Medjugorje Father René Laurentin: When the Visionaries touched eternity… When “they touched Our Lady, they had the impression of having touched something very “alive”!
MESSORI: But why is Our Lady described by different seers in appearance, depending on where she appears? In short: is Mary in heaven dressed as in Guadalupe, as in Lourdes, as in La Salette, as in Fatima or as in Medjugorje? What is your “wardrobe”?
LAURENTIN: Ah, there is no wardrobe, but an adaptation of the Virgin to the seer, to her culture, to her tradition, to her time. I am sure that Bernadette really “saw” Maria with a white dress, a blue band and two roses on her feet, just as I think that in Medjugorje the visionaries really touched Our Lady.
MESSORS: Touched? In Medjugorje have “touched”?
LAURENTIN: Yes, they touched the body of Mary.
MESSORI: And how was it? A “solid”, “physical” body?
LAURENTIN: Yes, yes, they said theysomething that emanated a very strong energy. Although, even here, the description does not allow us to fully understand.
MESSORI: Listen, mine is a question that may seem absurd. According to faith, there are two bodies already resurrected, that of Jesus and that of Mary. Where are these bodies? Where can we imagine them?
LAURENTIN: Not in our space, not in our three dimensions, four if we also count the time They live in God, in eternity.Where is it? As? I can not have an idea, I can not understand a dimension in which I have never been.
Continuing our daily study on Medjugorje and everything that happened and happens in the town of Mary, we rediscover today the ‘Dialogues on Our Lady’ between a great theologian and the most famous Italian Catholic writer.
The abbé René Laurentìn, French, was considered the greatest contemporary “mariologist”: he wrote 140 books, including a scientific history of the apparitions of Lourdes in twenty volumes. of which only seven documents. Vittorio Messori, is the author of the greatest post-war religious best-sellers: from Ipotesi su Gesù, published in 1976, to Cross the threshold of hope with John Paul II.
HERE IS THE DIALOGUE AND THE MEETING
The two meet at the monastery La Solitude of Evry-sui-Seine, thirty kilometers south of Paris. Laurentin is more than a scholar, a man of action: on the collar of his jacket he proudly brings the Légion d’Honneur to war, before becoming a priest: he still climbs without problems on the shelves of his immense library, and drives the Renault 4 with the look of a twenty year old on these roads that border that Seine on which. until a few decades ago, he was skiing. Messori, after spending a quarter of a century studying Jesus Christ, has for some time dedicated himself to Our Lady (every month, on Jesus, his Mariano notebook) and wants to “close”, as he says, with the Hypothesis be Mariti.
The meeting between Laurentin and Messori is also an opportunity. precisely, for a “dialogue” on this Mary of which so much is spoken: because of the facts of Civitavecchia (which Laurentin himself was called by the bishop, to judge) but also for the wars in the former Yugoslavia and in Rwanda: two tragedies which, according to reports in unsustainable times (1981 and 1982) by the visionaries of Kíbého, Our Lady had predicted.
MESSORS: Let’s start from Medjugorje. Our Lady had said to pray and do penance to avoid war. They prayed, they did penance, but the war broke out equally
LAURENTIN: I do not pretend to interpret the goodness of God. But I think, for example, the fact that the bishop of Zagreb is in favor of recognizing the authenticity of the apparitions, while the Mostar is against it. Zagreb is intact. Mostar has been destroyed by bombing. Bishop Zagreb told me: “The Church of the former Yugoslavia has not followed the indications of Our Lady”.
MESSORS: Are you more and more people from Medjugorje?
LAURENTIN: Yes, I have not changed my mind.,
MESSORI: And of Kíbého, in Rwanda, what do you think?
LAURENTIN: Even here, it all started long before the war broke out. The first appearance is August 19, 1982. The visionaries said that the Madonna was sad, and that she cried, as in Civitavecchia. The apparition lasted eight hours seers saw terrible images, a river of blood, massacres, corpses abandons decapitated heads .. All these things have been told 11 years before they were realized They themselves disappeared in the massacres.
MESSORI: You have spent half a century to “investigate” on Lourdes. Ever had doubts?
LAURENTIN: I posed problems, historical university questions, I did not start from a prejudice, neither positive nor negative.But now I have not the slightest hesitation in saying that, in Lourdes, Mary really appeared. Not surprisingly, in 1933, Bernadette Soubirous was declared a saint by the Church.
MESSORS: How come the Marian apparitions have intensified in the last centuries? It seems that Mary has decided to manifest herself only from a certain date onwards.
LAURENTIN: It’s not like that. The first confirmed appearance is that of Gregory the Taumaturgo, in the third century. Then there were others, even in the Middle Ages, but then there was a ban on talking about the apparitions, under penalty of excommunication. The first manifestation of Our Lady in the modern age is that of Guadalupe, in Mexico, in 1531: it was an episode of enormous historical significance because the «Morenita» appeared not to Catholic spies but to the Indians, who had other cults; and that apparition marked the beginning of the conversion of Latin America.
MESSORI: And how come so many apparitions in France after 1800? It begins with Rue du Bac, in Paris, in 1830, and continues with La Salette, in the mountains of Grenoble, in 1846: then Lourdes in 1858 and Pontmain in 1871. Provided that it is possible to understand something of God’s plan, because this privilege to France of the last century?
LAURENTIN: There was a Church traumatized by the persecutions suffered after the Revolution. Rue du Bac was a moment of rebirth of hope. Mary, appearing to Sister Cathérine Labouré (who will become a saint, like Bernadette), ordered her to create and spread what was called the “miraculous medal”. and since then there were many vocations, many conversions, many prayer groups were born. France was very “welcoming” at the time. Now … it’s not anymore. With us, the rationalist spirit that marks our culture has prevailed.
MESSORI: But why does Our Lady, if she wants to communicate something, does not do it in a clearer way, unquestionable for everyone?
LAURENTIN: Because communication between God and men is always a mystery, it always happens in chiaroscuro.
MESSORI: The “hidden God” of Pascal?
LAURENTIN: Yes. The apparitions go through the psychology of the individual. The seer sees and hears things that others do not see and hear.
MESSORI: But there have been cases. as in Fatima, where the “dance of the sun” was recorded by 70 thousand people and even filmed.
LAURENTIN: Yes, but that too is a mysterious fact because the sun has been seen “dancing” only within a radius of some tens of kilometers around Fatima, not all over the Earth. Even in Medjugorje there have been similar analogies, many have seen (and there are also videos) the cross at the top of the hill transfiguring and taking on the form of the Virgin. You can make many assumptions, but some rationalists will always find something to object. It is difficult to prove a supernatural fact.`
MESSORI: You have never witnessed, in Bosnia Herzegovina, an inexplicable phenomenon “
LAURENTIN: No, never.
MESSORI: Me neither, with the exception of a fact that you certainly know. You know well that in Medjugorje the “apparitions”, true or presumed to be, took place in the sacristy. Well, one evening I was there in that sacristy: and I can testify that, as always, the thousands of sparrows that shook in front of the church suddenly fell silent, all together, when the ecstasies of the visionaroes began, and then resumed singing immediately after. But a very different thing is to have an appearance … It seems that the strategy of Our Lady is to never appear to journalists and professors, no?
LAURENTIN: I think that too rational people are not suitable for such experiences. They are intuitive, personal communications … We are not in the esprit de géometrie, as Pascal said, but in the Éprit de finesse.
MESSORI: For several years it has been almost impossible for the Church to recognize supernatural facts. You say that Bernadette, today, would not be believed.
LAURENTIN: The Church asks. first of all, to verify that there are no deviations from the faith or dishonesty on the part of the visionaries. If there is none of this and if the “fruits” are good then the Church prefers not to intervene, limiting itself to watching the cult.
MESSORI: But not disconcerting, that, after 15 years, Rome is not yet pronounced on Medjugorje, which has not yet said yes or no? In Lourdes it took less than four years to decide.
LAURENTIN: Prudence prevails today. It is recalled that Christ said: “Blessed are those who believe without seeing”. Vision is secondary to faith. And faith is not a “seeing”.
MESSORI: Yes, but Jesus, just as he was saying those things, he showed himself resurrected! Our faith is not based on a thought, but on a concrete fact, on an experience, on eating and drinking with the Risen One.
LAURENTIN: True, but Jesus would have preferred that Thomas had believed without seeing and without touching; and the evangelist, telling us that episode, wants to tell us: if you believe, you will be more blessed you of the apostles. Of course, the “signs” have a great role. The fathers of the Church said: for visibilia to invisibilia, from things visible to God, which is invisible. But this passage of the visible to the invisible is very complex, the influence of God is mysterious, the limits of the seer also. For this reason, discernment is not easy.
MESSORS: Bernadette has repeatedly complained about how they depicted the Madonna. She has always said that the statue of Fabisch, exposed in the cave of Massabielle, looks a little like “she” had appeared to her. But she added that it was impossible to describe it accurately … In short: in every apparition, Mary is described by the visionaries with a similar and different aspect at the same time. How is it, really, Maria?
LAURENTIN: We can not imagine it because it is in another dimension, in the dimension of eternity. This is why Bernadette could not describe with human words what he had seen.
MESSORI: But why is Our Lady described by different seers in appearance, depending on where she appears? In short: is Mary in heaven dressed as in Guadalupe, as in Lourdes, as in La Salette, as in Fatima or as in Medjugorje? What is your “wardrobe”?
LAURENTIN: Ah, there is no wardrobe, but an adaptation of the Virgin to the seer, to her culture, to her tradition, to her time. I am sure that Bernadette really “saw” Maria with a white dress, a blue band and two roses on her feet, just as I think that in Medjugorje the visionaries really touched Our Lady.
MESSORS: Touched? In Medjugorje have “touched”?
LAURENTIN: Yes, they touched the body of Mary.
MESSORI: And how was it? A “solid”, “physical” body?
LAURENTIN: Yes, yes, they said they had the impression of having touched something very “alive”, something that emanated a very strong energy. Although, even here, the description does not allow us to fully understand.
MESSORI: Listen, mine is a question that may seem absurd. According to faith, there are two bodies already resurrected, that of Jesus and that of Mary. Where are these bodies? Where can we imagine them?
LAURENTIN: Not in our space, not in our three dimensions, four if we also count the time They live in God, in eternity.Where is it? As? I can not have an idea, I can not understand a dimension in which I have never been.
MESSORS: You who have dedicated 50 years of study to show the sincerity and the evangelical virtues, what will you say to Bernadette when you see her?
LAURENTIN: I do not think we will need to talk, just to see. It will be a contemplation. But then – I believe – we will hug each other laughing happily.
Source: The voice of the Mother
