The Way to Mary

Three years ago, I was standing in line to venerate the miraculous Krylos Icon of the Most Pure Virgin Mary during the annual pilgrimage to Krylos, and I asked a question: Who are You, Mary? To whom am I going?

I had a devotion to Jesus—but not to Mary.

A few days later, I was praying during Holy Mass at the indulgence feast in the sanctuary of Mary, Queen of Peace and Reconciliation in Bilshivtsi. Then I asked Mary that, if she wished, she should find me herself—because I had tried many times, but it hadn’t worked.

I did not feel the need to have a special devotion to Mary. I did not feel the need to have a mother.

A month and a half later, unexpectedly and without planning, I went to Medjugorje for the first time.

It began when I was reading Neal Lozano’s book “Unbound.” While reading, a clear thought came: “Well, Ira, it’s time for you to go to Medjugorje.” I put the book aside, checked the cost of tours, wrote to my friend asking if she would like to go to Medjugorje, and returned to my reading. And then, a month later, I heard from a new acquaintance that she was taking a group to Medjugorje in three days for a retreat—the theme of the retreat was “Forgiveness,” based on Neal Lozano’s teaching. I went. It’s true, I encountered Jesus there, just as I always had before.

A year later, I was again in Medjugorje for a seminar on fasting, prayer, and silence. By that time, a year had already passed since I had been learning to pray the Rosary every day. I wrote a letter of consecration of my coming year to Mary. I offered all my prayers for Mary’s intentions. This coincided with a Jubilee year in the Church. I prayed to Mary, but I still could not call her “Mother.”

And then, another year later, I was again in Medjugorje—this time for two weeks, with the community “Light of Mary.”

A few days before my trip to Medjugorje, my mother celebrated her birthday. That year, I felt deeply burdened inside because there was still a wall of unforgiveness in my relationship with her—for many of her choices that I did not understand and that had hurt me. I would flare up with anger toward her very easily, and it seemed that I had tried everything I knew in order to forgive. After my mother’s birthday, I said to God: “You can give me forgiveness whenever You want. You see that I am powerless here. I no longer know what to do or how long to wait. But if You wish—then give it.”

This time in Medjugorje, somehow I couldn’t manage to go to Podbrdo. There was always some other plan.

On the 25th anniversary of the passing of Fr. Slavko Barbarić, we (with the “Light of Mary” community) came to the evening prayer program, and all the members of the community stood on the right side of St. James Church, where there is a statue of the Blessed Virgin. I had never approached it before. This was the first time. During the Rosary, tears kept flowing from my eyes. Something was happening to me, and all I could do was cry.

Toward the end of the first hour of prayer, some inner wall that had been closing my eyes seemed to fall. I felt that something in me had melted. I realized that I had forgiven my mother. Suddenly, a lightness of forgiveness embraced me—as if something I had been carrying all along had lost its weight. Before my eyes, there was a scene from the movie “Home Alone,” when Kevin’s mother finds him in the center of New York by the Christmas tree. I looked at the statue of the Virgin Mary and continued to cry. I understood that God had healed me. It felt as if I were that Kevin, waiting for a miracle to see his mother.

I understood why I had not been able to go to Podbrdo. Perhaps God wanted me to come to a loving Mother, rather than for the hundredth time to a silent statue. When I finally went to Podbrdo, it was the only truly sunny day during those two weeks. There I asked Mary what I should do so as not to lose the renewed heart I had received. And I understood that prayer and fasting would preserve me—that these must be my priorities. If I do not lose these, everything else will fall into place, because everything else is only a consequence.

Once again, I am learning to entrust my life to God—a God who is patient, who listens, who waits; a God who helps me see so much beauty in my “here and now.”

Iryna (Ukraine)