Reflection on the Message of June 25, 2008

BE JOYFUL CARRIERS OF PEACE AND LOVE

"Dear children! Also today, with great joy in my heart, I call you to follow me and to listen to my messages. Be joyful carriers of peace and love in this peaceless world. I am with you and I bless you all with my Son Jesus, the King of Peace. Thank you for having responded to my call." Message of June 25, 2008

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It was 27 years ago when Our Lady presented herself in Medjugorje as the Queen of Peace. Throughout all these years she has patiently taught us and called us as a real loving mother to celebrate and practise the sacraments. She has been calling us to convert, to fast, to do penance and to worship Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament of the Altar. In her message marking the 27th anniversary of her apparitions she says that with great joy in her heart she calls us to follow her and to listen to her messages. While thinking about her latest message, as well as the others that we have heard so far, we should never forget the rule of St. Louis Grignion de Montfort saying: To Jesus through Mary! Mary always gathers people around her Son. She calls to a complete surrender to Jesus as only he can make each of us the whole person worthy of Heaven. Our Lady gives us an example of how to be faithful to God, how to live out our faith and how to live by faith. She took part in the acts of the Holy Spirit from the very beginning. Therefore the Church, which is also the work of the Holy Spirit, prays together with the one to whom God has done great deeds. Our Lady stands before us as a great gift, as the most beautiful image of the Church. She speaks in plain words that attract so many people from all over the world. Her messages are easily understood by both, the smallest and the eldest.

Our Lady calls us to be carriers of peace and love in this peaceless world. Today we witness serious dangers the whole of mankind faces, such as nuclear armament, various diseases, global warming, poverty. People live in great fear. Our Lady knows that. That is why she has been calling us, Christians, the faithful, to be carriers of peace and love in this peaceless world since the very start of her apparitions. On the third day of her apparition Our Lady gave us the first of her great messages saying: "Peace, peace, peace – and only peace!". After that she repeated twice: "Peace must reign between man and God, and among people, too!" A real peace may come only from God who has become “our peace“ in Jesus through Mary. (Eph. 2,14). "This world cannot give" this peace (John 14,27). That is why Christ commanded His apostles to carry it through the world (cf. Matt 10,11) so that all the people may become "men of peace" (Luke 10,6). Sometimes we tend to seek the source of restlessness in others because it is easier to act in this way. However, we must first find this source in ourselves and then deal with it. The source of restlessness is always a sin that one should renounce thus creating conditions for God to work in us.

At the end of her message, Our Lady blesses us with her Son Jesus, the King of Peace. Dear admirers of the Queen of Peace, let us say yes to peace in our hearts, let us choose God thus allowing Jesus to become the Path, the Truth and Life in us.

Fr. Danko Perutina
Medugorje 26/06/2008