Ivan's Dragicevic's Witness Talk at St. Paschal Babylon, Cleveland Ohio (March 2006)

Recorded and Transcribed by Connie DeMuth a parishioner of Ascension Church in Hurricane, West Virginia

IVAN: Praise be Jesus, Amen.

CROWD: Now and forever.

IVAN: Dear friends, this evening in the beginning I would like to greet all of you from the bottom of my heart. Can you hear me well?

CROWD: Yes.

IVAN: Friends, this evening I would like to greet all of you from the bottom of my heart. I am very glad this evening that I can be with you. I would like to share with you the Good News that Our Lady calls us to over these past 25 years. This evening we came here as if we came to Jesus. He came to the Holy Mass. The Holy Mass is the central point of our lives. We came to Jesus to speak to him. And we came to receive him. We came to Our Mother, we came to our Mother to give Her our problems of our families and want to sit in Her lap and to find assuredness and protection with Her.

Friends, it's almost 25 years since Our Lady is with us. Twenty-five years in Her schooling, in the school of peace, in the school of love, and the school of prayer. And that is very nice. And this is such a great pleasure. I have never been able to thank Her enough for this gift.

You know that during these 25 years Our Lady has given us many messages, and in this brief time, it is very difficult for me to speak about all of the messages, but I will now like to concentrate only on the most important messages, and I would like to speak a little more on them. I would like to talk to you very simply, as simply as Our Lady speaks to me. As a mother, She always speaks simply. She speaks simply so that the children can understand and live the way She speaks to them.

I know that many of you have been to Medjugorje and you have read books and your friends have spoken to you a lot about Medjugorje. How many of you went to Medjugorje? (Crowd indicates) Wow. Then I shouldn't have even come. For those of you who are here for the first time, I would like to tell you a little bit about the beginnings of the apparitions. And I refer the beginnings all the time because that is what is imbedded in my heart, deeply in my heart. In 1981, I was just a little boy. I was 16 years old. I was very shy. I was kind of more within myself. I did not communicate, and I didn't have very many friends. I was tied to my family very closely. I did not walk at night in darkness. I was afraid of the darkness.

In those days, I lived when Communism was still ruling the country. It was a very difficult time. It was a time without freedom. There was no freedom of speech and there was no freedom of religion. We simply could not speak about freedom of religion. Life was very difficult. I was the oldest in my family. Every morning I got up at five o'clock and worked in the fields with my parents. I was working in the vines, I the vineyards. About noon I used to come home, and then I went to school. And that's the way it was every day. And during all that time period, I always kept asking my parents, "When is the next holiday," so I could rest up a little, so I could play soccer and other things kids like.

And that day did come. On June 24th, 1981, it was the Feast of John the Baptist. And that morning, I slept a little longer than normal, but not too long to miss Holy Mass with my parents. And I remember well that morning I really didn't want to go to church, to Mass, because I wanted to sleep even more. But you know how parents are. Five or six times they come to my room and they tell me that I need to get up, get ready, get ready and wait, and there was not much to think about except to do it. I got ready, with my two younger brothers, and through the fields we went to church.

I was at full Mass that morning. I was there with my body, but I'm not sure I was there with my heart and soul. I was hoping that the Mass would end very quickly. When I came home and my parents asked me about the gospel of the Mass and I did not know. After that, we had dinner together, lunch together, and after lunch, my schoolmates came to my house and they invited me to go play soccer. And that afternoon, about three o'clock, we went to play soccer. And when we were all tired, we were slowly returning to our homes.

When we were walking to our homes, we met three girls. These were Ivanka, Mirjana and Vicka. And the friends who were with me, they asked them where are they going and what are they doing. And they told me they were just walking. They were looking for a sheep of their family's. I did not ask them anything because I was very shy then and I did not communicate with them. When my friends finished talking to them, we started walking toward our houses. Most of the boys went to the town itself, and since my house was a little further in the town, one of the friends went with me so I could change, and then we would return then to his house and watch basketball on television. There were only five or six families in the whole town with TVs, and especially in color, and that's why we always ended up in one place to watch TV. We watched the first half of a basketball game, and at that time, I told my -- and I told my friend, "Let's run over to my house and eat something and come back for the second half." We came home, we ate, and we were walking slowly back for the second half, but we never came there. And to this day, we have never seen that second half. Something else happened.

Walking on the way to his house, we heard a voice. Somebody was calling us, "Ivan, come and see Our Lady." I did not see anyone in front of me, behind me. I heard the voice from a distance and it kept calling me by the name again. Since we did not see anyone, we kept going on and on. As we walked further, the voice was stronger and stronger. At one point, I turned to my left and I saw one of the girls that we had met previously, by name of Vicka. She and the others were running toward us and they were shaking out of fear. They were barefoot and they were telling us, "Come, Our Lady is up in the mountain." I did not know what they were speaking about. I was telling my friend, "They must be crazy. I don't believe them. We'd better go and see the second half." However, she was so insistent that we had to go with her. So we said, "Let's go with her and see what really is this."

As we walked to that place, and watching her and the way she behaved, it didn't seem very simple for us either, because now this time we get fearful. And when we came to that spot, we saw the other two girls Ivanka and Mirjana. They were turned toward a hill and they were crying and they were looking at something. At that moment, the girl, Vicka, she turned toward the hill and she was pointing with her hand and telling us to look up above. I looked three times and I saw the likeness of Our Lady. And as soon as I saw, I ran home. I don't think anyone could have caught me. When I came home, I did not speak anything to anyone, neither to my parents. I closed myself in my room and the night that was in front of me was a night that was undescribable. I had so many questions going through my head at that point. Was this really possible? How is it possible? Was this really Our Lady? I saw that that evening, but I still wasn't sure.

Up to the age of 16, I could never even dream about something like this, that this would be possible, that Our Lady could appear to someone. And my parents never spoke about something like that. And I never had any special devotion toward Our Lady, and I never read about it at that point in my life or at that time. I was a very good Christian, believer. I went to church regularly, I prayed with my parents, and I knew of faith. Many times I prayed with my parents in the house that this would end quickly. That's the way I was when I was a child. And that night really was the night of terror and fear. Something was just awaiting something. You know what my greatest fear was? What if Our Lady comes to my room this night? Where can I run then? I was just waiting for the morning to come. That night was so long and daylight did come.

In the morning, my parents already heard in the town about this, and they were waiting by the door for me to get out, and they started telling me, "Be very careful what you're saying. Do not play with it. This is not something to fool around with." And in the days of Communism, you could not speak about these matters. They were afraid for us to be imprisoned or something like this. However, I told my parents what we saw. We told them we did see, but we're still not sure. That second day, thousands of people gathered, and these people were with us all day. They were kind of protecting us from the police.

And around two o'clock in the afternoon, the people that were with us, they told us, "Why don't we go up to the hill with you? Perhaps Our Lady has left something up there, some kind of sign so that we can be sure that she really was there." Spontaneously, we started with the people up the hill, and before we came to that spot, about 20 meters before we came to that spot, Our Lady was waiting for us. She was holding Baby Jesus in Her arms and She was kind of floating, like on a cloud, and with Her hand, She was kind of waiving to us to come closer. I will never forget that day in my life. And this day will never be out of my memory. At that moment I could not move forwards, nor backwards. My legs were cut off. However, in one moment, not with my own power, as if I was floating above the rocks and shrubbery and not doing anything, we came closer to Her. When we came closer to Her, Our Lady, blessed, holding Baby Jesus in Her arms, and with Her right hand, She was pointing Her hand above our heads, and She was saying Her first words to us. "Dear Children, I am with you. I am your Mother. Do not fear anything. I will protect you. I will lead you and I will help you."

However, it was very difficult to be in rest. We were still -- without ourselves emotionally, we were still full of fear. Then one of the girls that was with us asked Her, "Who are you?" And She answered, "I am the Blessed Virgin, Mary the Blessed Virgin, the Queen of Peace. I'm coming here, Children, because my Son is sending me to help you. Dear Children, peace, peace, peace. Dear Children, let peace be. The peace must be among man and God and among men. Dear Children, this world, this humanity, it's in a great crisis, and it could annihilate and destroy itself." These were the first words from Our Lady, and these were the first messages that Our Lady has given to us, to the world.

The second day, we recognized in Her Our Mother. And that second day was the first time we started to speak with Her. And till this day, the three of us are with Her every week, Vicka, Marija and myself. I hope that you're not looking at me as someone who is perfect or who is a saint because I'm not. I try to be better, I try to be holier. That is my desire. And that desire is deeply imbedded within my heart. I did not convert overnight just because I see Our Lady. I know that my conversion is a process, and it's a program for my life, for which I have decided myself, and I have to stay in that program, and every day I need to change and improve myself, and every day I must be sin and able to deny it, and I have opened myself toward peace, and have opened myself to the Holy Spirit and to be open to grace, accept the Gospel and the word of Christ, and in that manner, grow in holiness.

However, every day, one day of every day the same question keeps repeating within myself. "Mother, why me? Why did you select me? Mother, were there not any better ones than myself? Mother, will I be able to do everything that you want me to, in the manner in which you would want me to do it? Mother, are you satisfied with me?" And there is no day that I don't keep asking myself these questions. I remember well in one of the apparitions with Our Lady, then I asked Her -- I asked Her, "Mother, why me? Why did you select me?" And She just smiled and said, "Dear Child, I do not look for the best all the time." Practically 25 years ago, Our Lady had selected me to be Her instrument, an instrument in Her and God's hands. For myself and for my life, for my family, this is a great, great gift. And it is a great responsibility. I know that God gave me a lot, but I know that He asks from me a lot. And you know whenever God gave a lot, he expects a lot in return. However, it is not easy, nor simple to be with Our Lady every day, to speak with Her every day, five or ten minutes, sometimes even more, and then after every encounter with Her to return back to earth and to live how we live and to accept the reality of this world. Sometimes I need a couple of hours to really get myself back to this world after speaking with Her.

As I speak to you this evening, I'm still kind of trying to get myself from Our Lady, Her presence with me, this evening's presence with Our Lady. And I said I need a lot of time to get myself in touch and return to the world. What is it that is the most important thing that Our Lady calls us to? Which are the most important messages? Peace, conversion, returning back to God. A prayer from the heart, penance and fasting. From these, love, forgiveness, and the message of hope. These are the most important messages that Our Lady calls us to, and She leads us towards these messages. All of these messages throughout these 25 years, Our Lady is trying to simplify them. She keeps repeating them in a simpler manner. As I said before, the Mother has come to us as the Queen of Peace, and She comes from the King of Peace, because She said, "My Son is sending me to help you." Jesus is sending his mother to help us. Who can know better than a mother, and how important is peace in this tired world nowadays? And how important is peace in these tired families today? And how important is peace in the tired young people today? And how important is peace to this tired church of ours? The Mother is coming to help us. And She's coming to help us and warn us that those things that are not good. And She comes to us because She wants to raise us up. She wants us to lead us toward peace and toward Her Son.

In one of the messages, Our Lady says, "Dear Children, today more than ever, today's world is going through its difficult moments, very grave crisis, and the biggest crisis is believing in God because people have gotten away from that. Dear Children, today's world and humanity are going forward without God. And they're going without God. What we need is prayers within our families. However, that prayers have gotten out of the families. The parents do not pray with their children anymore. And there is no time for each other between the parents and children nowadays. There is no love within the families. Dear Children, there are divorces within the families. Broken, tired families. And there is no faithfulness among the families and there is much infidelity."

People ask me many times, "What does Our Lady say that there are not so many high priests as there used to be? Why don't more young men become priests nowadays?" And one of the biggest reasons is, there is no family prayer. Those priests are born within families that pray, and through the prayer of families, and if there is no prayer within the family, there are very, very few priests. And that's the reason Our Lady wants us to return to prayer within the families. And if we return to prayer within the family, peace will return, and joy will come back, love will come back, harmony and togetherness will come back. Many times I see many children away from their parents nowadays. There's so much abortion nowadays. And Our Lady says, "Isn't this a sign of war? A war that is destroying families and it's destroying society today and it's destroying our civilization."

Our Mother is coming to us and She wants to take us out of this darkness and lead us towards the bed of light and the bed of hope. And Our Lady says, "Dear Children, if there is no peace within the hearts of man, and if the man has no peace within himself, if there is no peace within the family, there's not going to be, there cannot be peace in the world." You have your families, and you know if one child has no peace, your whole family is missing peace. That's why it is important to pray for peace and to pray for the gift of peace.

And Our Lady said, "Dear Children, do not speak about peace, start living it. Do not speak about prayer, start living in prayer. Dear Children, in this world, there's too many words, and that's why I'm asking you to return to prayer. Only with the return of prayer within your families and the return of peace within your family, then can we spiritually get well within your family. Then the spirit will be within your family." It is very important for today's world to heal itself spiritually because Our Lady says that our world is spiritually healing. We must heal ourselves spiritually to get well physically. And Our Mother is coming to us and She's giving us God's medication for us, and it's the healing of wounds and She wants to treat our wounds and She wants to grab our wounds with so much love and so much tenderness, and She wants to make us stronger and She wants to make us feel better with ourselves.

And She wants to walk with this world of ours because She's a Mother who is very concerned for our salvation. And that's why Our Lady says, "Dear Children, I am with you. I am coming among you because I want to help you seek peace. However, Dear Children, I teach you. I can give you this only with you. That's why you have to decide for yourselves to do it and fight evil, fight sin." Our Mother is speaking very simply and She keeps repeating and She never gets tired. Yes, I am going practically 25 years, I am repeating the same story for people for the last 25 years, and I'm not tired because I see Our Lady is never getting tired. She's not speaking theologically something that we cannot understand. She speaks very simply and Our Lady is teaching us and She never gets tired, as your mothers do. How many actually have told your children to be good, keep studying, work, keep listening, don't do any bad things. Thousands of times you have to say this to your children. Do you get tired?. I don't think you have gotten tired yet. Which mother can say that she is very happy that she only tells her child once and she never has to repeat it again? There is no such mother. Every mother must keep repeating herself. Every mother teaches and she brings and she reads stories with and she wishes the best for her children. A mother must keep repeating herself so the children will not forget.

The Mother did not come to us to bring us fear, to criticize us or to speak to us about the end of the world or the second coming of Jesus. She's coming to us as the Mother of Hope and She wants to bring hope to this tired world of ours and She wants to bring hope to this tired church of ours. Our Lady says, "Dear Children, if you are strong, the church will be strong. If you are weak, the church will be weak. You are the living church. You are the love of the church." And Our Lady says that, "This world has a future, however, you must start training yourselves. You have to return to God. You have to put God in the first place in your lives, and you have to put God in the first place within your families, and together with God, go into the future."

Our Lady says, "Dear children, you are only passing through this world as pilgrims. You are only pilgrims." And that's why Our Lady keeps calling us to Holy Mass, for the Holy Mass is to be the central point of our life. Our Lady says in one of our encounters with Her, "Dear Children, if you have to make a decision to come to me or to go to Holy Mass, do not come to me, go to Mass, because going to Mass, you're going to Jesus himself who is giving himself to us in the Mass. We are to give ourselves to Jesus and we have to open ourselves up to him and to accept him."

She calls us about monthly penance, confession and the act of penance. She's calling upon us to pray the rosary within our families. She wants us to perform the Holy Sacraments and the Crucifix and read the Holy Bible within our families. In one of the encounters, "Dear Children, let the Bible be within your family in a visible location." And She did not mean that the Bible must be there in -- (Side 1 ended.)

She has repeated this so many times, "Dear Children, pray, pray, pray." Not only just opening your mouth, not mechanically. Pray from the heart." What does it mean to pray from the heart? That means to pray from love with love. To pray and to call out, so that now the prayer becomes a meeting with Jesus and a conversation with Jesus and a resting place with Jesus so that when you feel the peace and joy of praying with Jesus. Our Lady knows that we are not perfect and to ask in confident, concentrated prayer all the time. However, She knows we're not perfect, She wants us to start in the school of prayer, to learn every day. Our Lady says, "He who prays should not need the prayer of future."

She asks for us to pray for three hours a day. I remember one of the pilgrims in Medjugorje. She came from Austria and she heard that Our Lady is asking for us to pray for three hours a day. And that was not very clear to her. She says, "Well, how does She ask us to pray for three hours?" Next year when this pilgrim came again, she asked me if She still insists upon us to pray for three hours a day, and I said, "She is not looking for three hours, now She's asking for 20 more hours." Then she said, "Well, then I might as well remain in country." See how selfish She gets at times?

In one of the encounters with Our Lady, "Dear Children, if you wish to go to the school of prayer, then you must know that there are no weakness in the school of prayer. You have to go to the school of prayer every day, Dear Children. If you wish to pray better, then you need to pray more. To pray more is a personal decision, but to pray better, it's grace. It's a grace given to those who pray more." Many times a day we say that we don't have time for prayer because we work a lot, we are very busy, and then when we have to pray, we just don't have that time. Our Lady says, "Dear Children, the time is not the problem, the problem is love. Dear Children, when you love something, you always make time for it. And when you don't like something, you never look for time." For that reason, Our Lady is calling us so much to keep praying. During all these times that Our Lady has been with us, She wants to take us out of this wilderness and She wants to take us out of this spiritual dying, and She wants to bring us up from this spiritual coma, and to make us stronger in our faith through prayer.

This evening meeting with Our Lady, I would like to tell you a little more about this encounter. And I will use words that I am capable of because I don't have words beautiful enough to describe my encounters with Our Lady. For every encounter with Our Lady we prepare ourselves with the prayer of the rosary, and to pray the prayer of the rosary we accept Her coming. Praying the rosary with you, and as I come closer to the time 20 till 7:00, I feel Her presence more and more within my heart. That moment when I came up and knelt down, that was the moment when Our Lady comes. The first time of Her coming, we saw this bright light that precedes Her, behind the light Our Lady comes. As soon as Our Lady comes, then I cannot see anything around me, in front of me or around me. I would not feel time or space. This evening, She came very happy. She greeted all of us, "Blessed be Jesus Christ, my Dear Children." After that, She prayed a long time for us. She had Her arms spread over us. She blessed all of us with Her Motherly blessing. And after that, She was praying for the sick who are present here tonight, and She blessed all of your manner of messages which you have brought with you particularly. And after that, I recommended all you to Her, your needs, your families, and after that, Our Lady prayed. She prayed for the conversion of sinners. And after that, She keeps praying about all of us. And in that prayer, She disappears. And She leaves the Sign of the Cross with the greeting, "Go in peace, my Dear Children." That is the most important part this evening's encounter with Our Lady.

Before the Lent itself, Our Lady has given a message and Our Lady gave a message to the whole world, which I will read to you. Every month on the 25th, Our Lady leaves a message to the whole world. The message for February the 25, 2006: "Dear Children, in this Lenten time of grace, I call you to open your hearts to the gifts that God desires to give you. Do not be closed, but in prayer and enunciation say yes to God and he will give to you in abundance. As in springtime, the earth opens to the sea and heals a hundred fold, so also will your Heavenly Father will give to you in abundance. I am with you and love you, Dear Children, with a tender love. Thank you for having responded to my call." That is the message of February the 25th. In seven more days, Our Lady will give a new message to the world.

I see Our Lady as I see you now. I speak with Her as I speak with you, and I can touch Her. She has a gray gown, a white veil, blue eyes, rosy cheeks, and dark black hair. And She kind of floats, as if on a cloud, and She has a crown of stars upon Her head. It is very difficult to describe Her beauty to the world. At one time, we asked Our Lady -- we asked Her, "Mother, why are you so beautiful?" And She said, "Dear Children, I am beautiful because I love. And you love and then you will be beautiful." I hope that we will respond to the call of Our Lady and that we will accept Her messages and then be co-partners of a more beautiful world, a world worthy of the Children of God.

Let this evening be our beginning, a beginning of our spiritual renewal. As you go to your homes, continue with your spiritual renewal within your families, with your children, your church and your society, and let's decide ourselves for peace, and let's pray for peace. In the Gospel, Jesus repeats many times that we are to be praying, and Our Lady keeps repeating the same words to us. "Do not fear, Dear Children, so decide ourselves for God because the truth is within, only within God. And let there be peace at home. (End of tape.)

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