I’ve Hurt Myself By Hurting You

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[COC]

Today is Monday, January 26, 2015, and this is Radio WAVE.

 

[THEME MUSIC]

[COC]

Good evening, everyone, and thank you for joining us on tonight’s broadcast of Radio WAVE.

 

Our host is a Friend of Medjugorje, and it has been one month since the feast of Christmas and the feast with all of its jubilation and all of its joy, family and gathering and everything that goes along with that. And one month away, how much things have changed in the world and how much the world becomes a different place.

 

And so tonight, a Friend of Medjugorje is going to be sharing with us more insight about the message that Our Lady gave yesterday through a Marija.

 

And so, we ask you to open your hearts and prayer as we turn Radio WAVE over to our host, a Friend of Medjugorje.

 

[FRIEND OF MEDJUGORJE]

I find it difficult to believe that I live in the second most important time in the history of the world.

 

You say, “Well, what about Adam and Eve?” “What about the Israelites leaving Egypt with the Pharaohs?” “What about the times that we have seen through the wars that’s taken place?”

 

We’re second in our period of history only to when Jesus came, because the second Being that’s most important in history is the Virgin Mary. And the fact that we’re here for the fulfillment for all Her past apparitions to this one, which are the last on earth, is a statement in and of itself, that Our Lady Herself says, “…I will come and give messages as never before in the history of the world since its very beginning…” (April 4, 1985)

 

I find it amazing that no one speaks about this message. No one thinks and reflects on it. The Medjugorje world doesn’t speak about it. You hear the visionaries don’t speak about it. Yet, it’s one of the Thursday messages. A formation message. And it puts everything in a context that you can understand and say, once you realize and reflect on what Our Lady’s doing, that this is the second greatest moment in the time of history.

 

And so, if that’s the case, and when Jesus was here, and what turned around in the world to bring us back to the true law, the authentic law, the authentic way to live the Commandments instead of the burdens that were placed on them, we find ourselves, in the Church, very sick, with a Pope that’s identifying those sicknesses, calling down the cardinals and even the bishops and priests, as well as governments, and us as people, that we need a new beginning, a new change, a restorative return back to the roots of Christianity.

 

With those roots, and coming out to be made anew comes with suffering, carrying the cross, difficulties. No one goes to Medjugorje and converts and says they want to change their life and have a pleasant way to walk to do so. It is one of trial, fire, very difficult. And it’s not pleasant.

 

Our Lady says, “…Thank you for responding to my call.” A statement is one that has brought millions of people to Medjugorje who have heard it, who Our Lady’s spoken to to be thankful, but who have not stayed with the call and stayed with the conversion process and continued on the way. When things got difficult for them, they drop out. They limit themselves, or they just go so far with Our Lady and that’s it. Not a lot of people make it and stay with it year after year, ten years later, twenty years later, thirty-three years, now, we’ve been doing this with Our Lady. Some join at the beginning. Some in the middle. Some just last year. Some last month.

 

But Our Lady’s calling us to stay with Her, to listen to Her, to follow Her. And that’s what She did yesterday. She gave a message for the whole world that gives new insights, greater insights into the situation of the world that any of the headlines that you read yesterday or today in the papers in relation to what is the news. Because you can know human things. You can know things on the surface. You can hear issues that take place. But what the news is, is when it’s spoken directly from Heaven, speaking to us of what’s going on, what’s in past tense, what’s in present tense, and what’s prophetically said. And this message has both and the prophetic message of where we’re headed for 2015.

 

[COC]

Our Lady Queen of Peace of Medjugorje’s January 25, 2015 monthly message:

 

“Dear children! Also today I call you: live your vocation in prayer. Now, as never before, satan wants to suffocate man and his soul by his contagious wind of hatred and unrest. In many hearts there is no joy because there is no God or prayer. Hatred and war are growing from day to day. I am calling you, little children, begin anew, with enthusiasm, the walk of holiness and love; since I have come among you because of this. Together let us be love and forgiveness for all those who know and want to love only with a human love and not with that immeasurable love of God to which God calls you. Little children, may hope in a better tomorrow always be in your heart. Thank you for having responded to my call.”

 

[FRIEND OF MEDJUGORJE]

This message, of course, is something that we can look at as the same old thing. But did you catch it? Did you see what Our Lady said? Did you see what She talked about when She says, “…as never before…”? We heard that a little while ago in the message. “…I will give messages as never before…” (April 4, 1985)

 

Do you think Our Lady is sponging on truth? Say, “Here She comes again. She’s saying those words.” “…as never before…” When She says, “…Now…” that means this present moment, this time coming up, the time in which we live, the second greatest moment in the history of the world. “…Now…” This moment. This second you’re alive, and “…as never before…” This has never happened, not in the beginning when Adam and Even fell, not throughout Christ’s time, but as never before in the history of the world.

 

I’m adding the words “in the history of the world.” But Our Lady says,

 

“…Now, as never before, satan wants to suffocate man and his soul by his contagious wind of hatred and unrest…”

 

We’ve never had the sins being committed now. There’s no logic, Roman soldiers running around, “I’m going to go over there and make some kind of bomb,” which they couldn’t do that, or grab two guys and throw them off a cliff and jump with them and die—suicide bombers—or suicide cliff-jumpers, to kill other people. We didn’t have this mentality and this thinking and these things that take place.

 

But is that what Our Lady’s talking about?

 

Did you think the words that said,

 

“…as never before, satan wants to suffocate man and his soul by his contagious wind of hatred and unrest. In many hearts there is no joy because there is no God or prayer. Hatred and war are growing from day to day…”

 

Do you think about terrorism, that people killing each other…Is that what brought you to the point of that thought, these words?

 

No, Our Lady’s speaking about something else. Yes, it addresses that. But Our Lady preceded that with saying,

 

“…Also today I call you: live your vocation in prayer…”

 

What is your vocation? What state of life are you in? What is the vocation that most people are raised in? Their formation? How they grew up? How they think? What they become? Who are they?

 

“…Also today I call you: live your vocation in prayer. Now, as never before, satan wants to suffocate man and his soul by his contagious wind of hatred and unrest…”

 

Where is hatred the most today?

 

Where is the most unrest?

 

Is it really on the battlefields?

 

Is it really the terrorists in Paris, Afghanistan or other places in the Middle East? Or is it in 9/11?

 

Where is the unrest? Where is the war zone. Where is the most difficulties the world is suffering from as never before in the history of the world?

 

It’s an easy answer, but it’s difficult to answer it, because we don’t want to. We want to deny it. We don’t want to hear it.

 

But it’s real, and it’s right there where you are.

 

[SONG]

In between the coats in the closet, she held on to that heart-shaped locket, staring at a family flawless. But it ain’t a pretty picture tonight. Mom and daddy just won’t stop it, fightin’ at the drop of the faucet. Cuts through the walls, catastrophic. She’s caught in the crossfire.

 

Puts her hands over her ears, starts talking through the tears. She’s saying, she’s praying:

 

I wish words were like little toy guns. No sting, no hurt no one, just a bang, bang, rolling off your tongue (I wish words were like little toy guns) Yeah, no smoke, no bullets, no kick from the trigger when you pull it, no pain, no damage done (I wish words were like little toy guns) And just a bang, bang rolling off your tongue (I wish words were like little toy guns)

 

Wish there was a white flag waving, or that they were both just faking, and it was just a game they were playing, like shoot’em up cowboys. Leave the plastic pistols in the front yard, throw away the score card and just turn off all the noise.

 

I wish words were like little toy guns. No sting, no hurt no one, just a bang, bang, rolling off your tongue (I wish words were like little toy guns) Yeah, no smoke, no bullets, no kick from the trigger when you pull it, no pain, no damage done (I wish words were like little toy guns) And just a bang, bang rolling off your tongue (I wish words were like little toy guns)

 

Oh, I wish they didn’t cut like a knife. I wish they didn’t break you inside. I wish they didn’t bang, bang make you wanna run, yeah.

 

Like little toy guns. No sting, no hurt no one, just a bang, bang, rolling off your tongue (I wish words were like little toy guns) Yeah, no smoke, no bullets, no shot from the trigger when you pull it, no pain, no damage done (I wish words were like little toy guns) And just a bang, bang rolling off your tongue (I wish words were like little toy guns)

 

Oh, like little toy guns.

 

[FRIEND OF MEDJUGORJE]

No damage done? We can scream and we can shout at each other in the family in front of the kids. It doesn’t hurt anybody.

 

When you do that, you’re living divorce. You divorce yourself from the other. In the eyes of the children, what does that do to them?

 

I remember a lady told me, “Oh, my kids…” We ran across when she had gotten a divorce. I knew her from grade school, all the way through. And she says,

 

“Well, the children are getting over it. You know, it’s like a cold. You get over it.”

 

Really?

 

This culture today does not understand where the battleground is, where is the war field and the battles fought, but in the home.

 

So, you miss it when Our Lady says,

 

“…live your vocation in prayer…”

 

Because the only way to survive today, in the family is through prayer. We don’t say, “A family who prays together, stays together,” without it meaning exactly what it says. Where the cause is, there’s an effect. No prayer, you don’t stay there. Our Lady called for that.

 

“…live your vocation in prayer…”

 

Don’t think you can make it in today’s culture if you, as a family, aren’t praying, if you, as a community, aren’t praying. That’s why Our Lady says, be in prayer groups. She says prayer groups will be the healing of the world. Our Lady said, literally, here, in the Field, in Alabama, to

 

“Form and make prayer groups through which we will pray for your healing and the healing of this nation to draw closer to God and to Me.”

 

Incredible words. You believe in the apparitions?

 

And you think, “Oh, that’s just something that happened to the Caritas Community.” No. We had thousands of people here. We had been praying with thousands of novenas a prayers, literally millions, through the 23 years or so.

 

Why?

 

Because of family.

 

I was with Marija on the set doing Martin Sheen and Vicka, both of them in the fields. They were sitting on the side. They had the white screen, all the camera set, asking them the question, “What are you going to be?”

 

“I’m going to be a nun.”

 

Marija changes places with Vicka. She sits on the rock.

 

“What are you going to be?”

 

“I’m going to be a nun.”

 

Both are married. Ivan’s married. Jakov’s married. Mirjana’s married.

 

And so, why is that?

 

Because the holy vocation today that has to be lived can’t be if it’s first not lived in the family.

 

You wonder why we have so many crises in vocations in the priesthood and the nuns and the religious? Because many have not experienced, really, holy family. We’ve lost that.

 

And so, there’s crisis, and there’s crisis in religious vocations because there’s a crisis, organically, in the family. You’ve got man, and you’ve got woman today.

 

So, what is the problem in the family?

 

It’s not defined in marriage, today, on how to resolve conflict. Methods that are taught by the society to resolve conflict in marriage aren’t in Biblical truth. There’s all kind of methods that they give out, often which causes more conflict, breeding unrest and more difficulties, and that’s in society as well as in the Church. And I mean the Church, we’re not hearing from the pulpits, how do you resolve conflict in marriage?

 

An example of the methods of the Church is singer Amy Grant, a Christian, married to Gary Chapman, another singer. They went to counseling after they started having trouble. They were told to get angry with each other, to shout at each other. Then, they were given a pillow they could beat.

 

That really worked. They’re divorced now.

 

We’ve got these stupid methods, dialogue, do this, write letters to each other.

 

No, the Bible tells us how to do that. The world goes by a formation of mentalities that tells us these other methods. And you don’t accept it, and I’m not going to tell you. But what I will tell you is some Bible verses that shows you how to resolve conflict.

 

1 Peter chapter 3 says,

 

“Likewise, you wives be submissive to your husbands so that some, though they do not obey the Word, may be won without a word by the behavior of their wives…”

 

The Biblical truth is, even if your husband’s a heathen, does not excuse you from treating him as your lord.

 

Have you ever stopped to reflect about the wars in the families that’s taking place? That there’s two authorities: the husband and the wife, often in conflict, not knowing how to resolved the conflict, that one’s in charge, one’s over the other in the ideological ideas of what the family is, because here, it doesn’t say he’s got to be waking in Biblical truth. It says here in the Bible, that you be submissive, without a word by your behavior as a wife to the husband.

 

So, even if he’s not working in the Word, the children are watching a display of obedience to authority that’s not taught in today’s family, because he’s challenged repeatedly, put down, from Hollywood, all the way into the family. You mimic that.

 

Many women may not like to hear that, but the Bible can choke you, and society smooths everything over.

 

You think you can tell your husband to shut up without the kids telling you to shut up later?

 

We have, literally, nobody in the family that’s really a hundred percent teaching children obedience to authority. The wife is the teacher of that by her actions to her husband.

 

Peter goes on to say to the wives:

 

“…When they see your reverent and chaste behavior, let it be a hidden person of the heart with the imperishable jewel of gentle and quiet spirit which, in God’s sight, is very precious…”

 

And what does God say, in the Scriptures, to the husband?

 

“…Likewise, you husbands, live considerately with your wives, bestowing honor on the woman as a weaker vessel, since you are joint heirs of the grace of life.”

 

Did you catch that? A woman, you’re not any less than the man, except in your authority in the family.

 

Here it is, live considerately with your wives, bestow honor on her. This is done because, “…since you are the joint heirs of the grace of life.” She’s equal with the man. The man’s equal to her on the reception of grace, but not equal in authority. And if you do that, it says,

 

“…in order that your prayers may not be hindered…”

 

You don’t live this way, your prayers are hindered. You can be praying in the family, you’re not living the proper structure, you’re not teaching your children, what happens?

 

Destruction.

 

Ephesians says,

 

“Wives, be subject to your husbands as to the Lord…”

 

That’s a big thing. A lot of women say, “Well, he’s not the Lord.” Well, the verse over here in Peter says,

 

“Likewise, you wives, be submissive to your husbands so that some, though they do not obey the Word, may be won without a word by the behavior of their wives.”

 

That’s how you change them. That’s How to Change Your Husband. That’s what the book is about. And we’ve got a war zone in the family, kids that’s growing who hate. Hate who they are, hate who their parents are and what they’ve become, and the fruits of them growing old and having no fruit in the family.

 

And here it is, two of the visionaries, on camera, saying, “We want to be nuns. We want to be in a religious convent.” And the end up married.

 

“…I want the fruits of the family to be seen one day…” (May 1, 1986)

 

The family does not know how to operate. And you women have to learn how and what that means. It doesn’t mean to be a doormat. It means to treat your husband as you would Jesus Christ.

 

That chokes you? Truth always chokes. Many husbands would never allow that. Some would enjoy that and still be, maybe, reprobates. But that’s not your problem. If he’s a reprobate, that’s God’s problem. Your problem, if you’re so sanctimonious, and you’re holy, you’re supposed to be living this. If you’re not, you’re not teaching your kids how to obey.

 

We’ve had people that’s been raised in war zones, but the wife was a model of treating the husband with dignity, even though he didn’t live in the Word. It’s not lost. You teach those kids to go and always be respectful, that they can have a religious vocation, because the mother showed, through the cross, what it means to be, even when things are going against you, that you still must revere authority.

 

So, we have no respect for authority today because kids aren’t learning it from the mother. That’s why God is sending a Woman to the world, because we need Mother, and we need women today to be mothers. And that’s lost. We don’t have it.

 

In Colossians, it says,

 

“Let a woman learn in silence and with all submissiveness.”

 

I knew I couldn’t tell you these things. I knew I had to literally quote the Bible for you to hear it. And I know that’s still choking you. You want your children to obey you? Then you teach obedience!

 

You say, “I shouldn’t obey my husband.” Yes, you should. It’s Biblical, and if you don’t you are going to raise kids that are going to grow up and be suffocated, be contagious to the hatred and unrest of sin, who are going to be weak, who have no resilience.

 

We hear horror stories, horror story after horror story about what women are doing in the family today and blaming it on the man, picking up the phone, calling 9-1-1 screaming, “He’s beating me,” when she just got through beating him. Repeatedly! And you say, “Oh, that’s the husband’s story.” No, we’ve had women turn around and tell us those stories themselves.

 

We’re making a big mistake in our court system, saying that all the women have to have equal ownership of the house, of the lands.

 

Oh, does that choke you?

 

No, we’ve bred an independence where it’s easy to walk out. Women have always been taken care of by the man, if he has that in him. And I’m not saying all men do, but they most will.

 

But we have it too easy to walk out, too easy to split the family up. There needs to be obstacles put out there, in the court system based on Biblical truth that she’s underneath his care.

 

Now, if she wants to walk out, which often is the case, as opposed to the man, then she, herself, is walking out with nothing. You know what happens in that case? I’ll tell you, throughout history, the woman knew not to do that. She got on her work clothes. She got on her wife clothes, and she knew she had to perform as wife in taking care of her homemaker and taking care of her husband because she would be out with nothing. We’ve opened the door to untruth thinking this is the way it’s supposed to be, and we’ve made it so easy for women not to be married, that they walk.

 

And you say, “Well, if that’s the case, there would be abuse.” I tell you, there would be some abuse, for sure. Always has been. But it wouldn’t be near the abuse of the court systems now where the wives walk away, walk away from their husband, walk away from their children, walk away from difficulties—I’m not talking about perfect marriages—that had they not been able to get what they get, money wise and everything and all these other things, they would make it work.

 

It’s been proven that a man and a woman that work out and resolve their conflict, after five years, are happy.

 

Is this choking you? The Bible does that.

 

So, Peter says,

 

“Sarah obeyed Abraham, calling him, ‘Lord.’ And you are now her children if you do right and let nothing terrify you.”

 

It’s not to be scared of.

 

A woman told me once, “My husband acts like a bear.”

 

I said, “When?”

 

“When I’m arguing with him.”

 

“Well, don’t argue with him!”

 

He’s the resolve of conflict if you’re in conflict with your wife. You have the higher authority given by God to dictate what happens from that point. Make the decision, embrace it as a woman, and come in peace and be silent.

 

That’s not fair? Okay, well then, don’t do it and become a rotten family. Your kids on drugs. And when you call a family reunion twenty years later, nobody’s there because you have two families, and they both married each other, and you’ve got blended families, and you’ve got cousins you don’t know who’s cousins. It’s a disaster.

 

Malachi says,

 

“God hates divorce.”

 

Think about that for a moment. Think about it.

 

So, you want to blame your husband for everything? Society blames the husband for everything? Everybody’s on the man? And reversed roles? We weren’t content to say, “mankind.” We have to say, “humankind.” Well, we’re not content now to say, “brothers.” We have to say, “brothers and sisters.” Now, we’re not content to say, “brothers and sisters.” We have to say, “sisters and brothers,” and “woman and man.” We’re putting the woman first. It’s the wrong order! Adam was made first, Eve second! That’s not putting her down. That’s putting her underneath the man’s arm because Eve came from underneath the arm of Adam—his arm over her. She’s not to go first. She’s not to lead. She’s not to call the shots.

 

You say, “Well, I do better when my husband lets me do it.” No, man. You start standing up. And if you were formed in the wrong way, and you’ve got a crippled husband, that’s just the way it is, but you can teach a lot of lessons to your children by treating him as your lord, even if he’s not worthy of that.

 

You better decide: do you want good children? Do you want to be dealing with all kinds of problems that spin off from your disobedience and your not following the way and the structure God gave to resolve conflict, even if he’s not following the Word, “Honey, what do you want to do? Where do you want to go out to eat?”

 

You’d be surprised, even if he’s not in the Word, how much he will reciprocate back to you if you ask him, “Where do you want to go eat? We want to eat where you want.” And then he says, “Oh, well, where do you want to go?” And if it doesn’t work that way, you’re still teaching your children that you followed directions, which teaches them to follow directions.

 

We have a whole world of unrest and war, which manifests in the heart as Vicka said in Paris. The war starts in the heart. This comes out in the military battles by countries.

 

We’ve got a whole world at war because we’ve got broken family. And often, all these people blame each other for who they are. Unforgiveness is destructive in a relationship. It will lead you to lose every single thing you have, especially as you grow old, and you want to see the fruits in your household, your family that day, and those who will surround your community. And it’s gone. It’s vanished with the wind—satan’s wind. The contagious wind of hatred and unrest is in families.

 

You know what the sheriff’s department told us here at Christmas, right before? We’re real good friends with the sheriffs around here. They stop by, and we talk to them. They know us by name. We know them by name. They say one of the worst days is Christmas, or just before Christmas at family reunions, because people know they need to get together. They get together. They can’t live together. They’re so many fights that break out that it’s a horror story. Christmas is horrible for the police.

 

What a sad tragedy, and all because you never would ask for forgiveness. You don’t know how to fall into order or pattern, what your structure is, where you are in the wolf pack, if you want to say it that way. Even a pack of wolves knows who’s in charge above them, and they fall their position. And us, with a higher intellect, we can’t do that? We can’t live proper? “No, that is authority, and I am to respect that.”

 

There’s a story about a pet wolf. It wasn’t a story. It’s a true story. The family brought it in. They had four or five kids. The three younger ones, the wolf got real aggressive with them. They became worried about them. They realized that he was putting himself between the first and the second, and in between the third, fourth and fifth child. So, they made the other children hit the wolf and put him in his place, and he became bottom of the pack, even when he grew older.

 

An animal can learn that, and a wife can’t? And if you can’t, you can’t teach your children the same way? You lose authority by not following authority.

 

All this is too strong for you? Our Lady’s not coming as the Woman to heal the world without healing the woman, which heals the world. She who rocks the cradle rules the world. She’s the queen, and she’ll be honored for that.

 

And you don’t want to do that? That’s okay. Continue as you wish. You’ve got one more chance, one more day, you’ll be saying to yourself. If you could just say, “I’m sorry.”

 

I talked to an attorney one day. He said his wife left him six months before that, got all his stuff, got all the money, got all, everything, and then she calls him six months later, wanted to come back. He says, “No. I lived with you for so many years, and I put up with everything you did,” and now she’s on the other side.

 

You know most women suffer when they walk out? Like eighty percent of them? A lot of them are out on the streets. And lot of them, and most of them end up in poverty, even if they get a big settlement.

 

Your richness, your power, your self-esteem comes as wife and mother. Don’t think Our Lady hasn’t come first for the woman. This is the way it works. And you’re giving yourself a lot of hurt, and you think you can just walk away and nothing’s going to happen. You don’t understand the consequences coming.

 

[SONG]

Seems like it was yesterday when I saw your face. You told me how proud you were, but I walked away. If only I knew what I know today. Ooh, ooh.

 

I would hold you in my arms. I would take the pain away, thank you for all you’ve done, forgive all your mistakes. There’s nothing I wouldn’t do to hear your voice again. Sometimes I wanna call you, but I know you won’t be there.

 

Oh, I’m sorry for blaming you for everything I just couldn’t do. And I’ve hurt myself by hurting you.

 

Some days I feel broke inside, but I won’t admit. Sometimes I just wanna hide ’cause it’s you I miss. And it’s so hard to say goodbye when it comes to this, ooh, ah. Would you tell me I was wrong? Would you help understand? Are you looking down upon me? Are you proud of who I am? There’s nothing I wouldn’t do to have just one more chance to look into your eyes and see you looking back.

 

Oh, I’m sorry for blaming you for everything I just couldn’t do. And I’ve hurt myself

 

Oh, if I had just one more day, I would tell you how much that I’ve missed you since you’ve been away. Ooh, it’s dangerous, it’s so out of line to try and turn back time.

 

I’m sorry for blaming you for everything I just couldn’t do. And I’ve hurt myself by hurting you.

 

[FRIEND OF MEDJUGORJE]

My grandfather was a coal miner. He came from Italy when he was fourteen. He married my grandmother. They had ten kids. And she nagged him.

 

And more she nagged him, the more he’d drink.

 

After ten kids, they got a divorce. Scandalous at that time.

 

And she stood at his casket looking down at him, just like you will be one day, one day too late for you to ask for forgiveness. And she picked him up. Put her arms around him…

 

[PAUSE]

 

…and said, “Gianni…Gianni, I love you.”

 

“I’m sorry for blaming you for everything I just couldn’t do. And I’ve hurt myself by hurting you.”

 

[PAUSE]

 

Do you want one more chance?

 

Many people think in marriage they always have that second chance or that third or fifth or hundredth, but one day, they run out.

 

And as for the men, they often misinterpret why things fall apart. Men make a big mistake in doing this. Often, they’ll go to more appeasing, more trying to please when they see the wife distancing from themselves. Just the opposite should be done.

 

One guy showed up here at Caritas and starting confiding to me about his problems with his wife. She had been going to a college for two and a half years. He was paying for the tuition. He said she’s very independent, and he said he was very concerned that once she graduated and she got her degree that she would leave. He wanted advice.

 

I told him, I said, “You need to make her more dependent on you.”

 

He said, “What do I need to do?”

 

“You need to quit paying for her tuition.”

 

He said, “Well, I can’t do that.”

 

I said, “You better do that.”

 

He said, “Well, if I do that, she’s going to leave me.”

 

I said, “If you don’t, she’s going to leave you.”

 

And I got real strong with him. I said, “You go right now and stop paying for her tuition.”

 

He said, “I can’t do that.”

 

A couple years later, I saw him. He paid for her tuition. She got a degree, and she left.

 

I told him, I said, “If you had done what I said to do, she might have left. It’s true. But at least you had a chance.”

 

May sound like odd thinking to be thinking that way, but this is the problem. We have too much independence. We have, today, more women crippled than we do have men who are crippled. You’re always going to have, whichever way you go, certain consequences.

 

The art of warfare—I’m not putting that in the context of marriage, but on the battlefield—is where do you get least casualties? You do from the court systems all the way through to keep marriage intact, to do things and structure things in the culture that will make people want to stay together. You say, “Well, that’s force.” You’re forcing divorce on children. You’re forcing divorce, many women, against husbands and for some husbands that fail, the same.

 

So, where is the least casualties in having a structure that supports marriage, supports the need to stay together, and it’s not cruel. What’s cruel is you make it easy. What’s cruel is your kids don’t have a mom and dad together. That’s cruel. But again, that chokes.

 

Some men make this big mistake, and a woman must be, by the man, by the husband, guided. You say, “Well, she doesn’t want that.” Maybe she doesn’t. Maybe she’ll divorce you for it. But if you don’t a woman has cored in her very being the need to comply, the need to submit. And if you don’t bring that situation about where you’re guiding, then she’ll go find somebody that will guide her. It’s an innate need.

 

Yes, some rebel. There’s nothing you can do about it. But it doesn’t change your authority because you didn’t impose it. God did. It’s from God. And that’s a hard truth to take. It’s very difficult.

 

And so, many people get married, then the husband thinks he’s got to do this thing. He’s got to buy the cars. He’s got to do these things and chase materialism. He chooses that in giving that to her, placating her—she’s got the means to do it—when all the while, he puts that ahead of his headship. And he leads to doing just the wrong thing, and then, when it breaks up, he blames it on, “I was chasing cars. I was doing this. We were doing that. We were doing too much materialism.” You allowed that to happen instead of saying and guiding not to be so materialistic. A woman’s inclined toward that. Eve was inclined to a thing—touching a tree. She went shopping, made a big mistake, made a bad sale. It wasn’t even on sale. Big price.

 

Men have to take charge whether or not the wife concedes and wants that or not. It’s not up to them, and it’s not up to you.

 

And so, just like this man didn’t want to tell his wife, “I’m not going to pay for your tuition,” that, “We’re married, and I need you to be more of a homemaker. You can get a small job or whatever till we have kids,” or whatever, however you want to do that. But you’re in charge, and you do it.

 

Did he have a sliver of a chance, or a big chance, for that to happen? I don’t know the calculations of what would have happened. But one thing I knew, is she was going to walk by the information he told me, and she did. He had no chance that path. If he had stood up, be a man, “No, this is what we’re going to do. We’re going to hold this together. This is how we’re going to be,” she probably would’ve been upset, made a big fit over it. But there was a possibility through prayer that that could change. And now nothing can change except disaster, one after another. We have these situations that come up.

 

I had another husband once come to me, and he told me, “My wife just told me she doesn’t love me anymore.” And he was pretty upset about it. “What do I do about it?”

 

I said, “You go back, and you tell her, ‘You’re going to love me, and you’re going to decide to love me. You’re going to show this affection in front of the kids. You’re going to show it in your demeanor. You’re going to do it without your words. You’re going to prove to them and to me that you love me. I expect that, and I’m going to demand that out of you.’”

 

I heard later from him, last I heard, they’ve got a healthy family.

 

Don’t expect, well just try, “Okay, well, she doesn’t love me. What do I have to do? Go buy flowers?” That’s the last thing you’re going to do. You become a man. You say, “This is the way it’s going to be. This is the way it is,” because God ordained it.

 

“Well, I’ll just get an annulment.”

 

“No, we were married in the Church. You’re going to do that? You do that. But you’re not going to consign me to hell.”

 

There’s many things you can say. You start praying to have wisdom. Don’t blame it, “Oh, I wish I could have her back, because of what we want, we got into materialism.” You stand up. You guide the events. You state what needs to be done. You don’t have to be overbearing about it. You have to be in truth about it because truth convicts. If there’s any shred of desire for truth, and you’re praying, and you’ve got her praying, she’ll see that because she has to see it because God put in her heart to be a complier, to hear the baby cry when you’ve got to get up the next morning to go to work and hear it crying a year from now. She hears it when it’s to be nursed on the immediate situation. You hear it, how are you going to feed it a year from now. So, she gets up during the night to do that. God made her anatomy that way. She’s made in a way to be submissive, in a Biblical way. Not a bad way, but a holy way.

 

[SONG]

We all want what we ain’t got. Our favorite doors are always locked. On a higher hill with a taller top, we all want what we ain’t got.

 

We ain’t happy where we are. There’s greener grass in the neighbor’s yard. A bigger house and a faster car. We ain’t happy where we are.

 

All I want is what I had. I’d trade it all just to get her back. She’s moving on, but I guess I’m not. Yeah, we all want what we ain’t got.

 

We all wish it didn’t hurt, when you try your best and it doesn’t work. And goodbye’s such a painful word. We all wish it didn’t hurt.

 

All I want is what I had. I’d trade it all just to get her back. She’s moving on, but I guess I’m not. Yeah, we all want what we ain’t got.

 

Woah, woah.

 

All I want is what I had. I’d trade it all just to get her back. She’s moving on, but I guess I’m not. Yeah, we all want what we ain’t got.

 

Yeah, I wanted the world till my whole world stopped. You know a love like that ain’t easily forgot. I guess we all want what we ain’t got. Yeah, we all want what we ain’t got.

 

[FRIEND OF MEDJUGORJE]

Every woman will come to a point in their marriage when they believe that they don’t love their husband anymore.

 

That’s a given.

 

You may not admit that, but you know when you’ve been at that point or you haven’t arrived at that point because it’s part of the deception that sometimes a woman goes through, as Eve, and to conquer that, they have to be like Our Lady or the women of the Bible.

 

The singer got it wrong. He said,

 

“I’d trade it all just to get her back.”

 

Trade what? He doesn’t even interpret what it was. He wasn’t a man. He didn’t stand up. The same result may have happened, but it could’ve been like the man who didn’t want to stop paying for tuition, that had he did, he might have had a chance. She moved on. But the one who expected and demanded that his wife love him, she stayed.

 

Why is it like that?

 

As I said before, it’s not enough for your self esteem that you can just be a mother but not also a wife first. It’s both. But get your priorities right, because it is God Who wants us to be happy.

 

Solomon lived his whole life. He had everything you can imagine: kingdoms, wives, dancers, wealth beyond anything anybody could imagine, plus his wisdom. But even his wisdom didn’t serve him all the way through his life. But at the end of his life, in Ecclesiastes, he talks about it. He’s gone through his whole life, and what does he have to say at the end?

 

“Vanity of vanities,”

 

Says the preacher,

 

“All is vanity”

 

Why? Because he missed something. He got to his old age and looked over it, and he realized how empty he was. Oh yes, he had a lot of things, accomplishments and everything he could look at, but he wasn’t happy.

 

Life can be enjoyed, and you can only enjoy life in the context of being held accountable how you live.

 

Our Lady said and told us on February 25, 1987,

 

“…I want each one of you to be happy, but in sin nobody can be happy…”

 

We’re to have fun when we’re young. Things need to be lightened up. Look at the teenagers now. They’re too serious. Look at the girls, what they’re into. We need to realize life needs to be enjoyed, not endured. The Bible shows us, Solomon shows us, to lighten up.

 

Don’t endure life. Enjoy it, and you’ll be happy when you reach old age.

 

What’s happening to the elderly people now, that when they reach old age? They’re not happy. Why are they not happy? You think it’s something of what Marija said when she did adoration, stayed up all night on school nights, went straight to school from adoration after prayer. And it’s her who said that what she’s experiencing in her forties is a result of what she did in her youth.

 

Solomon taught this. Don’t endure life. Enjoy it, and you’ll be happy in old age instead of empty.

 

Solomon’s great witness at the end of his life, after searching throughout his whole life, was have fun in God’s will. May sound strange, but marriage doesn’t reflect that today. You’re just enduring it. You’re not enjoying it.

 

The second thing he really shows us is: give God the energy of your youth, or you will regret emptiness when you get older.

 

So, you’ve got a choice: give God the energy of your youth, or give God the emptiness of old age. What does that mean? People who are depressed, people who grow old, have no memories that they’re fond of or proud accomplishments, or the memories with family, the richness, even just gathering the grandchildren around you or friends and family. Even if you’re consecrated, when you give your life to God, you have something that you can look back over on your life and be proud.

 

St. Catherine, when she died, they wrote in the book about her and her life, and it was written, “She died as all old nuns die. She just went to sleep.” Why? Because they gave of themselves in completeness that they had satisfaction when their body wasn’t able to do what it did. But their mind still works, and they can reflect over their life of accomplishments.

 

So, if you want to grow in love, give God your youth of your life, you’ll be seeing life wide open. The happiest people are those who are obsessed with obedience to God.

 

If you want to be happy, obey God.

 

That means obedience to authority.

 

God has designated the husband in his authority over the wife.

 

So, if you would be happy, you would do that. And if you can’t, you won’t. Because happiness in old age comes from the consolation that you were obedient to God. That’s all that’s going to be important in the end.

 

Solomon wrote in Ecclesiastes something that we need to ask ourselves, who is the Creator? Well, that’s an easy answer: God. But you also are. You create what’s going to be determined in your future happiness in your life by what you do with the energy of your youth.

 

Chapter twelve says,

 

“Remember also your Creator in the days of your youth before the evil days come and the years draw nigh, when you will say, ‘I have no pleasure in them.’”

 

What does that mean? It means in the emptiness of old life, if you haven’t given over to God what was God’s, and if you didn’t have your fun in within the bounds of God’s will, you’ll be depressed.

 

If you want to follow your own whims, be partying or just live for yourself and love yourself before everyone else, this comes into a horrible inheritance of emptiness in old age, and it’s then you won’t have the energy to do anything for God.

 

So, you’re going to experience your youth for yourself, and then when you get old, and you want to start reflecting on God, “Okay, God. You can have my old age.” What are you going to offer Him? What can you do for Him? God demands that. He wants that. And rich do you become in your memories and reflection that you will be consoled if you’re even just confined to a chair and can’t even walk.

 

Solomon goes on,

 

“Before the sun and the light and the moon, the stars a darkened…”

 

So, he’s relaying this to old age. Everything will darken, even with the light there, the sun there.

 

“…Clouds return after the rain. In the day when the keepers of the house tremble and the strong men are bent and the grinders…”

 

Meaning teeth,

 

“…cease because they are few and those that look through the windows are dim…”

 

Your sight will go away.

 

“…and they are afraid also what is high…”

 

Older people don’t get in chairs. They’re not agile. They can’t do what they want to do.

 

So, what are you going to be able to do? Look back across your life and be joyed about what you did, or not.

 

Whether you held a marriage together, or you didn’t.

 

Whether your children became whole through you being whole as a husband and wife, or not.

 

He says,

 

“…All the terrors are in the way…”

 

All these images will come back to you. You don’t stick it out, it’s going to be like terrorism. And you don’t get happy about that; you get depressed about it.

 

Many a gray-haired person is very, very lonely because of the decisions they made, how they spent their life, without ever thinking long enough to reflect in the future what that will mean to them later.

 

And so, all these things add up to a life of completeness of happiness, because Solomon says,

 

“…Man goes to his eternal home…”

 

What will you suffer to get there?

 

In your youth, from your youth, in your marriage, and you as a woman, in your wifehood, if you do everything you’re supposed to do, you grow love.

 

If you grow love, you grow memories.

 

It’s always been said, “Behind every great man, there’s a great woman.”

 

What are you doing?

 

What’s your investment?

 

Are you going to be able to turn to your husband one day and say,

 

“Lay down and tell me the stories of your life.”

 

When he passes on, and you don’t, how rich you’ll be. Or if you’re not able to be there because of the bad decisions you made, your life is a wreck.

 

This is reflection time. This is time to mend the world, and it comes through you mending your world.

 

[SONG]

Won’t you lay down and tell me the places you’ve been. Won’t you lay down and relive your story again. If things could turn back around, I know I would do anything. Won’t you lay down ’cause I know that Heaven’s waiting.

 

Won’t you stay now. There’s so much that’s never been said. Won’t you stay now. Remind me to never forget. And I, I won’t break down. I don’t want to live with regret. Won’t you stay now. I’ll be by your side ’til the end.

 

And you’ve been to places I’ve never been. Built your walls so high, but you’d always let me in. You showed me that love can build a home. But now I see, that it’s time to let you go.

 

Won’t you lay down and tell me the places you’ve been. Won’t you lay down and relive your story again. If things could turn back around, I know I would do anything. Won’t you lay down ’cause I know that Heaven’s waiting.

 

No, no. If things could turn back around, I know I would do anything. Won’t you lay down ’cause I know that Heaven’s waiting.

 

[FRIEND OF MEDJUGORJE]

You have to have, in your marriage, the ability to resolve conflict. And it’s real clear, and it comes through the Bible. And you’ll have memories that you can be able to lay down when your life is before you, that these things will come back in delight, rather than something you want to fly back from.

 

We’re in serious moments, serious times that Our Lady comes to us showing us these things. But you can change your situation, and you change your children, and by doing so, you change the world, because the world is your own world, those who are around you.

 

There has to be a change in the mentality of the woman. The man also has to realize his authority. [INAUDIBLE] make that change reflective to the same thing. Without this structure of change, nothing will change.

 

The change means to go through a life where we are going to be hurt. The ground underneath us may be shaking. It may be very difficult. And if you’re going to go through conversion, and you feel that sweetness of that conversion, you’re going to be flying. But don’t expect to stay in the air. You’re going to be knocked down. satan will swat you down. And it’s not pleasant. Formation isn’t always the way you think it’s going to be. Conversion is not the sweetness it stays. It’s like the honeymoon. And then God will test you.

 

Are you going to get back up?

 

Are you going to fly back in the sky?

 

Or are you going to stay down?

 

[SONG]

Baby blue staring in the windowpane just counting drops of rain. Wondering if she’s got the guts to take it. Running down her dreams in a dirty dress, now her heart’s a mess. Praying she’ll find a way to make it.

 

So keep on climbing, though the ground might shake. Just keep on reaching though the limb might break. We’ve come this far, don’t you be scared now. ‘Cause you can learn to fly on the way down.

 

Searching for a sign in the night even like a lonely string of lights, that’ll burn just long enough for you to see it. The road’s been long and lonely and you feel like giving up. There’s more to this than just the breath you’re breathing.

 

So keep on climbing, though the ground might shake. Just keep on reaching though the limb might break. We’ve come this far, don’t you be scared now. ‘Cause you can learn to fly on the way down.

 

On the way down.

 

You won’t forget the heavy steps it took to let it go. Close your eyes, count to ten, hold your breath and fly.

 

Keep on climbing, though the ground might shake. Just keep on reaching though the limb might break. We’ve come this far, don’t you be scared now. ‘Cause you can learn to fly on the way down.

 

Ooh-ooh, ooh-ooh.

 

Fly.

 

Fly.

 

[FRIEND OF MEDJUGORJE]

What does this song mean? Flying on the way down?

 

As a woman, flying on the way down is where she needs to go. Where does she need to fly to? She needs to fly to humility, to meekness, to inner serenity. A woman who learns that is truly climbing in the eyes of he who loves her. Who loves her? It’s He: God the Father; and he: the husband.

 

I want to get serious with you, for just a moment, specifically women, the wives out there. You need to think about this.

 

What does God think about a spouse who has in the heart that they don’t love their husband, or even the husband to the wife?

 

I can tell you, He doesn’t think well of it.

 

And if He doesn’t think well of it, it means you’re not getting blessed. You’re not going to flourish. You’re not going to be what He wants you to be.

 

When I first started going to Medjugorje, I had a pilgrim group, and one man came to me and said he didn’t love his wife anymore. And I was green, and I wasn’t into the messages. And I didn’t know what to tell him. I did what many people do now, even in Confession from priests. You don’t know what to say. It’s what Our Lady’s come to the world to teach us, to have the answer. Her messages are about that.

 

And so, the next year, in one of my pilgrim groups, a woman came to me and said that she didn’t love her husband anymore.

 

I said, “That’s your fault.”

 

She said, “What are you talking about? He’s an addict. He does all this. His addiction is causing so much strife in the family.”

 

I said, “You’re charged with loving your husband.”

 

And she didn’t understand how I could say that with all that she’s gone through.

 

I went on to tell her, “What about your enemy? Are you commanded to love him? Are you commanded to love those who hate you?”

 

We just had 21 Coptic Christians killed. Do you think, right before when they went in front of God, that He held them accountable if they hated the people who killed them, or if they loved their enemy?

 

That’s a serious thing. And that’s understandable to be upset with people like that.

 

But if we are to love our enemy, how much more are we to love our spouse who we’ve had children with?

 

That’s just what I told her.

 

You’re not excused for not loving your spouse no matter what the conditions are.

 

You can be wounded, but so were the Coptic Christians.

 

You can be put down. You can be persecuted. But nowhere in the Scriptures are you excused, in Jesus’ teachings, that you can rationalize that away.

 

It’s well-taught. It’s very clear that that who you’ve married and you once loved, and you don’t love now? You’ll be held accountable for.

 

You may be the only person that will give them salvation. You may have been put on this earth to bring them to God.

 

We’re in serious times when we start reflecting on how deep the messages go and what we’re commanded to do. And you call yourself an apostle of Our Lady, or a follower of Our Lady?

 

There again, we start getting choked.

 

If you don’t love your spouse, how does God see that?

 

Love thy enemy? You’re okay with that, but not loving your husband? You’re excused from that?

 

No, you are to love your spouse, love them more than an enemy. Love is a decision. It’s not that you have to have something romantic. Do you not have to decide to love your enemy?

 

Our Lady said, quote, “Love is a decision.” (January 25, 2002; November 20, 1986) She said, “Love is the greatest sacrifice.” (March 27, 1986)

 

If we’re commanded to love our enemy, we’re commanded ten times the more to love our spouse.

 

For love to flourish, you must know how to resolve conflict. You must know and allow God’s ordained structure to operate within your family to bring the harmony it needs. If you do this—and this applies mostly to the woman who must abide by it to win, because—you do win. What do you win?

 

You live a life of richness. And if it’s not the relationship you dreamed of with your husband, you still imprint your children, those who witness you were a good mother and a good wife, your family or your neighbor. And if he’s good, or if he’s bad and won over, you will win the richness of aging with grace, a grace of a life together that will not bring emptiness, but that you kept it together, man and woman, who as husband and wife, who have not greater richness than toiling a life together.

 

You’ll sing through your memories.

 

You’ll be rich and dancing together all those years of memories that you sit when you can’t walk or you’re feeble, that you held it together.

 

That’s how you win.

 

God’s given you the means to do that.

 

He’s given the formula.

 

The question is: do you want that?

 

What will it be for you to love until you’re seventy?

 

You need to toil to love right where you are.

 

[SONG]

When your legs don’t work like they used to before, and I can’t sweep you off of your feet. Will your eyes still smile from your cheeks?

 

And darlin’ I will be lovin’ you till we’re seventy. And baby my heart could still fall as hard at twenty-three. And I’m thinkin’ ‘bout how people fall in love in mysterious ways. Maybe just the touch of a hand. Well me, I fall in love with you every single day, and I just want to tell you I am.

 

So, honey now, take me into your loving arms. Kiss me under the light of a thousand stars. Place your hand on my beatin’ heart. I’m thinking out loud that maybe we found love right where we are.

 

When my head’s all but gone and my memory fades, and the crowds don’t remember my name. When my hands don’t play the strings the same way, I know you will still love me the same.

 

‘Cause honey your soul could never grow old. It’s evergreen. And baby your smile’s forever in my mind and memory. I’m thinkin’ ‘bout how people fall in love in mysterious ways. And maybe it’s all part of a plan. Well, I’ll just keep on makin’ the same mistakes, hoping that you’ll understand.

 

Baby now, take me into your loving arms. Kiss me under the light of a thousand stars. Place your hand on my beatin’ heart. I’m thinking out loud that maybe we found love right where we are.

 

[INSTRUMENTAL]

 

Ah-la-la, la-la-la, la-la-la, la-la-la, la

 

[INSTRUMENTAL]

 

So baby now, take me into your loving arms. Kiss me under the light of a thousand stars. Oh, darlin’, place your hand on my beatin’ heart. I’m thinking out loud that maybe we found love right where we are. Oh, baby, we found love right where we are.

 

And we found love right where we are.

 

[COC]

For those of you who are tuning in for maybe the first time, don’t know too much about a Friend of Medjugorje, you might think that he doesn’t have an appreciation for women by what he’s saying, and that’s not truth to that.

 

I live here in the Community in the mission here, and we live submission. We live this Biblical principle in our families, in our homes, and in the mission. And the keyword in the message here is “vocation.” What is this “vocation” of motherhood? Of wifehood? Of holy womanhood? And in living this principle, you see the flowering of your own vocation, a complimentary position, not something that is downtrodden, but something that compliments each other. That is the fruit of what we do comes through that.

 

A Friend of Medjugorje is not somebody that does not desire to bring everyone into the heart and soul of family, of the mission, but he always is respectful of including people’s, and women’s opinions, thoughts, ideas. But in the end, conflict has to be resolved somehow, and that’s the point of he has spoken about today.

 

But vocation, the way God has created it, is something that is missing in our families, because everybody’s jockeying for power, and there’s no trust in God Who is the One in between the husband and the wife. That is the inspiration that comes through the message, what Our Lady’s trying to bring families back to, the beauty of vocation in women and in men.

 

Just another thought that I read a couple days ago that I overlayed on this message was something that Marija said in the war years when Bosnia was in great turmoil, great suffering. They asked Marija, “Why this war?” And she said Our Lady told her She could stop the war tomorrow if She just had enough prayer. That’s what struck my heart in this message that, with all the wars that we’re facing in our families, in our countries, our nations, our governments, whatever, that God just simply doesn’t have enough prayer. That really just breaks your heart when you realize that Our Lady is fighting for people to be praying. And in that way, She can resolve every war, whether it’s between our husbands or wives, whether it’s with our children, whether it’s with our governments. We don’t pray enough.

 

[FRIEND OF MEDJUGORJE]

Well, Paul Harvey, I remember years ago saying, when he was alive and did his newscast, that he and a friend were at a gym, and he was on the upper deck watching the guys run around the track. He turned to his friend, and he says,

 

“You know, men are just ugly. Thank God for women.”

 

And I tell you, our community would be a very boring place if it wasn’t the lay community we are with the girls, the wives and the consecrated women. They make the world go around. They’ve got a finesse that men simply don’t have. They’ve got class. They’re beautiful. And when they’re sweet, and they live God’s Biblical mandates, it’s a joy to be around them.

 

Some of the greatest terrorists today are wives in the family, the mothers. You may think that’s harsh. But some of the greatest people, far surpassing the man…He doesn’t have…The woman is superior in her ability to do things than a man, the way she can carry herself, if she’s that model of Our Lady, if she’s virtuous.

 

And there’s a certain beauty in that, even if there’s not a physical beauty, that when there’s sweetness there, nothing is greater. It’s why Proverbs says, “A good wife, who can find? She is far more precious than jewels.” And that’s just not wives. That’s just the little girls being raised.

 

And so, there’s a beauty that can be seen in our girls here. In fact, we have guys that come here. And we did a retreat for the single consecrated. Joan called it, “Don’t come here wife shopping.” And we have people do that. We have, actually, suitors coming for our consecrated, often, from the outside, because they are rare gems. And then, when they consecrate themselves to the work of holiness of spreading the messages, it’s what men are looking for.

 

And so, we have to be contagious, just like satan is with the wind, with our “odor of holiness,” Our Lady says She’s come as, (March 25, 1994) with those traits of really being women, and even a mystery to man and what he does.

 

And it’s true. I believe the world would not go around without the woman. And it’s not. It’s stopping. And that’s why God is sending the Woman, and that’s why I’m in love with Our Lady. Her traits, what She does, the sweetness, the things She’s done for us in our community, even privately, even messages, just does something to the heart that the woman stands in the same position.

 

The beauty of women, the capability of women, is something man doesn’t have, and God put him over her (the wife) because she’s so talented in so many ways, that she can exercise what God put into her as far as love, that she has to be capped by somebody lower than her. I look at man beneath women. The Jews always held the woman above them and put her in a place of honor, on a pedestal.

 

Why are women not on a pedestal today?

 

Why does Italy have a zero population rate? They’re not keeping up. There’s not children around? It’s because the mothers have left the home. They’re walking around like models. They dress awful in Italy. And they look like brutas. Bruta’s Italian for brute. And many of the Italian women are brutes. And I can say that because I’m Italian.

 

So, it’s the truth. It’s why I said I’m never going to marry an Italian woman. But they’re a lot worse now.

 

Are there some beautiful Italian women? Yes, there are. But it’s those who are carrying the virtues of Our Lady. Those are the virtues that women have to have. If you adopt that, you’re seeking forgiveness,

 

“…Together let us be love and forgiveness…”

 

Joan just said, that we be prayer. Our Lady’s saying, “…be love…” “…be…forgiveness…” When a woman gets that, the boy will get it. If the wife gets it, the man will get it. The Scriptures says that. He’ll be won over by your behavior.

 

So, you’re not excused from this. And the fruit of that is being around sweet children.

 

Life in our community is incredible because of the kids. And that comes from the mothers. And when a mother is disrespectful to her husband, or she tells him to shut up, this damages the family. It hurts it. It starts division. And if it’s not checked, if it’s not corrected, if it’s not reversed, it results in people going and killing each other, because if divorce is hated by God, the absence of God is hell. And so, hell comes into the family, and hell comes into the nation. And this, simply put, is the way it is.

 

And so, one of the biggest assets we have in our community, the richness of our life, is what the world is poor in. There’s not children around. Kids are always around us, and they’re one of our joys. And when the women here, the mothers and older girls take care of this and adopt these things in a way that make these children more obedient, more respectful by showing some respect that there’s somebody in authority…not that everybody’s running around here, “Oh, what do I do next?” We’ve got more talent with the women than we do the men. We have good men here because we have good women. It’s all connected.

 

And so, the kids here are a touch of Heaven when the woman is a touch of the same beauty of Heaven. And there’s no greater richness we have than this in our community.

 

[SONG]

Can we touch the soul of Heaven? Can we unite a sacred lesson? Every child creates a skylight of beauty. Can you hear cathedrals falling? All the universe is calling. Cry a single cello from your heart. Since the world has lost her way, loneliness journey endlessly. Yet the promised chance remains. Gift of what could be.

 

So let the children remember the sun. Let them dance, let them soar, for their lives have begun. Let the children engender the rain. As the river runs through fields, forever subsiding their pain. Prayer.

 

Every voice along the shoreline, standing still within time, spinning unresolved the walking. As each season passes, through wonderland and looking glasses, the secret garden shires beckons you. Gentle flower, don’t fade away. Sweet innocent still harbors thee. In the faith of golden dreams where one love lives eternally.

 

Let the children remember the sun. (Remember the sun) Let them dance, let them soar, for their lives have begun. Let the children engender the rain. (Engender the rain) As the river runs through fields, (river runs through) forever subsiding their pain. Prayer. Prayer.

 

Prayer. Prayer.

 

Oh,

 

Bless the children for they are the light. They are the truth of spirit in flight. Yes, the children engender the rain. As the river runs through life, healing their pain. If you could trust with your heart but for time, sweet angels, conceive you have forever and always believed, prayer.

 

Prayer. Oh… Prayer. Prayer. Oh…

 

Prayer.

 

[FRIEND OF MEDJUGORJE]

You, as woman, “Gentle flower, don’t fade away. Sweet innocent still harbors thee.” You can forever subside the pain, through prayer.

 

We wish you Our Lady. We love you. Good night.

 

[THEME MUSIC]

[FRIEND OF MEDJUGORJE]

We often see the projects that we do as spiritual and the writings that I often do, Our Lady writes them. She runs me across people’s paths. Different stories, different things happen.

 

And children, as children, live prayer, as the song that you just heard. And sometimes, they act through that just by simple questions.

 

After we did this program, my wife, my daughter, with my son and daughter-in-law and their children, were coming back from Mass. And they put in a song that started to play, and I stopped it, and I asked the children, do they know the story about this song? They said, “No. Tell it.”

 

So, I started, and I said, “No, Tony and Erin, you tell it.”

 

So, they began to tell the story, and it was beautiful. And as they were telling the story, I realized we needed to add this to this program, I’ve Hurt Myself By Hurting You.

 

And so, that’s what follows. It’s something prompted by children, by prayer, and by Our Lady.

 

[PIANO INSTRUMENTAL PLAYS]

[COC]

Every night before our children go to sleep, Tony traces a Sign of the Cross on their foreheads, and he does this cross twice. The first cross is a special blessing for themselves, and the second cross is a blessing for their future spouse, whether they be married or choose a religious vocation and that spouse be Christ.

 

And this tradition has been passed down from his own father and is now taken on by all the fathers of the Community here and also many people across the world who have heard of this tradition of fatherhood.

 

And the tracing of these two crosses on the forehead has really fruited into a beautiful story that, only in hindsight, looking back, do you see the full circle of what God’s grace did because of these two blessings.

 

And I think it was the confidence in these two blessings that started Tony and I’s walk with our discernment going into our marriage.

 

In September of 2003, we met with Tony’s father, and he knew our intentions and knew what we felt like was God’s will for our lives to be married. But in community here, we always start with a 54-Day Rosary Novena. We don’t date. We don’t do anything, really, that the world does as far as relationship goes. We work a lot together. We spend a lot of time with each other’s families. And that’s our discernment: prayer and work, and God really does speak more profoundly in those ways than you would think He would in the ways that the world follows.

 

So, in 2003, we met with Tony’s father, and his words—I remember them very clearly—were,

 

“I’m not for you, and I’m not against you. I’m for God’s will. If it’s God’s will for you to be together, I’m for that. If it’s His will that you’re not together, I’m for that.”

 

And looking back, it’s the confidence that this Sign of the Cross traced on Tony’s head twice since the moment he was born that I see he had the confidence to be able to say that.

 

And so, we walked into the bliss of our first 54-Day Rosary Novena, which Tony decided to start on October 6^th, which was an important feast day for his father and our community. It’s the day that Our Lady gave a message to his father to,

 

“Pray and by your life witness. Not with words but rather through prayer will you attain what your desire is. Therefore, pray more and live in humility.”

 

And that message meant a lot to Tony always because it was given to his father. And so, we started our first 54-Day Novena on that date.

 

We never stopped praying 54-Day Rosary Novenas from that moment.

 

So, fast forward a couple years, and Our Lady was coming, through Marija in August of 2005 for Our Lady’s Birthday. It was a huge event, a very big celebration that was planned. We had finished a 54-Day Novena sometime before that and were actually just praying a nine-day novena in preparation for this event.

 

During the course of these two years, I had started to feel a little bit of anxiousness to get married. We had very clear signs, very beautiful messages, Scripture messages picked. We knew 100% that we were for sure each other’s discernments, that it was for sure God’s will.

 

So, on the girl’s side of it, I was thinking, “Okay, so, what do we do now, and why aren’t we engaged yet, and what’s going on,” and “We’ve gotten enough signs from God, so what is He waiting for?” And I had this begin to build in my heart, mounting into this August event.

 

So, August 5^th was the highlight of this event—Our Lady’s Birthday. Everyone had been fasting up to that point. This anxiety I’d been feeling for these two years of “When are we going to be married?” “We know this is God’s will.” “We think we know this is God’s will.” “Maybe it’s not God’s will.” “Why aren’t we married yet?” All of this that I felt…

 

As the rain started to fall on August 5^th, I remember feeling just a very clear abandonment to that and just saying, “Mary, why am I concerned? I love him. I love living here. I love this way of life. I’m blessed to just be here. Just take this off of me, and just let me be at peace. Whenever it happens, it happens,” and “Just take this off of my shoulders, out of my thoughts, my heart.”

 

And I felt a real big release, and there was actually a physical washing of that from the rain, just a tremendous joy flooded over me as I just totally let this whole situation go into Our Lady’s hands and just experienced a great miracle from the rain to the hail to the huge lightning storm, but mostly just this release of this weight that I was carrying for these two years just totally went at that moment.

 

So, that was what was in my heart at that moment.

 

[COC]

And Erin felt the release and the relief, and I felt the pressure.

 

And at some point during that rosary, I was talking to my brother, and financially, I didn’t know how it was going to work out to be engaged, get the ring, the details. And I’d met with my father, met with my brother. And God worked out all those details. And I had this burning desire that now was the time. Now it’s time to propose to Erin. Do it while Our Lady’s here during this event. I want to do it in the Bedroom.

 

And so, when I had met with my father, I had heard a song five years prior to the meeting with my dad, and I had told him that I’m ready now to ask Erin to marry me. I need to get the ring. It needs to happen now while Our Lady’s here.

 

And he said, “I’ve got a song you know.” And I thought at that point, he was going to be like, “Well, now’s not a good time. We’re busy. Look at all that’s going on with everything.”

 

And he said, “Alright. I’ve got a song I want you to hear.” So, he played this song, and the song was the same one I’d heard five years before. I didn’t know the artist. I didn’t know the name of the song. But when I had heard it five years before, I knew at that moment, that if I ever was going to be married, that was the song I wanted to play to propose to my future wife.

 

And so, all-in-all, the details were worked out. We went out in one day. I went with my brother. I was sick, and I was very sick. Didn’t feel like going shopping, but [LAUGHS] I pushed through and did it, and with my brother and his wife now, which at that time, they were dating, and they would soon to be engaged right after we were. We went around and shopped, went to ring places. And everyone said, “Okay. Well, you know, we have this. We have that.” And the first place we went, I saw it. I liked it. We went to other places. We came back. We said, “We want this.”

 

They said, “Alright. We can have it ready for you next week.”

 

And I said, “No, I need it tonight.”

 

And they said, “Well, that’s not possible.”

 

And I said, “If we’re buying the ring, we need it tonight.”

 

And so, we left. We went and had lunch, came back. They had the ring finished. Everything worked out. And I felt that release of pressure. God had worked it out. The details were done.

 

So, I had brought the ring home, placed it on the Bed, put it under a pillow. No one, at this time, knew other than my brother, my father, and my brother’s girlfriend at that time. And I had the ring blessed by Our Lady the day before. The next day, I was going to propose to Erin.

 

[COC]

So, that evening, August 6^th, the ring was blessed. It was important to him to have the ring blessed before he proposed, which has always touched my heart.

 

So, the next day, August 7^th, we were told, in the Community, this was a private apparition for the Community.

 

So, we were told as a community to be down to the House, be early, plenty in time for the Rosary and apparition, so we all were down there early and on time.

 

As we started to gather, there was no feeling of anything about to happen. I was running around like crazy with pilgrims. I was single consecrated at that time, technically. I was in discernment, but I was still living at the singles’ house. There was a lot going on, a lot of things running through my mind, but the very least of which was that I was about to be engaged, because remember my prayer. I had just totally released that, and it really was not even in my thoughts.

 

So, we entered the living room, and it was time to go into the Bedroom. And I had noticed that the Bed was decorated beautifully with rose petals, and there was two silver crosses leaning up against the pillows. And it was different from other apparitions during this event, but not unnormal because Tony’s mother, usually as a goodbye to Our Lady, this would be the last apparition in Alabama before we got on the charter… So, it would not be uncommon for her to do something beautiful like that to say goodbye.

 

But what was awkward was that, right when we walked in, on the left side of the Bed, Tony’s father began to place his oldest brother, and then Tony, and then the second oldest brother were all kneeling on the left side of the Bed facing in.

 

I saw that Tony’s father had placed his girlfriend first on the right-hand side of the Bed, and then me and then his girlfriend at the time. We were all kneeling on the right-hand side of the Bed facing in towards each other: the girls on the right, the boys on the left.

 

And I remember thinking how awkward it was, because it’s not normal placement. There’s not couples usually facing each other on the left- and right-hand side of the Bed. Many times, Tony’s father would place different people in the room, maybe to see Marija’s face or different things like that. But normally, we just flow into the room naturally, and we would not choose a spot closest to the Bed. So, that was a little awkward, but I didn’t think anything of it at that moment.

 

But I remember distinctly, Tony’s dad making the Sign of the Cross, and everyone saying the Sign of the Cross. And immediately, I song began to play, and it wasn’t meditative song. It wasn’t instrumental. I noticed right away it was a country song. And I thought it was a little awkward.

 

And as the song began to play, I remember the very first time I heard the words, “my last name,” playing in the first verse, I put my face in my hands and tried to really fight back tears because I was trying to remind myself of the prayer that I had just given to Our Lady not to worry about this, and I knew in my heart, his oldest brother was about to propose to his girlfriend, and I needed to make sure that I had a joyful face, because I was going to be joyful, but I was fighting back this feeling of, you know, why was this not going to be me.

 

So, as the song began to unfold, and just the beauty of the song, and generations that were mentioned, all of the words that were just so awesome, I was overcome with tears. And I didn’t not see what was taking place on the other side of the Bed because my face was in my hands, and I was crying.

 

[COC]

At this point, my oldest brother reaches under the pillow and pulls out the ring box.

 

[COC]

Tony would hold it for a minute.

 

Kyle would hold it for a minute.

 

Casey would hold it for a minute.

 

So, everyone was thinking, “Gasp! Gasp! Gasp!” every time the ring got to another person. But here’s me with my hands in my face crying. [LAUGHS] And I remember the girls elbowing me in the side, like, “Look up! You’re missing this.”

 

So, I remember looking up and seeing this ring getting passed back and forth and trying to have this look on my face, like, that I’m so excited for what’s about to happen.

 

And then I hear the words to the song say,

 

“I guess you’re wondering why I brought you here tonight. I want to be your husband. I want you to be my wife.”

 

And at that moment, the boys gave the ring to Tony, and Tony stood up…

 

And I just completely lost it…

 

…Because I thought it was not me.

 

And I was so emotional that the girls had to physically pick me up and say, “Go over there!”

 

So, Tony…

 

[COC]

I was standing there all alone waiting for her to come. [LAUGHTER] And I was like, “Great. She’s backing out at the last moment.” In front of everyone! I thought, this was going to be a great moment. [LAUGHTER] And here, I have fifty people to witness that Erin didn’t get up to greet me when I was going to propose to her.

 

And I forgot to kneel down on one knee because I was standing there listening to the song.

 

[COC]

It was okay. It was so romantic that I forgot that part. You did do it, the next night.

 

[COC]

I did. I re-did it.

 

[COC]

[LAUGHS] But, so, we sit at the foot of the Bed, and Paolo and Marija were just to our right because we were facing each other now. And Tony pulled the ring out, and he said,

 

“Would you like my last name?”

 

And I, like, screamed, “Yes!” And the whole room went into, just jubilation, and everybody just, such a shock and awe moment…

 

[COC]

Screaming and jumping up and down and…

 

[COC]

Tears, laughter, screaming, shouts of joy, excitement, more tears, and the whole scene unfolding was just incredible.

 

Tony’s grandparents were both there, who’s his namesake, Papa Tony and Nana were both there. So, every word of the song had such detail of passed down from generation. Everything came to fruition right there. And it was just like, time stood still. And we had got so loud with excitement and tears that we actually had to leave the Bedroom and go out to the living room, and all the girls looking at the ring, and all the kids screaming with excitement, and Tony still shaking, [LAUGHS] and nervousness. And it was just such a joyful, peaceful moment.

 

And as we started getting nearer and realizing that it was getting close to apparition time, we headed back into the Bedroom.

 

And just when we thought it could not get any better or more perfect of an event…We already did not deserve what we had. It only got better from here.

 

Because we went into the Bedroom at that time. Marija was kneeling at the foot of the Bed where she always kneels, and normally, Tony’s father and mother are kneeling on either side of her.

 

So, this was a rare event, but he placed Tony on one side of Marija and myself on the other side. And we knew we would be directly in eye vision with the Mother of God. And at that moment, before we even started prayer, you know, the tears began to flow, and it just can’t get any better than this…

 

…But it did.

 

So, the apparition rosary continued, and when it was time for apparition, we felt like we were in Heaven, just the moment being together with family and friends, the whole Community, our whole life right there together, the moment of being able to actually thank Our Lady for this in Her presence was just more than we could even comprehend.

 

And that still wasn’t the greatest moment.

 

Because at the end of the apparition, Marija, as she stood up to tell us what happened in the apparition, she said that she recommended all of us and all of our intentions. But she said,

 

“I recommended, in a special way, this engaged couple.”

 

And she said, “I recommended Tony and Erin. And Our Lady made the Sign of the Cross. She made the Sign of the Cross over Tony, and then She turned and made the Sign of the Cross over Erin and blessed their engagement.”

 

And we felt, there’s no words, really to describe. It was something that no one is worthy to receive. All the years that felt like forever waiting for me, just took all a natural event into supernatural, and it was an inexplainable joy and peace and love and every combination of every word all in one. And who has this?

 

In hindsight, looking back and retelling this story, years later, we see this full circle come together of what Our Lady did through our simple engagement.

 

[COC]

With Our Lady giving the two blessings—one for myself, one for Erin—we see the reflection all the way back to the two blessings my father gave every night before I went to bed: one for myself, one for my spouse in the future to-be.

 

And who has this?

 

[COC]

This is Our Lady, the Mother of God. This is the same Mother Who was the inspiration for the first miracle that Christ worked at the wedding feast at Cana. And weddings are important to her, and we’re important to Her, and we don’t deserve this, and it’s nothing that we’ve done. It’s nothing that we’ve earned. It’s nothing that anybody could do to deserve something this beautiful, but it is the fruit of our way of life, and it is the fruit of the decision for this way of life, and it’s the grace that came from these two blessings from the time he was born, all the way through now to his grandchildren, which are our children.

 

We wish everyone could experience, but we know no one will ever be able to feel the way we felt in that moment.

 

So, for a bride retelling her story, after nine years of marriage, and looking back on this engagement, there is no fairy tale that could be written that tops this. There’s no imagination. There’s no characters that you could write. There’s no better story of Prince Charming or anything that could top this engagement with the Mother of God, with my incredible husband, and with a story truly written—a script—written from the hand of God.

 

[SONG]

I learned how to write it when I first started school. Some bully didn’t like it. He said it didn’t sound too cool. So I had to hit him, and all I said when the blood came,

 

It’s my last name.

 

Grandpa took it off to Europe to fight the Germans in the war. It came back on some dog tags nobody wears no more. It’s written on a headstone in the field where he was slain.

 

It’s my last name.

 

Passed down from generations too far back to trace. I can see all my relations when I look into my face. May never make it famous, but I’ll never bring it shame.

 

It’s my last name.

 

Daddy always told me far back as I recall, “Son, you’re part of somethin’. You represent us all. So keep it how you got it, as solid as it came.”

 

It’s my last name.

 

Passed down from generations too far back to trace. I can see all my relations when I look into my face. May never make it famous, but I’ll never bring it shame.

 

It’s my last name.

 

[INSTRUMENTAL]

 

So darlin’ if you’re wonderin’ why I’ve got you here tonight. I want to be your husband. I want you to be my wife. I ain’t got much to give you, but what I’ve got means everything.

 

It’s my last name.

 

Oh, it’s my last name.

 

I learned how to write it when I first started school.

 

[CLIP]

[PRIEST]

And may Almighty God bless you, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, amen.

 

And Tony, you may now kiss your bride. [LAUGHTER] Okay.

 

Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you Mr. and Mrs. Tony and Erin Colafrancesco! [APPLAUSE]

 

[ORGAN PLAYS]

[END CLIP]