...when the Church gives its definitive statement on the alleged visions at Medugorge.
Like so many other Catholic writers, I've met numbers of good people who have had profound experiences of spiritual renewal at Medugorge. And I've been told dozens of times that I "ought to go" and so on, and so on... But I've never had any desire to go there, and have always assumed that the Church would eventually say something along the lines of "This is a place where many good people have prayed and found help, where many good confessions have been heard and much good has been done...but we cannot state that the alleged visions are authentic." The sheer volume and vagueness of the "messages" together with the seemingly unending saga of the thing as it has expanded over decades made it seem unlikely that there were actual, literal, visions of Our Lady involved.
When the decision is announced, it will be horrible to see and hear the gloating of people who have long sneered at "mega-forgery" and who will delight in the discomfort of those who have been pilgrims and who have believed in the alleged visions.
I won't be among those gloating. Most - indeed virtually all - the pilgrims and fans of Medugorge that I have ever met have been good and sincere people whose activities, manner and commitment to the Church have been worthier and humbler than some of those who attack the alleged visions.
The Medugorge enthusiasts are going to need help and spiritual support, and the Church will need unity and goodwill...
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3 comments:
Thankyou for this :)
The whole thing is embarrassing and sad....
The Church never pronounces on supernatural phenomena of this sort until they have ceased. That applied even to the resurrection of Jesus. It was not until Pentecost, nine days after the ascension, that the resurrection became a formal dogma of the Church. (So Thomas remained a disciple in good standing, despite denying it).
I really don't know about Medjugorje. A nun I knew brought back a stone from the mountain of apparitions, and it definitely smelt of lavender. But the messages themselves demand very long prayers, it's not something that's easy for even reasonably committed Catholics to fulfil. There also some rather depressing, very human failings in the background to the story, which isn't fatal to the authenticity of the visions, but causes one to be sceptical.
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