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Hysterical Hallucinations?

Conference Honors Condemned Apparitions

By James Andrew

Nearly 5,000 Catholics gathered October 20-22 at the Bren Events Center at the University of California, Irvine to participate in the eleventh annual Medjugorje Peace Conference. The conference featured Catholic speakers, upbeat and inspirational music, prayer, charismatic Masses and devotions.

"This is my favorite conference to attend," remarked Connie Salazar-Alves, an Irvine resident and conference singer. "There's a wonderful depth of spirituality here." Salazar visited Medjugorje, in the former Yugoslavia, in 1989, where six young people claim to have received apparitions of the Blessed Mother since 1981. Although she saw nothing, she credits her visit with reviving her Catholic faith and making her realize the importance of the sacraments.

Brenda Dickey of Long Beach was also impressed with the message of Medjugorje. In her life, it means praying the daily rosary, and realizing "how powerful one person can be in praying for others." Jeff Corrigan, also of Irvine, experienced a spiritual peace during adoration of the Blessed Sacrament at the conference, a peace he's motivated to share with others: "It's very powerful, it's awesome."

The Medjugorje Conference is organized annually by a group of volunteers in the Orange County area. These include Elaine Starbuck of Brea, who comments, "what Our Lady says at Medjugorje is what the Gospel says: pray, fast, convert, reconcile with one another and have peace in your heart." Thirty-seven hundred attended the first conference held in 1989. In the years following conference attendance reached 5,000, a level at which it has remained ever since. Starbuck estimates that roughly half of this year's attendees came for the first time.

Other key volunteers include Starbuck's husband, Bob, Dennis and Mary Drozd and Joan Hosek. In preparation for the conference, volunteers pray and fast for its success. Each, according to Starbuck, is motivated solely by a desire to share the message of the Gospel as presented at Medjugorje: "Jesus is our focus, with Mary leading us to Jesus."

Each year, permission for the conference is sought from the local bishop, currently Bishop Tod Brown. Unlike his predecessor, Norman McFarland, Brown has participated in the conference, this year celebrating the event's closing Mass. In a letter to 2000 conference participants, Brown declared, "Your annual convocations have been rich opportunities for growth in grace and dedication to God's cause, and I am indeed grateful to have this reservoir of praise and prayer once again in our midst, animating us all." Additionally, plans for all conference liturgies are submitted for approval to the director of the diocesan liturgy office, Father Rod Stephens.

Of all the conference speakers, the most closely linked to the alleged Medjugorje apparitions is 28-year-old Jelena Vasilj, a "locutionist" who spoke on the spiritual life. Jelena was reared in Medjugorje, and believes that beginning in 1982, at age 10, she began receiving interior messages from Jesus Christ, the Blessed Mother and angels. The messages ceased in 1995, but she has since shared her experiences with groups in the United States and Europe. She is attractive, articulate, and fluent in English. She is currently studying theology in Rome, and previously attended Franciscan University of Steubenville, Ohio.

Although she has discussed her private revelations with a priest in Medjugorje, Father Tomislav Vlasic, her messages have never received official Church approval. (In fact, she seemed uncomfortable in addressing queries as to the authenticity of her locutions.) She was sensitive to past challenges to the authenticity of the apparitions, but conceded that Ratko Peric, the bishop of Mostar, the diocese in which Medjugorje is located, has declared the apparitions a hoax. "We don't know what's the matter with him," she mused.

(Starbuck acknowledges that the Church has not approved the Medjugorje apparitions, and adds that she and her fellow volunteers would cease their involvement in the conference should they learn that Church authorities had declared the apparitions false: "We would be obedient to the Church. We've always put on the conference with the full approval of the local Church authorities.")

In multiple appearances, Vasilj stressed to conference participants the importance of prayer, fasting and reception of the sacraments. She declared, "Our Lady says we should pray three hours a day ... we won't be able to survive without the Eucharist ... fasting and prayer are two pillars on which Our Lady founded her spirituality."

Another key speaker was well-known Medjugorje promoter Wayne Weible, who, like Vasilj, urged participants to incorporate prayer and fasting into their daily lives. Weible is a convert from Protestantism, and has traveled to Medjugorje 32 times. He promotes Medjugorje through a newsletter, books, audiotapes, the internet, public appearances and more: "I've devoted my life to spreading the message."

Some presentations were testimonials given by speakers who had visited Medjugorje, including Chris and Eric Mattson of San Diego. Chris had left the practice of her faith when she married Eric, an non-practicing Lutheran, some three decades ago. She read a Reader's Digest article on the reported Medjugorje apparitions in 1986, and two years later, made a trip. She followed visionary Yvonne up Apparition Hill to pray, and, during a reported apparition, "was given a new heart." She returned a renewed and committed Catholic, and became "a nicer, gentler mom." She is now employed in the marriage and family life office of the diocese of San Diego.

Eric, a fireman, traveled to Medjugorje a few years later, and also had a conversion experience. When he returned to the United States, he studied Catholic teaching and entered the Church. "Turn off the TV," he advised, "and teach [your children] the faith!"

Other testimonials came from Glenn Lanham and Damir Vrebac of Our Lady of Hope Community, a group of homes in the United States, Europe, and Central and South America which help residents break addictions through prayer and mutual support. Twenty-eight-year-old Lanham, for example, was suffering from drug and sexual addictions when he entered the community nearly three years ago. Through prayer, including three daily rosaries, fasting and the support of others in the home, he asserted, "you get the devil out of your system ... we experience healing through the cross." Twenty-seven-year-old Vrebac was a nine-year heroin addict when he entered the community in 1996, and has since experienced a similar conversion.

Not all speakers were directly related to Medjugorje. Monsignor James Lisante of New York, for example, offered a spirited address urging Catholics to vote according to their beliefs: "You must be a person of the political realm!" He went on to offer a denunciation of abortion, euthanasia, the death penalty and welfare reform. Jesse Romero, a Catholic apologist, addressed the audience on Sunday morning, challenging Catholics to live their faith better.

Although the demands of putting on the conference are immense, Starbuck believes the effort was well worth it. She remarks, "We're pleased with the turnout, and impressed with the deep spirituality of the participants." Although she doesn't see it as an imperative that conference attendees go to Medjugorje, she believes the fruits speak for themselves: "It's holy ground over there."

Millions of tourists have visited Medjugorje since the reported apparitions of the Blessed Mother began there in 1981. Additionally, numerous Medjugorje apostolates have arisen, promoting the message of the Gospa (a favorite title for the appearing Madonna) through books, magazines, videos, conferences, travel agencies and more (see www.medjugorje.org or www.medjugorjeweible.com for some typical examples).

Medjugorje promoter Wayne Weible explains that Medjugorje is "no longer a sleepy farming village, it is bustling with commercialism ... it is now the number one tourist attraction in Yugoslavia."

Despite the enthusiasm among some for the reported apparitions, however, a significant number of critics have arisen as well. They charge that the visions are fraudulent and that the Franciscan priests who have cared for the six visionaries are corrupt, disobedient to superiors, exploiting the visionaries for financial gain and even guilty of sexual misconduct. (Father Vlasic, for example, locutionist Jelena Vasilj's spiritual director, is accused of having fathered a child with a nun.)

While such charges are hotly debated, what both sides acknowledge is that the local Church authorities in the diocese of Mostar, in which Medjugorje is located, have rejected the authenticity of the visions almost since the beginning.

Pavao Zanic, the bishop of Mostar at the time the apparitions were first reported, was excited upon learning of them. He was known for his Marian devotion, and quickly lent his support to the visionaries. However, upon further examination, he reversed his support, declaring the apparitions "hysterical hallucinations."

Zanic established a diocesan commission in 1982 to investigate further. Two years later, the bishops' conference of the former Yugoslavia declared that Catholic leaders, including priests and nuns, could not organize official pilgrimages to the shrine until its authenticity was established. Vatican officials concurred in 1985.

In 1987, Zanic told a packed congregation of parishioners and pilgrims in St. James' church that the visions were false, explaining, "through all my prayers, my work and research, I have sought one goal only: the discovery of truth." Zanic continued, "it is said that Our Lady began appearing at Podbrdo on Mount Crnica, but when the police banned going there, she went into homes, on fences, into the fields, into vineyards and tobacco fields, she appeared in the church, on the altar, in the sacristy, in the choir loft, on the roof, on the belltower, on roads, on the road to Cemo, in a car, in a bus, on a carriage, in a few places in Mostar, in more places in Sarajevo, in the convents of Zagreb, in Varazdin, in Switzerland, in Italy, again on Podbrdo, on Mt. Krizevac, in the parish, in the parish rectory, etc. Surely not even half the places of the so-called apparitions have been counted, and a sober person who venerates Our Lady would naturally ask himself: Dear Mother of God, what are they doing to you?"

On April 10, 1991, the Yugoslavian bishops' conference (with a single dissenting vote) supported Zanic, declaring, "on the basis of investigation up till now it cannot be established that one is dealing with supernatural apparitions or revelations."

Weible describes Zanic as "a good bishop who loved Our Lady and the Church" but believes his opposition stems from an age-old hostility that has existed between the Franciscans and the diocesan bishop. He believes that in the years before Zanic's death in January of this year, the bishop softened his stance toward Medjugorje.

A weary Zanic retired in 1993. His replacement, Ratko Peric, launched his own investigation into the apparitions. He, too, declared them a hoax and dubbed the visionaries liars. In a letter dated February 6, 2000, to priest-author Rudo Franken, Peric stated: "regarding Father Fra Jozo Zovko, OFM, member of the Franciscan Province of Herzegovina [Zovko is the confidant of the Medjugorje visionaries, and a central figure in the apparitions] ... I am obliged to inform you that he was revoked of 'every faculty and canonical mission in the diocese of Mostar-Duvno and Trebinje-Mrkan' by my predecessor Bishop Monsignor Pavao Zanic, died on the last 11 January, in a letter of this diocesan chancery office ... of 23 August 1989.

"As the present diocesan Bishop of these two Dioceses of Herzegovina, I withhold this decision and action. Futhermore, since he has heard confessions without the necessary faculty, he has also fallen into the penalties prescribed in Canons 1378 2, 1. I notified him of this in my letter ... of 14 June 1994.

"The Congregation for the Evangelization of the Peoples requested in 1990 that he [go] away from Medjugorje, into a 'convento lontano,' but he is still very involved in the Medjugorje affair, residing in Siroki Brijeg and visiting Medjugorje.

"Fr. Jozo Zovko is a disobedient Franciscan.

"Fr. Zovko is constructing a Convent of great proportions in Siroki Brijeg in this diocese without a permission of the ecclesiastical authority. According to the project, of 1997, it costs about 8 millions DEM. From where [the money comes], I do not know."

Weible acknowledges that Peric stripped some of the Medjugorje Franciscans of their faculties, and laments, "he did it for no defining reason ... out of spite." He adds, "I can't think of [Bishop Peric] as being objective. He came into office saying, 'I will destroy Medjugorje.'"

The Vatican has not made any official statement on the authenticity of the reported apparitions at Medjugorje, although it has told bishops that their parishes and dioceses may not organize official pilgrimages to the site. Weible and other Medjugorje supporters point to a variety of statements the Holy Father is said to have made privately supportive of the apparitions. Critics respond that these statements have been manipulated, taken out of context and fabricated. Additionally, the Holy Father has visited many Marian shrines in Europe, they say, but has been noticeably absent from Medjugorje.

Phil Kronzer, a former supporter of the Medjugorje apparitions and, today, a critic, declares, "Medjugorje supporters say that the Vatican is still investigating Medjugorje, but the bottom line is that it is not ... it's under the jurisdiction of the local bishop."

Kronzer, a successful businessman and resident of Los Gatos, California, traveled to Medjugorje five times in the '80s and '90s and was an ardent supporter. In fact, he provided lodging for two of the visionaries in his home, who reported having visions there. Through further investigation, which included a lengthy meeting with Bishop Peric, Kronzer concluded that the apparitions were a hoax designed to enrich the Medjugorje Franciscans and their upper-level supporters. He blames his Medjugorje experiences with the breakup of his marriage of 39 years, and the loss of a significant amount of his personal wealth (see his website for details, www.bosniacoverup.com).

Kronzer, embittered by his experiences, declares it an "absolute outrage" that bishops in the United States -- including Bishop Tod Brown in Orange and Bishop William Weigand of Sacramento -- offer their support and/or participate in Medjugorje conferences when their brother bishop in Mostar has declared the apparitions fraudulent.

Monsignor Lawrence Baird, director of communications for the diocese of Orange, explained to me that "Bishop Brown did not endorse the conference, but he celebrated the closing Mass at the conference to demonstrate his pastoral care for the very large number of Catholics present and for the spiritual good to be derived therefrom.

"I would direct your attention," continued Baird, "to the cautionary note appearing on the conference program, which reads as follows: 'Conference organizers recognize and accept that final authority regarding apparitions rests with the Holy See.'

"Further, I would point out that the Yugoslavian bishops discouraged official pilgrimages to Medjugorje since their supernatural character has not been established; but that the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith continues to study the alleged apparitions."

Weible says of Medjugorje critics, "this is not something to be debated. I don't respond to negative attacks. The question is, what are the fruits? Come to any conference and you see tremendous conversion. I'll let that speak for itself."

"They speak of the fruits of Medjugorje -- people praying the rosary, going to Mass and confession and so forth -- that's wonderful," Kronzer retorts. "But I can tell you of different fruits: broken marriages, divorces, and people losing a lot of money."

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