The Vatican speaks on the Medjugorje case

According to my colleague Saverio Gaeta, if the ten main places where the Madonna appeared in Europe are united with a pen, the letter M of Mary is formed. The apparitions, true or false, the reports of Madonnas tearful of blood, are thousands. Exaggerating a little, Paul Claudel called Fatima "the most important religious event of the century", while the thesis that he claims to be the celebration of Vatican Council II is the most convincing event of the twentieth century. Maria is however around the corner. Lurking like the hidden God mentioned by Francois Mauriac. Usually he chooses the simplest, the illiterate, the children or the children. The world, as she claimed, wants to find a mother. After the attack on the Pope, the so-called "apparitions" began in Medjugorje and it is from Medjugorje, moreover, that the statuette of Civitavecchia comes, with that sign of blood at the gates of Rome. Statuette that "teared blood" in the hands of the bishop of the city, Monsignor Girolamo Grillo.

I see it, eminence, thoughtful, I hope not annoyed, Medjugorje, it is easy to be fortune-tellers, it will not be so easily and soon recognized. Unless we are faced with respect for a fundamental rule: the truthfulness of a supernatural phenomenon is seen in the fruits: prayer, penance, conversion, approach to the sacraments. For Renè Laurentin Medjugorje it is the place where one confesses the most. Let's skip miracles.
The fruits you listed are not the only or first of the criteria. You see, in Czestochowa, Poland, there is no apparition recognized by the Church at the start, there is a Marian place of worship that, over the centuries, has given amazing fruits, has even become the center of the identity of a nation. The spirit of a people, of a Catholic people like the Polish one, has continuously nourished and strengthened here. When I was Secretary of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, it was my turn to write to the bishops who asked for pastoral information and suggestions on Medjugorje.

Have you practically discouraged pilgrims?
It is not quite like that. In the meantime, it is one thing not to organize them, one thing is to discourage them. The issue is complex. In a letter to the French magazine "Famille Chrètienne" the bishop of Mostar, Ratko Peric, made highly critical statements about the alleged "supernaturality" of the apparitions and revelations of Medjugorje. At this point, following a request for clarification, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, in a letter to Monsignor Gilbert Aubry, bishop of La Rèunion, signed by me as Secretary on May 26, 1998, made clear the point on Medjugorje. I kept, first of all, to clarify that “it is not the norm of the Holy See to take, in the first instance, its own direct position on supposed supernatural phenomena. This dicastery, for all that concerns the credibility of the "apparitions" in question, simply follows what was established by the bishops of the former Yugoslavia in the declaration of Zadar of 10 April 1991: "Based on the investigations conducted so far, it is not It is possible to affirm that these are apparitions or supernatural revelations ”. After the division of Yugoslavia into several independent nations, it would now be up to the members of the Bishops' Conference of Bosnia and Herzegovina to re-examine the matter if necessary and to issue new declarations, if the case so requires. What Monsignor Peric said in a letter to the secretary general of "Famille Chrètienne", that is, that my belief and position is not only "not aware of supernaturality" but equally that of "it is aware of the non-supernaturality of the apparitions or revelations of Medjugorje" , must be considered an expression of a personal conviction of the bishop of Mostar who, as an ordinary of the place, has all the rights to express what he is and remains his personal opinion. Finally, as regards the pilgrimages to Medjugorje that take place in a private way, this Congregation believes that they are allowed on condition that they are not considered as an authentication of current events and that still require an examination by the Church.

All this, from the pastoral point of view, what consequences has it had? Almost two million pilgrims go to Medjugorje every year; the event had serious complications such as the attitude of the friars of the parish of Medjugorje who often found themselves in conflict with the local ecclesiastical authority; then there is the imposing mass of the "messages" that, in these years, the Madonna would have entrusted to the six presumed seers. "When a Catholic goes to that sanctuary in good faith, he has the right to spiritual assistance," said former Vatican spokesman Joaquin Navarro-Valls.
I stick to the important consequences. The declarations of the bishop of Mostar reflect a personal opinion, they are not a definitive and official judgment of the Church. Everything is postponed to the Zadar declaration of the bishops of the former Yugoslavia of 10 April 1991, which leaves the door open for future investigations. The verification must therefore go on. In the meantime, private pilgrimages with pastoral accompaniment of the faithful are allowed. Finally, all Catholic pilgrims can go to Medjugorje, a Marian place of worship where it is possible to express themselves with all devotional forms.

If I understand correctly the faithful are accompanied by priests, the bishops should not get involved. Pilgrimages only organized privately, even though I understand that only since 2006, under Vatican pressure, the same "Roman Opera pilgrimages" has had to cross from its proposals Medjugorje. I understand that we must be on guard against the "religion of the apparitions" that fuel the "tourism of the apparitions", I understand the extreme prudence of the Church, yet this unknown village in Bosnia and Herzegovina attracts more and more faithful. During the Balkan war not a mortar or bomb fell on the alleged places of the "apparitions". We continued to pray and invoke Mary, and all the appeals for peace of John Paul II were heard live around the sanctuary. But the question everyone is asking is simple; Did the Madonna appear in Medjugorje or not?
This is a problem.

His opinion?
According to Tarcisio Bertone it is a big problem. Compared to the other apparitions, there is a certain anomaly to the traditio of the apparitions. From 1981 to today Maria would have appeared tens of thousands of times. This is a phenomenon that cannot be assimilated to other Marian apparitions that have their own line, their own parable. They begin and end as divine meteors. The times, it is said, are so extraordinary that they require an extraordinary response from Mary. That "is said" is a parenthesis to highlight or mark my personal difference of views. It is the thesis of those who would like the most sided Church in a certain line. Mary, however, do not forget it, it is present in all the sanctuaries of the world which are a kind of immense protection net, points of spiritual irradiation, immense resources of good and goodness.

She is skeptical and doubtful.
I am with the institutional Church, although I understand the devotees who go to Medjugorje. I repeat: it is not necessary to start from specific events, the manifestation of the divine through the apparitions is not a necessary requirement to cultivate a true, authentic Marian devotion.

Source: From the book The Last Seer of Fatima Ed. Rai Rizzoli (pages 103-107)