Medjugorje and the Special Quiet Times with Our Lady

By Stephen K. Ryan

I just completed a boat race to Bermuda.  The race started off the Chesapeake Bay Bridge just north of Annapolis, Md. and   I was fortunate enough to be part of Captain George Bauer’s crew on a forty-four foot sailboat.  But this is not a story about, storms, race competition,  tactics and weather  but rather this is a story  about a spiritual journey – one that I took with the Virgin Mary. It is a story about finding myself close to God, Our Lady and Christ far from land.

I think all of us find moments when we feel close to God. Certainly when we walk deep into the woods or climb high up on a mountain  we find ourselves thinking of God; we  find ourselves contemplating things greater than ourselves, greater than office e-mails, and weekend errands. For me, I seem to come close to God when I am on a small boat hundreds of miles from land – for me the ocean lets God in.  At night, grinding through two-to six a.m. watches, with nothing to see but the horizon, or the edge of the earth or the stars in the infinite night sky, my mind easily begins to contemplate eternity and our creator.  This of course is  not new to any of us – we all have our special places where we feel close to God.

But this trip was different for me. My boat race to Bermuda was my eighth ocean competition, but it was only my second  boat race since I became interested in Medjugorje, my second race since I discovered  the special messages of Our Lady.  As I set sail, the special messages were on my mind and as our boat settled into the race, out  on the ocean, what came rushing in – it seemed to come from nowhere – as if Our Lady was talking to me – were the messages from the Queen of Peace that urges us to seek joy in nature and to love the beauty and colors of our world – a world our God created for us.

Our Lady – The Queen of Peace of Medjugorje – has talked of “Nature” frequently. Here are a few of her  beautiful words that  capture, for me anyway,  the relationship between ourselves and the world our Creator has given us.

Dear children! Also today I call you to give glory to God the Creator in the colors of nature. He speaks to you also through the smallest flower about His beauty and the depth of love with which He has created you. Find peace in nature and you will discover God the Creator Whom you will be able to give thanks to for all creatures; then you will find joy in your heart\

Dear children! I invite you now to be open to God. See, children, how nature is opening herself and is giving life and fruits. In the same way I invite you to live with God and to surrender completely to him

Dear Children! Today I invite you to go into nature because there you will meet God the Creator. Today I invite you, little children, to thank God for all that He gives you.

Dear children! Also today I call you to give thanks to God in your heart for all the graces which He gives you, also through the signs and colors that are in nature. God wants to draw you closer to Himself and moves you to give Him glory and thanks.

Our Lady invites us “to go into nature” and I seem to do that best on the ocean.   Offshore,  on a small boat, I feel the presence of eternity and best of all there are wonderful unexpected  moments when the reality of heaven and salvation pour into my soul – that I can testify to. Many people seem to have problems with the simplicity of the messages of Medjugorje, but I am here to tell you off shore on a small boat far from land, the messages, as they are written,  reach deep into my soul. I find the words perfectly said – they require no less – they need nothing more. They are words from the beyond.