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The Catholic Our Lady of Medjugorje Queen of Heaven Pray for us Part 4




The Virgin Mary Leads the Our Father Among The People At Medjugorje


Last night I listened for about 18 minutes a priest speaking out against Medjugorje. Within this talk I counted about 12 different issues he had against Medjugorje and it seemed to hinge on a basic problem he built for the whole thing. I decided to place his main effort next on my list of responses to those who are speaking out against Medjugorje.


At Lourdes, it is recorded that the Virgin Mary praying the Rosary with St. Bernadette would recite the Apostles Creed and the Glory Be as she would not pray to herself. At Medjugorje, apparently she also prayed the Our Father with the Children. Boy, did Father make his case on this point that became the foundation for all his points. Why would the Immaculate Conception pray the Lord's prayer which asks the Father to forgive us our sins and lead us not into temptation. That is a strong case to make and the priest made that case very well. Because of this point, he began to refer to the Lady of Medjugorje as an "idol", even a "demon" who was out to deceive the children and the world.


However, for those who are in the peanut gallery yelping in delight over this "revelation" I think we need to back this up and start again. Like all these issues coming from the peanut gallery, this can shake you up if there were any teeth to it. I do want to point out that I regard good people on both sides of this debate, when you listen to the priest speaking here, I believe he is sincere in what he is saying. I will not speak ill of him who was speaking from the pulpit. I can share an explanation that more than answers what Our Lady is reported to have prayed with the Children of Medjugorje.

Br. Dominic Bouck OP on December 3, 2015 in his article, "Praying the Our Father with the Blessed Mother" gives a detail I wish the good Priest (mentioned above) would have known but obviously was not aware when he gave his homily on Medjugorje.


Br. Dominic Bouck was born and raised in Dickinson, North Dakota, the youngest of seven children. He went to the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul, Minnesota, where he graduated with a degree in Philosophy, Catholic Studies, and Classical Languages. While at St. Thomas he studied one semester at the Angelicum in Rome, where he came to know the Dominican Friars. On DominicanFriars.org


"When the disciples of Christ asked Him how to pray, he gave them a formulaic prayer that has been recited billions of times since His instruction. Let us now consider praying that prayer with the one who is God’s highest creation, the Mother of the Eternal Son and the daughter of the eternal Father.


Our Father, who art in heaven

Mary calls on God as her Father. If you think Mary did not pray, you need to reconsider that theory and re-read John 17. If the Son who is God could pray, Mary who is not God can pray also. Like her Son who on the night before he died interceded for all mankind, Mary intercedes for mankind, seated as Queen of Heaven, the new Mother of all the Living.


Hallowed be Thy Name

Mary’s great song of praise when greeted by her cousin Elizabeth, called the Magnificat, is fittingly inserted here as praise of the Holy Name: “the Almighty has done great things for me, and Holy is His name” (Lk 1:49). As a real man, Jesus learned how to pray in our human language, and he learned primarily from his mother and foster father. Mary’s “holy is His name” becomes her Son’s “Hallowed be Thy Name.”

Thy kingdom come

Mary’s Magnificat praises the justice and mercy of the Father who casts down the mighty, the proud, and the rich, and exalts the lowly. She herself is a recipient of this “topsy-turvy” kingdom, the handmaid who became queen. We too, despite our often humble state in life and our weakness, are made royalty through our participation in the Body of Christ—even infants from the moment of their baptism.


Thy will be done

Here Mary’s greatest word “Fiat, thy will be done” to the announcement of the angel Gabriel is an exact model given by Christ of how we are to respond to God. We must respond with a generous “Yes,” a concession to the fact that our own wills are sometimes set against the ultimate good that God has set before us, namely, our own happiness of living a life with Him. Mary’s will was never turned against the Divine Will, and we can plead with her to make our will conform to God’s just as hers did most magnificently on that day over two thousand years ago.


On earth as it is in heaven

Mary knows well the “earthiness” of the life of faith. We know from Scripture that she performed an act of charity by attending to her elderly cousin in her pregnancy. She also accompanied her Son on His way to Calvary, experiencing the greatest trial of a Mother, witnessing the pain of her Son. Yet despite all the injustice and evil, she remained faithful to the Divine Will. Today, she maintains her allegiance to God’s Will in heaven, body and soul, and helps us to obey it perfectly.

Give us this day our Daily Bread

Mary’s concern with the “hungry” is seen in the Magnificat, where she expresses her confidence that God fills them “with good things,” while the rich, who are self-sufficient either materially or spiritually, do not know how to receive from God and “are sent away empty.” This petition can also be taken in the spiritual, Eucharistic sense. Mary adored her Divine Son on the Cross, held his Body after He was taken down, and witnessed the power of his Resurrection. We too, in our worthy reception of the Eucharist, adore and receive the Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity of Christ, and it is a great grace to participate in that Sacrifice of the Cross daily, presented to us in the Sacrifice of the Mass.


And forgive us our trespasses

For this petition, Immaculate Mary is silent for her own sake, but as when she told the waiter at the Wedding of Cana, “Do whatever he tells you,” she is powerful to intercede with her Son on behalf of sinners. Her simple advice applies to us now, to again follow the Will of God, and to experience the transformative effect of Jesus’s power in our lives. Mary’s intercession turns the crises in our life into events of joy greater than we have experienced or expected.

As we forgive those who trespass against us

Mary, who heard her Son beg the Father to forgive his persecutors, certainly forgave those same murderers for the killing of her Son. We then ask her in confidence in the “Hail Mary” to remember us “at the hour of our death,” even us sinners who offend her—along with all our neighbors—when we offend God. We can count on her intercession for sinners to gain for us the power of God’s forgiveness.


And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil

Mary questioned the angel, “What can this greeting mean? For I have no relations with man.” She, in full faith in God, discerned whether this messenger was indeed from God and wanted to be certain that nothing untoward was a part of his message. In confidence in God, we discern whether our perception of His plan is actually His plan, and beg the Father not to let us fall, knowing that without Him, we would certainly perish.


In the final two Glorious Mysteries of the Rosary—the Assumption and the Coronation of the Blessed Virgin—we contemplate our mother as the first full recipient of the Lord’s renewing work. Reigning with Christ in her glorified body, she models what Christians hope to become and prays constantly for us that we be delivered from the ultimate evil."✠


Reportedly, Our Lady at Medjugorje did pray the Our Father, probably as she had with St. Bernadette of Lourdes. Br. Dominic explains this very well for us about the true happening being reported of Our Lady at Medjugorje. So, what are we to do about the other 11 issues the good priest made centered on his assertion that Our Lady made praying the Our Father? Well, just like before, I will begin to look into his points that this "idol", this "demon" is calling for "Religious Indifferrentism" or that all Religions are equal. Is the Devil at work in all this, I would say definitely, but he is wanting to divide and conquer. That is his motivation in all this. When we stand on the truth, the devil runs. In this case he will leave his puppets to do his bidding.


It is an honor for me to defend Our Lady who seems to be under attack by those who also know her to be their Mother. It is what it is as we move forward. Mother Mary is Our Queen and it is the obligation of being her sons to hold the line.





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