An Hour with Jesus This booklet was designed to enhance your time spent with Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament. It includes a prayer format to use in Adoration with rosary meditations, prayers and spontaneous meditation topics. It's a terrific tool to guide your devotions. Spiral bound. Hugely popular.  CLICK HERE

 __________________________________________________

CHURCH MATTERS: CRISES IN IRELAND AND U.S. DOVETAIL WITH CONTROVERSIES OVER APPARITION

It is ironic that areas of the Church often opposed to the apparitions in Bosnia-Hercegovina at Medjugorje are now being helped in large measure -- in some ways, nearly rescued -- by powerful, widely publicized visits by seers to those dioceses and countries, bolstering the faith of many who otherwise may have threatened -- over abuse crises -- to leave the Church.

It is also ironic that dioceses presiding over empty convents, seminaries, and pews oppose an apparition that has been credited by bishops and cardinals with generating more vocations than any other situation in decades. At the church in Medjugorje itself, the pews overflow during five daily Masses: in June, 5,136 priests concelebrated on the altar there (171 a day) and handed out 225,000 Hosts. Meanwhile, tens of thousands attended a youth day there recently and the sixteenth international seminar for priests gathered 305 priests, deacons, and seminarians from 24 countries.

Were it not for Medjugorje -- which has been drawing large numbers of Irish, and has sent a major seer to appear on national television -- Ireland would be in even greater risk of losing its Catholicism. Another seer has been specifically ministering in the U.S. (especially in the Boston area; the mystical and ethnic link between Ireland and Boston is intriguing; two Catholic powerhouses; two places of crisis).

This is not to say there are no problems at Medjugorje nor that the seers are perfect nor that the Vatican -- which has now assumed direct control over the judgment -- will render a positive one. In fact, there was an ominous message from the Blessed Mother last week, on August 25, that reportedly said: "Dear children! Today I call you to pray and fast for my intentions, because Satan wants to destroy my plan. Here I began with this parish and invited the entire world. Many have responded, but there is an enormous number of those who do not want to hear or accept my call. Therefore, you who have said ‘yes’, be strong and resolute. Thank you for having responded to my call."

In the early days of the apparition, language like that -- Satan interfering with her "plan" -- coincided with controversies that involved the local diocese in Mostar, which is operated by secular priests (where Medjugorje is a Franciscan parish). Consider that way back on January 14, 1985, she had said, "My children, Satan is strong. He wishes with all his strength to destroy my plans. Pray only, and do not stop doing it. I will also pray to my Son so that all the plans that I have begun are realized." On August 1, 1985, she added that "Satan has taken away one part of the plan and he wants to possess it." A  month later, after strong prayer by the parish -- on September 5, 1985 -- she intoned, "I thank you for all the prayers. Keep on praying all the more so that Satan will be far away from this place. Dear children, Satan's plan has failed. Pray for the fulfillment of what God plans for this parish." She used the word "plan" frequently -- both when parts of it seemed filled and when parts were not.

Interestingly, those words were spoken before, during, and just after a local diocesan commission formed by a bishop who opposed the apparitions and sought to condemn them (since disbanded) was concluding a study of the apparitions. They were also right before and then during a great uproar during which the local bishop, Pavao Žanić, declared open war on the apparitions, especially on a priest who had been involved in a scandal involving a former nun nine years before (the only publicly known scandal in a parish that has had dozens of priests during the past 25 years). Reported BBC journalist Mary Craig: "On 29th-30th November 1985, the bishop confronted the newly convened commission with the accusation. The members, naturally enough, failed to see what it had to do with the apparitions, though it was obvious that for Bishop Žanić, the connection was self-evident. The commission was dismissed, to give time for further reflection in the light of the momentous discovery, and a further session (the eighth) was fixed for May 1986. The bishop confidently forecast a negative final verdict. At the end of April 1986, however, he returned visibly chastened from a visit to Cardinal (Josef) Ratzinger in Rome." When the Commission reconvened, a secret vote was ordered, with Bishop  Žanić collecting the results and taking them away. "The ballots were sent to Rome," wrote Craig. "Three weeks later, in May, Cardinal Ratzinger dissolved Bishop Žanić's Commission, and ordered the Yugoslav Bishops' Conference to set up a new one. He gave no reasons for this action, unprecedented in the history of the Vatican, which has always left such investigations to the local bishop."

The matter eventually was also removed from even the national commission and last year -- with Cardinal Ratzinger now Pope -- was handed to the one in Rome now studying it. The current bishop of the diocese, Ratko Perić [left], who reportedly was Bishop  Žanić's right-hand man, is as fervently opposed to the apparitions as his predecessor (and also has voiced skepticism about Lourdes and Fatima). Meanwhile, scandals among the Franciscans have been few and far between -- none involving youngsters and far fewer than at similar settings in the United States, Canada, Austria, and Ireland. In Italy itself, Medjugorje has been all over the airways after a major television celebrity was converted from atheism after a visit there.

Yet, one wonders if the Blessed Mother is hinting that behind closed doors, somewhere, more resistance yet will afflict the apparition. Is the current Vatican group -- largely composed of theologians and psychologists (not exactly a profession keen on supernatural claims) -- considering some kind of negativity at this moment? Will anything be released -- or will the process be a very long one, as has been related by one key member of the group? Is there a hidden scandal? More to the point: when the investigation does conclude, whenever that may be (and it may not be until the last seer has his or her last apparition), will the Pope accept the judgment? If it is accepted, will all the seers be approved, or only two or three (the ones deemed most credible, and holy), as happened with the major sanction of apparitions that began around the same time -- in 1981 -- at Kibeho in Rwanda? While we will abide by whatever the formal Church rules, it seems apropos to report on such matters in full context at this time. Or is the Blessed Mother simply commenting on the deterioration of the world at large?

As for scandals in the Church, one has to admit that Satan has infiltrated it in a way that is true to the essence of dire prophetic warnings (if not their specificity) and it has been horrendous: Nothing like it has occurred since the Middle Ages -- which by way the last time that there was a comparable flurry of alleged apparitions (and also a time during which there was a flurry of great natural disasters). It has been an incredible whirlwind. The abuse cases continue to unfold -- some so severe we have chosen not to report or at least to dwell on their details (as in the case of a bishop in Canada). 

But let us add one final note: It is also time to consider how many of the allegations against priests -- in Ireland, in Boston, across the West -- are real. No doubt, a large percentage of them. A few horrendous ones have not yet been reported. The Church itself is now releasing long lists of the accused -- first in Philadelphia, then Boston, soon Chicago (250 in Boston, or four a year, during the past six decades). Incredible: thousands of youngsters abused by those they trusted the most. It is difficult to think of a more heinous transgression. Public apologies and penance by the bishops would send the most resounding signal (much more than new bureaucratic guidelines).

But let's also remember that Satan is attempting to ruin other "plans" as well and has attacked the priesthood not only in the way of inserting homosexuals into clergy ranks or tempting otherwise heterosexual men into relations with teens or boys but also in the way of "false-memory syndrome." Entire books have been written about how psychologists can suddenly elicit remarkable traumatic memories from people (including through hypnosis). The problem is that at least some of these claims are not true and are implanted by forces of deception. The devil is a magician when it comes to the subconscious and he possesses with legions. Consider: there is even a book entitled Mutliple Identities and False Memories: A Sociocognitive Perspective (by Nicholas P. Spanos). There have been whole communities where all the leaders were falsely accused of things like satanic or homosexual abuse. Recently, the Christian Broadcasting Network, which does some very fine work, nonetheless had an article in which a woman claimed her father was a satanist who abused her and caused her to have ten babies as a teenager (for human sacrifices). Short of abortions, it didn't seem all plausible (this was another "suppressed" memory case). That means more than one baby a year. We wonder about all this because of how many of the accusations against priests come from men who suddenly remember molestations that took place decades ago.

And so it is in our topsy-turvy times. How active is the enemy! Note the hardening of folks around you. Note also the call to prayer. As the Blessed Mother said a few weeks ago to another alleged Medjugorje seer (not the main one who received the official monthly messages): "Dear children; Today I call you to be born anew in prayer and through the Holy Spirit, to become a new people with my Son; a people who knows that if they have lost God, they have lost themselves; a people who knows that, with God, despite all sufferings and trials, they are secure and saved. I call you to gather into God's family and to be strengthened with the Father's strength. As individuals, my children, you cannot stop the evil that wants to begin to rule in this world and to destroy it. But, according to God's will, all together, with my Son, you can change everything and heal the world. I call you to pray with all your heart for your shepherds, because my Son chose them."

[resources: The Medjugorje Fasting Book]

Return to home page www.spiritdaily.com