Schönborn says Medjugorje can be known by its ‘fruits’

Austria

Cardinal Christoph Schönborn, one of the few bishops worldwide who has been on a pilgrimage to the Marian site of Medjugorje in Bosnia, has said the value of the site should be measured by its “fruits”, writes Christa Pongratz-Lippitt. Flying back from Fátima on 13 May Pope Francis said of the Medjugorje apparitions, that have been ongoing since 1981, that in his opinion “this is not the Mother of Jesus. And these presumed apparitions don’t have a lot of value.”

Cardinal Schönborn devoted his weekly column in the Vienna free paper, Heute, on 19 May to Medjugorje.

“‘You will be able to tell them by their fruits … a sound tree produces good fruit’,” Jesus said. “For me this tree [Medjugorje] is good as I see such an abundance of good fruit. Medjugorje is a message of peace and prayer, both of which our world needs today! That for me is the real miracle of Medjugorje,” the cardinal wrote. People found faith, reconciliations and healing there, he said. Medjugorje had, moreover, seen hundreds of vocations and had 2.5 million visitors annually.

Cardinal Schönborn has regularly invited Ivan Dragicevic, one of the six Medjugorje visionaries, to the annual Evening Prayer for Peace in Vienna.