Why you see me at Mass every day.
(A speech I gave to my parish.)
Many of you might have seen me around the parish. I am just a sewer cleaning plumber but I take comfort in the fact that God sometimes works through the very lowly. I am here tonight to talk to you about my trip to Medjugorje, Bosnia. I must start by telling you that as a child I was very devout and fascinated by the possibility that the Blessed Virgin Mary may have come to the world at Fatima, Portugal in 1917. I read everything I could get my hands on about it back then. Then came my teenage years and I found out about girls. I am one of those type of people who either does things all the way or not at all. During those years I simply couldn't live up to what Our Lady had asked us for at Fatima and I walked away from the faith I loved. For many years I walked around calling my self a recovering Roman Catholic. As with many Catholics who have fallen away I made excuses but the real truth was I never took the time or effort to really learn my faith. I never took the time to find out why we believe what we do or to learn the fact that the early church fathers , the people in the 1st 4 Centuries before the New Testament was put together, believe just as the Roman Catholic Church today. Ever wonder how the New Testament came into our lives? Did it just drop out of the sky?
The Holy Spirit guided and entrusted the Catholic Church in the Councils of Hippo and Carthage 393-397 to assemble what we use as our modern Bible. About 8 years ago I heard that the Blessed Virgin Mary might be appearing in Bosnia. I was still away from the faith at that time but this is the seed which brought me back to the Church. There are literally millions of fallen away or lukewarm Catholics that have had the same seed planted as this. The Holy Spirit is going around watering it and sooner or later it blooms. Over 20 million people have made the long journey to Medjugorje. Many that were lukewarm or fallen away now take the great gift of Faith very seriously. To understand Medjugorje better we need to go back in time a little. First I would like you to remember that these apparitions and belief in them is not necessary to get to Heaven. In the case of Lourdes and Fatima the Church has stated that they are "worthy of belief". You are free to not believe any of this but I encourage you strongly to listen to what Our Mother is telling us and consider the possibility that this is the work of Our Lord. Do you all remember the story of Lourdes? Mary appeared to St.Bernadette on Feb.11th 1858. When Bernadette asked who she was she said, "I am the Immaculate Conception." She appeared around 6 in the morning. She asked us to pray and repent of our sins and to pray the rosary. Ok now think about Fatima, Portugal 1917. Mary first appeared May 13th, 1917 which at that time was the feast day of the Blessed Sacrament. When asked who she was, she said, " I am the Lady of the Rosary". She appeared at noon and asked us to pray, pray, repent of our sins and to pray the rosary. At Fatima she always appeared on the 13th of the month. Ever wonder why the 13th of the month? Isn't that an unlucky number. I think it is unlucky for one person only, Satan. She appeared wearing a dress that had a big star on it. Maybe later you will read the book of Esther in the Bible for Esther in Hebrew means star. The book of Esther is about the Jewish Queen who interceded before the Persian King to save her people who were to be annihilated on the 13th of the month. Mary gave the children three secrets. One was that the war, the first world war, would soon end. but if mankind didn't repent another greater war would follow it. The other secret was that if Russia was consecrated to Her Immaculate Heart, Russia would convert and the world would enjoy a time of peace. She also said if we didn't do this Russia would spread it's errors all over the world even causing annihilation of nations. Remember this is 1917, communism had not even begun. The 3rd secret is not known yet. Only the Pope and Sr Lucia, one of the children who is now in her 80's, know it. Mary also told the children that on Oct. 13 1917 God will perform a miracle so all may believe. This is the only time that someone has said be here at this time so God can show you a miracle. On Oct. 13th 70,000 people gathered in the rain. The clouds parted and they saw the sun spinning and rotating, throwing off colors and appear to fall to the earth. Then at the last moment with a wave of Our Lady's hand it retreated back into the sky.
To the great relief of all the people gathered that day, with the wave of Our Lady's hand it retreated back to its place in the sky. Many were healed and many converted. In a symbolic way it was Queen Esther saving her people from annihilation once again, possibly saving them by warning them of the path they were heading before they stepped on to it. The question is will she again intercede once again, on behalf of her Son, to save us from annihilation whether it be physical or maybe spiritual annihilation. Will we heed her call to turn back to her Son with prayer, penance, and conversion of our hearts?
In June 1981, Our Lady started her apparitions in Medjugorje. She appears to six children in what at the beginning was officially an atheist nation, a communist country. She comes under the title of Our Lady Queen of Peace. She is still appearing and it had been 16 years 7 months now. the first day she appeared was the feast day of John the Baptist. John prepared the way for the coming of Jesus. Is she now preparing the way for the coming of her Son? For us Catholics this all shouldn't be hard to understand. If you were Jesus and you had a big job to do, who could you trust more than your mother.
Her main messages from Medjugorje are prayer, peace, fasting, conversion, and reconciliation. Mary has said in Medjugorje, I came to Lourdes in the morning time, Fatima at noon, Medjugorje in the evening. The symbolism is quite clear. At Lourdes she asked us to pray, repent, and pray the rosary. In Fatima she called us to pray, pray, repent, and pray the rosary. In Medjugorje she begs us to pray, pray, pray, repent, and pray the rosary. She has said the Mass is more Holy than we can ever imagine and if we had a choice of seeing her or going to Mass, we should go to Mass because her Son is there. She begs us to make the Mass the center of our lives, go to confession once a month, adore Jesus in the most Blessed Sacrament and do penance for those who can't or won't.
Each of the children will be given ten secrets and then apparitions will cease in the way they happen now and soon afterward the secrets will begin. Of the six children who now are all in their thirties, two have 10 secrets and the other four all have nine. For the two with ten secrets the daily apparitions have ceased. One Mary appears to on the 2nd of each month, Christmas and her birthday. For the other it is once a year. The other four still have daily apparitions. When all have the ten secrets shortly after the secrets will begin. The way this will happen is Mary will tell them 10 days before the secret happens. They will tell their spiritual advisor and both the visionary and spiritual advisor will complete 7 days of prayer and fasting and 3 days before the secret occurs, tell it to the world.
The Church has never made a ruling on a ongoing apparition. It is said we must "test everything, retain what is good" 1st Thess. 5:21 and in Galatians 1:8 Paul said, "But even if we or an angel from heaven should preach to you another gospel other than the one that we preached to you, let that one be accursed." So far, and believe me Medjugorje is watched very closely and with interest by the Holy Father, it has not gone against anything the Church teaches in 16 years 7 months now. The Holy Father has told many Bishops and a few Archbishops he was happy they were going there or just returning from there and has given them His blessing. He has been quoted saying "If I wasn't Pope I would have been in Medjugorje already."
You might wonder what effect the war had on Medjugorje. During the war the pilgrims kept coming. It was a little harder getting there but they did. You know when I was there we went through the village a few miles down the road. There was thousands of bullet holes on every building I saw and shell damage everywhere. Then we got to Medjugorje, it was completely untouched. The Serbs tried to shell it but they would fire the artillery, the shells would shoot but when they came down they wouldn't go off. In the Wall Street Journal there was an article about a Serb pilot. His job was to bomb Medjugorje. Nothing would happen to his plane, he could arm his bombs, but the minute he was on his bomb run his eyes would fill with a fog as he described it. He would turn his plane and his eyes would clear, the minute he turned back his eyes fogged again. He defected to Croatia, needless to say. None of the villagers from Medjugorje that fought in the front line of the war was injured.
Do you remember Lola Falana? The famous singer dancer lady from the 70's. She had M.S. When she went to Medjugorje and came back it went into complete remission. Remember Capt. Scott O'Grady? The American pilot who was shot down over Bosnia. In his book, "Return with Honor" on page 116 he states that on the 3rd day when he was hiding from the Serbs that Mary appeared to him. They still let that guy fly million dollar jets, imagine that. There have been many healings of people. There is an Irish singer who went to Medjugorje an atheist. You see he had Krones disease and had 6 weeks to live. He had gone from 220 lb. to 100 lb.. That was 10 years ago, he is fine and there is no trace of Krones anymore. He was given two miracles, a spiritual healing, and a physical one. He was asked if he had to make a choice between the two, which would he rather have. He said the spiritual one of course because without his gift of faith he was dead already. My friend in town who runs the Medjugorje center in town had brain cancer they asked for the Queen of Peace to intercede before her Son. He is fine today. Another woman named Rita Klaus had MS so bad she was in a wheelchair. One day she read about Medjugorje and sitting in her bed prayed this simple prayer. "Our Lady Queen of Peace who I believe is appearing in Medjugorje, please ask your Son to heal me in any way he thinks I should be healed" She was walking the next day and is fine today. The key to all this I think is faith.
Before I take questions I want to tell you a true story that illustrates the difference of the faith of the people of Medjugorje and the faith of some of the American Catholics today. It is from a manuscript of a book that Dr. Scott Hahn of the Franciscan University of Stuebenville is writing entitled, "A Father who keeps His promises."
Everybody felt it.... a moment of eerie silence...........a low rumble and then the ground began to shake. Buildings swayed and buckled and then collapsed like a house of cards. Less than 4 minutes later over 30,000 were dead from an 8.2 earthquake that rocked and nearly flattened Armenia in 1989. In the muddled chaos a distressed father bolted through the winding streets leading to the school where his son had gone earlier that morning.
The man could not stop thinking about the promise he had given his son many times.
"No matter what happens Armand, I'll always be there."
Well he reached the site where his sons school had been but saw only a pile of rubble. He just stood there at first fighting back tears....and then took off stumbling over debris running toward the east corner where he knew his sons classroom had been.
With nothing but his bare hands he started digging, desperately pulling bricks and pieces of wall plaster. While others just stood by watching in forlorn disbelief, he even heard someone growl, "Forget it mister they're all dead" He looked up flustered and replied, " You can grumble or you can help me lift these bricks" but only a few pitched in, and most of them gave up once their muscles began to ache. But the man couldn't stop thinking about his son, so he kept digging and digging....... for hours and hours.
12 hours went by..... 18 hours..... 24 hours..... 36 hours......... and finally into the 38th hour he heard a muffled groan from under a piece of wallboard. The man grabbed the board, pulled it back and cried, "Armand!" and from the darkness came a slight, shaking voice, "Papa?" Other weak voices began calling out as the young survivors stirred beneath the still uncleared rubble. Gasps and shouts of bewildered relief came from a few onlookers and parents who remained.
They found 14 of the 33 students still alive. When Armand finally emerged he tried to help dig until all his surviving classmates were out. Everybody standing there heard him as he turned to his friends and said, "See I told you my father wouldn't forget us."
We have a Father like that....we also have a mother like that who comes to help us at the request of The Father and her Son. The Father in Heaven has dug and dug to rescue us for a lot longer than 38 hours and at a much greater cost. He gave us a gift of grace that was free and He allowed His Son to be sacrificed for our sins. He adores us that much. Our Lady calls us to adore Him in the Blessed Sacrament. She is being sent to bring us out of our ignorance and apathy and we are not making enough of an effort to dig ourselves out of the daily rubble of our own lives that simply overwhelms us sometimes and takes us farther from her Son. ......Why are the statues crying and Mary herself in certain apparitions.....We are breaking her Sons heart and in turn we are breaking her heart because we don't take the time to come to God in prayer like we should.
A good way to define sin is simply put, when we love ourselves more than we love God. We need to do more, pray more, we are Catholics. Our Church is the only Church that can historically prove that it was founded by Our Lord Jesus Christ. What is the pillar and foundation of truth? The church of the living God 1st Tim 3:15.
One day we will all have to stand before Our Lord to give an account of ourselves. It is possible that he could ask us, "Why didn't you listen to my mother when I sent her to help YOU?"
Please listen to Our Lady's message for this month
Our Lady of Medjugorje's message: 25 January 1998.
"Dear children! Today again I call all of you to prayer. Only with prayer, dear children, will your heart change, become better, and be more sensitive to the Word of God. Little children, do not permit Satan to pull you apart and to do with you what he wants. I call you to be responsible and determined and to consecrate each day to God in prayer. May Holy Mass, little children, not be a habit for you, but life. By living Holy Mass each day, you will feel the need for holiness and you will grow in holiness. I am close to you and intercede before God for each of you, so that He may give you strength to change your heart. Thank you for having responded to my call."
Thank you for inviting me here tonight.....any questions?
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