Medjugorje 2024

Our Lady of Medjugorje, a miracle of business with "apparitions" included in the price. The Vatican does not put its hand in the fire on the apparitions of Our Lady in Medjugorje or on supernatural events. The only confirmed miracle seems to be his unstoppable business. Posted on October 2, 2024 Author Domenico Megali

In chronological order, the latest news concerning Our Lady of Medjugorje are of the opposite sign. Or rather, one concerns business, the other Faith. The first has been found in all the newspapers for a few weeks. And it involves pilgrims. Or rather the economic business that derives from it. More and more often they are sold all-inclusive accommodation packages, as they like to write to travel agencies to entice the buyer. And so it turns out that, in this case, the devotees of Our Lady of Medjugorje in addition to the transfer, board and lodging also pay for the apparition of Our Lady. All included in the price. Yes, yes, you read that right. It is certain that Our Lady will appear to them between one prayer and another. Between lunch and dinner. Who offers more?

But fortunately there are those who bet everything on the Faith. The second piece of news concerns the Faith and an enlightened entrepreneur provides it to us. More precisely, Enzo De Simone, owner of Sbf Tubi in Leině, on the outskirts of Turin. And what does De Simone invent for me? The entrepreneur has chosen to offer his employees an unusual company benefit. That is, free trips to Medjugorje. A choice that "appeared" in De Simone's dreams after going through a difficult personal phase and a profound religious conversion. And it is for these reasons that he decided to share his newfound faith in the factory as well. "Those who are sad and who have problems I take with me," he decided, referring to the pilgrimages he organizes for workers. His goal? Offer not only work support, but also spiritual support, creating an environment that favors inner serenity through these journeys of Faith. A ritual that no one now questionsYou understand that believing or not believing at this point matters little. Especially for those who live and prosper in Medjugorje.

Medjugorje, with all the heavy load it carries with it, from the Faith of pilgrimages, to the business of tourists, to speculations, has become part of our History with a capital H. Would any of you question Our Lady of Lourdes? Of course not. And so... Everyone in Medjugorje where everything is paid for in cash without leaving an electronic trace. Now, then, that the Vatican has officially hypothesized that there certainly "something happens", who stops it anymore the business of the Gospa of Medjugorje. But above all, who stops the multitude of believing pilgrims willing to pay to see Our Lady? With the viaticum of the Vatican, now the Gospa has the road clearedMedjugorje is the small town in Herzegovina where for 34 years Our Lady (Gospa in Croatian) has descended to earth every day. Physical but above all spiritual healings accompany Mary's presence in this place. Since the first appearances a few weeks ago in a note from the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, the Vatican has officially authorized the public worship of Our Lady. And the faithful are authorized to give this phenomenon their support "in a prudent way". "We do not have a certainty that they are messages from Our Lady," the Vatican says in summary, in any case in recent years positive phenomena have occurred around the alleged visionaries.

An induced income of 100 million a year3 million faithful a year revolve around the Gospa with an induced of 100 million between restaurants, hotels, restaurants, official and unofficial taxis and souvenir shops. And to think that in 1981 around the village there were only fields and mountains and people lived on sheep farming. Today hotels are everywhere. And almost every day new songs open. Once upon a time, only rooms were rented to accommodate pilgrims. But year after year, rent today rent tomorrow those rooms have become, apartments, then palaces and then hotels and resorts with swimming pools. Houses, palaces, villas and resortsAbout 300 inhabitants reside in the village but there are now hundreds of accommodation facilities From traditional hotels to villas holiday homes with prices ranging from 170 to 500 euros per night per person. In short, Mudjugorie has become the Monte Carlo of Bosnia and Herzegovina where those who can speculate. The visionary Ivanka Ivanković-Elez, then fifteen, and Mirjana Dragičević-Soldo, sixteen, the first two girls who on June 24, 1981, walking at the foot of the Podbrdo hill at four in the afternoon, would have glimpsed a female figure holding the baby Jesus on a small cloud, in these decades apparition after apparition have built real estate empires and more. Like the other four boys at the time, Vicka Ivankovic, Ivan Dragicevic, Ivan Ivankovic and Milka Pavlovic, to whom she had appeared, today they live a comfortable life and live in houses outside the city and have started businesses. Nothing to complain about.

Source: https://www.lacitymag.it/cronaca/mistero/madonna-di-medjugorje-un-miracolo-di-business/

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The truth is in the details By Silvana De Mari 1 October 2024

In the late afternoon of Wednesday, June 24, 1981, in the village of Medjugorje, in Bosnia-Herzegovina, a group of young people who stole cigarettes found themselves smoking and listening to rock music. Jokes like this scandalize only those who ignore that God often calls even the most skeptical and distracted sinners to penance. In Medjugorje, however, there are many contradictions, which arise from a primitive, substantial, lie. In the first public and passionate confession, the visionaries had spoken of stolen cigarettes and rock music, but later, pressed by the insistent questions of those who wanted to reconstruct the story, without giving any weight to the improbable time and after having sworn on the crucifix, they gave a different and more coherent version to the role of seers: we had gone out to graze the sheep. However, when their first statement was appealed, one of the visionaries admitted that they had gone out to smoke stolen cigarettes and listen to rock music. Many teenagers smoke cigarettes and listen to rock music, but it is naďve to believe that one can lie, after having seen Our Lady and enjoyed the beauty of eternal Truth.

The first vision of the Gospa is confused. The boys say that they saw in a great light a figure that blended in with the light itself, and that they did not understand what that light was. A frightened clairvoyant Ivan runs away. Finally they recognize in that light a beautiful woman, whom one visionary sees floating, another sees appear and disappear, and another even notices that her hands are trembling. One of the attributes of Our Lady is power, second only to that of God, and it is blasphemous even to think that her hands can tremble in the One whom many saints define as "omnipotent by grace". Our Lady's hands and voice do not tremble, and she does not appear and disappears, remaining silent. Another absurd detail. Heaven does not break into the lives of men if it does not have something shocking to communicate. In all the apparitions, so far recognized by the Church, the visionaries are overwhelmed by the divine, but in Medjugorje some visionaries run to meet the Virgin and embrace her, as if she were the old grandmother, and she starts laughing.

These eccentric seers will report their experience in a curious and contradictory way: it was like having fingers of steel bouncing off Our Lady. They shared the first apparitions with the Franciscan friars who recorded them, in order to be able to collect them in numerous books, which are still available. In the stories of these visionaries, the ignorance of the Virgin Mary is surprising, asking them to be surprised where those who are not present at her apparition are. But nothing is unknown to the Mother of God. The Sedes sapientae does not ask for information, it brings it. To the seers who ask her how long she will appear, the Gospa gives a surprising, incredible answer: how long you come. And when they ask her for a sign, she performs a miracle by stopping the hands of a clock, which a watchmaker will find stopped for the sole fact that that the clock had fallen and broken. When they then ask her for help for a relative who needs to be operated on, she says she prays a lot for him. He will die during surgery! Medjugorje is an absolute novelty in the panorama of Christian mysticism.

Until now the Church, taught by the admonition of the Apostle: "It is not surprising, because even Satan disguises himself as an angel of light. It is therefore not exceptional if his servants also disguise themselves as servants of justice; their end will be according to their works" (2 Cor 11:14-15) and from the millennial ascetic experience of the saints he had always examined the apparitions with rigorous attention, knowing full well that they can represent either an authentic supernatural event, or a fearful deception of Satan, who from an angel of darkness presents himself as an angel of light, or a hallucination of a sick mind, is a squalid machination of a person in bad faith, aimed at satisfying his thirst for power and money. Often it is the details that allow us to distinguish the true from the false. An apparition of Our Lady is not authentic if it is not worthy of her. Only then is she magnificent, and radiates and generates humility and holiness in the lives of the visionaries and all those whom she attracts. Just to give a few examples, who does not remember the trials, pain and fidelity to Christ that marked the life of St. John Bosco, of the visionaries of Lourdes and Fatima, of Don Orione, of Fr. Pio of Pietrelcina, of Fr. Candido Amantini, the exorcist of the Holy Stairs?

Anyone who is in good faith knows the abysmal distance that separates the lives of the saints from the self-referential life of these seers, who, with the same lightness, do not hesitate to lay their hands on the heads of priests to bless them, implementing a reversal of the sacramental mandate of the Lord, and to hire the well-known, attractive and expensive singer godmother of Pride, Maja Šuput, to cheer up the wedding of Mirjana Soldo's eldest daughter (May 15, 2016). In this perspective, no one is surprised that this ten-year apparition, repetitive to the point of boredom, did not convince any of the seers to consecrate themselves to God, making their vows. Nor could it be otherwise, since this Gospa thwarted the Sacrifice of her Son by declaring (October 1, 1981) that "All religions are equal before God" (René Laurentin, Message and Pedagogy of Mary in Medjugorje. Raccolta cronologica dei messaggi, Queriniana, 1988, p. 300. See p. 149). If this were the case, Jesus would be one of the many prophets and she would not be the Mother of God.

The apparitions of Medjugorje were authoritatively declared false in the 1980s by the Bishop of Mostar and the Vatican. The bishop of the Diocese in which an apparition takes place has always been the authority appointed to observe and judge it, to establish its veracity, after questioning the visionaries and examining their lives before and after the supernatural event that invested them. In the spring of 1982, the First Commission of Investigation into the events of Medjugorje also issued a negative report. On 11 October 1984 Mons. Pavao Zanic, bishop of Mostar, is forced to make a disconcerting and very courageous communication: "I declare that everything is a great scam, a deception... there are no "apparitions" of Our Lady... I believe that there is the Devil!" In the spring of 1986, the Second Commission of Inquiry into the events of Medjugorje issued a second negative judgment, which on May 12, 1986 Mons. Pavao Zanic sent to the then Prefect of the Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. Card. J. Ratzinger in turn asks the CEJ (Yugoslav Bishops' Conference) to establish a Third Commission. Three years later, on August 17, 1989, the bishop of Mostar, Pavao Zanic, in a letter addressed to a priest, frankly reiterated: "I must say that I have not changed my thinking about Medjugorje. I declare that everything is a great scam, a deception... Naďve and eager people believe everything... Incredible nonsense! There are no apparitions of Our Lady, there are no messages! In my diocese, not even a diocesan priest believes in the apparitions... This is a painful episode in the history of the Church! A huge amount of money is at stake! The seers are very well manipulated, rewarded, made rich! I must defend the Faith and Our Lady; I am ready to die for the truth!"

During the ordinary session of the Italian Bishops' Conference, held in Zadar from 9 to 11 April 1991 – after the work of the Third Commission chaired by Mons. F. Komariza, bishop of Banja Luka, is made up of 30 selected priests and doctors and 20 bishops, divided into three Commissions, and after more than 30 Sessions – on April 10, 1991 the CEI, issues the Doubtful Declaration which states: "On the basis of the research carried out so far it is not possible to affirm that we are dealing with supernatural apparitions and phenomena (Non constat de supernaturalitate, the supernatural is not confirmed). Medjugorje is the version of an emotional Christianity, completely stripped of the Logos, which is the Wisdom and the eternal Word of the Father. In Medjugorje everything dissolves into sentimentality. Medjugorje is a lie! It is the trivial reduction of the figure of Mary, Virgin Mother of God and our Co-redemptrix, to that of a little woman who thanks those who deign to visit her. This stupid Gospa, while limiting herself to begging for prayers without ever passing judgment on the crisis that troubles the Church and our history, numbs the intelligence of Pastors and faithful and destroys the good news of the Gospel, denying that Christ is the only Way that leads to the Father and gives men eternal Life, after having opened their eyes to the Truth, who is always He, the Savior of men. Medjugorje is the painless destruction of Christian dogmas, severed by the Gnostic axe that hates Christ's command to evangelize all peoples and claims that all religions are equal. The heretical message of Medjugorje is carefully dispersed in a myriad of banal messages, which recall a senseless asceticism to be pleasing to a god who has nothing more to say to us, since he died drowned in the do-goodism of the new universal religion. Satan is cunning and, like all misers, he invests a thousand to earn a million. She endures conversions and suggests prayers, in exchange for the marginalization of Christ from human history and the trivialization of the One whom the Church will always honor as the Theotokos, the holy Mother of God. He deceives men, but he knows well that only in Christ and "in no one else is there salvation; for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which it is appointed that we may be saved" (Acts 4:12).

Source: https://www.silvanademaricommunity.it/2024/10/01/la-verita-e-nei-dettagli/

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Marian apparitions: Fatima in the crosshairs 28 Sep 2024

Stefano Cecchin, president of the Pontifical Marian Academy in Rome, says that “interpretations” continue to make Fatima, and not Medjugorje, the “most complex case” for the Church.

(From this interview it is clear that the Pontifical Marian Academy now condemns all apparitions that speak of punishments and approves those that speak well of the Church, which is why it was so easy to deceive Bishops, the Vatican and the Academy itself regarding Medjugorje. My personal advice is to reject them all and for those who prefer to pray to Our Lady, to go to any Church or Sanctuary not linked to apparitions with attached revelations. After all, graces are granted by God with sweetness and in silence, not with "extraordinary" events.)

One of the priorities of Father Cecchin’s commitment is the fight against phenomena that criticize the current pontificate or that are interpreted in this sense.

“It is not Medjugorje, but Fatima that remains the most complex case.”
“The Chinese are afraid of Fatima”
Father Stefano Cecchin says that “interpretations” continue to make Fatima, and not Medjugorje, the “most complex case” for the Church.

The Roman judgment on Medjugorje by the Dicastery of Faith has provoked numerous reactions, including comments and interviews from representatives of the International Pontifical Marian Academy and the associated Observatory of Apparitions and Mystical Phenomena Related to the Figure of the Virgin Mary. Last Monday, a meeting organized by these institutions was held in Rome. Among the speakers were Father Stefano Cecchin, president of the Academy, and Sister Daniela Del Gaudio, director of the Observatory. An interview with Father Cecchin was published yesterday.

When the Observatory was established last year, Father Cecchin gave a series of interviews. Since the adoption last May of new norms on the procedure for evaluating alleged supernatural phenomena, decisions have been coming thick and fast regarding phenomena, some of which had been awaiting a decision since the end of World War II. Especially because of the decision regarding Medjugorje, it was to be expected that after Rome’s decision, both the Academy and the Observatory would speak out.

In 2023, Father Cecchin’s statements had already caused a stir. He had then declared that the alleged supernatural messages speaking of “punishments” and “catastrophes” were “absolutely false”.

Yesterday, the podcast “Hablemos Iglesia” of the communications department of the Costa Rican Bishops’ Conference published an interview with Father Cecchin on the role of the Pontifical Marian Academy in developing the new norms and on the importance of these norms in the study and judgment of the alleged apparitions. The interview, however, focuses on Medjugorje.

Excerpt:

Hablemos Iglesia: So my next question is whether, in your opinion, Medjugorje is the most complex case of Marian apparitions.

Father Cecchin: No, no, it is not Medjugorje.

HI: No?

C: No. For us, Fatima is the most complex case, and continues to be so.

HI: Really? And why?

C: Not Fatima per se, but Fatima in the interpretations that we have, with the different groups that have interpreted it. Fatima is the most known [apparition] in the world. Fatima is everywhere in the world. The Chinese are afraid of Fatima [ndt: pardon the familiarity, but it is hard to believe, and the Chinese have a convenient excuse. Unless it is a question of sparing the Chinese in view of the alleged agreement that is underway].

HI: Is it the most prophetic?

C: Yes, because they are afraid of the fall of communism. That is why the Chinese, North Korea too, are very afraid of Fatima as a reality that can destroy it. But Fatima has this problem of interpretations and these catastrophic interpretations continue. Different interpretations that… Medjugorje does not have this problem.

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The enigmatic statement of the Franciscan Marianist is surprising.

It is an open secret that Rome wants to stifle the phenomenon of Akita in Japan, just as the “Lady of All Nations” of Amsterdam has already been judged as probably not supernatural [ndt: a young Dutch woman, Ida Peerdeman claims to have witnessed, between 1945 and 1959, 56 apparitions of the Virgin under the name of ‘Lady of All Nations’. In 2020, a decree of the DDF ruled that “the ‘Lady of All Nations’ must not be venerated and the faithful must stop all propaganda” – Aleteia].

The events concerning Our Lady of Akita are considered to be linked to those in Amsterdam, because the statue of the Virgin of Akita was sculpted in 1963 on the model of the representation of the Lady of All Nations of Amsterdam. In 1973, various phenomena took place – apparitions, a statue of the Virgin in tears and stigmata on the statue and the visionary, a nun.

The “message of Akita” is however considered particularly “problematic”. It calls for atonement for the sins of men. A “grave punishment for all humanity” is announced if men do not convert and if offenses against God do not cease. This punishment will be, according to the message, more terrible than the flood. The “only weapon” left to believers is.

Source: https://www.benoit-et-moi.fr/2020/2024/09/28/apparitions-mariales-fatima-dans-le-collimateur/

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Medjugorje Case: Biblical Scholar Maggi Stings the Vatican: “Late Intervention and the Telenovela of the Apparitions Continues”

The provocation from the Servites of Mary: “If the devotion and prayer of the faithful count, there were also some in Trevignano. They have applied double standards.”

Rome, September 21, 2024

Those who hoped that the note from the Holy See would finally close the Medjugorje issue, after 43 years of high tension between skeptics and devotees of the supposed visionaries, risk being disappointed. Not only because the document itself, ‘The Queen of Peace’ – more a title than a wish – leaves to the Pope, and him alone, the possibility of resolving the issue of the authenticity of the apparitions, but especially because criticisms of the Vatican, which, having decided to suspend its judgment on the visions, has fully endorsed the devotion in Slavic lands, are coming from all sides. This includes those from a heavyweight in Italian biblical exegesis, Father Alberto Maggi, 79, who studied at the prestigious École Biblique et Archéologique française in Jerusalem and has numerous publications dedicated to the Virgin Mary. The one most relevant to the Medjugorje case is titled ‘Bernadette, the True Story of an Imperfect Saint’ (Garzanti, 2022) and focuses on another story of Marian apparitions, the more orthodox one from Lourdes.

Was a pronouncement from the Holy See really necessary regarding Medjugorje?
“Certainly, but forty years ago, when the dubious affair began. Popular wisdom teaches that you don’t close the stable door when the horses have already bolted. Evidently, there are different criteria at the Vatican.”

Do you find the decision to suspend judgment on the authenticity of the apparitions more controversial, or the green light given to pilgrimages at the site of the supposed apparitions?
“The Vatican has adopted double standards. If what matters is the devotion of the faithful, their prayers, and not the truth of the event, why have different criteria been adopted for the supposed apparition of the Virgin in Trevignano? There too, thousands of people gathered in prayer.”

As a biblical scholar, do you see pagan reflections and mere superstition in miraculous phenomena like Medjugorje?
“The magistral teaching of Sacred Scripture is contained in the Book of the Prophet Jeremiah, where the Lord laments: ‘My people have forsaken me, the fountain of living waters, and have hewn them out cisterns, broken cisterns that can hold no water’ (Jer 2:13). When one does not know the Word of the Lord, the good news of Jesus, one resorts to gossip.”

What is the difference between a visionary like Bernadette and the six citizens of the former Yugoslavia who claim to have seen the Virgin?
“In Lourdes, from the very first day, everything is rigorously documented thanks to the diligence of police commissioner Jacomet. Bernadette, a clear and crystalline figure, never accepted even a coin; moreover, over time she distanced herself from her experience. One of the Church's rules for the authenticity of apparitions is their brevity; this was the case for Lourdes, while in Medjugorje the telenovela continues.”

Was the Vatican's verdict in any way influenced by the business surrounding Medjugorje, primarily the Radio Maria network?
“I believe that a business of one hundred million euros a year is a strong argument.”

Why do so many people, even in the 21st century, need to seek the Other through apparitions, miraculous healings, and miracles?
“If one believed and practiced the Gospel, a word that, if accepted, brings forth the fullness of life in every creature, people would not seek answers elsewhere. Jesus is very clear: he rejects those who ask him for signs to see and believe (Jn 4:48) and asks to believe in order to be a sign that others may see.”

Translated by ChatGPT https://www.alzogliocchiversoilcielo.com/2024/09/caso-medjugorje-alberto-maggi-punge-il.html