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Fr. Stephen Shin’s Reflections on the Messages
 
August 25, 2024

Dear children! Today, my prayer with you is for peace. Good and evil are fighting and want to prevail in the world and in the hearts of people. You be people of hope and prayer and of great trust in God the Creator to Whom everything is possible. Little children, may peace prevail in you and around you. I am blessing you with my motherly blessing that you, little children, may be joy for all those whom you meet. Thank you for having responded to my call.”

 

Dear children! Today, my prayer with you is for peace. Good and evil are fighting and want to prevail in the world and in the hearts of people.

 

With the words "Dear children! Today, my prayer with you is for peace." the Blessed Mother lets us know what our common prayer intention should be—peace. There are countless other prayer intentions, but above all, she asks us to pray for peace. Why should we pray for peace? Because it is the most urgent and important issue for us, and as she mentioned in her message on June 25, peace is in danger. Furthermore, the battle between good and evil is being fought in the world and in the hearts of people. We must fight against Satan, who seeks to steal peace from the world and from people’s hearts, by praying for peace.

The Blessed Mother not only asks us to pray for peace, but she also tells us that she herself is praying with us for peace. How reassuring it is to know that the Queen of Peace is praying with us for peace! When our weak prayers are joined with her powerful intercession, those prayers gain tremendous strength. We must never forget that when we pray for peace, the Blessed Mother is always praying with us.

Each of us faces different situations, and thus we all have different prayer intentions. Of course, it is necessary to pray for our personal intentions. However, before our individual intentions, we should always place peace and the conversion of sinners as our primary intentions in prayer. This is what God and the Blessed Mother desire most. By adjusting the priority of our prayer intentions in this way, we can help God, the Blessed Mother, and our neighbors, ultimately contributing to our own peace and salvation.

 

You be people of hope and prayer and of great trust in God the Creator to Whom everything is possible. Little children, may peace prevail in you and around you.

 

The Blessed Mother wants us to be people of hope and prayer. A person who hopes and prays is someone who has faith in God and a positive outlook on life. Such a person never despairs because, although they cannot see God, they firmly believe that He exists and that He will always rescue them from despair and sorrow. This is why they constantly view, think, and accept everything from a positive perspective. Even in seemingly hopeless situations where no solution or way out appears humanly possible, they do not despair but maintain hope. They believe that, despite the great difficulties or despair they are facing, everything will turn out well. Instead of worrying, even in situations where humanly speaking there seems to be no possibility, they choose to pray. With absolute trust in God, they entrust everything to Him and pray. At this point, the words of St. Padre Pio naturally come to mind: “Pray, hope, and don't worry.”

With God, all things are possible. He is the one who created something out of nothing by His word. Everything in the world, indeed the entire universe, was created by God's word. The phrase “God said, and it was so” is repeated throughout Genesis 1. Everything happens as He commands. "For nothing will be impossible with God" (Lk 1:37). Our Creator God, who makes all things possible, asks only one thing from us. The Blessed Mother teaches us that it is deep trust in the Creator God—faith. If we trust deeply in the Creator God, who makes all things possible, and firmly believe in Him, we will experience the fulfillment of Jesus' words, “Everything is possible for one who believes” (Mk 9:23). This faith will give us life, even after death (cf. John 11:25), and bring us eternal life (cf. Jn 6:47).

 

I am blessing you with my motherly blessing that you, little children, may be joy for all those whom you meet. Thank you for having responded to my call.

 

Satan sows seeds of hatred in the hearts of people and tries to divide every relationship. However, the Queen of Peace desires that peace fill us and surround us. The reason the Blessed Mother has been coming to us for such a long time is because of her desire for peace in us and in the world. She wants our hearts and the world to be filled with peace. As the Queen of Peace, when she appeared in Medjugorje on June 26, 1981, the third day of the apparitions, she said, "Peace, peace, only peace!" while descending from Apparition Hill. Afterward, she appeared again to Marija while they were descending the hill and, with tears in her eyes, said, "Peace must reign between God and man, and between men." Forty-three years later, in her message on August 25, 2024, she continues to speak about peace: "Dear children! Today, my prayer with you is for peace... May peace prevail in you and around you."

If we do not have peace within ourselves, we cannot bring peace to those around us. Nor can we bring joy to everyone we meet. The peace of this world starts with the peace within us. First and foremost, let us pray with the Blessed Mother for peace to be abundant within us and around us, and continually seek her motherly blessing.

 

 


 
 

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