Bosnian blessing
Mary Wakefield
Ispent last Tuesday afternoon sitting on the floor of a Franciscan church in Bosnia listening to a man many think is a saint.
Father Jozo Zovko was the pastor of St James's, Medjugorje, in 1981, when the Virgin Mary appeared to six of the village children. At first he thought they were telling fibs, then as he was praying he heard the Virgin's voice saying, 'Save the children', so he became their champion, defending them against the communists. Twenty-three years later, Mary still materialises and speaks to the visionaries at 6.40 p.m. every day (5.45 p.m. during daylight saving time), and Jozo tours the world, spreading her message. The talk on the Medjugorje streets, between the racks of four-euro pearly-sheen rosary beads, is often of Fr Jozo's healing services, of conversions and miracles.
By the time I arrived at his church, in Siroki Brijeg, all the chairs had been bagged by wily septuagenarians, but it was nice on the floor. To my left and right were Irish knees in flesh-coloured tights, behind me, a roll of marble fitted into the curve of my neck. Dead ahead, standing at the lectern with his interpreter, was the 'saint', looking tired. 'Pilgrims!' shouted the interpreter, her bony grey head poking out of a pink turtleneck. 'Our Lady has brought each of you to this place for a reason!'
'Last week, a woman with a brain tumour came to the church,' she said, her voice strict, but sibilant. 'When she arrived, she couldn't walk, but by the end of the service she got up from her chair and ran out, cured! These are the sorts of blessings Our Lady wishes to give you!'
I glanced up covertly at a blonde girl in a wheelchair in front of me. She looked hopeful. I would like to be hopeful, too, but Medjugorje is a confusing place. Mary's messages, for instance — 'Children, darkness reigns over the whole world'; 'Many people now live without faith' — do we really need an apparition to tell us that? One visionary, Ivan, charges New Yorkers nearly $2,000 for the 'Ivan Dragicevic Prayer Experience'. But then, if you crowbar your mind open, beneath the babble of Hail Marys, and lost Americans asking for the coach park, Medjugorje does feel calm, prayerful. And pilgrims come back, year after year, in their millions, talking of signs from the Virgin in the sky.
In the church aisles, Jozo's female helpers handed out free gifts from wicker baskets: glow-in-the-dark rosaries and a picture of Our Lady in her usual blue. 'Put the picture on your heart,' said the interpretess, in what she probably thought of as her loving voice, 'and listen to what the Blessed Virgin is telling you.' I closed my eyes. The Virgin seemed to be telling me with some urgency to test the luminosity of the rosary under my T-shirt.
Then there was another gift, a 'personal' blessing from Fr Jozo via the other priests present. Under orders from the pink turtleneck, the congregation wobbled into the aisles, row upon row of Irish, Americans, Bosnians, Italians, English, old men and women, some families. 'Could those feeling strong today be ready to catch those overcome by the blessing?' said the interpreter.
Soon a priest approached, praying his way down my line. The badge on his chest said he was Father Andrew from Scotland. He seemed nice, but not particularly miraculous, and, in a second, he had blessed me, the blonde in the wheelchair and had moved on without drama.
Across the aisle, a manly-looking American priest was having more luck. As he held the heads of his flock, and whispered into their ears, some swooned and fell over backwards. Five or six women in his line were already out cold on the marble and so I walked over for a closer look. The nearest woman definitely wasn't faking: behind her eyelids, her eyeballs flickered as if during REM. Her hands, up by her cars, clenched sporadically into fists and she breathed in and out rapidly. When I looked up again, I saw the wheelchair blonde staring longingly at the American priest, who had finished his row and was standing with his back firmly to her. I didn't blame him. It's one thing to put a Texan woman into a Godly stupor, but quite another to make a paralysed girl get up and walk. After a five-minute stand-off, one of the blonde's friends walked over and tapped him on the shoulder. Could he come and pray over her? It seemed rude to watch, and when I turned back the American priest was smiling and raising his eyebrows apologetically. The blonde looked sad, hut not despairing.
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