Medjugorje - Bosnia
The parish of Medjugorje is situated in Herzegovina, 25 km southwest of Mostar.
Medjugorje, with the villages of Bijakovici, Vionica, Miletina and Surmanci, forms a Roman Catholic parish where today about 4,000 inhabitants live. The pastoral care of the parish is confided to the priests of the Herzegovinian Franciscan Province of the Assumption of Mary.
The whole region is inhabited by Croatians who received Christianity 13 centuries ago. The present parish was founded in 1892 and dedicated to St. James the Apostle, protector of pilgrims.
The village was like all other villages of this region: people worked on their land, planted tobacco, produced wine and vegetables to acquire just enough for a modest life for their families.
In 1981, when the apparitions started, the life of the parish changed: Our Lady chose for her witnesses and co-workers not only the six visionaries, but the entire parish and its pilgrims. This was expressly told in the following message: “I have chosen this parish in a special way and I wish to lead it.” (March 1, 1984)
On June 24, 1981, at about 6pm, six young people - Ivanka Ivankovic, Mirjana Dragicevic, Vicka Ivankovic, Ivan Dragicevic, Ivan Ivankovic and Milka Pavlovic, saw on the hill called Crnica, several hundred metres above the place called Podbrdo, a young woman with a child in her arms, who gave them a sign with her hand to come nearer.
Surprised and scared, they did not approach her.
The next day, June 25, 1981, at the same time, four of them: Ivanka Ivankovic , Mirjana Dragicevic, Vicka Ivankovic and Ivan Dragicevic, felt strongly drawn towards the place where they had seen the person the day before, which they had recognised as Our Lady. Marija Pavlovic and Jakov Colo joined them. The group of Medjugorje visionaries was formed.
They prayed and spoke with Our Lady. This is why June 25 is celebrated as the Anniversary of the apparitions. According to the testimony of the visionaries, from that day onwards, they had daily apparitions, together or separately, wherever they were. Milka Pavlovic and Ivan Ivankovic never saw Our Lady again.
The third day of the apparitions, June 26, 1981, Our Lady gave the call to peace for the first time with the words: “Peace, peace, peace – and only peace! Peace must reign between God and man and between men!” Attracted by Our Lady’s apparitions and messages, people – first the parishioners and then from other villages and from all over the world – started to gather and pray.
The persecution of the visionaries, of their parents and relatives, of the parishioners and priests, and even of the pilgrims began immediately after the beginning of the apparitions.
The visionaries were taken for police investigations and
psychiatrical examinations, but it was always stated that they were healthy. The same conclusion brought about further examinations done in the following years.
Fr Jozo Zovko, priest of Medjugorje at that time, was arrested a month and a half after the first apparition.
Although innocent, he was condemned by a communist court to three years and a half of prison.
Thanks to Our Lady’s apparitions, Medjugorje became a place of gathering for a multitude of pilgrims from the whole world (in the first 20 years, more then 20 million), and one of the biggest prayer centres in the world, comparable to Lourdes and Fatima. Innumerable witnesses say that, precisely in this place, they have found faith and peace.