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Official Commentary on the
monthly message of
September 25th 2006 & a Reflection
by Fr. Jozo OFM
Below
is the official English translation of this month's commentary on Our Lady's
message to the world through the visionary Marija, provided by The Medjugorje Information Centre
~ Acknowledgements information and
links
COME,
Holy Spirit, come by means of the powerful intercession of the Immaculate Heart
of Mary, your well beloved spouse.
Most
Holy Spirit, open my heart, soften it, and fill it with light and love so that I
may understand clearly what I will read, and act on it for my own spiritual
benefit and for the delight of my Heavenly Mother, Your Beloved Spouse. May I
read each word under Your guidance so that, free of all worldly desires and
distractions, I may grow in wisdom and prudence enough to follow perfectly the
wishes of the Most Blessed Trinity. Amen
"Dear children! Also today I am with you and call all of you to complete conversion. Decide for God, little children, and you will find in God the peace your heart seeks. Imitate the lives of saints and may they be an example for you; and I will inspire you as long as the Almighty permits me to be with you. Thank you for having responded to my call." Monthly message
to the world, September 25, 2006
Our
Lady has regularly said the messages are for each one of us individually so try reading them as if your own name was
there; "Dear .........." - it can
make them so much more personal, challenging and effective.
O
Blessed Mother, help us hear your words to us. Teach us to listen ever
more carefully to the words of your Son. Pray that our hearts will be
transformed into the hearts he would have us have, and that we will
always be open to His call. Amen.
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message commentary:- I CALL YOU TO COMPLETE CONVERSION
In
many of her previous messages the Virgin Mary spoke to us: "I am
with you", "I intercede for you", "I remain with you
on your way to conversion", "I am with you and I want you to
believe me that I love you".
Even today she is with us, just as she has been with us for all of the
25 years of the apparitions. Our Lady appears not to be visibly present
among us in the flesh, but to call us to conversion, to the way of
holiness and a new life in Jesus. The seers once asked Our Lady:
"Our Lady, why don’t you appear in front of everybody, why do you
appear only before us?" Our Lady replied to that question:
"Blessed are those who do not see but still believe." It is
not necessary to see something with our physical eyes. Important things
that we need in order to live cannot be seen, but we can sense them with
our spiritual powers that God bestowed on us. The same is with Our Lady’s
presence among us. All those who have believed the Virgin Mary with
their open and penitent hearts have experienced and lived up to feel the
greatness of God’s mercy in their faith.
Heavenly Mother Mary knows that we tend to forget things easily and we
easily get used to the good, to blessing and mercy. When this happens,
man forgets all about the Giver, the God who gives life and blessing to
everything. In spite of our forgetfulness, Mary has not forgotten to
call us today. It is a call from the bottom of a heart which loves and
feels pain for each and every one that is far from Her heart.
Even today she presents us with an ideal. Even today she is demanding
because she wishes us well. She does not call us to partial or
superficial conversion. It is a call to enter into the unity with God.
Motherly love is demanding. Do not expect impossible from us, but seek
what is in harmony with our nature and what we ardently desire in the
depth of our hearts. What kind of mother it would be if she did not want
the best for her children. She has not come here to tell us what we want
to hear, what is easy or what we like at first sight. She speaks of what
is for our good and for our true joy and peace. No mother does good to
her children if she makes all their selfish wishes come true. A real
mother is demanding when it comes to raising her children.
Mary knows where the source of peace that our hearts are looking for is.
We cannot fool our heart with things, not even the most expensive ones.
A heart knows who its Creator is and therefore cannot be filled with
anything less than its Creator. This is what St. Augustine wrote in his
confessions who, after much wandering, finally found God: "Our
hearts are restless till they find rest in Thee." On the path
towards God, and towards conversion there are many who had been there
before us - saints. It is why Mary is made an example for us. She is a
role model and inspiration. They certainly cannot replace us nor live
instead of us, but can intercede for us, give us advice, encourage us to
persevere, not to give up and not to withdraw from everything that is
good, holy and positive.
As a mother Mary does not give up. She is encouraging us even today. She
intercedes for us, loves and suffers for us and often because of us. Let
us not make her love, closeness and encouragement be in vain for us and
for our lives.
Fr. Ljubo Kurtovic ~ Medjugorje, 26th
September, 2006 ~ Official
English Translation
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Apparition to Mirjana on October 2, 2006 - Mirjana reported that Our Lady said the following:
""Dear
children, I am coming to you in this your time, to direct the call to
eternity to you. This is the call of love. I call you to love, because
only through love will you come to know the love of God. Many think that
they have faith in God and that they know his laws. They try to live
according to them, but they do not do what is the most important; they
do not love Him. My children, pray and fast. This is the way which will
help you to open yourselves and to love. Only through the love of God is
eternity gained. I am with you. I will lead you with the motherly love.
Thank you for having responded."
More
Mirjana Apparitions
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Fr Jozo's
September Reflection:
In
her message, the Queen of Peace tells us, "Dear Children, also
today I am with you." In this she desires to tell us that her
presence with us is a grace but at the same time a mission and a call to
conversion. We are all called to complete conversion. Her
words 'complete conversion' are not new in her messages but are
infrequent. Each of us is called. This call especially
pertains to our Prayer Partnership family which was established in
response to the messages of the Queen of Peace.
For St. Paul, complete conversion meant to set aside idols, errors,
waywardness, public sins and scandal. The Apostle concretely
explained to us that 'to convert' means to remove the old person with
all of his faults and vices and to be clothed in the new person, similar
to Christ Our Lord. Complete conversion is a complete return to
God. So often in her messages Our Lady calls us to 'put God in the
first place' in our lives and in our families. This means to
behave like saints, like St. Francis of Assisi. It means to leave
behind everything, including our security, our trust in our knowledge,
our friends, our money, our resourcefulness or the like. It means
to set aside everything we attribute to our own earning, success and
career. Our Lady knows our weaknesses. So often, we have
fallen and stumbled in most ordinary trials. We are always on some
kind of a turbulent sea in our life. In these, our storms, we are
persecuted by our anguish and disappointments because we want to do
everything on our own, without our God or His help. This is pure
arrogance and selfishness.
If we look at the history of the Church, we see that the Church has also
experienced falls and scandals. The human element often over
shadows and sometimes even rejects God's will.
In this way, man starts to sink and to lose hope. He is left
without self confidence. He then accuses and attacks everyone
because of his lack of success. He feels that he is alone and
therefore starts to criticize everyone, even the Lord Himself. On
the other hand, the Church has also always had its saints, those who
were great and brought abundant fruit. The greatest wisdom
expressed by the poor man of Assisi was when he said, "My God and
my All".
In this way he over shadowed the wise and the rich of all times.
Complete conversion is a wondrous freedom from our daily attachments and
enslavements. A man so enslaved serves things and not the Creator.
He wastes his feelings and time on what is unnecessary. He does
not feel or recognize that all things are less than he is and that he is
less than his Creator. Complete conversion is that wondrous wisdom
that St. Francis received as a gift before the Crucified Lord.
Jesus called Peter to follow Him just at the moment when Peter had the
greatest catch of his life - a boat over flowing with fish (Luke 5:9).
However, that wealth did not scandalize Peter. To the contrary, he
became aware of his sinfulness and unworthiness of God's nearness.
"Come, follow me" was the greatest reward for the astounded
fishermen.
Dear Brothers and Sisters, this message of Our Lady is so powerful.
I see us as the Israelites who were told by Joshua that they could not
enter into the Promise Land by serving both God and idols. Joshua
points them to the fact that it is time to make a radical decision.
He calls them to choose whom they will serve and belong to. The
prophet Elijah also strongly criticized and called the Israelites,
"How long will you serve God and idols? Today is the day of
decision" (1Kings 18:21). They responded, "As for me and
my house, we will serve the Lord" (Joshua 24:15).
Today's families in the Church , wounded by selfishness and motivated by
pleasure, have abandoned God. Many of them are separated having
destroyed the gift of love and rejected the call to holiness. Also
the scandals in our community and in the Church of today show that we
are a generation which serves both God and idols.
In this message, Our Lady is radical, as all the prophets and saints
have been - calling us to decide completely for God. Our Lady's
call to complete conversion means to abandon the idols of our time, the
errors and the sins that the community promotes and governments
legalize. To convert means to completely decide for God and to
live the Gospel. The call to conversion is difficult and therefore
we cannot see it as a pre-election slogan. It is truly a personal
choice deeply motivated and inspired by grace. Conversion is a
fruit of fasting and prayer. It is a fruit of living the
Sacraments of Confession and the Eucharist. It is the complete
surrender recognizable in the lives of saints. The way of
conversion is a special grace to which the Queen of Peace calls us.
Who are the saints we must follow? Saints are people for all
times. They are examples for all men and all generations.
Saints are like flowers, with every flower being different. Each
one is so beautiful and wonderful. They are like a starry sky.
The stars are marvelously scattered in the sky but each receives its
light from the sun. This is also with the saints. Each saint
is a light to us and to all generations. Their light comes from Jesus
and is recognizably reflected to us. Saints are dear to us
because, like flowers and the starry sky, they evidence the beauty,
holiness and fullness of God. To follow Christ and the saints is a
special charism of religious communities. Each religious life is a
call to follow Jesus and the saints. The religious community,
which knows the way and the means to the goal, assists in this.
This is holiness.
What do those who have accepted God, and have decided for Him with all
of their heart, find in Him? They find a peace that the world does
not know and cannot give. They find a joy that is complete in
Jesus. They find the blessing and a fruitful life. They find
what every person seeks and is in his nature - the realization of his
life.
Dear Ones, I thank the Mother who inspires, calls, leads and encourages
us to decide for God. I pray and fast that you may persevere and
that each one of us may be like a saint - a living example to others.
This month we will pray for the following intentions:
1. For our Holy Father, Pope
Benedict XVI - for the Blessed Virgin to wrap him with her mantle of
love and peace so that he may lead the Church without fear. We
will pray for our Bishops, priests and religious that they may daily
decide to serve God and the Church: that also today we may have
our examples and saints in them.
2. For the Church of 'the little'
who are shaken by the scandals of 'the great' - that they may not build
their faith on men but on God for whom it is worthwhile to decide.
3. For peace in Lebanon, the Holy
Land and the whole world. For the grace and gift of wisdom.
For the Church to live with other religions.
Dear Ones, to live the messages perseveringly with love is the only
remedy and the way of the Church in this unstable world. Be wise
and persevering in living the messages. I pray for each of you and
recommend you all to our Queen of Peace.
Yours most Sincerely, Fr. Jozo Zovko, OFM 28.09.2006
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updated 6th
November,
2006 - Praised be Jesus and Mary - His Peace to all! - ê¿ê
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