Message December 25, 2022
MESSAGE OF THE VIRGIIN MARY
DECEMBER 25, 2022
On the 25th of each month, the Blessed Virgin gives a message to the visionary, Marija that is to be given to the world.
“Dear Children, Today am carrying my Son Jesus to you that you may be His peace and a reflection of clarity and joy of Heaven. Pray, little children, to be open to receive peace because many hearts are closed to the call of the light, which changes hearts. I am with you and am praying for you to open yourselves to receive the King of Peace, who fills your hearts with warmth and blessing. Thank you for having responded to my call.”
And Yet We Turn Another Page……
I collect clocks. I have about 100 in all, all ticking and ringing and chiming and many I wind up every day, sometimes a couple times every day. If they run a little bit fast or slow, I adjust them, but they do not all go off at the exact same time. I space them apart just enough that one starts the hour, and the rest follow one by one.
At first, that was a chore, but soon became part of my day and makes me happy to hear them, although I am so used to them, sometimes I wonder if they did or not.
When I was a newly-ordained priest, some 38 years ago, my first assignment was right next to a whole set of railroad tracts. Trains came and went, even shaking the windows and with the loud noise and whistles they created, I thought I would never get used to them! Within a month, when people would ask me if that bothered me, I would honestly answer; “If what bothered me?” I was so used to the trains and the rumblings and noise and shaking of the old rectory, I didn’t even notice them anymore!
Life can be like that! I have done enough listening to married couples who just get used to each other and they say here is no more excitement in their relationships. I know brother priests who, after a while, need a retreat just to get away and get back in tune with who they are and with Whom they serve! Know when I need to stop and listen again to the holy voices of God and our Blessed Mother with all the other on Wednesdays and Fridays so natural and routine that we are on automatic pilot somehow? (I have to stop and laugh here, as I misspelled in my typing word “pilot” and when I reread it, the auto correct put in the word “piglet”!!) I am sure at times I am on automatic “piglet”, too!
New Years is a time many make resolutions. That is a food thing, as we all need to take a good look at our life and see if we are living life or just going through the motions. We can just “go through the motions” with our families and loved ones, with our jobs and vocations, with Holy Mass, our holy Prayers, our daily routines, and everything else, without realizing time is a gift and not to be wasted! Each day is precious as is each person, and also we, ourselves, are very precious and gifted!
God created us for a purpose, but gives us free will to do with our life what we choose to do, and yet so many times we simply put our lives on automatic pilot and “exist” rather than “live”!! God wants us to live our lives and live them to the very fullest!
When we pray, our Blessed Mother reminds us to: “Pray with our Hearts”, not just running a quick prayer like a auctioneer trying to sell something quick as a high bid comes in. To pray with our hearts to live our lives with our hearts and mind and souls, requires us to think, to pause, to pray, and to realized what we are doing and saying and to whom!
When we get the “Spirit of Medjugorje” newsletter on mailing day, we fold them, (We have our “folders” do that), then we have the “sealers” who put the little sticky dots on the folded newsletters to keep them from opening up as they are the process of being delivered to you, then we have the address “labelers”, and then the “checkers” ((not the game but those who check they are all correct and ready to be taken to the Post Office)! I come to the mailings each month, and I am a “sealer” and a “labeler”, and all at our table do this add we talk about Mary, Her messages, our families, and we look as see what this newsletter is going to the Philippines, that batch is going to India, another is going to a friend I know in Buffalo, NY, or Erie, PA.
It is not work for us, it is a joy and all of us who come each month can’t wait to come to this monthly mailing to deliver our Blessed Mother’s words and messages and feel the love of the family we have become because in doing so! I also take time to hear Confessions and talk with others who would like to just talk, and it is wonderful! It is such a joy to do holy things, and it is fun and exciting at the same time.
In this new year of 2023, make time for God in your daily prayers and try not to wander in your thoughts. Pray when you schedule that time, as I said before, years ago, put in your book or in your mind, these letters, “AWG”, just as you would with a doctor’s appointment or a dentist appointment or a lunch date, or whatever is important! “AWG” stands for: “Appointment with God” and keep that appointment. Pray from your heart. Get into a conversation with God as well as praying your prayers from your heart. Talk to your favorite Saints and ask their help and assistance. Open yourself up to the Blessed Mother and Her love for you, Her child, whom She loves with all her Immaculate Heart!
When you are at Holy Mass this year, come early to church and pray before Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament, as He is there in that Tabernacle, of Jesus, as you receive the Blessed Lord in the Most Holy Eucharist.
In my 30 pilgrimages to Medjugorje, I am always asked the question: “Father, did you see any miracles?” I always respond, “YES!” I say “I have seen countless people waiting in line in the hot sun just waiting to confess their sins and become a new creature, pure and holy!”
I say, “I have seen crowds and crowds of people of all ages, some with severe handicaps, getting assistance from others who are strangers helping them climb the mountain or the Hill of Apparition.”
I say: "I see people from all over the world coming to Holy Mass, trying to fit into the church which is already packed to the rafters, and there is no hesitation or meanness or complaining, but peace!"
I see holy priests and deacons and religious men and women on their knees and ministering to the faithful with smiles and joy in their eyes!
The best miracle I WANT to see the most is when I come back and see the same thing happening in my own country, in my own city and diocese, in my own church; but sadly, that hasn't happened yet, but I know it will.
Be faithful in your own vocation, whatever it is, and love! Be gentle in this new year and not mean or grumpy, jealous or hateful. In this new year, get to Confession once a month (I promise you, it won't kill you or hurt you in any way, and it is a powerful medicine both for your soul and your body and all your relationships.) Encourage your family to come to Confession with you! Forgive those who hurt you and let it go, give it all to Jesus through Mary! Pray each day from your heart the Holy Rosary put yourself in each mystery as you are right there with Jesus and Mary and all. Pray for peace, in your homes, our nations, and in our world. Pray for the sick and troubled, and visit them if you can, or send note and kind words. And, ask God and Our Lady what it is they want from you. In holy prayer, they will tell you what you need to do and what they are asking you to do and off up for them. Always pray for the Holy Souls in Purgatory and for all the unborn babies to have the same chance at life that we had.
Happy New Year to all of you, and feel my prayers for you. Offer up life's troubles to God as a sacrifice. It's a brand new start! If you fall, get right back up and try all over again God gives us "Do-Overs" and they are called the Hope Sacraments and living a holy life that God wants us to live.
In Jesus, Mary and Saint Joseph, -Father Ray and my little spirited dog, Dublin ©
Patron Saint for 2023
For many years, we have been randomly choosing the name of a saint to be the "holy protector" for The Spirit of Medjugorje for the year. St. Faustina's community used to do this every year on New Year's Day (St. Faustina's Diary, #360). This can be a fun and educational thing to do with your family and friends. Almost always, there is a connection between the saint and the person or group who randomly picked it.
Although any list of saints can be used, there is one we recommend on the website, www.marytv.tv. You can also use the saint generator on jenniferfulwiler.com/saints. However you choose, it is important to pray to the Holy Spirit first! The tradition goes that it is the saint who chooses you, not the other way around. As you pray with the saint every day, that saint will pray for you and help you. On October 25, 2020, Our Lady said, "Invoke the help of all the saints, for them to be an example and a help to you."
This year our youngest grandchild, Theo, age 2, picked our saint for us from my bag of saints. At first, he picked St. Jerome, our patron saint in 2014, and since the saint stays with us after the year is over, we needed to pick a different one. I had been so concerned about possibly forgetting to have Theo pick our saint when he came over to help decorate our Christmas tree that I forgot to pray before Theo had put his hand in the bag. Yikes!
After I prayed to the Holy Spirit, Theo put his hand in the bag again, and this time he picked St. Lawrence. I knew there were a number of saints named St. Lawrence, so I looked at the feast day on the little paper and it said, "August 10", so I looked online to see which St. Lawrence had a feast day on August 10. It turns out to be the saint I expected: St. Lawrence, deacon and martyr, who lived in the third century. His story is a rather famous one.
As a deacon, St. Lawrence was in charge of caring for the poor and had a great love for them. He distributed alms and was a "keeper of the treasures of the Church". The Prefect of Rome at the time, who was greedy, ordered Lawrence to bring the Church's treasure to him. Days later, Lawrence brought all the poor and sick people who were being maintained by the Church to the Prefect, and proclaimed, "This is the Church's treasure!" The Prefect was furious and condemned Lawrence to a cruel death. Lawrence was tied on top of an iron grill over a fire that roasted his flesh slowly. Lawrence burned with so much love of God that he joked: "Turn me over. I'm done on this side!" Among other things, St. Lawrence is the patron of the poor, cooks (because of the way he died) and comedians.
St. Lawrence's life and death are inspiring, but I did see a connection right away for why he chose The Spirit Medjugorje for his patronage this year. So, I looked at a few more websites to see if I could find more information. What I did find was that right before he died, St. Lawrence prayed that the city of Rome might be converted and that faith would spread all over the world. That was it! On Our Lady's main messages is conversion! I further read that he is a patron saint of students also, and are we not "students" of Our Lady, in Our Lady's School of Love?!
St. Lawrence, please pray for us, as students of Our Lady to live Her messages and also help spread the message convert the world! Thank you for choosing us!
Prayer Intention of Pope Francis for January
For educators - We pray that educators may be credible witnesses, teaching fraternity rather than competition and helping the youngest and most vulnerable above all.
Tracey's "St. Paul-like Conversion"
The following is a testimony The Medjugorje Web received from a woman named Tracey. Steve Shawl wrote this introduction:
When Our Lady speaks about conversion, one of the first changes one must make in their life is to rearrange their priorities and put God first. The world and its empty promises can be quite seductive, and also very subtle. It can be easy to lose our way without God being first in our life."
It will be challenging to accurately describe what happened to my life almost 13 years ago. My husband Mark and I had two beautiful children. We were Sunday-going Catholics. I prayed a Hail Mary and the Angel of God daily. That was pretty much the extent of my Catholic faith. I was on the fast track with my career. I had worked for 5 years as a critical care BSN, RN. I was hired as a cardiac drug research nurse and worked for the Heart Institute of Nevada and Cardiovascular Consultants of Nevada. During one of my drug research assignments, I was offered a position with one of the largest pharmaceutical companies in the world, Merck. I soon found myself traveling the country and, within two years, I had been promoted to a senior position in the company. I was making a very good salary, big bonuses, company car, and prestige. My husband Mark was also making a name for himself. He was the head strength coach at UNLV and started competing on the world stage as a professional athlete. Mark won America's Strongest Man in 1997, and soon found himself as a regular sports figure on ESPN. Our careers and lifestyle were so busy and full that we felt very content on having just a boy and a girl. We believed that God had blessed us with being able to afford private schools, a nanny, housekeeper, and all of our material possessions. What more could we want? We were living the American dream. But inside my heart, I felt restless. My heart ached every time I would leave the house, sometimes not seeing my children for days if I were traveling. I had been primed by the culture that a modern-day mother does not need to stay at home. The goal was success and self-fulfillment. This misery I was feeling made me falsely believe that if only I could get that next promotion, make more money, and buy more clothes, I would be much happier. This was the trap I was in. God would not allow me to experience rest in my soul when I was so far away from living the truth and fulfilling my true vocation as a wife and mother. I was blinded. I truly thought that I was doing the right things. I did not know that I needed a conversion. The famous quote from St. Augustine sums it up: "My soul was restless, oh God, until it rested in You." Hopefully, you get the picture of where I was in my life.
In the summer of 1999, Mark was competing in the World's Strongest Man in a country called Malta. I went with him. I did not know at the time anything about Malta. During our time there, my heart started to stir. There were beautiful Catholic shrines everywhere on this island. Mark had an event one afternoon and it was very rainy. I stayed in the bus in between events. The bus driver was a very gracious and kind man. He shared with me the history of Malta and how St. Paul on his journey to Rome had been shipwrecked there. St. Paul had converted the island after being bit by a poisonous snake. To this day, Malta has remained a Catholic country. I remember contemplating this and realized that I knew nothing about the deep history of my faith. Mark and I returned to Las Vegas. But something had happened to me in Malta - a desire that every human heart has - "Why am I here, who made me, and what is truth?" After our return, I was picking up my son at St. Viator's preschool and started talking to another mom about my trip to Malta. I then asked Angie how she was doing. Angie responded that she had just come back from Medjugorje. I quickly asked her about Medjugorje. Angie had shared with me the story of the visionaries and Our Blessed Mother's messages. I was stunned and could not stop asking her questions. A few days later, Angie brought me a book on Medjugorje. I was headed off on a business meeting in Santa Barbara. I started reading the book while I was on a plane. I could not put in down! What happened to me that night in the Biltmore Hotel, I will never forget. It completely changed the course of my life. My question, "Why was Jesus sending His Mother to the earth every day?" was answered. As I read the messages, I felt Our Lady speaking right into the center of my heart. I heard Her message. I felt the weight of my sins. I felt the horror of where my life was, through the eyes of God, and I saw my place in hell if I did not change the course of my life. God had, in an instant, revealed to me that when we go against His laws, we put ourselves in grave dangers. I was prostrated on the floor in my hotel room crying out to God to forgive me. I cannot find the words to describe what I was feeling except deep sorrow over the state of my life and unbelievable awe that Our Lord was sending His Mother to the earth to warn us, and to convert us. It was a real St. Paul-like conversion. I wasn't riding a horse or struck by lightning but, nonetheless, in an instant, God had revealed to me the state of my soul and the great gift of His forgiveness and mercy.
My life from that moment would never be the same. The journey to where I am today is credited to the great Mother of God and Her messages of Medjugorje. I knew that God was calling me to stay at home, raise my children, keep my marriage open to the gift of life, and to learn my Catholic faith. I will never forget telling my husband that I would be resigning from my job. It was very difficult and painful during the early part of my conversion. I was totally alone, with no support, going through a complete 180-degree direction turn in my life. We would need to totally transform our lifestyle and finances. With much credit to my husband, he did not understand was happening to me, but he stepped up to the plate and worked extra to support us so I could stay at home. My husband, and many close family members and friends, thought that I had gone off the deep end. This was very difficult for me. I felt the rejection and indifferences from all corners of my life.
In a very short time period, I went from being a full-time working mother with a successful career to being a full-time stay-at-home mom. Yes, there were many days that this transition was challenging. I had to make many adjustments. My soul was experiencing much needed transformations. I could not get my hands on enough Catholic books and resources. I would spend hours at the Divine Mercy bookstore. Soon, I found EWTN and Catholic radio. I was like a kid in a candy shop. I was awakened to a world that I did not know existed. Our Lord had infused a thirst in my soul for truth, a thirst to follow Him. I immediately started, to the best of my ability following the instructions of the Blessed Mother: going to Confession, praying the daily Rosary, fasting, reading the Scriptures, and going to daily Mass and receiving the Eucharist. This is the remedy to a godless world. What gifts our God has given to His Church.
Within 8 months, I conceived our third child, and have been blessed to have 3 more children. I have been a home-schooling mother for 12 years. How I came to home-schooling is a whole other story. It wasn't something that I ever imagined that I would be doing. In fact, it is something that, at first, I did not want to do. To make a long story short, I knew in my heart God was calling me to do this. I had to respond and trust that He would give me the graces I needed to be a home-school morn. It has been one of the greatest blessings to our family. The Lord knew that I was going to need some support and direction. Within months of my conversion (1999), I found a parish in Las Vegas that had 6 PM daily Mass. It was the parish of the Holy Family. I would drive every night to the east side of town with my children. Our Lady was leading me to a holy priest, Monsignor Ben Franzinelli. During this time, Monsignor Ben preached and taught with vigor about our Blessed Mother's messages and God's call to living a holy life. I learned so much from Monsignor Ben and will be so ever grateful to him and his love for the Church and Our Lady. The Lord provided all I needed to be strengthened and nourished during this time. Being alone on my journey was very difficult and lonely. But at the same time, the joys and happiness that my soul felt, I cannot describe. God also heard my prayers and my lamenting for my husband's conversion. My husband Mark was Confirmed in the fall of 2003. He also has responded to Our Lady's call and leads our family of seven in the daily Rosary.
My prayer is that all people hear and respond to the call of Our Blessed Mother. Our Lord has been sending His Mother to this earth every day for over 40 years from a small in Medjugorje, Bosnia-Herzegovina to six children, now adults. The message is urgent. We are living in a world that is self-destructing. Our hearts have grown cold to voice of God and His Holy Catholic Church. I lived most of my life following the culture of death. The culture of one that is self-centered. It is closed to the gift of children and does not respect God's laws. It encourages immodest fashions that promote sins of the flesh, modern secularism, pornography, feminism, relativism, and indifference to the Catholic Church's teachings on contraception, divorce, and the holiness of marriage between a man and a woman. Saint John Paul II called it "the culture of death".
It pains me to know that there are many people who have chosen to disregard the messages of Medjugorje. They fail to see the awesome gift that God has given us through the loving care of His Mother. Many times, I hear people say that the Church has not approved them. Most people do not understand that the Church cannot officially approve an apparition until it has ceased. The apparitions of Medjugorje have been ongoing every day since 1981. They are the second longest ongoing public apparitions recorded in the2000-year history of the Catholic Church.
I can only give you my testimony as to how Our Lady's messages affected my life. She led me into the heart and soul of Her Son's Catholic Church. Our Lady led me to Confession, the Holy Eucharist, prayer, penance, and conversion. I beg all who are listening; please respond to Our Blessed Mother's call. She is showing us the way to live a holy life and how to attain Heaven for all eternity, praising and worshiping the Blessed Trinity. She wants us to love Her Son and to do His will, for His will is the will of Our Heavenly Father, Who has given us life. Praise be Jesus Christ, the center of our lives! In my family, we try and go to daily Mass to receive Our Lord in the Eucharist. The Eucharist is the Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity of Jesus Himself. Jesus Himself said, "Unless you eat my flesh and drink my blood, you will not have life in you." This is why going to Mass every day is a wonderful way to get all the help Jesus is offering to us.
These are all the things that I have learned from Our Blessed Mother's messages from Medjugorje. They are the same things that Our Lord has always taught us through His Holy Catholic Church. Our Blessed Mother is helping to remind us and encourage us to listen to her Son, Jesus.
Be Ready!
By June Kilns
Last fall, I attended Bible Study about the Eight Last Things" (Death, Individual Judgment, Heaven, Hell, Purgatory, The Second Coming and the Resurrection of the Dead, The Final Judgment, and The New Creation). I was surprised at how many scripture references there to the last things, both in the Old and New Testaments. For those who chose to do all the “homework” for the study, answering Our Lady’s request to read the Bible daily was not a problem!
At the final night of the study, we discussed some themes that ran through the scriptures we read. The two most prevalent ones were: “Be Ready” and “On our Judgment Day, we will be judged on how much we have loved God ad one another.”
Here we are at the beginning of a new year. This is a time to reflect on our lives and what we need to change to love God and one another more and more so that we CAN be ready. Although I could not find one mention of “Judgment Day” in her messages, Our Lady has been preparing us for that day for over 42 years. Our Lady has mentioned the words “eternity”, “eternal life”, and “eternal salvation” and “be ready” many times in Her messages. On Christmas Day of 2018, Our Lady said, “My presence is a sign of love here while I am with you to protect you and lead you towards eternity.”
In a message to Mirjana on August 2, 2018, Our Lady said, “I know my children that what is to come afterwards is unknown own to you, but when your hereafter comes you will receive all the answers. My motherly love desires that you be ready. My children by your life keep putting good feelings in the hearts of the people whom you meet, feelings of peace, goodness and forgiveness.
I think it was no coincidence that while in the midst of the Bible Study on the Last Things that I received a gift in the mail from one of our subscribers Fr. John Geinzer. It was a book he had written in 2020 entitled, “There Will Be Signs: Eyewitness Reflections on Medjugorje Miracles”. Written on the back cover are the words, "The miracle of the sun, the miracle of the moon, and the miracle of the stars — together — have delivered to me a poignant message about the Second Coming of Christ.
I was intrigued and read the short book, which is easy reading, during the Thanksgiving break from the Bible Study. It was fascinating, so I wrote to Fr. Geinzer for permission t use an excerpt from it in The Spirit of Medjugorje newsletter. He granted me permission but when trying to discern which part to use, it seemed like the parts I wanted to use would not make sense without the rest of the book or without "spoiling" the book for those who want to read it. So, I decided to use the Foreword for the book (below) which was written by Fr. Geinzer's brother, Fr. Patrick Geinzer, is also a subscriber of ours (and whose testimony was in our January 2010 issue).
May you be blessed this new year and "open your heart and pray with gratitude for all the good that you have and say: 'I am here created for eternity' - and yearn for heavenly things because God loves you with immeasurable love." (Our Lady, 9/25/12).
There will Be Signs
Forward by Fr. Patrick Geinzer, C. P. (see article above)
Signs are a part of our culture and social communication. We look for and appreciate signs that direct us toward a desired destination. There are also signs that inform us or invite us to consider some event or product. All these billboards of life are associated with our daily activities, our material needs, and life at ground level. Sometimes they annoy us because of their ubiquity, as with some advertisements. Yet we need signs to help us navigate the world.
What about our immaterial soul, our spirit, that non-visible part of our human make-up? Are there signs that invite or guide us into a deeper spiritual journey? The author believes the answer is "yes". These spiritual billboards come to us, personally and occasionally collectively with others, on this journey we call life. Spiritual signs are sometimes very subtle and at other times are quite surprising or striking, even visual.
On four separate trips to a place named Medjugorje in the former Yugoslavia, Father John Geinzer witnessed multiple supernatural signs of a heavenly presence. According to the opinion of millions of other travelers to that region, the Blessed Virgin Mary has been appearing there to six ordinary local people since June of 1981. Through their teenage years and into adulthood and then into their lives as parents, Mary has allegedly guided these six visionaries on their spiritual journeys. But Our Lady has also come to give special signs, graces, and experiences to pilgrims from many nations who have traveled there seeking inspiration, spiritual assistance, healing, and direction in life. If you see something extraordinary and inexplicable, and you see it more than once, then your mind and heart are challenged to interpret what it means. Fr. John Geinzer leads us step by step from his skepticism to wonder and then belief in the reality of Mary's ongoing apparitions and messages in Medjugorje. Most helpful to us is that he shares in detail the observable but inexplicable signs he and others with him have witnessed in Medjugorje.
Signs are not a destination in themselves; they point toward something or someone more significant or meaningful. The sights Father John experienced in Medjugorje point to the presence of a heavenly power, a power that is above nature. Medjugorje leads one to prayer, to truth, to faith in God, to insight, to healing, or to whatever one needs on one's spiritual journey. Mary's words also speak to our world today, to all humanity: they tell all of us about God's presence with us and about God's love and desire to lead his children away from spiritual disaster and toward our goal, life in heaven. Medjugorje is a spectacular sign. Mary is there, and Mary always points not to herself, but to her Son, Jesus, our source of spiritual life.
I think you will find this book easy reading that draws you forward into faith and wonder.
Editor's note: Fr. Geinzer told me that There Will Be Signs is available through Amazon, and that he would appreciate any comments on Amazon that readers might have.
Going through some old files, I found the following short conversation with visionary Jakov Colo. It was published in the November 2001 issue of Mir-Peace Letter. Jakov's answers are just as pertinent today as they were then.
Medjugorje Visionary Jakov Colo
Our Lady appeared daily to Jakov Colo, youngest of the six Medjugorje visionaries, from June 25, 1981 to September 12, 1998, on which day Our Lady revealed to him the tenth secret message. She has promised to appear to Jakov every year on Christmas.
Q: Many ask why the apparitions are lasting so long.
A: I think it is the wrong question. We should all give thanks to God for these 20 years of Our Lady's love toward us. Through this we can see how much he wants to save us and lead us to Jesus. Q: Can you tell us something about the secrets?
A: People ask us about the secrets and think they are something to fear. But we should only concern ourselves with one mystery, and that is our life. How are we living it? How do we accept God? Are we doing everything God expects from us?
Q: What does God want to say to us through Our Lady?
A: Just look around and see how today's world is in crisis and without God, especially now in 2001 when many abnormal things have become normal. Our Lady is coming to us that we may begin to seek the true value and goal of our life, and that is God.
Update on Jakov's Charity
In prior issues, we wrote about an organization in the U.S. called "Friends of Mary's Hands", which helps Jakov's charity in Medjugorje called "Mary's ands". Founder Veronica Raymonda wrote in their December newsletter: "Who would have thought that when the Soup Kitchen opened its doors on January 25, 2022, it would reach capacity by September of the same year? Exceeding 6,000 meals per month would require extra cooks and volunteers and, of course, more funding. We pray that our Blessed Mother will guide Jakov about the next steps to follow... As you can imagine, the need for funding has increased considerably with the operation of the Soup Kitchen at full capacity while continuing all the other services that Mary's Hands was already providing when we started our mission to support Jakov's work....We kindly encourage you to spread the word and invite a friend to join our group. And, as Jakov reminded us... we hope one day to hear the sweet voice of Jesus saying, 'Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers of Mine, you did for Me."
Editor's note: If you are interested in helping Jakov's charity, Mary's Hands Marijine Ruke), you can visit friendsofmaryshands.org. 100% of their donations go directly to the charity. You can also write to Friends of Mary's Hands, 1635 Telegraph Avenue, Oakland, CA 94612-2113.
Jakov's Message on December 25, 2022
At the last daily apparition to Jakov Colo on September 12, 1998, Our Lady told him that henceforth he would have one apparition a year, every December
25th, on Christmas Day. This is also how it was this year. The apparition began at 2:18 p.m. and lasted 8 minutes. Our Lady came with little Jesus in Her arms. Through Jakov, Our Lady gave the following message:
"Today, wizen the light of Jesus' birth is illuminating the entire world, in a special way, with Jesus in my arms, I am praying that every heart becomes a stable of Bethlehem, in which my Son will be born, so that your lives become a light of His birth. Little children, you live in peacelessness and fear. That is why, little children, today, on this day of grace, implore Jesus to strengthen your faith and to become the ruler of your lives; because, my children, only with Jesus in your lives will you not be looking at peacelessness but praying for peace and will live in peace; and you will not be looking at fear but at Jesus Who frees us of all fears. I am your Mother who ceaselessly keeps vigil over you and I am blessing you with my Motherly blessing."
As of December 25, 2022, the number of Masses reported for Our Lady's intentions was 39,302.
Our thanks to Fr. Ray Donohue, Carol Bleck, Diane Niebauer, Sue Taccone, Elaine Brady, Mary Spaeder, Tom McIntire, Chris Opron, Betsy Truran, Kathy Luschini, Corky Young, Rose Heintzel, Louise Lotze, Peggy Smith, Irene and Dan Zuba, Chris Falk, Jane Culmer, Barb Cesare, Cindy Bielanin, Peggy Chludzinski, Joan Peterson, Marlene Figurski, Darleen Wilkinson, Judy Johns, Georgia Chludzinski, and those who want to remain anonymous for their help with the December mailing. We thank Louise Lotze for the use of her photos in this issue. We also thank our webmaster, Jason Klins, our prayer group administrator, Patti Millar, and our proofreader, Pat Berrier.
MARY IS CALLING YOU
On June 24, 1981 in Medjugorje, Our Lady began appearing to six children. She identified Herself as the Blessed Virgin, Queen of Peace. Her words to the visionaries: "I have come to tell the world that God exists. He is the fullness of life, and to enjoy this fullness and obtain peace, you must return to God."
Today, the Blessed Mother still appears daily to three of the visionaries, and monthly or annually to the others. They are all now adults. During the apparitions, the visionaries do not react to light, don't hear any sound, or react to being touched; they feel that they are outside of time and space. They declare to see the Blessed Virgin as they see other people — three dimensional. They pray and speak with Her.
The Blessed Mother granted to confide ten secrets to each visionary (some are chastisements for the world). Some of the visionaries have received all ten secrets. Our Lady promised to leave a visible sign at the original site of the apparitions in Medjugorje, for all humanity. In the meantime, this period of grace is for conversion and a deepening of faith.
Father Jozo Zovko, who was the pastor of St. James when the apparitions began, has spoken about what he calls "the weapons" or "the five stones" of Our Lady (as in the story of Goliath). They are PRAYER with the heart, especially the Rosary; EUCHARIST; BIBLE; monthly CONFESSION; and FASTING.
The publisher recognizes and accepts that the final authority regarding the apparitions at Medjugorje rests with the Holy See.
If you want a prayer cloth we made to keep, send a self-addressed stamped business size (4 78" x 9 '/2") envelope with $.84 postage on it.