Miracle in Medjugorje

Hotel Mir

   It is amazing that so many people have come to know Medjugorje as a very special place.  As I indicated in my previous post, the two women whose photos I had taken at the Split Airport, asked me to present their petitions to Our Lady in Medjugorje.  A flight attendant wrote down her request on a slip of paper and gave it to a group member when she found out that she was making a pilgrimage to Medjugorje.  Others brought messages for Our Lady from family and friends back home.

Fig tree next to Hotel Mir.

   When we arrived at Hotel Mir (Croatian for "peace") in Bijakovici, a village next to Medjugorje, we had time to clean up and had a sumptuous meal served family style.  You could taste the freshness of the food.  It brought back memories of my life in Croatia.  Outside the hotel was an area with fruit trees and a vegetable garden.  I asked one of the servers if the orchard/garden belonged to the hotel.  He replied with a smile, "Of course!  That's where the fruits and vegetables we serve come from."

A Visionary's Former Home 

Waiting to get inside Vicka's former home.

Line builds to view the Glowing Virgin.

   We had heard that on Monday, the day before we arrived, a couple Italian women who had come on a pilgrimage, decided to stop in what was Vicka's childhood home to pray in a room with a large statue of the Blessed Mother.  As the women knelt praying the rosary, a sudden flash of light hit the concrete statue causing it to glow with a green luminescence. Fear nearly paralyzed both women, causing them to quickly exit  the house in fright.  Once visitors, pilgrims and natives in the area heard of this glowing statue of Mary, hundreds of thousands flocked to Vicka's childhood home in Medjugorje.

A pilgrim prays
the rosary.

    So after supper we took what seemed like a twenty minute to a half hour stroll from our hotel to Vicka's mother's former home.  It was all uphill.  I saw a man on his knees, deep in prayer, on the road across from Vicka's house, praying the rosary. Pilgrims from various countries, identified by their flags, pressed in from all directions.  We went to the end of the line which seemed nearly a half mile long by this point.  It was about 9 P.M.  At a quarter after nine, since the crowd of people had swelled and we hadn't made much progress toward the building, a number of individuals from our group went back to the hotel.  A half hour later, more group members decided to leave.  Five other group members and I persevered in semi-darkness, moving at a pace that seemed like less than an inch per minute.  I was at the tail end of our group, allowing others to lead the way; but as we approached the steps leading to the house, I suggested to Nancy that she and I switch places.  I noticed that they were counting people off in small numbers.  I was afraid that some of our group would get separated.  Being up front I could speak to the young men in Croatian and tell them that all six of us were together.  We were finally inside the house at around midnight.