Father Livio: I tell you the main message of Medjugorje

The most important message that emerges from the apparitions of the Madonna, when they are authentic, is that Mary is a real figure, truly existing mind, even if in a dimension that escapes our senses. For Christians the testimony of the visionaries is undoubtedly a confirmation of the faith, which is often vacillating and asleep. We cannot forget that, from the moment of the Resurrection of Christ until today, the apparitions of Jesus like those of Mary have had an important influence in the life of the Church, reawakening the faith and stimulating Christian life. The apparitions are a sign of the supernatural with this God, with his wisdom and his providence, he gives new vigor to the pilgrim people of God on earth. To snub the apparitions or, worse still, to despise them, means to ignore one of the tools with which God intervenes in the life of the Church.

I will never be able to forget the inner experience I experienced on the first day I arrived in Medjugorje. It was a cold evening in March 1985, when pilgrimages were still in their infancy and the police were constantly watching over the village. I went to church in pouring rain. It was a weekday, but the building was packed with locals. At that time the apparitions took place before the Holy Mass in the small room adjacent to the sacristy. During Holy Mass a thought of light crossed my soul. "Here," I said to myself, "Our Lady appears, so Christianity is the only true religion." I did not doubt at all, not even before, the merits of my faith. but the interior experience of the presence of the Mother of God during the apparition had the truths of faith in which I believed, covered with flesh and bones, making them alive and shining with holiness and beauty.

The vast majority of pilgrims experience a similar experience, who, after an often tiring and uncomfortable journey, arrive in Medjugorje without finding anything that satisfies the material senses or sensational expectations. A skeptic may wonder what people who come to that remote village from America, Africa or the Philippines might find. After all, there is only a modest parish waiting for them. Yet they go home transformed and often return at the cost of great sacrifices, because in the heart the certainty that Maria is really there, that deals with this world and the life of each of us with a tenderness and a love has made its way that has no limits.

There is no doubt that the most important and immediate message that reaches the heart of those who go to Medjugorje is that Mary is alive and that therefore the Christian faith is true. Someone might argue that a faith that needs signs is still fragile. But who, in this unbelieving world, where the dominant culture despises religion and where, even within the Church, there are many tired and sleepy souls, does not need signs that strengthen faith and support it on the counter-current path ?