Napredak’s Historical Calendar for 2007

Dear brothers and sisters! Dear Christians, Catholics, Croats, Napredak members, and all people of good will throughout the world! With this Calendar we wish you a merry Christmas and a happy new year 2007.

During the whole of the year 2006 we have been celebrating the twenty-fifth anniversary of the apparitions at Medugorje; on 25 June the Mass was co-celebrated by four bishops, three Franciscan provincials and 322 priests in front of more than one hundred thousand believers.

What started on 24 June 1981, in front of a group of children in the hamlet of Podbrdo, the village of Bijakovici, in the parish of Medugorje, is now heading for its golden anniversary. The visionaries, six of them, in spite of many suspicions and intimidations, bravely testify up to date to Our Lady’s apparitions and convey the messages of the Queen of Peace to the people all over the world.

This extraordinary phenomenon has made Medugorje a Christian, religious, pilgrimage and prayer centre of the world.

In the silence of Medugorje everybody can feel a sigh, cry, pain, suffering, smile, joy and peace. Here, in the silence of the heart and soul, the incentives of grace penetrate. While we are praying, grace is settling down in our souls like the rays of the sun pouring down on the fertile vineyards of Medugorje. While the grace of God is enveloping the multitudes of God seekers, many lives, encumbered with difficulties, remain in Mary’s fold, and with the holy Rosary, under a safe shelter of the Queen of Peace, people start their new, reborn life, a life of conversion, faith and prayer.

The events of Medugorje have a great effect not only on Catholic Christians but also on the people of other religions and denominations. The villages of Bijakovici and Podbrdo have become famous, and Medugorje a widely known parish. The message of Our Lady’s apparitions has domed the world over like the heavens.

It is this extraordinary event at Medugorje, which with ever stronger messages is heading for its golden jubilee, that I devote this year’s Napredak’s Historical Calendar. The history of the Croatian Cultural Society is actually the history of the Croatian culture and the Catholic faith in Herzegovina in the last one hundred years or so. Napredak is a lighthouse of spirit, of love for God, and love for one’s country. It is a nursery of learned and wise men, a pivot of faith and culture.

At the urge of and with the help of the benefactor Bruno Nicolodi from the Italian town of Malcesina, I have furnished the Calendar with choice photographs.

I would like that this Calendar may encourage other people, too, and bring them to the beauty of peace that only Heaven can give.

At Medugorje, with our Mother and her Son, we are a community of faith, a Church, a community of prayer, repentance, adoration, surrender, understanding.

Many events and incentives are related to the phenomena of Medugorje. Many of them have born multiple noble fruit. In my personal life these incentives are sweeping over me like blessed waves.

I have started, continued and accomplished a number of books of the Homeland Library – Life and Testimonies and published a score of books; I have launched Napredak’s Library with fifty-two published books and eight calendars – you are holding the ninth in your hands. From the proceeds I help our studying youth: secondary school students, the students of the University in Mostar and other cities. With some ten thousand euros a year I help the poor, whose number is, unfortunately, daily increasing.

As its president I have put the Napredak in Mostar under the patronage of the Queen of Peace. Apart from what Napredak has already undertaken, I have been prompted that one should build a Hostel for university students and for the pilgrims of the Queen of Peace. I would like all people of good will to get involved in the building of that Hostel: visionaries, artists, benefactors, Our Lady’s devotees, friends of Medugorje, pilgrims, priests and all those who want to partake in this noble and patriotic idea. During the academic year the Hostel would accommodate students, and from 14 July to 4 October the pilgrims to Medugorje.

The proceeds from this year’s Napredak’s Historical Calendar will be donated to the poor and talented students, and for the building of the said Hostel in Mostar.

Those who want and can support the construction of this Hostel, can send their donation to the account: HKD Napredak, Mostar, SWIFT ZABA BA 22. The transfer account number is: 7100-48-06-17093-8 with the UniCredit Zagrebacka banka No. 3381002201980532; the number of the KM account is: 22-10-01980-5. The names of all benefactors shall be listed in the Memorial that we will publish upon the completion of the works. We make use of this opportunity to sincerely thank our benefactors once again!

Prof. Dr. fra Andrija Nikic, president of the HKD Napredak, Mostar

2 Kneza Mihovila V. Humskog Street, BiH, 88000 MOSTAR, POB 17.

Faxes: 00/387/ 36-323-310 and 323 111

e-mail: nikic.andrija@tel.net.ba

A HAPPY AND GOD-BLESSED YEAR 2007

AND THE 105TH ANNIVERSARY OF NAPREDAK!
Heading for the Golden Anniversary

Peace, peace, peace – peace must prevail between man and God and among people! (26 June 1981)

For the celebration of the silver jubilee – June 25, 2006 – the Queen of Peace gave us the following message:

Dear children!

With great joy in my heart do I thank you for all the prayers that these days you have been offering for my intentions. Make no mistake, children, you shall not regret it, neither you nor your children. God shall reward you with great graces and you shall deserve life eternal. I am close to you and I thank all those who in these years have accepted my messages, put them into practice, and decided for holiness and peace.

Thank you for having responded to my call!

The Queen of Peace is calling. Her call echoes throughout the world. Our Lady’s power has attracted millions and millions of God seekers to the place of peace. What happens here is reconciliation, peace, love, prayer, repentance, conversion. Joy echoes in the hearts. The people, beaming with the gift of grace, are singing.

Reportedly, more than thirty million believers have been to Medugorje. An obscure Herzegovinian hamlet has been transformed into a world-famous Marian prayer meeting-place. In this Our Lady’s school of love and holiness, in this peculiar university of its kind we recognise, understand each other for She is the Mother of all races and peoples. In Her motherly simplicity She educates and teaches by examples. Through Medugorje we become bridge-makers of Christianity, love of God, love of man, patriotism, friendship, togetherness – for the benefit of every man.

The children, today grown-up people, to whom Our Lady appeared are: Ivanka Ivankovic, Vicka Ivankovic, Ivan Dragicevic, Marija Pavlovic, Mirjana Dragicevic and Jakov Colo. They see Our Lady, hear her messages that urge to conversion, prayer and penance. The Church regularly judges such phenomena by their spiritual fruits and their spiritual echo. The apparitions are a renewed response to the message of Jesus. We all need an impetus to revival, conversion, hope…

Many wonder with good reason: Why is the Blessed Virgin Mary appearing at Medugorje? God alone knows the answer to this question, but the Queen of Peace says that she has chosen this parish and wants to lead it.

The visionaries described the Blessed Virgin Mary like this: All too beautiful. She is anywhere between 18 and 20 years old. She is of medium height, of an oblong white face with rosy cheekbones. She radiates mildness, and smiles mildly. Her lips are of an ordinary form, rosy, and her nose is in harmony with her face. Especially beautiful are the eyes of the heavenly Mother – largish, blue. She is dressed in a simple bluish grey dress falling freely down her body and disappearing in a whitish cloud, on which she hovers and which conceals her feet. The sleeves reach down to her hands. The dress reveals her neck and moderately manifests her womanhood. She also wears a white veil, covering her head, shoulders and the whole body on the back and the sides. The veil reaches down to the cloud in which its edges disappear. She has no visible ornaments on her. A small black curl is seen on the left side of her face above the forehead. The only adornment is a crown on her head with twelve golden stars. Her arms are free, relaxedly open. She never moves them except when she is pointing to something. Her fingers are relaxed, and the nails snowy white. With the visionaries she speaks Croatian. Three flashes of light precede her appearance, as an outer sign by which the visionaries recognise the coming of the heavenly Mother. She is accompanied by a song, which the visionaries hear in the background. When she appears, the visionaries maintain, she always greets them with “Praised be Jesus!” Then everything that follows depends on her. – If Our Lady starts praying, we also pray; if she speaks, we listen. If she gives messages, we accept them; if she asks something, we try to obey. If we can, we ask her questions – the visionaries testify.

For Christmas she always appears with the Baby Jesus in her arms. Once, on Good Friday, she came with the grown-up Jesus. He was wounded all over. He had a crown of thorns on his head. – It could be seen that he had been tortured – Vicka testifies. Sometimes Our Lady disappears all at once, some other time she leaves slowly. As she goes away, the blue sky seems to be opening. She always faces the visionaries. She never leaves without a greeting. When she is gone, a sign of the cross, the heart or the sun remains after her. The cross is a sign of our salvation. The heart is a sign of God’s love for us, and the sun is a sign of the light of our faith, a sign that Jesus has illuminated our lives – as Our Lady once interpreted these signs. The visionaries are unable to describe in words the beauty of the heavenly Mother. They say it is not this beauty of ours. It is something heavenly, something we will be able to see only in Heaven. Do not the words of St Paul attest to this beauty: – Things which eye has not seen and ear has not heard, and which have not entered the heart of man, all that God has prepared for those who love him. (1 Cor 2:9) Artists, listening to the visionaries’ accounts, try to present colourfully, in their peculiar manner, the Queen of Peace.

Our homeland has become known in the world through Medugorje, and Medugorje again has influenced the whole world. Medugorje receives under the aegis of the Queen of Peace many a person in need of help. Poor and abandoned children find their home here (Mother’s Village). Then there are Cenacolo and Merciful Father communities, which shelter drug-addicts from all over the world, who, through the intercession of the Queen of Peace return to the everyday life from the hell of drugs. It is here that all others, who find themselves in any trouble, ask for help.

I believe that everything works out fine for those who build their future on evangelic foundations and under Our Lady’s cloak. That is the case with the Croatian people and this tired, centuries-long Christian culture. Since moral values are endangered, it is greatly endangered, too.

The power of Our Lady’s messages has overarched the world, like the vault of heaven. Millions of Christians and people from the whole world today know that after the apparitions of Medugorje there is only one language – the language of faith – which all other world languages speak; that the rocky path winding up the Hill of Apparitions and Mount Križevac, and then descending by the grave of the martyr Fra Križan Galic and the propagator of Our Lady’s glory Fra Slavko Barbaric and finally proceeding all way to the magnificent Church of St James, has become a path of mankind. This year’s visitors from the Philippines have already booked their accommodation for the next year.

– The Marian Pope John Paul II, according to the words of bishop Paul Hnilica, stated that Medugorje is the biggest religious event in the 20th century. He requested us to cherish Medugorje! It is a special place of prayer, piety, mental concentration, confession, conversion. Medugorje has greatly affected the religious life and brought about conversion of many. Here believers feel at home, in their native place, at their Mother’s. – As the head of the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith, cardinal Dr Joseph Ratzinger defended Medugorje; now as Pope Benedict XVI he has put it under a special magnifying glass. – Cardinal Franjo Kuharic said several times that the bishops had recognised Medugorje as a place of pilgrimage. – Bishop Pavao Žanic enthusiastically listened to the visionaries and said they were not lying. – Archbishop Dr Frane Franic spoke several times about the authenticity of Our Lady’s apparitions at Medugorje…

– During almost two decades of life in the best known parish in the world Dr Fra Slavko Barbaric initiated several spiritual and humanitarian actions. His work at Medugorje has born manifold fruit. – Bishop Komarica has declared that he had been to Medugorje several times. He said it had been a special place for a long time, and that it had outgrown the local diocese. It is the Holy See that should decide on these phenomena, while the local bishop has the right and duty to care for the proper worship in this parish of his diocese, too. – Such huge gatherings are a big sign, don Živko Kustic wrote. It is hard to close the eyes in front of these signs without a guilty conscience. The faithful multitude, the living Church, have obviously made their judgement already, while the Church authorities have the right to deliberate further. – We are here primarily and again to lift up our eyes to Heaven – said Dr Tomislav Ivancic in his homily on 25 June 2006. What Heaven wanted to make only you and your souls know! The fact is that daily – and after the silvery anniversary – every individual who, prompted by the calls of the Queen of Peace, has been to Medugorje, “decides” on its credibility. A large number of people testify with their life, writings and accounts to the miraculous happenings related to them, their families, or their religious communities, parishes or dioceses.

The story started on the country road at Bijakovici on St John’s feast in 1981 is Our Lady’s story, a call and a sign to our age and to future generations. It could not have been stopped by anybody’s doubts, by any insinuations. With this story we have entered a time of grace. This is how the Queen of Peace in her messages calls this time. So many testimonies about conversion, spiritual and physical healings, in confessions and prayers that have revived and taken hold in the families all over the world, are only small drops of a huge mainstream washing the humankind, heralding a better future for the faithful, especially for her Christian children.

Since at Medugorje miracles are happening constantly, it itself has become a great miracle. Far from subsiding, the echoes of the miracle of Medugorje are assuming planetary proportions; more and more pilgrims from the whole world are swarming into this small Herzegovinian place and praying to the Mother of God.

With celebrations and prayers for the silvery anniversary we are heading for the golden anniversary of Our Lady’s apparitions at Medugorje, and only God knows how many anniversaries are there still going to be, celebrating the heavenly Mother who does not forget and does not leave her children! Therefore let us remain Mary’s children, as she calls us, and we will look to a better future that we all are so much longing for.

With Our Lady Medugorje has a future, for the message of peace to all the mankind will echo even stronger from it!

May the Queen of Peace from Medugorje hear all your ardent prayers, may she, with her Son, bless you all!

Merry Christmas and a blessed year 2007, as well as the 105th anniversary of Napredak. Blessed be the footsteps of all God seekers and of Mary’s devotees, the footsteps directed towards the golden anniversary of Mary’s apparitions at Medugorje.