Why don’t we wipe the tears She has in Her eyes?

The Medjugorje Visionary Ivan – June 15, 2009 in Medjugorje

 

Dear friends in Christ! In the very beginning of this meeting I would like to welcome you from the bottom of my heart. I have a great desire, that in this short time I will spend with you, to share with you the most important messages from Our Lady that She has been giving us these past years. Of course, to really talk about the messages we would need much more time than I am going to spend with you today. I would like to emphasize the most important messages of Our Lady and share a little bit more about them. It is going to be 28 years that Our Lady has been with us. Twenty-eight years ago, Our Lady knocked on the doors of my heart. I was chosen by Her. I was chosen to become Her instrument and an instrument in God’s hands. And so, I started in the school of Our Lady. The school of peace, the school of love, the school of prayer, and I am trying to be a good student in this school. I’m trying to finish my homework on a daily basis the best I can.
 

For me and for my family, of course, this is a great, great gift but, at the same time, a great responsibility. I know that I was given this joy by God but, at the same time, He asks a lot of me. And this responsibility and this joy I want to share with you today. To whom God gave a lot, He also asks a lot. It is not simple. It is not easy to spend time with Our Lady everyday – to spend five, sometimes ten minutes, sometimes even longer and to spend that time in the light of Heaven and to see the light of Heaven. Whenever Our Lady comes, She brings the peace of Heaven to us. Of course, it is not easy to come back and live here on earth. After each meeting with Our Lady, I need a couple of hours to get back to the reality of this life. I am sure if all of you were able to see Our Lady for one second, just one second, no more, I don’t think life on this earth would be interesting for you anymore.
 

What are the most important messages of Our Lady? What is Our Lady leading us to? These are the most important messages; peace, conversion, prayer with the heart, penance and fasting, firm faith, love, forgiveness, Holy Eucharist, and the message of hope. Through these messages Our Lady has been leading us. Each one of these messages Our Lady gives in a simple way. She is trying to place these messages closer to us so we can understand them and put them into our lives.
 

At the very beginning of the apparitions, back in 1981, when we were children as well, the first question we asked Her was what is your name? She said, “I am the Queen of Peace. I am coming my dear children because I have been sent by my Son in order to help you. Dear children, peace, peace, peace! Peace must reign. There must be peace all over the world. Dear children, there must be peace between men and God. There must be peace among all people. Dear children, this world, this mankind is in great danger; in danger of self destruction.” This was one of the first messages Our Lady gave to the world through us visionaries. From this message we can see what the greatest desire of Our Lady is; and that is peace. Mother comes from the King of Peace. Who can know better but our Mother how much peace we need in today’s tired world. How much peace we need in tired young people, in our tired families; and how much peace our tired Church needs. Mother comes as a Mother of the Church. She comes to us because She wants to help us. She comes to us because She wants to show us what is wrong with us. She comes to us because She wants to comfort us and encourage us. She comes to us because She desires to lead us by the hand to Her Son towards peace; and we can only find peace in Her Son. In one of Her messages Our Lady says, “Dear children, today more than ever, today’s world, today’s mankind goes from the terrible crisis. But the biggest crisis is the crisis of the faith in God because you make yourselves distant from God. You distance yourselves from prayer. Dear children, today’s world, today’s families want to walk towards the future without God. Dear children, prayer disappeared in your families.” Parents do not have time for their children or children do not have time for their parents. Father has no time for mother; mother has no time for father. There is no love in families anymore. There is no faithfulness in marriages. There are so many young people who live far away from their parents; without love; without support.
 

There are so many abortions which cause tears in the eyes of Our Lady. Why don’t we wipe the tears She has in Her eyes? Mother comes to us. She wants to lead us out of this darkness. She wants to take us to the way of hope and love. Our Lady says, “Dear children, if there is no peace in man’s heart; if man has no peace with himself; if there is no peace in the family, dear children, you cannot have peace in the world. That’s why open yourselves towards the gift of peace. Pray for the gift of peace because of your goodness. Dear children, do not talk about peace, but start living peace. Do not talk about prayer, but start living the prayer. Dear children, only the return of prayer and peace into your families can you be healed on a spiritual way.”
 

Today, more than ever, the world and families need spiritual healing. Today, how many families are praying together? Today, how many parents pray together with their children? Very little. How much time do parents spend talking with their children? They close themselves in front of their children and children close themselves before their parent, especially in today’s world where they live. We must bring the conversation back into our families. We need to have healthy communication, and this is the way we will be able to help our children. Because this world, the speed we live with is going to swallow us one day. We must bring back prayer in our families. We cannot expect that the world will be better if we do not bring prayer back to our families. We cannot expect to have more vocations in the Church if we do not pray because God is the one who invites those from families. Through family prayer; in families the priest is born. Our Lady says, “Dear children, this world is sick in a spiritual way. You cannot have physical healing of men and mankind if there is no spiritual healing. We have to be healed in a spiritual way.” Mother comes and She brings a cure to us. She heals our pain. She puts the Band-Aid on our wounds with so much love and gentleness this warmth of the Mother. She lifts up this sinful mankind. She is worried about our salvation and She says, “Dear children, I am with you. I come to you because I want to help you that peace comes, but dear children you are those who I need; only with you can I reach peace. But, dear children, that’s why decide for good and fight against evil; fight against sin.”
 

Mother speaks in a simple way. She repeats so often and She never gets tired, as I never get tired. You see that on the face of Our Lady. I see that She is never tired to repeat and to invite us; like all of you mothers here. How many times have you repeated to your children: study, work, do not forget your homework, do not do this or that because it is not good. Thousands and thousands of times you have repeated this to your children. Are you tired? I don’t think that you are tired. Is there a mother here who is able to say, “I’m happy I said to my child only once and I never had to repeat this again?” There is no such mother! Every mother needs to repeat. Every mother teaches. Mothers must repeat in order that children do not forget. It’s the same with Our Lady.
 

Mother did not come to us to punish us or to bring fear. She did not come to talk about chastisement or the Second Coming of Jesus. No, She comes and brings hope to us. She brings hope to our Church. She brings hope to our families. Our Lady says, “Dear children, if you are strong, then the Church is going to be strong, but if you are weak, the Church is going to be weak as well. You are, dear children, the living Church.” We are the lungs of the Church that is why Our Lady is inviting us to bring prayer back into our families, so the family can become the living Church – that it becomes the Church where we pray. There is no living Church without living families.

Besides prayer, Our Lady invites us to attend Holy Mass. Holy Mass is the center of our lives. During one apparition Our Lady said, “Dear children, if you have the opportunity to make a decision tomorrow between seeing me or attending Holy Mass, do not come to me, go and attend Holy Mass.” To attend Holy Mass means to walk toward Jesus who is granted to us during the Holy Mass, which means to surrender to Him, to open to Him. It means to talk to Him. It means to receive Him. Jesus must become the center.
 

Our Lady invites us to monthly confession. She invites us to attend Adoration and venerations. She wants us to pray the Holy Rosary in our families and to read Sacred Scripture in our families. Our Lady says, “Dear children, read the Holy Scriptures, so that reading the Holy Scriptures Jesus is reborn among you, among your families.” Forgive each other, love each other, and Mother carries us all in Her heart. She places us all in Her heart. She says so beautifully in one message, “Dear children, if you knew how much I love you, you would cry with joy.” That’s how great the love of Mother is.
 

One of the most important messages Our Lady has been inviting us to live these years is prayer with the heart. She has repeated so often, “Pray, pray my dear children!” Do not pray with your lips, do not pray out of habit, do not pray watching the clock to see when the prayer is going to end. Decide for prayer. Find the time for God. Find the time for your family. To pray with the heart means to pray out of love and with love. It means to pray with our entire being so that our prayer becomes a meeting with Jesus. so that prayer becomes joy. When we finish the prayer with the heart, we are fulfilled with peace and joy. Let prayer become joy for you.
 

“Dear children, the one who prays is not afraid of the future.” The desire of Our Lady is for us to pray everyday for three hours. Not three hours at once. Not three hours praying the Rosary. When Our Lady asks for three hours of prayer it means to go to Holy Mass, read Holy Scripture, pray the Rosary, spend time in Adoration before the Blessed Sacrament. It means to spend time with your family in prayer, to spend time in conversation with your family. It means to do good deeds, be a help to others. This is the program Our Lady has been giving to all of us. I can recall pretty well this pilgrim lady that came to Medjugorje a couple of years ago. This pilgrim heard that Our Lady wants us to spend three hours daily in prayer. She came to me and asked, “I wonder how Our Lady can ask us to spend three hours daily in prayer? It cannot be Our Lady!” I talked to her a little bit, but it was very hard for me to explain it to this woman. She did not comprehend. She came back a year later and she asked me, “Is Our Lady still asking us for three hours of daily prayer?” Not anymore I told her. Our Lady doesn’t want us to spend only three hours in prayer but twenty-four. And do you know what this woman said. “Okay that’s fine; I would rather stick to those three hours!” You can see how selfish we are in prayer sometimes. But, you see, Our Lady does not want us to do anything we are not able to do, but She asks us to do what we can. She tells us that if we want to attend the school of prayer then we must know that there are no weekends and no breaks during the day in the school of prayer. It means to attend the school of prayer everyday.
 

“Dear children, if you want to pray better, than you must always pray more.” But to pray more is always a personal decision and to pray better is grace, a grace given to those who pray more. So often we say we do not have time. We work too much, we are too busy. We do not have time for children and for our families, and time is always a problem. But, Our Lady says to all of us in a simple way, “Dear children, time is not a problem, the problem is love. Dear children, when one loves something than one always finds time for that.” When you do not like or love something then you do not have time for it. That is why Our Lady invites us to prayer.
 

So, I can say that Our Lady has been awakening us from this spiritual coma. She wants to strengthen our faith and prayer. Tonight when Our Lady comes I am going to recommend all of you, all of your needs, all of your families, and especially the parishes that you come from. In a special way I am going to recommend the sick. I hope that all of us will respond to the call of Our Lady. That we are going to accept Her messages. That we all are going to become co-creators of a better world, a world that is worthy of the children of God.
 

May your arrival here become a beginning of your spiritual renewal, and may you go back to your homes and continue this spiritual renewal with your families, with your children, and with your friends. All of you can become a living sign, become the light; the light of peace. Let us pray together with Our Lady for peace in the world. Let us decide for God. My soul rests in God alone. Let it be this way. Thank you and God bless you.