Medjugorje and the Vatican 2008
Richard Salbato July 11, 2008
I am sick of writing about Medjugorje (there are bigger
problems in the world today), and there is nothing more I can do about it except
wait and hope that the
I think, however, that that following two statements by both Bishop Gemma and Bishop Peric are worth posting on my web site, because they prove that these claims are lies. These two newsletters also show that if the Vatican ever does make any statement it would have to conclude Medjugorje is false and probably demonic.
Vatican will reject Medjugorje, says bishop
6 June 2008
An Italian bishop has predicted that the
Emeritus Bishop Andrea Gemma of Isernia-Venafro
said that he believed the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, which has
been studying the claims since 2006, would not rule in favour
of the six seers at the end of a review of the alleged apparitions.
"You'll see that soon the Vatican will intervene with something explosive
to unmask once and for all who is behind this deceit," the 77-year-old
bishop told Petrus, an online Italian Catholic
journal.
Bishop Gemma, the most senior exorcist in the
Catholic Church until his retirement two years ago, said he personally believed
the phenomenon to be a "scandal" and a "diabolical deceit".
He said: "It is a phenomenon which
is absolutely diabolical, around which revolve many underground interests.
He said: "In Medjugorje everything happens in function of money:
pilgrimages, lodging houses, sale of trinkets.
"So much so that abusing the good faith of those poor souls who go there
thinking to encounter
the Madonna, the false seers have organised
themselves financially, have enriched themselves and live a rather comfortable
life.
"Just think, one of them organizes directly from
"Thus, together with those who shore up this noisy deception, they
patently have every interest in convincing people that they see and speak with
the Virgin Mary."
Since the first alleged apparition on 25 June 1981, the seers say they have
seen Mary on about 40,000 occasions during which time she has supposedly
imparted tens of thousands of messages and dozens of secrets.
Medjugorje has since become a popular destination for pilgrims, attracting more
than five million visitors, including hundreds of thousands each year from the
Pilgrims have included Spanish tenor José Carreras, who performed a concert
there, and the American actor Jim Cavaziel, who
played Jesus in Mel Gibson's blockbuster The Passion of the Christ.
The Medjugorje phenomenon began when a group of children told a priest they had
seen the Virgin on a hillside near their town.
An investigation by Bishop Pavao Zanic of Mostar-Duvno found the claims inconsistent with the faith
and they were dismissed as false. But the seers responded by claiming that the
Virgin had told them that the bishop was a "wolf" who would perish
unless he accepted the apparitions as true.
Three Church commissions failed to find evidence to support of their claims and
in 1991 the bishops of the former
Their judgments have sharply divided Catholics and the
According to the Sunday Times newspaper some of the seers have grown wealthy as
a result of their claims - and so has their town. Some seers today own smart
executive houses with immaculate gardens, double garages and security gates,
and one has a tennis court. They also own expensive cars and have married - one
of them, Ivan Dragicevic, to an American former
beauty queen.
The new Bishop of Mostar-Duvno, Ratko
Peric, is as opposed to the claims as his predecessor and in 2004 he upheld the
suspension of Fr Jozo Zovko,
the "spiritual adviser" to the visionaries.
Bishop
Peric on Alleged Commission
Van: Biskupija [mailto:biskupija@gmx.net]
Verzonden: donderdag 3 juli 2008
20:08
Aan: Mark Waterinckx
Ratko, bishop
PRESS
RELEASE REGARDING THE ALLEGED COMMISSION ON MEDJUGORJE
Mostar,
27 June 2008
The
Croatian daily newspaper “Večernji list” on 27 June
2008 published the following sensational headline on its front page: “The
The text
mentions a falsehood that “seventeen years ago the Commission of the Bishops’
Conference of the former
The truth is that no Commission of the Bishops’ Conference made any decision, nor did the Commission order any further enquiry, but that this decision was made competently by the Bishops’ Conference, which on 10 April 1991 declared in Zadar that: “On the basis of investigations made thus far” – hence on the basis of the investigations and conclusions of the Commission established in 1987 by the Bishops’ Conference of that time – “it cannot be affirmed that these events involve supernatural apparitions or revelations”.
The text of the article begins with the affirmation: “The President of the Bishops’ Conference of Bosnia-Herzegovina, the Cardinal Archbishop of Sarajevo Vinko Puljić, announced the formation of a new commission which will investigate the phenomenon and which will be under the jurisdiction of the Holy See”.
This affirmation is then followed by confusing claims and the Cardinal himself in the text that follows refutes the statement in his radio-interview published by “Večernji list”.
The first is that this Commission “will most probably be under the jurisdiction of the Holy See”. Hence it is not clear, but only assumed and anybody’s guess.
Secondly, this Commission “will – if it is established, as is probable – be like an international commission which will override our jurisdiction”.
Thirdly: “It is certain that the international commission will receive, if it is established, different instructions which remain to be seen”.
One may ask what kind of assertions and declarations expressing extremely doubtful statements are these: “Most probably” followed then by “probably”; “if” and then “like”; “it is certain” – “if it is established”; “which remain to be seen”?
A contradiction then appears since this so-called and most probable Commission “will override our jurisdiction” and then: “Yet the local bishop will never be excluded, since he is the most competent person for everything that goes on within a diocese”.
After reading this, even a more than average reader of “Večernji list” will not know: has the formation of a Commission only been pre-announced or is it really being established? Will it finally become a reality and when? Will it be established at all and when? Will it be under the jurisdiction of the Holy See and in which form? Will it override the competency of the Bishops’ Conference of B-H but not the jurisdiction of the local bishop? The only thing that is certain in all of these media announcements, journalistic fabrications and Radio-Medjugorje guesses is that the local bishop of Mostar knows nothing about it at all!
We ask ourselves why do we need such compromising statements and who needs these radio-interviews on the case of Medjugorje for the anniversary of the supposed “apparitions”?
As if we don’t have more important Church issues to deal with in these difficult times and as if there don’t exist more pressing social issues that require our attention in this country, amongst our people and in this region, than the spreading of unfounded, incoherent news and contradictory statements on the phenomenon which was already in 1991 theologically and authoritatively resolved at the level of the Bishops’ Conference which declared: On the basis of comprehensive investigations on the entire phenomenon of Medjugorje – to this day – there has been no valid proof that these events concern supernatural apparitions or revelations!
Note:
Michael Brown’s response
to these articles can be found on Kevin J. Symonds’ web site
http://d-rium.blogspot.com:80/2008/07/michael-browns-response-to-bishop.html