date: 13.02.2022.
On November 27 last year, Pope Francis appointed Archbishop Aldo Cavalli as an apostolic visitor with a special role for the parish of Medjugorje, where he arrived last night on the feast of Our Lady of Lourdes.
Medjugorje joyfully welcomed its new apostolic visitor, and we are also glad that on the first day of his stay he found time to be a guest on the program of the Radio Station Mir Medjugorje and the Information Center Mir Medjugorje video platforms.
Father Archbishop, praised be Jesus and Mary and welcome.
Thank you, thank you for inviting me to this interview. I thank the Lord and the Virgin Mary, and the Holy Father who have appointed me here. I have never been here, but many people from my country and from my parish came here. And upon their return, I always noticed something very deep: they returned full of good will, filled with faith, filled with the desire to live good, to receive the Lord, filled with the good for Our Lady, with the desire to pray the rosary. I noticed many positive things. But I have never been here in person. So when the Pope appointed me, at the age of 75, I was pleased. I was glad to come here. I came gladly, very gladly.
What are your first impressions upon your arrival in Medjugorje?
I wanted to talk to the Franciscans who have been here for a long time and who have done many good things. And they continue to work very well. They are the ones I first met. And I noticed that they love this place. They are glad to confess, they gladly preach, they are at the disposal of the grace of God. And that is very positive. This morning I visited the church, the places where people come and I always have a profound question: Why do so many people come here? And there is a profound “because”. They don't come for fun, for other reasons ... I have always noticed that they come with a desire to meet the Lord, pray and be in the company of the Virgin Mary. Two things together: encounter the Lord, pray, change lives and be in the company of the Virgin Mary. When my people came back from here, these were the two fundamental points. And now comes the consequence: What should I do? What do the Franciscans do, and they do it very well? We work with the grace to help, in the best possible way, people who come to encounter the Lord and be in the company of the Virgin Mary. That is our goal. Together with the Franciscans, the Bishop of Mostar, and many lay people who work here like you, work together with these people who come for a single goal: to meet the Lord in a holy place—and this has become a holy place—, to meet the Lord in the Eucharist, to meet him in the Gospel, meet him in Adoration, meet him in confession, and abide in the company of the Blessed Virgin Mary. We need to cooperate in that, not in something else. We need to work with the Holy Spirit to help believers in this regard.
You said that you had never been to Medjugorje before, but you had the opportunity to meet people who made a pilgrimage here. How familiar are you with the Medjugorje phenomenon and everything that has happened here in the past 40 years?
Look, I am Italian. In my country, Medjugorje has become a starting point. And when people have a starting point, they realize that there they will meet who they want to meet, and that is the Lord and the Virgin Mary. And no one can stop them in that, no one can stop them. And that is very positive. People have come, are coming, and will be coming even more. But we must preserve this place as a profound spiritual place. It is natural, if people come that there should be reception facilities, which means when people come, they should stay somewhere. Where will they stay? Therefore, one facility needs to be built in which they will be able to eat; another facility in which they will be able to buy gifts related to their experience… We make it available to them, and these are normal, human things that are needed to be able to live here. And that's normal, normal. In every holy place people have a need for facilities and that is always the case. It's the same in Rome. People come to Rome because the Pope is in Rome. That’s the most important reason, but there are a lot of beautiful things in Rome. Rome is beautiful, but the Pope is also there. And when they come, where will they stay? In hotels, institutes. They are also needed. They want to buy souvenirs, and they will buy them. They are useful to remind them of the spiritual environment in which they were. It is the same for Medjugorje.
You have spent much of your life in diplomacy. At the end of January, you completed your ministry as Apostolic Nuncio to the Netherlands. Now the Pope has entrusted you with a ministry that has above all a pastoral character. How did you receive the news of your appointment as an apostolic visitor with a special role for the parish of Medjugorje?
Look, since I became a priest, everything has been a pastoral ministry for me. The division between diplomacy and pastoral care does not exist for us, for me. Why? Because a person has a pastoral ability, not a function. The function comes later. Inside we have a pastoral ability so that everything we do becomes pastoral care. And that is very positive. I used to meet ambassadors, they are the people who represent an entire country. They have their importance, because they represent an entire country. And there is a very big responsibility. We approach it as apostolic nuncios, ambassadors, but also as priests. And they know it. Wherever I went, to any part of the world, when we met for cocktails, dinners, meetings, national celebrations, I came dressed as I am now. And everyone knows that. I speak like others do, I eat and drink like others do, I talk to everyone, but they always, just always, and always start talking about the Lord, the Pope, the Church,… always. Always, always, always. Because these are spiritual themes that we all have inside of ourselves. And they have them inside of themselves. They take the opportunity because there is a person who represents such an invisible and such a profound world. A conversation develops, and it is always deep and spiritual. And that is a pastoral care.
Father Archbishop, what does the continuation of the ministry of the Apostolic Visitor mean for Medjugorje?
You see, the Pope represents the universal Church and therefore sends an envoy, and the envoy with the Pope represents the universal Church. This means that the universal Church is attentive to this phenomenon, very attentive. I saw in the parish house one picture, a beautiful picture, very profound. It is located in the office of the apostolic visitor. It depicts Medjugorje, the church, this church is a recognizable sign all over the world… It shows Medjugorje, Mary, it shows the whole world close to Mary, and the rays that radiate from Medjugorje to the whole world. That is what we should become: the rays of the Lord, the rays of the Virgin Mary all over the world. And the Pope represents the whole world, the spiritual world, the visitation of the Son of God among us. That is the meaning of the apostolic visitor. The whole Church looks at Medjugorje. Medjugorje should watch the whole Church and in the whole world. The means I have noticed here is very important: to reach the whole world. These means are normal today, they should be used in the best possible way and with the best possible technique to reach the whole world. That is something very positive.
You met with the Holy Father after being appointed apostolic visitor. Since the Pope sent you to Medjugorje, we know that he cares about Medjugorje and everything that is happening here. So how does the Pope look at it and what did he say?
Look, the Pope received me very nicely. He told me a few words about Medjugorje. He told me: “You go there, be there and be calm, calm and balanced, be there and follow people.” And that's it. And the rest of the conversation with the Pope, and the Pope is always like that with me, we talked about how to bring the Gospel to people. How to bring the Gospel to everyone today in this society, which is ours. Society has its culture, and culture is changing. When culture changes we must not condemn, or criticize, nor judge. We have to be within it, because that is our culture. How to proclaim the Gospel within that culture? How did the Lord do that? He entered a culture and preached the gospel within that culture: by language, by the way he behaved, the Lord was a Jew, by the way of behaving inherent in that culture. How to reach that culture? In this part of our world—the western world—that culture used to be all Christian, all, in different ways: Protestants, Anglicans, whatever you want, but the moral was completely Christian. Europe was Christian. We have an incredible change of culture. Are they evil? No, not at all, not at all. They just live in a different culture. And they are very accessible. I was in the Netherlands, and the Netherlands is a reflection of that other culture. It is one strong country, I can tell you that for sure. Strong means that these are people who produce, work, have innovations. Every year in the Nunciature I received young people, groups of young people, young students from all over the world. Namely, all Dutch universities are bilingual, and here you are also translating all of this for the whole world. At all universities Flemish and English are spoken, at all of them. So young people from all over the world came in groups of fifteen, from all over the world. What did they know about Jesus? Almost nothing. In that culture, Jesus is just one of many. What did they know about God? That is something completely unclear. What did they know about the Church? But they knew the Vatican. Because the Vatican is the Vatican. They know the Pope because the Pope is the Pope and he goes to many places. They wanted to know why the Pope has embassies. And used to come to me. And I would start explaining to them, starting with Jesus Christ. If we do not start from Him, nothing will be explained. They were very attentive, very attentive! I would speak for half an hour, explaining to them the things from Jesus Christ to the present day. I explained it to them well and they were very attentive. And how many questions would follow later! How much interest would they show? No one was against us, no one! But they didn't know us, because our message barely reached that culture. What has to be done? We need to accept them, to live with them, it is very important to live with them and be with them. I talked to the Pope about one very important letter from the first century around the year 100-110 Diogenes' letter. How do Christians live? Who are the Christians? It was written about it at that time, in the time immediately after the Apostolic times. We live like others: we dress like others, we eat like others, we work like others, we pay taxes like others, we marry like others, but we live like Christians. Here’s what we need to do. To live with everyone, not to criticize, not to condemn, but to live like Christians. To convey the life of Jesus Christ as He did, to pass it on to others. But we need to change our attitude. There is no need to change methods, because methods do not create the Christian life. Attitude changes the Christian life. And attitude means that something inside that changes us, that sees people the way the Lord sees them. Human persons need to be loved and served. We need to live an inner life without an inner fear of living in communion with them. With no fear, but to live as Christians.
Although the ministry of the apostolic visitor is primarily pastoral, Archbishop Hoser spoke positively about the Medjugorje phenomenon, visionaries, Marian devotion, especially emphasizing Christocentric nature of Medjugorje and the celebration of the sacraments. How familiar are you with the work of your predecessor, the late Archbishop Hoser?
I never met him. But I understood one thing about him: he loved Medjugorje. He loved Medjugorje. That is the attitude, to love Medjugorje and be happy to live in it. That's what I recognized. He loved it and was pleased. He had great devotion to the Virgin Mary—great—and he had great love for the Church. He was in Rwanda for twenty years, in difficult times and I understand him well, because I was in Burundi for five years, which is close to Rwanda and I know the situation well. He was a physician, so he did well in that area as well. He was a bishop in Warsaw. And then they sent him here as old as me. He loved this place. He loved this place. In the parish house I said: “Please keep the picture of Msgr. Hoser, keep it." It’s a story, a beautiful story of a man who gave his life here and practically died. One beautiful story and it should be kept. Because history does not need to be erased. It should never be deleted. The Franciscans showed me in the parish house how many people died in the past, not so long ago, they died as martyrs, so many people were killed in this region. It's history. We can never forget that we are the fruit of that history. I came after Msgr. Hoser worked here well for 3,4,5 years. He worked well, in the sense that he gave his life for Medjugorje.
Even this year, at the beginning of August in Medjugorje will be held Mladifest, which brings together tens of thousands of young people from around the world. The young people emphasize that they are particularly impressed by the devotion to Adoration, the Holy Mass concelebrated by more than 500 priests from all over the world. In recent years, church dignitaries have been with the youth in Medjugorje at the Mladifest and sent their message to the youth. Will it be the same at this year's Mladifest?
Look, there are organizational bodies here that know how to do that kind of work. We talked about that youth meeting in August and it seems to me that two years ago, before covid-pandemics, there were more than 50,000 young people for a whole week. And we always ask ourselves: Why did they come? They prayed, many fasted, listened to presentations, participated in adoration, day and night. Why is this happening? These are young people from all over the world. Why is this happening? Why do young people come here? What do they expect to meet? The Lord Jesus, no doubt. And the Virgin Mary, no doubt. And we, how can we work with Jesus and the Virgin Mary to help these young people meet Jesus and the Virgin Mary? The parish priest of the Ars (St. John Maria Viannney) understood one profound reality: thousands of people came to his confession, he confessed for fifteen, eighteen hours a day and he always did it well, calmly, peacefully, listening to everyone and everything, he received them nicely. He realized that the One who called all these people was not him, it was the Lord Jesus. But he was the means by which all these persons met the Lord Jesus. So, there was the Lord Jesus, all those people and he as an instrument. He realized that he was a valuable asset, a very valuable asset, both spiritually and in a human way. He always received everyone nicely. So must we do. Who invites these young people? It's not us. Who is calling them? This is the Lord Jesus, using the Virgin Mary, which is very important. And what are we? We are the instruments. We need to have the ability to be open, accepting, cheerful. In a way that we are valuable and useful means for others to meet the Lord Jesus.
Now that you have arrived here in Medjugorje, what are your plans and what will be your first moves?
Look, it's very simple. I didn't expect to be sent here either. If they sent me, Lord, Virgin Mary, Pope, Church, there is a reason, but I do not know it. The first thing is to cooperate, to cooperate. To cooperate with the Franciscans who are here and work hard, to cooperate with the Bishop of Mostar who is the bishop of this whole part of the Church, to cooperate with the laity who work well here, to cooperate. That's the first thing I need to do. But cooperating means working together, I need to work with them. Because together, united, a lot and good can be done. That's the first thing I'm going to do. Furthermore, pray, pray, pray, because we are empty without prayer, we are empty. My father who could only read and write, a poor man, never told me anything. But once I became a priest, he told me, “Do you know why priests are not so good today? Because they don't pray.” My father, who never said anything to me, said, "Because they don't pray." I realized something in his humility and poverty: our strength is prayer. For we, as I have already said, only represent the Lord Jesus, but our fundamental point, our foundation is the Lord Jesus. Without prayer we become empty. Therefore, one should pray. And then do what we need to do. With no fear of anything.
Father Archbishop, thank you very much for this conversation and for all the messages you have sent to our viewers and listeners. I sincerely hope that this will be the beginning of a beautiful collaboration with you now upon arrival in Medjugorje. May the prayers of all the parishioners of the parish of Medjugorje and our pilgrims be your strength.
Thank you, thank you very much. Thank you all, thank you for what you are doing for the whole world. You reach out to a lot of people that we don’t reach out to, but you do reach out to them this way. Many are listening to you. Thank you very much, thank you for your ability, because it seems to me that you are doing a good job. What I have seen, you work very professionally, and that is how it should be done. Thank you and may the Lord and the Virgin Mary bless you. Thank you.
