Vatican City, Feb 11, 2017 / 09:21 am (CNA/EWTN News).- Pope Francis on Saturday appointed Archbishop Henryk Hoser of Warszawa-Praga as a delegate of the Holy See to look into the pastoral situation at Medjugore, the site of alleged Marian apparitions in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
“The mission has the aim of acquiring a deeper knowledge of the pastoral situation there and above all, of the needs of the faithful who go there in pilgrimage, and on the basis of this, to suggest possible pastoral initiatives for the future,” stated a Feb. 11 communique from the Vatican Secretariat of State.
“The mission will therefore have an exclusively pastoral character,” it added.
Greg Burke, the Holy See press officer, strenuously reiterated the pastoral, and not doctrinal, nature of Archbishop Hoser's mission, while speaking at a press conference.
“The special envoy won’t enter into the substance of the Marian apparitions, which is a doctrinal question in the competency of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith,” he said.
The alleged apparitions originally began June 24, 1981, when six children in Medjugorje, a town in what is now Bosnia and Herzegovina, began to experience phenomena which they have claimed to be apparitions of the Blessed Virgin Mary.
According to these six “seers,” the apparitions contained a message of peace for the world, a call to conversion, prayer and fasting, as well as certain secrets surrounding events to be fulfilled in the future.
These apparitions are said to have continued almost daily since their first occurrence, with three of the original six children – who are now young adults – continuing to receive apparitions every afternoon because not all of the “secrets” intended for them have been revealed.
Since their beginning, the alleged apparitions have been a source of both controversy and conversion, with many flocking to the city for pilgrimage and prayer, and some claiming to have experienced miracles at the site, while many others claim the visions are non-credible.
In April 1991, the bishops of the former Yugoslavia determined that “on the basis of the research that has been done, it is not possible to state that there were apparitions or supernatural revelations.”
On the basis of those findings the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith directed in October 2013 that clerics and the faithful “are not permitted to participate in meetings, conferences or public celebrations during which the credibility of such 'apparitions' would be taken for granted.”
In January 2014, a Vatican commission completed an investigation into the supposed apparitions' doctrinal and disciplinary aspects, and was to have submitted its findings to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.
When the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith will have analyzed the commission's findings, it will finalize a document on Medjugorge, which will be submitted to the Pope, who will make a final decision.
Pope Francis visited Bosnia and Herzegovina in June 2015, but declined to stop at Medjugorje during his trip.
During his return flight to Rome, he indicated that the process of investigation in the apparitions was nearly complete.
When journalists noted this point at Saturday's press conference, Burke responded that the doctrinal question of the alleged apparitions “are still being studied … this is neither a recognition nor a negative judgement. That is always a doctrinal question separate from this, which is pastoral. If you read [the communique], you can’t read any doctrinal judgement” in the pastoral appointment of Archbishop Hoser.
Rather than being involved in the doctrinal questions, Archbishop Hoser's mission is a matter of “people’s needs,” Burke emphasized: “pastoral life, liturgy, catechesis, sacraments and the experience of devotion they have there,” but not the management of local parishes.
“It’s important to note that it’s not an apostolic visitation,” Burke concluded. “Look at the words. This is more 'for' than 'against'. It’s for the life of the pilgrims who go there.”
Archbishop Hoser will remain Bishop of Warszawa-Praga, and is expected to complete his role at Medjugorje by the summer.
Article Archive
Vatican appoints pastoral envoy to Medjugorje
Related Articles • More Articles
Father David Waller will become the first bishop Ordinary of the Ordinariate. / Credit: Courtesy photo / Bishop's Conference of England and WalesNational Catholic Register, Apr 29, 2024 / 18:45 pm (CNA).The Vatican has announced a new leader of the ordinariate in Great Britain.Father David Waller, 62, a parish priest and vicar general of the Ordinariate of Our Lady of Walsingham, will replace Monsignor Keith Newton, 72, who is retiring after serving over 13 years as the ordinary of the ecclesiastical structure for former Anglicans.In a statement, Newton called the Vatican's April 29 announcement "momentous" given that Waller, who is a celibate, will become the first bishop ordinary of the ordinariate. As someone who was already married as an Anglican clergyman before entering the Church through the ordinariate, Newton was not allowed episcopal consecration.Established by Pope Benedict XVI in 2011 through his 2009 apostolic constitution Anglicanorum Coetibus, the ordin...
Landscape view of Sacrofano, Italy, north of Rome. / Credit: Dmitry Taranets/ShutterstockRome Newsroom, Apr 29, 2024 / 15:00 pm (CNA).The World Meeting of Parish Priests for the Synod opened on Monday to discuss "how to be a synodal local Church in mission," allowing priests from around the world to discuss questions raised during the ongoing synod and share their personal pastoral experiences. The four-day meeting, which is taking place from April 29 to May 2 at the Fraterna Domus retreat house in Sacrofano, Italy, just north of Rome, is attended by about 300 priests from around the globe and is divided into several sessions, taking cues from different themes and questions raised in the synod's synthesis report. "The parish priest is a man of the people and for the people. Like Jesus, he is open to the crowd, constantly open to the crowd, to help each and every one understand that they are a letter from Christ," said Cardinal Mario Grech, secretary general of the Gen...
Archbishop Christopher J. Coyne. / Credit: Diocese of Burlington, VermontCNA Staff, Apr 29, 2024 / 07:00 am (CNA).A New England prelate is urging Catholics to both minister to transgender-identifying individuals in the Catholic Church while still continuously affirming "the goodness of human creation" as male and female.Coadjutor Archbishop Christopher Coyne of Hartford, Connecticut, told CNA last week that he would make it a point not to challenge a transgender-identifying man or woman when they present as the opposite sex.Coyne appeared on Connecticut Public Radio earlier this month arguing against the basic claim of gender ideology, which argues that men and women who "identify" as the opposite sex should be treated as such."Biology is biology. You're either XX or XY. That's a scientific fact. You can't un-prove that fact," the bishop told public radio. But, he argued, the LGBT debate has "pulled me more into a place of understanding and care," including regarding trans...