourself, that’s very important, and then move on. There is a man who killed many people in his life and then his conscience started bothering him. When he finds himself in a crisis he calls me at 11pm. I know that he confessed his sins, but yet he did not forgive himself. You have to forgive yourself, because if God forgives you, I emphasise this, you have to forgive yourself and move on.

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There is a story of a woman who came to a priest and said, “I had a conversation with God.” The priest asked, “What did He say to you?” She said, ‘Everything.” The priest said, “Then let him tell you all about my sins.” When next they met the priest asked, “So, did God say anything about my sins?” The lady said, “God told me he had forgotten all about your sins.” So God will forget your sins.

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Please go and have Confession, purify yourself and then move on. Christ’s words are very important, ‘go and sin no more’.

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• Grateful thanks to Angela Callan who recorded these talks and typed them up.

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