Fr. Martin’s reflection on - Our Lady’s Message

25^th October 2019

“ Dear children, Today I call you to prayer. May prayer be a balm to your soul, because the fruit of prayer is joy, giving and witnessing God to others - through your life. Little children, in complete surrender to God, He will take care of everything and will bless you; and your sacrifices will have meaning. I am with you and bless all of you with my motherly blessing. Thank you for having responded to my call. ”

Dear Brothers and Sisters of Medjugorje North East and beyond.

We must not tire of our openness to the Call of Our Blessed Lady, Mother and Queen of Peace. She comes to us with the Gospel Message of Conversion and Repentance, with the call of Prayer that is at the heart of everything, in the school of Our Lady.

“Today I call you to Prayer.” St. Pope John Paul II said of Our Lady, “She is the Mother and Teacher of Prayer.” (Redemptoris Mater. 25) We see her in the Cenacle at Jerusalem awaiting the coming of The Holy Spirit, the Advocate,- The Lord and giver of Life, as she “Joins in continuous prayer with the Apostles.” (Acts. 1: 14)

Prayer is the sign that we belong to Her, and we should respond without hesitation to Her call to prayer. For the fruit of Prayer is “Joy and Peace” it is “Balm to your soul.”

This month’s message reflects in a particular way the basic desire of the apparitions. For there is a singular aim in Our Lady coming to us. Atheism and Apostasy is spreading, and along with a sweeping humanism many now know nothing of God or Faith in Jesus Christ. So many forces are at work in a hidden way that make it difficult for people to have the experience of Faith, in an encounter with the Living God. Our Lady is creating the conditions for us to awaken in every heart the capability of receiving the gift of Faith, by bridging the distance for us in encountering God.

When we know Him and love Him then Peace and Joy can be for everyone. The way to God and the ability to draw close to him is in Prayer. Our Lady began by teaching us the basics of Prayer.

Seven Our Father’s, Seven Hail Mary’s, and Seven Glory Be’s. Then she taught us how to recite the Apostle’s Creed, slowly with Faith. Then She added Holy Scripture, Holy Mass, Holy Rosary. This she says is “Balm to your souls.” Amidst much confusion and disorientation in people’s hearts and souls today Our Lady says, “Today I call you to Prayer.” In the Stillness of Eucharistic Adoration, in the silent reflection of ‘Lectio Divina’, or the flowing of Hail Mary’s , we receive the consoling Balm of the Holy Spirit , which is the Life and Love to our Souls. God’s soothing unction. “Heal our wounds, our strength renew, on our dryness pour thy dew. Wash the stains of guilt away.”

(Veni Creator Spiritus.)

“In complete surrender to God, he will take care of everything and will Bless you.”

“For us men and for our Salvation.” We say in the Creed. to be saved and to save others means to make room for God so that He can have the first place in our Hearts. He who is our Creator, the Lord and giver of Life, wants us to know his Peace and His Love. “Surrender” is the posture Our Lady invites us to. To let go of everything that is vying for our attention, demanding our time and energy, tempting us into delusional ways of thinking and acting, letting go of the materialistic and negative forces that so often interplay within us, and can be so destructive. It is a ‘Holy Surrender’, a “Complete surrender” of ourselves to him, who is Our Way, Our Truth and Our Life. As long as we put lasting hope in anything but God, we are not open for the true Faith in the true God, who reveals himself in Jesus Christ. Only God should be given our “Complete surrender.” so many ideologies, can be competing for our attention, but only by surrendering completely to the Heavenly Father, can we know true and lasting salvation. Let us remember the Saints, and many consecrated persons in the Church today, who left everything and completely surrendered to God in a deep and radical way. They knew the experience of being loved by Jesus Christ, of being called by Him. The Joy of His Gospel that enabled them to leave everything in order to be truly free. Each in our own way, can be inspired by them by helping us to surrender completely to God, knowing that He will take care of everything and will Bless us.

May we remember Our Lady at the moment of the Annunciation, at the moment of Calvary, Her trust in divine providence was unwavering because of her interior surrender to the Father.”

God Bless, Fr. Martin

St. Boniface pray for us.