Suspension of Fr. Jozo Zovko Lifted
Fr. Jozo Zovko received a decision from Cardinal Fernandez, head of the Dicastery of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, which revokes the decree of Bishop Ratko Perić on the ban on activities in the Diocese of Mostar.
Fr. Jozo Zovko’s suspension for action was lifted. Fr. Jozo Zovko, the parish priest in Medjugorje at the time of the beginning of the apparitions, was imprisoned under communism because he was considered an instigator of children “to lie that Our Lady appeared to them.” However, even in the three and a half years that Fr. Jozo spent in prison, the communists could not “break” the visionaries, reports Maxportal.
Fr. Jozo Zovko was not suspended like other Franciscans for disobedience to sporadic parishes in Herzegovina, in the well-known “Herzegovinian case”.
As Fr. Jozo Zovko continued to preach and testify about Medjugorje, Bishop Ratko Perić issued him with a decree prohibiting him from working in the area of the Diocese of Mostar.
Fr. Jozo in Medjugorje again?
Thus, the possibility opened up again for Fr. Jozo to celebrate Holy Mass in Medjugorje, if the parish priest invited him. After so many years, many would certainly like to see him at the Medjugorje pulpit, from where this charismatic friar prophetically and fearlessly “thundered” even during the communist regime.
The Priestly Path of Fr. Jozo Zovka
On April 3, 1965, he was ordained a priest. After completing his studies, he went to serve in the parish of Konjic, and then he was the chaplain of the parish of Čerin. He was a member of the Pax commission for the preparation of catechisms and religious education manuals, which was part of the then Council of the Bishops’ Conference of Yugoslavia.
In 1974, he enrolled in postgraduate studies in religious pedagogy at the University of Graz. Upon his return, he was assigned the parish of Posušje, where he was the parish priest, and in the autumn of 1980 he became the parish priest in Medjugorje.
Apparitions in Medjugorje
On June 24, 1981, Our Lady’s first apparition took place in Medjugorje. Late in the evening, on August 17, 1981, he was arrested and taken to the pre-trial detention center of the Mostar District Court. Before the court, Fr. Jozo Zovko was defended by lawyer Milan Vuković.
The show trial that followed was unique in that the content of Scripture became part of the accusation and punishment. He was sentenced to three years in prison. He challenged that verdict. Parts of the indictment were dismissed at the Federal Court in Belgrade and the verdict was reduced to a year and a half in prison. He was imprisoned in Foča until 1983.
After he was released from the Foča prison in 1983, he was assigned the parish of Bukovica, where he was a parish priest until 1985. His new place of pastorship was Tihaljina, where he stayed until 1991. In 1991, he became the guardian of the monastery in Široki Brijeg, where he held this position until 1994.
During the Greater Serbian aggression against Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina, during 1991 and 1992, he spoke twice in the United Nations Security Council and in the European Parliament, calling for an end to the war.
Suspension
On August 23, 1989, Bishop Pavao Žanić suspended Zovko’s priestly powers in two Herzegovinian dioceses due to “involvement in the conflict between the Franciscans and the bishops over the division of parishes – which has been intense in Herzegovina since the last 40 years.”
On October 14, 1989, Zovko sent an objection to the Holy See against the bishop’s decree, and on February 15, 1990, the bishop’s decree was confirmed with the verdict that the bishop’s sanction would remain in force until he withdrew to a monastery far from Medjugorje.
Zovko was then appointed guardian of the Franciscan monastery in Široki Brijeg and did not perform any pastoral service. Despite the ban, he continued to confess, and in 1994 the local bishop, Ratko Perić, abolished his confessional jurisdiction.
Zovko continued to promote the apparitions, traveling around the world, especially in the United States. On November 5, 2002. Zovko began a tour with speakers in the United States. The rector of the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception in Washington, DC, Walter Rossi, forbade Zovko to celebrate Holy Mass there.
Outside Herzegovina
The Franciscan Province of St. In 2005, she handed over the monastery and the island to Badija in Croatia, the Herzegovinian Franciscan Province, for 99 years. The provincials, Fr. Bernardin Škunca and Fr. Slavko Soldo, invited Zovko to move to the Franciscan monastery and supervise its restoration.
However, Zovko turned a deaf ear to this request for four years until February 16, 2009, when he agreed to move to the monastery in Badija.
Later, Zovko lived between Badija and Graz in Austria, where he occasionally visited. In December 2011, he was transferred to Zagreb, where he resides in the Franciscan Monastery of the Franciscan Province of Herzegovina. Since then, he has lived between the Franciscan monastery in Zagreb and the Franciscan monastery in Badija.
SOURCE: HERZEGOVINA.COM