There are new reports that the Holy See is preparing a commission to investigate the reported Marian phenomena at Medjugorje.
We’ll see.
There have been such reports before. Three years ago, for example, it was reported that . . .
Cardinal Vinko Puljic of Sarajevo, Bosnia-Herzegovina, announced a commission would be formed to review the alleged Marian apparitions at Medjugorje and pastoral provisions for the thousands of pilgrims who visit the town each year.
“The commission members have not been named yet,” Cardinal Puljic told Catholic News Service in a July 24 telephone interview. “I am awaiting suggestions from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith” on theologians to appoint.
“But this commission will be under the (Bosnian) bishops’ conference” as is the usual practice with alleged apparitions, he said.
The cardinal said he did not expect the commission to be established until sometime in September because of the summer holidays.
Such an announcement would seem to have a high degree of reliability, but as far as I know, nothing came of it. (I could be wrong on this point and would love to find out the details if so.)
Assuming the plan was to do something back then, what might have held it up?
Well, last year there were reports that the CDF was preparing a new document for the evaluation of apparitions. But the sourcing was very thin. On the other hand, Medjugorje is such a massive phenomenon that before re-examining it the Holy See might want to re-look at the criteria for judging apparitions, which (so far as we know) were last dealt with in a 1978 document.
So if they got the document done then it might explain why, last October, Cardinal Puljic told Reuters that they were awaiting some kind of action from the Holy See on Medjugorge:
We are now awaiting a new directive on this issue,” said Puljic, the Sarajevo archbishop who survived the city’s long wartime siege in the 1990s. “I don’t think we must wait for a long time, I think it will be this year, but that is not clear… I am going to Rome in November and we must discuss this.”
Then, when he did go to Rome the next month, he apparently denied the existence of a new document or that the would be a commission created by the Holy See to investigate Medjugorje. Also
Nevertheless, he reiterated, “for the moment, everything is under the jurisdiction of the local bishops.”
“Still, at any given moment, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith could establish an International Commission in order to study the case of Medjugorje,” the cardinal remarked.
So we fast forward two months to January 2010 and Cardinal Schonborn, after his controversial visit to Medjugorje (for which he apologized to the local bishop for not following protocol), is talking as if there is a commission:
KATH.NET: In the past few days, you visited Pope Benedict XVI. Did you tell him about your positive experiences of Medjugorje? Did he express any opinion about it?
Cardinal Schönborn: It’s not customary to talk about audiences. But I can naturally say this much: that Medjugorje was a topic in Rome during those days, due to the public awareness of my pilgrimage. I reported about my impressions in Rome. And I am very confident that the Commission, which the Holy Father is setting up to examine the events of Medjugorje, is very good and will work very conscious of its responsibility, and that the result will certainly be good. And I am confident that it will proceed with great prudence and great sensitivity to a phenomenon that has attracted about 30 million pilgrims and brings very many good fruits, but certainly also some open questions.
Jump ahead another two months, to now, and the Italian paper Panorama is reporting:
Benedict XVI wants a clear understanding about the apparitions of the Madonna of Medjugorje. That’s why he has decided to form a commission of inquiry, led by Cardinal Camillo Ruini, associated with the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.
And then it’s reported that Bishop Ratko Peric of the diocese of Mostar, where Medjugorje is located, has been called to Rome, possibly about Medjugorje.
Maybe more about this commission will be known in the coming days because Dr. Ratko Peri?, the bishop of the Diocese of Mostar-Duvno and apostolic administrator of Trebinsko-Mrkan has been invited to Rome.
Well . . . we’ll have to see, won’t we?
We’ve seen this kind of reporting before, and thus far it hasn’t materialized . . . but maybe it will.
If so, should we expect—as Cardinal Schonborn seems to—that the results of such a commission would be positive toward the reported phenomena?
I wouldn’t be quick to assume that. On the other hand, I wouldn’t be quick to assume the opposite.
Rather than pre-judging the matter based on what one’s own personal opinion of the phenomena is, I think people on both sides of the issue should be prepared for a judgment—if one comes—that is contrary to their opinion.
Your thoughts?
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Jimmy,
Your objectivity on this matter is praiseworthy, and another example of why you are among the best of the Catholic bloggers. Much of the Catholic blogosphere, on this issue, is more like an echo chamber - where one factoid (like Cardinal Schonborn’s recent meeting with the Holy Father) is spun in a certain direction and then passed through the mutual admiration society as “news”.
If the commission is truly immanent, then I think all sides should keep their powder dry and “wait and see”.
Peace!
This commission (the fourth) will be ongoing and is unlikely to produce a verdict different to that given at Zadar in 1991 by the Yugoslavia bishops’ conference.
Cardinal Puljic gave clear indications in November 2009 in his interview with the Catholic media agency Zenit. He stated that what is happening at Medjugorje is the responsibility of the CDF and the bishop of Mostar Msgr Ratko Peric.
The cardinal also made reference to the tradition in his country of praying at shrines and that it was part of the identity of the Catholic faithful.
Now the cardinal did not say that Medjugorje WAS a shrine but he voluntary raised the subject of shrine. Bishop Peric is adamant that Medjugorje is not a shrine.
And it is in these two claims that we discover the difficulty the Bosnia & Herzegovina bishops’ conference faced when it was commissioned by the Holy See to give further study to the events at Medjugorje and shrine status in particular.
Two years later this stalemate resulted in Cardinal Peric handing back the commission to Rome without it getting off the ground.
But at least the Holy See afforded the B&H bishops the courtesy of making a decision, even though it failed to do so.
So the question of shrine status is still unresolved and now it is left to the Holy See to make a decision. Medjugorje was declared a shrine in August 1993 by Cardinal Franjo Kuharic on behalf of the Yugoslav bishops’ conference. However with the break up of Yugoslavia and the its bishops’ conference one can legitimately ask the question: does shrine status still exist?
The three levels of of shrine status afforded by the Church are independent of each other. Bishop Peric will certainly not afford status at local level. The opportunity for shrine status at national level is also gone with the B&H bishop’s conference unable or unwilling to fulfil its commission. So now the other remaining opportunity is at international level which can only be granted by the Holy See.
When Cardinal Schönborn says the result of the latest commission will certainly be good, he is not referring to any decision on the outcome of the validity of the claimed apparitions but to a decision on shrine status. This is more than likely to happen within the current year as much of the ground work and study on this has already been completed during the past 18 months.
As to the apparitions, Rome is in no hurry, but it does want steps taken to protect the tree that produces so much good fruit, even though there are some who choose to observe only the roots and not the tree or its fruit.
Shrine status will not be an endorsement of the claimed apparitions but a route to raising the profile and rebuilding the decimated Catholic Church in Bosnia & Herzegovina.
A correction: Cardinal Schonborn never “apologized” for what he said; he said only that he regretted if the local bishop took it the wrong way. Big difference. Meanwhile, why have not Catholic “media” reported on the handwritten notes from John Paul II expressing not just a belief but a devotion to Medjugorje?? Objectivity has been sorely lacking.
Our blessed mother has been appearing to individual believers for thousands of years. I don’t need the church heiararchy to tell me what criteria I should use to evaluate the veracity of these appearances. I need but one - my faith in Jesus and my love for his mother, and of course the fruits of all this. Whatever the Vatican does, or doesn’t do, won’t change things for me or for the millions who have gone to Medjugorge and had their lives changed for the better.
Cocon, that is a dangerous way to walk. Not every appearance of the Blessed Mother is actually her. Even the saints had experiences (Padre Pio being one) of visions that turned out to be of Satan, not of Heaven. There are ways to test the spirits, as we’re commanded to do in Scripture, so that we are not deceived (and Padre Pio was well-versed in them!). One of the biggest indicators as to the authenticity of the vision is the obedience of the visionary to Church authority. If Medjugorje is genuine then the Church will find it so. But nothing is going to be decided until the visions cease. But to toss aside the Church’s judgment based on your own experiences is to put your experience as more authoritative than the Church’s. That’s a dangerous path to travel.
I made a pilgrimage to Medjugorje in September of 2009. I for one will welcome any investigation by the Vatitcan. What I saw and experienced in Medjugorje was phenomenol. Those who return from there with lives changed do not usually go out and put an ad in the paper but try to live the peace that they found there. The Truth will out!!
Jimmy quoted Cardinal Puljic: <i>“We are now awaiting a new directive on this issue… I don’t think we must wait for a long time, I think it will be this year, but that is not clear… I am going to Rome in November and we must discuss this.”</l>
Perhaps this new directive or discussion with Rome was about partitioning the diocese of Mostar-Duvno? Aside from the talk of a new commission, it is now being suggested by some Croatian media sources that Rome is ready to move in this direction and place the parish of Medjugorje in a new bishopric.
Now is not the time to be bringing Medjugorje out of the closet. Our church is dealing with enough embarrassing matters right now.
What Closet? The fruits have been with believers all along. Never in any closet.
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