Marian Interventions in the Wars of Ideology: The Elastic Politics of the Roman Catholic Church on Modern Apparitions

Abstract

Since 1945, the Western world has recorded a sharp increase in Marian apparitions and messages, which in terms of frequency, content, structure and representation differ from those of previous centuries. The often oppositional content is actively disseminated by traditionalist and fundamentalist Catholics and devotees, and generates cults and shrines which turn away from or disassociate themselves from the Catholic Church. On the basis of two related and much discussed cases, Amsterdam’s cultus of The Lady of All Nations and the devotion to the Queen of Peace at Medjugorje, this paper investigates the manner in which these two Marian interventions are articulated and interpreted by the visionaries, and how these interventions relate to the ideological wars which have dominated ecclesiastical politics, and the politics of the Christian world, since the Second World War. When the Roman Catholic Church fails to get such processes of religious divergence under control, it appears that because of the success of some of these cults the ecclesiastical hierarchy ultimately finds itself forced, willingly or not, to join in or converge with the heterodox and previously rejected opinions. In this way the Church increases the significance of conservative and traditionalist thought and practice within its faith community.

Keywords:

• Mary
• Apparitions
• Roman Catholicism
• Ideology
• Ideologies
• Conflicts
• Amsterdam
• Medjugorje
• Netherlands
• Bosnia‐Herzegovina

Notes

[1] The published texts of the messages with Peerdeman’s commentaries are subject to change. For example, as compared with previous editions, in the latest editions in both English and Dutch, respectively in 1999 and 2002, texts have been altered and/or passages omitted without indication this has occurred.

[2] In the Marian year 1954, and in 1955, the image also toured various countries. Much later, after the fall of Communism, in 1997 new revival missions were held with the Fatima image in various countries of the former Eastern Bloc. On the way back to Rome it once again visited Maastricht.

[3] Likewise, its visionary Peerdeman herself was not unrestrained in her enthusiasm for Medjugorje, having observed “Mary doesn’t waffle around that much.” Personal communication from Mr. J.A. Leechburg Auwers, Voorburg, The Netherlands, who was one of her assistants for some years.

[4] Traditionally Marian devotions have been important for the Dominicans, a fact which particularly is expressed in popular devotion with their centuries‐long monopoly on praying the rosary, which developed into the most important prayer among the laity in modern times. Since the Fatima messages, praying the rosary has likewise developed into an arena for Catholic traditionalists.

[5] This also relates this depiction of Mary to the “radiant” Our Lady of the Miraculous Medallion (1830) of the Rue du Bac in Paris.

[6] Private communication from Mr. J.A. Leechburg Auwers, Voorburg, The Netherlands, who in the 1970s personally negotiated with Cardinal J. Ratzinger on behalf of those involved with the cultus of The Lady of All Nations; see also the entry “Mitlöserin” in Bäumer & Scheffczyk, 1992.

[7] For this, see the index to the 1971 Dutch text edition of the Messages (1999), which differs in its arrangement from later indices.

[8] Knuvelder (1959).

[9] In a document not for public release, on 6 April 1957 the Holy Office endorsed the views and measures of the Bishop of Haarlem, that no preternatural source had been found and therefore there could be no consideration of a public devotion for The Lady of All Nations or her image.

[10] The Papal Decree Romanus Pontificibus of 6 June 1975 had ordered the Franciscans to turn over seven parishes in the region to the Bishop.

[11] In this context, a clear reference to Matthew 7: 15–16, regarding false or genuine prophets (or, mutatis mutandis, visionaries) “By their fruits you will know them”.

[12] Cited from the foreword written by Cardinal Simonis for a missionary booklet directed against Medjugorje, from the pen of the Dutch pastor Rudo Franken (1999).

[13] Reproductions of the official documents of the approbation of the apparitions and the title can be found on the official website of the cultus: http://www.de-vrouwe.net/english/

[14] This article was written in 2004; in 2005 pope Benedictus XVI, the former apparition‐sceptic cardinal Ratzinger, demanded that the contested words in the prayer, “The Lady who once was Mary”, would no longer be practised. In order to sustain the devotion and prevent harsher measures from the Vatican the bishop of Haarlem‐Amsterdam obeyed.