This week, I have been reflecting on the past three decades since Our Lady reportedly began appearing in Medjugorje. I have been pondering the incredible persecution and danger that the seers endured, never knowing from day to day if the Communists would dispatch them as the Yugoslavian government was known to do with “resistors” (since the six seers would not, under threat, say that the apparitions were false). I am thinking of the countless apostolates that I have encountered in my travels, men and women who found their conversion and calling on that mountainside… most especially the priests I have met whom Our Lady called on pilgrimage there. I am thinking too that, not too long from now, the entire world will be drawn “into” Medjugorje as the so-called “secrets” that the seers have faithfully kept are revealed (they have not even discussed them with each other, save for the one that is common to them all—a permanent “miracle” that will be left behind on Apparition Hill.)

I am thinking too of those who have resisted the countless graces and fruits of this place that often read like the Acts of the Apostles on steroids. It is not my place to declare Medjugorje true or false—something the Vatican continues to discern. But neither do I ignore this phenomenon, invoking that common objection that “It’s private revelation, so I don’t have to believe it”—as if what God has to say outside the Catechism or Bible is unimportant. What God has spoken through Jesus in Public Revelation is necessary for salvation; but what God has to say to us through prophetic revelation is necessary at times for our ongoing sanctification. And thus, I wish to blow the trumpet—at the risk of being called all the usual names of my detractors—at what seems utterly obvious: that Mary, Mother of Jesus, has been coming to this place for over thirty years in order to prepare us for Her Triumph—whose climax we seem to be rapidly approaching. And so, since I have so many new readers of late, I wish to republish the following with this caveat: though I have written relatively little about Medjugorje over the years, nothing gives me more joy… why is that?

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ACCORDING to Our Lady, there is a “blessing” coming upon the Church, the “Flame of Love” of her Immaculate Heart, according to the approved revelations of Elizabeth Kindelmann (read The Convergence and the Blessing). I want to continue to unfold in the days ahead the significance of this grace in Scripture, prophetic revelations, and the teaching of the Magisterium.

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Pope Francis opening “doors of mercy”, December 8th, 2015, St. Peter’s, Rome
Photo: Maurizio Brambatti/European Pressphoto Agency

FROM the very beginning of his pontificate, when he refused the pomp that often accompanies the papal office, Francis has not failed to stir controversy. With deliberation, the Holy Father has purposely tried to model a different kind of priesthood to both the Church and the world: a priesthood that is more pastoral, compassionate, and unafraid to walk among the fringes of society to find the lost sheep. In so doing, he has not hesitated to sharply rebuke his confréres and threaten the comfort zones of “conservative” Catholics. And this to the glee of modernist clergy and the liberal media who intoned that Pope Francis was “changing” the Church to become more “welcoming” to gays and lesbians, divorcées, Protestants, etc. ^[1]eg. Vanity Fair, April 8th, 2016 The rebukes of the Pope toward the right, coupled with the assumptions of the left, has led to a cascade of downright anger and accusations toward the Vicar of Christ that he is attempting to alter 2000 years of Sacred Tradition. Orthodox media, such as LifeSiteNews and EWTN, have openly questioned the Holy Father’s judgment and rationale in certain statements. And many are the letters I’ve received from laymen and clergy alike who are exasperated with the Pope’s soft approach in the culture war.

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