For me, Medjugorje is primarily peace. I want to share a small testimony of my life, and you will understand how important peace is when you do everything and understand that the Lord wants it and calls us to it.
I was born in the Soviet era in a large family. My father was not only the head of the collective farm, but also an important party worker. Mom is a very simple woman who completed only three grades of primary school and is very religious. She never told me about God, but I always saw her praying. Daily. Every night, going to bed, I saw her kneeling in prayer. I never asked her about it, but I just always saw her doing something that was very important to her.

We were all baptized, even though we lived in Soviet times. I am the youngest of the brothers. Once, when I was in the 5th or 6th grade, I saw a priest on the street. And since I was from a musical family, I asked him: “Does your church have an organ?” He answered: “Yes.” “Then let me play.” After I played, I asked: “Can I be your organist?” And he agreed. That day I came home and told everyone that I had met the priest and that he had hired me. I will be the organist! So I started learning to play the organ in the church.

Time passed… I was drafted into the army, but I knew very well that when I returned, I would continue to do what I did before military service – I would be an organist. However, everything changed in my life: I was sent to serve in Afghanistan.

It was a good school of life for me. In the first four months, I already received the first bullet. After the second wounding, I was transferred to the “Katyusha”. So there was another more serious injury, jaundice…

After some time, a decision was made that the Soviet army should withdraw from the territory of Afghanistan. My officer came to the hood, asked for paper and a pencil, and told me that I must write my last letter to my mother. I saw how he wrote it for 3-4 hours. He cried more than he wrote…

I was always convinced that no matter how disabled I became, I would definitely return home. My parents didn’t even know I was serving in Afghanistan because I couldn’t imagine what it would be like for my parents to live every day waiting for a letter saying that their son was coming back to

For me, Medjugorje is primarily peace. I want to share a small testimony of my life, and you will understand how important peace is when you do everything and understand that the Lord wants it and calls us to it.

I was born in the Soviet era in a large family. My father was not only the head of the collective farm, but also an important party worker. Mom is a very simple woman who completed only three grades of primary school and is very religious. She never told me about God, but I always saw her praying. Daily. Every night, going to bed, I saw her kneeling in prayer. I never asked her about it, but I just always saw her doing something that was very important to her.

We were all baptized, even though we lived in Soviet times. I am the youngest of the brothers. Once, when I was in the 5th or 6th grade, I saw a priest on the street. And since I was from a musical family, I asked him: “Does your church have an organ?” He answered: “Yes.” “Then let me play.” After I played, I asked: “Can I be your organist?” And he agreed. That day I came home and told everyone that I had met the priest and that he had hired me. I will be the organist! So I started learning to play the organ in the church.

Grateful to the Mother of God
Time passed… I was drafted into the army, but I knew very well that when I returned, I would continue to do what I did before military service – I would be an organist. However, everything changed in my life: I was sent to serve in Afghanistan.

It was a good school of life for me. In the first four months, I already received the first bullet. After the second wounding, I was transferred to the “Katyusha”. So there was another more serious injury, jaundice…

After some time, a decision was made that the Soviet army should withdraw from the territory of Afghanistan. My officer came to the hood, asked for paper and a pencil, and told me that I must write my last letter to my mother. I saw how he wrote it for 3-4 hours. He cried more than he wrote…

I was always convinced that no matter how disabled I became, I would definitely return home. My parents didn’t even know I was serving in Afghanistan because I couldn’t imagine what it would be like for my parents to live every day waiting for a letter saying their son would come back in a “nice box” . And I was surprisingly good at cheating. The fact is that one of my friends served in Germany, and we decided that all my letters that I will write home, I will first send him to Germany, there he will change the envelope, write his address… “Hello, mom, dad, my dear brothers and sisters, how I love you all! I am already counting not only the days, but also the hours and minutes when I will see you. We’ve just been to the bath, then we’ll go watch TV again. Our life is very simple. Super!” And imagine that my mom and dad always read letters like this… When I saw my colonel writing a letter to his mother for four hours, I began to believe that perhaps we really would not return home. And after these four hours, I also decided to write a message home… The last stage of withdrawal from the territory of Afghanistan has begun. It was a very difficult time, because out of 600 soldiers, only 40 survived. I survived and did not receive another wound. Why? The night I wrote my last letter, I had the feeling that I had signed my own death sentence, as if I had accepted that there was no more content. In the morning I took the letter to the headquarters, put it in the box and could not accept that it could be true and that I would never come home again. And for the first time in my life, I did not go to the barracks, but simply headed somewhere to the territory and knelt down. It was the first prayer in my life. And I said, “God, I don’t know whether You are or You are not. But if You are, then there is meaning, and if You are not, then there is no meaning at all.” I’m the kind of person who really likes deals. So he said: “God, if You exist, I have a deal: if from now on I will not have another wound or bullet, I will definitely become a priest. If there is even one bullet or a small wound, then You are gone and there is no meaning. Then everything is very simple.” After this prayer I got up and went to the barracks. I felt peace inside. And I no longer had any fear. That same day, before lunch, the alarm started and we had to pack up and leave the territory of Afghanistan. As I said, it was very difficult. I don’t want to repeat myself. But, thank God, we were found and taken out of there. My colonel, with whom I lived in the same room, never returned home. And when I returned – alive, without a single wound, without a single bullet, I immediately understood that my life was to be a priest.

On September 13 – I will never forget this date – early in the morning I arrived by train from Moscow to Riga. What I wanted most was confessions. I decided: whichever temple will be opened first, I will make my first confession there. It is interesting that at six in the morning the Polish church was opened and one priest, a Pole, a professor of the Theological Seminary, served there. I confessed. And this priest invited me to breakfast after Mass. But don’t forget that I am a person who loves deals. So I said: “If You want me to come to You for breakfast, I have two agreements: the first is that after breakfast You will let me play the organ, and the second is that You are a professor at the Theological Seminary, so help me enter there.” He agreed. Just asked me when I want to enter the seminary. And I answered: “Tomorrow.” I didn’t want to be a minute late. I knew what I wanted and who I wanted to be.

After starting my studies at the Theological Seminary, I realized that this is my place in life. I was ordained a priest and sent to serve in Courland, a part of Latvia where there are very few Catholics. This is a Catholic mission. The parish is very small, a tiny priest’s hut.

Once an addict came to me and asked for help… I invited him to dinner and gave him the opportunity to tell everything about drug addiction. And at the end I asked him the question: “How can I help you?” He replied: “Just don’t drive me out, leave me here. And don’t tell me I have to pray the Rosary and read the Scriptures. Because all the priests tell me: pray the Rosary and you will no longer be a drug addict. And I pray the Rosary, and I remained a drug addict…” That’s how he stayed with me. Then two more guys came – another drug addict and one alcoholic…

After some time, I got an old manor, and we made a community there. I did not know and did not imagine what it was like to live in a community. Three years after that, I was invited to go to Medjugorje. And this trip changed my further life. Before that, I did everything with great fear, I couldn’t imagine what it was like to live in a community, how to share my life with such people… In Medjugorje, when I got to the “Cenakolo” community, I realized that I didn’t invent a second bicycle, but one the practice of life already exists. And even the rules of our life were almost the same as in Medjugorje. You see how the Holy Spirit guided everything, despite the fact that at that time I knew nothing about how to live in such a community.

For me, Medjugorje is the foundation of my life. And since then, I have never doubted and do not doubt now what exactly God expects from me. For about 18-19 years, I prayed every day and asked God that my bishop would allow me to be a priest in the community (because before that I had 11 small parishes and a community that was 300 kilometers away from them). Virgin Mary in Medjugorje heard my prayers. And it is now the third year that I have fully devoted my life to service and community life in Brookne. It is an extraordinary place where we create many beautiful projects, open schools, etc.

Finally, I would like to invite you: open your heart, open. The most important thing we need in life is peace. Peace. I received it in Medjugorje. I can no longer imagine a single year without the spirituality of Medjugorje, this way of life, all that the Virgin Mary invites us to. It is very, very important to me. And it is also very important to be sincere, genuine. For me, it is a great vocation to live with young people, drug addicts, alcoholics, and gambling addicts. There are many young people today who do not see the point, so it is not enough for them to just say something, they must see the real spiritual life.

I will always thank the Virgin Mary, because after the first time I came to Medjugorje, which was already 23 years ago, I am no longer in a hurry and do not worry, I have become calm, because everything I do, I do together with the Virgin Mary and with the Holy Spirit.

And I invite you today: open your heart – and you will receive the most important thing, which is peace. Not peace around, but peace within. And then you will always be able to understand what God wants and expects from us. This is exactly what the Virgin Mary is leading us to in Medjugorje. Amen. Glory to Jesus Christ!”

at. Andrii, Latvia