This book is the first of the four volumes of sermons and discourses given by Fr. Slavko Barbaric and Fr. Tomislav Vlasic during 1984 - 1987 in Medjugorje, and contains talks given from Easter until December 1984.
All chapters of this book are now included
These apparitions started on 24th June 1981 and are continuing every day. At the beginning, Our Lady presented herself saying : "I am the Queen of Peace"; and the first message that she sent to the world is one of peace. This message is the essential one around which all else revolves. The context of the message is this : The world with all its present tensions is going towards its ruin. If it wants to be saved, it must have peace, but it will only have peace if it finds God ; those who find God find a joy in their hearts from which comes peace.
Here is the second message which has been repeated to us a thousand times :"Be converted, be converted, be converted." Then come the messages of prayer and fasting. Our Lady says :"There are many Christians who no longer believe because they do not pray. So start with at least seven Our Father's, Hail Mary's, Glory Be's and the Creed every day. Fast on Fridays on bread and water. Fasting cannot be substituted by prayer and almsgiving ; only the sick can substitute it by prayer and almsgiving." Then she stressed the need for monthly confession for a full participation in the Holy Eucharist. Once she spoke of the Holy Eucharist saying :"Those Christians who go to church without preparation, without receiving Holy Communion, without giving thanks, it is better that they do not go because their hearts become hard." She said to Jelena, one of the visionaries :"When you go to church, start preparing for Mass as soon as you leave home and never leave the church without thanking God."
So the messages are these : PEACE, PRAYER, FASTING, THE SACRAMENTS AND AN URGENT CONVERSION.
All the visionaries say they have seen Heaven and Purgatory, four of them have seen Hell and two girls prayed Our Lady not to let them see it because they were afraid. These visionaries say that, from the very beginning, Our Lady told them she would confide ten secrets to them for the whole of humanity : up to now (1984), eight secrets have already been confided to Vicka, ten to Mirjana, and nine to the others. (As at 31/1/03 - Ten secrets have been confided to Mirjana, Ivanka and to Jacov, and nine to the rest). I that you know the names of all the children who have the visions : Vicka Ivankovic, Ivanka Ivankovic, Jacov Colo, Ivan Dragicevic, Mirjana Dragicevic and Marija Pavlovic
These visionaries say that the ten secrets refer to the whole world and are linked together in a chain. There are also other secrets, personal secrets for the children or for certain people who are connected with these future world events. Among the ten secrets there is the promise of Our Lady to leave a visible sign on the site of the apparitions here in Medjugorje. The visionaries say they have seen this sign in a vision. It is very beautiful, permanent and indestructable. It will be given here in Medjugorje for all humanity and many miracles will be connected with it. Five of the children know the date on which the sign will occur : all of them stress that this period until the appearance of the visible sign, is a period of grace and for the strengthening of faith.
Mirjana tells us something more about the secrets and the future of the world. As from Christmas 1982, Mirjana no longer has daily apparitions, on that date she received the last of the ten secrets for humanity and the dates of all the secrets to come. On that day Our Lady said :" Now turn to God by faith as everybody else. I will appear for your birthday and when there are difficulties in your life." After this, Our Lady has appeared twice on her birthday on 18th March 1983 and 1984. (Since 1984 Our Lady has appeared each 18th March, and also Mirjana now sees Our Lady on the 2nd of each month, where she prays for unbelievers)
Mirjana says that before the visible sign appears, three secrets will be revealed to the world. These three secrets will be three admonishments to the world and will be revealed by her three days before they are to occur. She will tell a priest what should happen. After the three admonishments, the visible sign will appear and after the sign, if the world is not converted, the punishment will come. Mirjana says that the punishment will surely come because it is no use expecting the conversion of the whole world, but it can be diminished. She tell us that the seventh secret has already been cancelled. This was an evil one, which was coming to the world for its sins, but it has been cancelled because many people have fasted and prayed. From this we can see that punishment can be diminished by penance, fasting and prayer. This is why Our Lady always urges us :"Pray, fast and be converted."
I asked Mirjana if there is a long or rather short time before these things come to pass and she replied that, for her, it is a short time. What is meant by short I do not know ; does it mean months, years or decades ? I do not know. However, she said "This period is short." Then I asked her another question, "What do you want to tell the world of today ?" She replied,"Be converted as quickly as possible and open your hearts to God."
Mirjana had a particular vision on 14th April 1982. While she was waiting for Our Lady to appear, Satan arrived disguised as Our Lady. She writes,"He was ugly, horribly ugly. You cannot even imagine how ugly, he almost killed me with his gaze, I almost fainted. He then told me,'You must leave God and Our Lady because they will make you suffer, come with me and I will make you happy in love and life.' My heart echoed -No, no, no! Then Satan went away and Our Lady came and she said to me :"I am sorry for this, but you must know that Satan exists and has asked God to allow him to test the Church for a certain period with the intention of destroying Her. God allowed him to have one century, saying ,'You will not destroy Her.' This century in which we are living is under Satan's power. When the secrets I have confided to you come about, his power will be destroyed. Satan has become aggresive because he is losing his power. He is breaking up marriages, causing quarrels amongst priests, obsessing people, even killing them. Therefore, protect yourselves by prayer, fasting and, above all, community prayer. Renew the use of holy water, wear blessed and holy objects and put them in your homes."
There have been foreign experts here in Medjugorje who say that this vision is the same as that which Pope Leo XIII had a century ago when he saw the Church attacked by demons in an apocalyptic vision. Afterwards, he introduced the prayer to St. Michael the Archangel to be recited by the priest after Mass which was said until the recent Vatican Council.
(The) Other five visionaries continue to have daily apparitions. The apparitions are now fairly brief, about one minute. Our Lady does not give many answers, but urges us continuously to pray, to do penance and to live the Gospel. The details about these five visionaries during the last year are the following. As from 7th January, 1983 Our Lady has been telling the children some episodes of her life. She has been telling Vicka the story of her life every evening and all this will be published when Our Lady says so. Since mid-July, 1983 Our Lady has been telling the future of the world to Ivanka. All this has to be written down by the visionary and afterwards, to be published when Our Lady tells her.
The last most powerful messages were given in the Autumn. In September, through Jacov, Our Lady said : "I have already several times that peace in the world is in danger : have brotherly love for each other, increase your prayers and fasting so that you may be saved." Jacov said that everyone must be told this. Then, on 30th November, 1983 Our Lady told Marija to tell the priest : "You must advise the Bishop and the Pope at once of the urgency and great importance of this message for the whole of humanity."
Other details of the last months are connected with the intention of Our Lady to guide the Parish on the way to its consecration to God. I will talk about this later, as it is connected with the other phenomenon. In addition to the six young people who have the apparitions in the strict sense of the word, there are two young girls, 11 and 12 years old, who see Our Lady with their heart. They see her in a different way and cannot touch her as the other six do. Their names are Jelena Vasilj and Marijana Vasilj. Jelena started this experience on 15th December 1982 : Marijana, together with another young girl, saw Our Lady on Good Friday 1983. Our Lady told Jelena that if the two of them continued with prayer and fasting they would receive the gift of locutio interna, that they would hear her voice. Marijana persevered and received the gift of locutio interna on 5th October 1983 for her birthday. This phenomenon is, at the same time, divergent from and convergent with the other phenomenon. That is to say that the separate accounts of everything that Our Lady has told the six children confirm one another. They do not know the secrets, however, and Our Lady told Jelena at the beginning : "I do not intend to reveal the secrets through you, but rather to guide you on the path to consecration to God." In this young girl we can, in fact, see very strong spiritual dynamics with many spiritual experiences.
Through Jelena, Our Lady sent a message to the world on 25th April 1983 : "Tell my sons and daughters that my heart is burning for them. I ask only for conversion, only conversion." I asked if I should tell this to the Pope and Our Lady replied : "To all as quickly as possible." She continued : "The word I tell the world is 'be converted'. I will pray to my Son not to punish the world, but you must be converted. You do not know, you will not know and cannot know what God will send the world; you must be converted. Renounce everything and be ready for everything. That is all I wish to tell the world; be converted."
This message was given in an atmosphere of a thousand questions from the clergy, the Bishop and priests who were saying; who knows if she has appeared, how she appeared, why she has appeared at Medjugorje, why not in another parish; why, why, why ? Then Our Lady said : "The word I want to tell the world is; be converted."
As from the second anniversary of the apparitions here at Medjugorje, 24th June, 1983, Our Lady through Jelena, is guiding a prayer group. Our Lady said : "I wish to have a prayer group. Everyone can participate, but I commend it particularly to young people because they are freer from engagements and, in a special way, to those young people who wish to lead a consecrated life."
Now the group is a closed one. Our Lady said : "I will tell you when other groups can be formed." She asks the following essential resolutions of the group : a total abandonment to God, to renounce all fear, because she said : "When you have abandoned yourselves to God, there is no more fear in your hearts." At least three hours prayer every day ; at least half an hour in the morning and evening. She recommended daily Mass. Then, twice a week, fasting on bread and water; for the past five months she has asked the group for three consecutive days of fasting for special needs of the Church
She stressed, especially, the need for the group to love its enemies, not to slander, not to bear ill feeling towards anybody, but only to love and bless. She has asked the group to follow her for four years and during this period not to choose a vocation, not to enter a convent or to marry. I asked, "Why not even go into a convent ?". She replied : "You are all free, you can become part of the group or not, but I am putting these conditions to the group and I tell all Christians that the most important thing is to enter into the depth of prayer and then you will able to make the right choice." Last year, through Jelena, Our Lady expressed the wish several times that the world be consecrated to the Heart of Jesus and to the Immaculate Heart. In the Autumn she emphasised this and dictated two prayers of consecration to the Sacred Hearts.
In the last week of Advent, Our Lady said : "Start invoking the Holy Spirit every day in church." Later on she recommended that the invocation to the Holy Spirit be made, not only in church, also in the family and said : "Every morning say at least five Our Father's, Hail Mary's, Glory Be's in expiation of the wounds of Our Lord and a sixth Our Father, Hail Mary and Glory Be for the intentions of the Pope. Recite the 'Angelus', make the consecration to the Sacred Hearts and invoke the Holy Spirit. Do at least this much every morning."
The subject of prayer to the Holy Spirit is greatly stressed by Our Lady. Once she said : "Many people pray in the wrong way, they ask for graces, but few ask for the grace of the Holy Spirit. But it is those who receive the gift of the Holy Spirit who have received everything. First of all, ask for the gift of the Holy Spirit."
At the beginning of 1984, through Jelena, Our Lady expressed the wish that the parishoners meet one evening each week and it was decided to do so each Thursday evening in order to be guided by Our Lady. Our first meeting took place on 1st March and, on that occasion, Our Lady gave the first message to the Parish through Marija :"Dear children, I have chosen this Parish in a special way because I want to guide you and protect you by love. Thank you for coming. May more of you come each time and stay close to my Son and I. I will give you a message each Thursday." She has continued in this way each Thursday to give us a message.
I will only give you a brief summary of Our Lady's messages. Once she expressed the desire that all the parishoners be truly converted so that this community could become a source of conversion for all those who come here. She stressed the importance of the adoration of the Blessed Sacrament, the Veneration of Our Lord's Wounds, especially His Side Wound. Once she said : "Stop talking, but pray for the unity of the Parish because my Son and I have a special plan connected with it."
Last Thursday, Holy Thursday, she said : "Share in my feelings ; pray, pray, pray." On 1st March, through Jelena, at the first meeting of the Parish, she gave this message : "Every Thursday, re-read and put into practice the passage from the Gospel of St. Matthew VI, 24-34: a man cannot be the slave of two masters ! Do not be worried : look at the birds of the air, make it your first care to find the Kingdom of God ..." Later on you will realise that this passage of the Gospel has not been chosen by Our Lady at random but because it reflects the meaning of peace as spoken of by her. That same evening she said to Jelena : "Every Thursday, those who smoke should give it up at least on that day, those who drink alcohol give that up and others can give up some other pleasure and, if there are some generous people amongst you, they can also fast."
On 21st March she said to Jelena : "Today I am rejoicing with all my angels. The first part of my programme has been accomplished." Then she paused and wept saying : "I do not know what to say. There are many people who live in sin ! here amongst you, too, there are some people who are piercing my heart. Pray and fast for them."
The following day, 22nd March, she said to Jelena : "Yesterday I told you that the first part of my programme has already been accomplished ; now turn to the second part by fasting and prayer so that this part, too, may be accomplished."
A special message during Lent was given for Holy Saturday. Our Lady said : "Prepare yourselves in a special way for Holy Saturday. Do not ask me why for Saturday, but I repeat to you ; prepare yourselves for Holy Saturday."
Now I will tell you what Our Lady said yesterday evening. I will try to translate it. Before I tell you what Our Lady said yesterday, on Good Friday she said : "You must be very happy. Today Jesus died for your salvation. He descended into Hell, opened the doors of Paradise and opened the door of Paradise in your hearts ; so you must be happy." I was surprised that Our Lady was not weeping and calling us to penance but actually on Good Friday said : "You must be very happy."
Yesterday evening Jelena and Marijana had a proper meditation. I will try to give you an approximate translation of the contents of the message. Jelena said this : Our Lady said : "Lift up your hands, long for Jesus because at this time of His Resurrection He wishes to give you graces. I am telling everyone to be enthusiastic about the Resurrection of Jesus. Meditate, meditate on this. Heaven and Earth are praising Him because He is risen." Then, after a silence, she said : "All of us in Heaven are happy but we need joy in your hearts. My gift and that of my Son Jesus which we are offering to you now is this : your ordeals will be lightened. We will be close to you in your difficulties and will show you the way out of them if you accept Us." I am doing my best to translate this for you ; to continue : "Now in moments of trial you will be especially helped and the trials made easier for you." Then she added : "Pray a great deal, pray tomorrow." - that is, today - : "that Jesus is truly risen, so that He may be truly risen in your families. There is much quarrelling and I want to transform it into resurrection and peace. I want something to be born in your hearts. Do not say that the year of Redemption is over and you do not need to pray but rather strengthen your prayer. May the year of Redemption be only a stepping stone in your lives."
Jelena has seen the Risen Jesus and a brilliant light shining from His wounds. Jesus blesses everyone, telling them to continuously experience the graces and joys in their hearts and to tell everyone in the world that salvation comes from Him and Him alone. At the end Our Lady said : "My Children, thank you ! Continue reawaking the Resurrection of Jesus in all men." Marijana then added that Our Lady also said : "Dear Children, today I am joyful because many of the faithful have truly lived Holy Saturday as I desired."
These are the latest items of news and the latest messages.
I have only told you something about how Our Lady is guiding the prayer group and the contants of the messages. It would be possible to write a whole book on how she is guiding Jelena and Marijana but, unfortunately, we have not been able to do this yet. However, I will give you a few essential points so that you can follow them.
First of all, I want to tell you that Our Lady is guiding the prayer group on an interior level. It is useless for people wanting to organise prayer groups to come to us for guidelines because Our Lady does not speak of guidelines here, but guides in an interior way. We can offer the group leaders our experiences along the pilgrimage with Our Lady, but I say at once to those who wish to organise prayer groups : consecrate yourselves totally to Our Lady and I guarantee that she will be in your midst and will guide you in an interior way. Two weeks ago, a woman from Milan asked Our Lady through Jelena, "Dear Mother, as you see we have come from Milan to visit you, when are you coming to Milan to visit us ?" Our Lady replied : "When you open your hearts to me." This is the answer to all those who are seeking Our Lady and wish to follow this road. Our Lady is truly present wherever there is true opening of heart and guides every group and person. This is why it is useless to ask for guidelines because, as I have seen with this prayer group, Our Lady has a definite purpose.
I have to explain several things to you so that you are able to walk truly on the path of spiritual life. Some people come here and, immediately, when they hear that these apparitions will be the last ones of Our Lady on earth and hear about the secrets, they become frightened and start saying that soon there will be a catastrophe, soon there will be a war, soon troubles will come. As to this Our Lady said :"Those who say that on such a date, in such a year, there will be a catastrophe are all false prophets. I have always said : be converted, be converted, be converted. Your future depends on your conversion." It is from this that we are able to see the difference between true and false prophecies. That is, false prophecies are always fatalistic, whilst Biblical prophecies are always conditional - "If Nineveh had converted, it would not have been destroyed." As you see, it depends on us and, for this reason, Our Lady always stresses the messages of peace, prayer and fasting.
Through Jelena, Our Lady said : "Love is peace, peace is love." When we speak of peace here you must understand it as a deeper spiritual reality, an attitude, a profound gift from which all others originate. Jelena explains this attitude of peace saying, "Our Lady does not like speaking of sin but, when she has to do so, she seems to be weeping because from the very beginning of her life she has always lived a pure life without sin." This is why Our Lady says : "Do not think of wars, punishment, evil, because if you do so you are on the road towards them. Your task is to accept the Divine peace, to live it and to spread it." From this we can see what is meant by peace : it is a totally positive attitude. Now you can understand that the passage of the Gospel of St. Matthew VI, 24-34, when Our Lady calls for total abandonment at every level, because in this way you can arrive at the true peace she desires. When Our Lady says : "Be converted." you must take a step forward. The majority of people who come here for the first time remain on a superficial level, on an earthly level, asking for healing, solving of marital problems, for their children, for the solution to various problems, but always on an earthly level. Divine peace cannot be found on this level because on this level everything collapses and if we only live on this level we are still in the condition of bearing our fears in our heart. This is why there are fears for the future and fanatical Christians who frighten others saying that Our Lady is menacing and so on. To solve this problem we must look realistically at our lives and at the true Christian life.
I know for sure that soon I will undergo a catastrophe : in a few month's time, in a few years, in hospital, at home, on the road or by an atom bomb, the effect is the same for me : I will die. This is my catastrophe. The only catastrophe of my earthly life. I believe that you, too, are certain of undergoing this catastrophe. If we shut our eyes and pretend death does not exist for us, we are deceiving ourselves and we will try to protect ourselves, to save ourselves from this catastrophe. Instead, we Christians will not undergo a catastrophe because, for us, life consists primarily in eternal life. This life is only a transition. I say this in a very special way after the experiences I have had here because, in a certain sense, through the visionaries, we have been able to touch Heaven, Paradise, because they have all seen Paradise. Three of them have had the experience of being taken up to Heaven. If we truly accept eternal life, a catastrophe does not exist for us any longer. This life is only a transition. We must truly accept this essentially Christian fact and then all fear will vanish, there will be no more fear of the future and we will be capable of accepting Divine peace, of living it and spreading it as Our Lady tells us. Otherwise, we cannot be true messengers when we speak of peace and the apparitions of Medjugorje. We will talk of punishment, troubles, secrets and we will spread fear. Our Lady has repeated several times : "Your task is to receive Divine peace, to live it and to spread it."
I must explain something else to those who come here to ask for the grace of healing and so on. Our Lady always replied to everyone : "The most important thing is to believe, to have faith, to pray every day for the same intention, to fast on Fridays on bread and water. For the gravely sick, pray more and fast more." When Our Lady says that the priority is to have faith, this does not only mean to believe that God exists. The faith of which Our Lady speaks here is an opening of one's whole self to God, in a total abandonment to Him. We can be helped to understand this if we read the episode in the Gospel of St. John, chapter 4 - where Jesus meets the Samaritan woman. They started to talk about water and Jesus entered into her heart and found evil there because she had been married six times, she was an adultress. An opening of heart had come about. Jesus wants to walk with us, so all of you, if you have a special intention you must set out on the path of faith. Perhaps you will not obtain it in five days, maybe five months will be necessary. Some intentions will be granted already today, but it is necessary to set out. With regard to advice that you often ask for here, I would say this : start out in faith with your priests and group leaders. Later, along the way, Jesus will draw near and will make it clear to us, deep down, what we have to do.
I believe that the most important messages for our spiritual life have been given in the last months. The essential one given by Our Lady is this : "If you want to be very happy, live a simple, humble life, pray a great deal, do not delve into your problems, but let yourselves be guided by God." I have meditated for many days on this message and I see it as fundamental, because our problems are the result of a really complicated life, which we have complicated with various philosophies and so on. Our Lady, on the contrary, leads us to a sincere and simple life. Several times during this period she has repeated to me, through the visionary : "Do not complicate matters. Yes, you can walk on a deeper spiritual way but you will have difficulties. Take the simple way, do not delve into your problems but let yourselves be guided by Jesus Christ." I understand this now and realise that those people who want to go deeply into their problems, aggravate matters and block Jesus and His work for us. On the other hand, putting ourselves in the hands of God with simplicity means leaving room for Him Who is Master of our life and of all the mysteries.
I see a great sin in the world in this : we have taken over many areas of our lives that should only belong to Jesus Christ
About the method of prayer, Our Lady said this : "The fundamental point about prayer is to have a great desire for God and for the salvation of souls. Let yourselves be carried along by these desires, of thanking God, really longing for God, and for the salvation of man. If you possess these desires then you will pray and find time for prayer." Our Lady always says that the basis of prayer, like a fruit from which everything comes, is to reach an inner peace, a total abandonment to God. It is from this peace that Divine Gifts derive. But if you are agitated then you cannot understand the Will of God. Several times she has said : "Every agitation comes from Satan."
Lastly, I want to tell you to set out on the pilgrimage of the messages. During this time, I have understood that the entire spiritual life consists in deep prayer. To enter spiritual life in depth means to enter prayer in depth. Depth of prayer is reached by praying, fasting and loving. I have seen that Our Lady has stressed these three elements during this period. You must pray not only with your lips but with your heart. Fast, love your enemies, love those who are suffering, love your neighbours, love everyone. It is by these means that it is possible to reach depth in prayer and reach a spiritual life. I repeat once more : set out on the path of the messages and of prayer. Never say that you have not time to pray. If you say this, it is as if you say you have no time for God, God is of no use to me, God cannot help me, I can live without God. All this means having no time for God. From my own experience I tell you to try to pray morning and evening. Those who wish to go ahead in their spiritual life must pray not less than half an hour each morning and evening. At least half an hour each morning and evening so that we can feel one with God. You will then see how the spiritual life within you reawakens and continually increases.
On Good Friday, Our Lady, through Jelena, said : "I will give you a spiritual secret so that you can be protected from sin and always be united with God." She said this : "Create an active conscience for yourselves. Pray in the morning and read a passage from the Gospel. Impress it on your mind and in your heart and carry it within you through the day. In moments of crisis, meditate on it again and pray to God to strengthen that Word within you." I now understand that this is fundamental for faith. Several times, Our Lady has told us "If your faith is strong Satan cannot harm you." Let us not forget, that to be strong in faith means to have this really active conscience, means growing, being full of the Word of God in an active sense : so it is that a person lives his faith.
Well, I do not want to tire you as our talk has already lasted for an hour. I only wanted to say that this evening at 6.15pm we begin the Rosary and at 7.00 pm Mass. Before Mass, the visionaries will recite seven Our Father's, Hail Mary's, Glory Be's and the Creed and invoke the Holy Spirit. After Mass there will be prayers for the sick. During the apparitions only priests, people in charge and special cases will be allowed in the chapel. By special cases we mean the sick, like that boy in the wheelchair. Let them be present as they feel a special need to be there. Do not be disappointed because Our Lady said : "It is better for people to remain in church in prayer than to be there out of curiosity." In any case, nobody can see anything that the visionaries see. Many people have seen the film of what happens during the apparitions and everyone will certainly see it in the future. If there is any extra room we will allow the group leaders to enter and, if possible, a few people from each group. Please accept our advice, otherwise, if the chapel is full, the visionaries will not be able to enter and they will go elsewhere and the apparition will take place there. After Mass there will be prayers for the sick and the blessing of religious objects. This evening the preparation for the prayers for the sick will be a little longer and fuller. Yesterday, the ceremonies were long and there was no time for preparation but this evening there is. I want to remind you that the Mass offered here each evening at 7.00pm Greenwich time or 6.00pm solar time is offered for peace in the world and for you pilgrims. We wish to be with you and pray for you each evening. Many groups in the world now pray with us for peace at the same hour and, in this way, we feel stronger and more united.
Now some words of consolation for you. You ask for graces and Our Lady says: "You can receive as many as you wish, it depends on you : pray, pray, pray."
I leave you with these words. Seek an answer for yourselves in the light of these words, because only a word which comes from your heart, like a light, is the true answer to each of us. I leave you in prayer.
(Fr. Tomislav Vlasic - 22nd April 1984, Easter Sunday)