Medjugorje Message: December 25, 2018
Dear children! I am carrying to you my Son Jesus who is the King of Peace. He gives you peace and may it not be only for you but, little children, carry it to others in joy and humility. I am with you and am praying for you in this time of grace which God desires to give you. My presence is a sign of love here while I am with you to protect you and lead you towards eternity. Thank you for having responded to my call.
Annual Message to Jacov: December 25, 2018
Dear children, on this day of grace, I am calling you to love. Little children, God loves you immeasurably and that is why, little children, full of trust and without looking back and without fear, completely surrender your hearts to Him so that God may fill them with His love. Do not be afraid to believe in His love and mercy, because His love is stronger than every one of your weaknesses and fears. Therefore, my children, full of love in your hearts, trust in Jesus and say your ‘yes’ to Him, because He is the only way which leads you to the Eternal Father.
River of Light
January 2019
Every Christmas Day in Medjugorje, Our Lady says, “I am carrying to you my Son Jesus who is the King of Peace.” The visionaries actually see Our Lady with the infant Christ-child in her arms on the Feast of the Nativity, bringing us afresh to a state of renewed awe and amazement at the mystery of the Incarnation and the eternal “now” of God’s presence and action as experienced in heaven. Lest we become too distracted by this phenomenal apparition, Our Lady quickly points out the relevance to US of this, her annual Christmas appearance with the Baby Jesus in her arms. She says: “He gives you peace and may it not be only for you but, little children, carry it to others in joy and humility.” First let us absorb the entire truth that the King of Peace—God Incarnate in Jesus—“gives us peace.” Is this true? If not, why not?
Are we open and receptive to the fact of this precious, adorable, vulnerable infant in Mary’s arms coming to us as Love Incarnate to GIVE US PEACE in the midst of any sort of trouble or suffering our life contains? Do we experience—know and feel with both mind and heart—this “peace that passes understanding” in the depths of our being, which is the gift of Christ? If not, what do we need to do to open ourselves more completely to the peace-giving Divine Presence that is Christ-consciousness? Perhaps turn down the noise of our busy, overstuffed schedule and hyperactive lifestyle? Perhaps breathe in more grace-filled silence and solitude in which to hear God’s voice and soak up divine peace?
Next, Our Lady immediately reminds us that this peace must be SHARED: “May it not be only for you but, little children, carry it to others in joy and humility.” Like all the spiritual gifts that St. Paul explains in the New Testament, the gift of divine peace is also given for the good of Christ’s whole mystical Body—all humanity—not just for the lone individuals who consciously receive it. This peace is meant to be “carried to others“—transferred and transmitted continually, contagiously, abundantly, generously, extravagantly—AND “in joy and humility.”
Now why does Our Lady need to tell us “HOW” to carry the peace of Christ? Why can’t we just carry this peace any way we like? For example, if I feel the peace of Christ in my heart and I’m supposed to “carry it to others,” why can’t I just target the people whom I think need this peace and tell them about it? If they disagree or act disagreeable, why can’t I engage in a fiery debate or even an argument with them, to convince them of their need for this peace, and even force it upon them if necessary? Why not threaten them with hellfire and damnation if they refuse the King of Peace? Or aggressively point out how much better we peace-filled Christians are than they who lack it?
The absurdity of these questions illustrates why Our Lady must give us the instruction on “HOW” to carry the peace of Christ to others—because our fallen human condition, riddled with egoism, sadly leads us to “evangelize against” people in an unloving, hypocritical, anti-Christian way much of the time. This is especially apparent today when religion and politics often overlap in mean-spirited verbal dialectic that is turning more and more young people into the “none’s” of church-rejection or atheism.
Our Blessed Mother says clearly that we are to carry the inner peace of Christ’s indwelling Presence “to others“—all others whom we meet, without exception—but that we are to do so “in joy and humility.” Never in judgment, criticism, anger, self-righteousness, competitiveness or arrogant superiority! It has been said that JOY is the surest proof of the presence of God—not brilliant apologetics or sharp debating skills. And HUMILITY is the queen of the virtues, lived in the most exemplary manner of all humans on earth by Mary, Queen of Peace. So we carry Christ’s peace to others with a smile, a light touch, an open heart, and without ever taking ourselves too seriously.
Our Lady concludes by reminding us of her role in the divine plan of Medjugorje: “praying for you in this time of grace which God desires to give you. My presence is a sign of love here while I am with you to protect you and lead you towards eternity.” As always on our spiritual journey, GOD is taking the initiative in reaching out with a “desire to give” us a “time of grace” and to give us Our Lady as “a sign of love” in Medjugorje, to “protect us and lead us towards eternity.” The initiative in giving is always God’s, but the RESPONSE of either receiving or rejecting the opportunities of the Divine Initiative is completely ours. We choose with our God-given wills to either open or close ourselves to Jesus, Mary, God and the eternal life of our souls in heaven.
In Our Lady’s annual apparition and Christmas message to Jacov Colo (the youngest of the Medjugorje visionaries—now middle-aged), she uses the word “love” six times in four short sentences. She begins by saying, “I am calling you to love,” and goes on to stress the “immeasurable” love of God for us—the divine love that will fill our own hearts if we give our “Yes” to God in trusting faith and complete abandonment. She says: “full of trust and without looking back and without fear, completely surrender your hearts to Him so that God may fill them with His love. Do not be afraid to believe in His love and mercy, because His love is stronger than every one of your weaknesses and fears.”
Here, Our Lady mentions “fear” three times in a row, indicating what a HUGE OBSTACLE “fear” is to faith and to love! This teaching echoes Sacred Scripture: “There is no fear in love. But perfect love casts out fear, because fear has to do with punishment. The one who fears is not perfected in love.” (1 John 4:18) Again, Our Lady is tweaking our “evangelistic attitude” to be one of joy, humility, and now—fearless LOVE that is totally surrendered to the merciful Jesus in bold and trusting confidence. Just as she counseled us to carry Christ’s peace to others “in joy and humility” rather than in argumentative arrogance, now Our Lady urges us to lay our many fears, insecurities, weaknesses (sins and addictions) at the feet of Jesus. In this way, the world will see and be attracted by the faith and the trusting love poured into our hearts by God. In contrast, so-called “evangelizing” that presents a judgmental, divisive counter-gospel of negative, fear-based intimidation and the need to threaten and control others who are “different” serves only to repel and drive people away from Christianity! To use “fear-mongering” for promoting the LOVE that is Christ twists, distorts, perverts and betrays the authentic message of Jesus.
Again, our current cultural and political climate often gives Christianity a “black eye” through the misguided efforts of “evangelizers” operating from a fearful, negative, critical or even violent worldview that is far from “perfect in love” or securely trusting in the King of Peace, whose merciful love is stronger than any firearm, border wall, or anything else the world can offer for protection. “Faith leaders” who manifestly LACK faith in the God whom Our Lady and the Gospel reveal form a malignant scourge of hypocrisy wounding the Body of Christ and emptying our church pews. For this reason, in her monthly messages to Mirjana, Our Lady repeatedly begs us: “Pray for your shepherds.”
As we celebrate this beautiful Christmas season, may the love of the King of Peace be born anew in our hearts, opened wide each day, so we may joyfully, humbly, and fearlessly carry the message of God’s saving mercy that will open eternity to all we meet.
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January 2: St. Basil the Great & St. Gregory Nazianzen
“The bread in your cupboard belongs to the hungry. The cloak in your wardrobe belongs to the naked. The shoes you allow to rot belong to the barefoot. The money in your vaults belongs to the destitute. You do injustice to every person whom you could help but do not.”
—St. Basil the Great
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Christ is infinitely open to human beings as he is infinitely open to God….Jesus is at the same time the Son of God and the Son of Man: he is the Man in a unique sense. He is the One who contains all humanity in his person, because in him, humanity has no limits. As for us, we are a speck of dust in this vast multitude. If he is the Man with this unique power, it is because he is open to God in a unique way: his “me” is God. Our Lord is not the man of one nation, of one time, of one era. He is the universal Man who bears all humanity in his life…who is the counterweight of love which counters all human sins. Because of that, our Lord can only perceive all of humanity at the same time…without excluding anyone. And if we want to follow Jesus Christ, if we want to be his disciples, we must enter into the catholicity of Jesus Christ.
Jesus is Catholic because he embraces all of humanity, and if we become his disciples, if we want to be what he is, we can go to him only by embracing all of humanity, the whole history and the whole universe along with him. If we wish to reduce Jesus Christ to the relationship we have with him, he becomes an idol. We can reach the true Christ open to all of humanity, only if we open our hearts to all humanity, if we remove all barriers and all limitations.
There is a Face, a Face within ourselves, engraved in our heart and which is our only treasure. It is on this Face that our life must converge. It is to this Face that we must go back. It is by hiding ourselves in the light of this Face that we will reach this vast grandeur to which we are called and which is…to let shine this Face of the eternal Love, for which the whole earth yearns.
—Fr. Maurice Zundel
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“On that day, you will know that you are in me and I am in you.”
—John 14:20
“That day” is usually a long time coming for most of us. We hold on to the illusion of a separate self as long as we can. Yet this process of transformation has been the enduring invitation of every great religion in history. Divine—and thus universal—union is the core message and goal of all healthy religion. The spiritual wisdom of divine union is first beautifully expressed in writing in the Vedas (the oldest source of Hinduism, at least 3,000 years old).
The True Self—in its original, pure, primordial state—is wholly or partially identifiable with God, the Ultimate Reality that is the ground and origin of all phenomena. That which you long for, you also are. That is where the longing comes from. Longing for God and longing for our True Self are the same longing. The mystics say that it is God who is even doing the longing in us (as the Divine Indwelling or the Holy Spirit). God implanted a natural affinity between God’s Self and all of God’s creatures. Otherwise the limited and the Limitless would be incapable of union; the finite and Infinite could never be reconciled into one.
Religion has one job: to make one out of two and one out of many. For Christians, this is the “Christ Mystery” whereby we believe God overcame the gap from God’s side. The initiative (grace) is always from God’s side. God overcomes the gap in Christ and in every experience that we allow to be graced. God is saying in all incarnations that “I am not totally Other; I am the transcendent within everything here. I have implanted some of myself in all things which forever long for reunion.”
If God is perceived as absolute otherness, it eventually creates absolute alienation, which is most of Western civilization today. Add to that any notion of God as petty, angry, torturing—and the mystical journey comes to a standstill. So God created similarity and compassion, visible in the human Jesus, to overcome this tragic gap—in a way we could see, touch, and understand. God-in-you seeks and loves God beyond, like an implanted homing device.
—Fr. Richard Rohr, OFM
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Wisdom from Pope Francis
Young people can help the Church fight the logic of “it’s always been done this way,” which is a poison, a sweet poison that tranquilizes the heart and leaves you anesthetized so you can’t walk….We know that many young people do not ask us for anything because they don’t consider us significant to their existence. Some ask to be left in peace, because they feel the presence of the Church is annoying or irritating. They become outraged when they do not see a clear condemnation of sexual and economic scandals. Some have the courage to say: “Don’t you see that nobody is listening to you anymore, or believes what you have to say?” We need to be converted, to realize that in order to be with youth we need to overturn many situations that keep youth at a distance.
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Mark Your Calendar
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To reject the contemplative dimension of any religion is to reject the religion itself, however loyal one may be to its externals and rituals. This is because the contemplative dimension is the heart and soul of every religion. It initiates the movement into higher states of consciousness. The great wisdom teachings of the Vedas, Upanishads, Buddhist Sutras, Old and New Testaments, and the Koran bear witness to this truth. Right now there are about two billion Christians on the planet. If a significant portion of them were to embrace the contemplative dimension of the gospel, the emerging global society would experience a powerful surge toward enduring peace. If this contemplative dimension of the Christian religion is not presented, the Gospel is not being adequately preached.
– Fr. Thomas Keating, OCSO
