I’ve been here before a few times, mostly early on while it was still a communist country. For me, it was coming here to pray in desperation over different situations, and then it became a gold mine for me ever since. 

When I was in the seminary, there were little rumblings about some kids in Yugoslavia. That was back in 1981. It wasn’t until I was first ordained that a group of little ladies at the parish where I was first stationed were giving a presentation about Medjugorje.

I began to do my own research. I was amazed at what these children were going through in a communist country, and yet they were all coming out positive, putting probes in their ears and eyes and all the visionaries’ eyes focusing exactly one tenth of a second on exactly the same place. It drew me in scientifically. 

I felt drawn, or as they say, felt called to come to Medjugorje.

Medjugorje is peace. Mir mir mir. 

[ iMedj note: Mir mir mir is Croatian for peace peace peace. This was the first message Our Lady gave in Medjugorje. ] 

Years later, when I was able to renovate a parish when I was a pastor I put those three words in the sanctuary above the tabernacle, “Mir mir mir.” 

They say here, if you don’t have peace in yourself, you’re not going to have peace with your family, you’re not going to have peace with your parishioners and strangers and so I really wanted that peace and I wanted to find a way to bring people to peace so I came here searching, and I found it. 

It was the intercession of Mary who helped me to discover that pearl of peace that I was talking about. 

I always struggled with the image of Mary. She was perfect and She was sinless and I couldn’t approach Her. I never measured up to what She expected of me. That’s how I felt in the presence of people’s devotion growing up. I knew it was important to pray the Rosary, I knew Her intercession was important, but in my heart I felt judged by Her or condemned by Her because I was never that perfect person that could stand in a perfect person’s presence. 

When I came to Medjugorje, I discovered Her heart, Her motherly heart, and it was the opposite of what I had thought. I saw Her merciful heart. The way I describe it is She felt my pain more than I did because the more sinless you are, it doesn’t make you better than others, it makes you more vulnerable to others. If you lived in Alaska and moved to Florida, you would feel that heat more than the people that live in Florida. Mother Mary’s heart is like that. She lives in a heavenly state full of grace, but because it’s so full of grace doesn’t make Her cold and distant, it makes Her even closer to me because She could feel the areas of my life that were absent from grace. She could feel it more than I could, and She was reaching out to me in love to fill me with grace.

I have a changed image of Mary since I’ve come to Medjugorje, a warmer picture of Her, a picture that She knows me better than myself. She’s not God, but She sees with God’s eyes, and She’s non condemning which was a very good first start for me to enter more into prayer. Then I began to feel comfortable inviting Her into my prayer life. I began to pray from the heart. 

Thanks be to God, Fr. Slavko was an excellent spiritual director here who helped all of us learn how to pray from the heart, how to fast from the heart, how to convert from the heart. It changed everything for me. She threw me under Her mantle as soon as I was ordained. 

My nephew came here, and now he’s in the seminary in third theology and, God willing, will be ordained next year. What started in my heart overflowed into my family’s heart and my nephew’s heart. It’s so true that you change the world by changing your heart and then it changes your family and then it changes society. 

It makes you more compassionate towards other people. 

I saw the fruits here over time, keeping up with the fruits of Cenacolo, this place for addicts and how they heal, and Mother’s Village. The fruits of it, I long to bring that back and to create whatever that atmosphere is wherever I’m living. 

I want to say that you will not be misled here in Medjugorje. Stick with the mainstream messages of Medjugorje and the mainstream leaders. There are little offshoots that you want to stay away from, but there are very good people that are trained guides who know the lay of the land and know the history. If you come to Medjugorje, you want to find one of those groups that are trained. And enjoy the ride. 

I try to have a heart like Hers and Her Son’s and to bring it to people that are lost and forsaken, drug addicts, people that are skeptical about God, people that are lost in what true justice really is. She’s helped me to bring a heart and Her light and Christ’s light into a very dark world and try to be a light without becoming cynical or hopeless or hardhearted or resentful because people aren’t responding the way you want them to. All the more reason to continue to try to be the light. That don’t give up attitude, don’t give up on anybody, because God never gave up on me, that’s what He brings to my priesthood. 

Thank you, Mother Mary, for all that you do to help me, my family, and my priesthood. Amen.