Today, the eve of the feast of Medjugorje, we celebrate Saint John the Baptist. John the Baptist was the forerunner of the Lord Jesus, he preceded Him by six months. John the Baptist recognised Jesus in his mother’s womb¹, he was raised and formed by the Holy Spirit in deserted places.

He was the last prophet of the Old Testament and Jesus said great things about him, He said: «No one born of woman is greater than he»². To the apostles He said: “You are not worth even a fingernail of John the Baptist”. But then He added: «But those destined for the Kingdom of Heaven are greater even than John the Baptist»³.

He was called to prepare the way, called to recognise Jesus. It is he who says, at the Jordan: «Behold the Son of God»⁴. But he had never seen Jesus with his own eyes before, he did not know who He was. This becomes clear when he sends out his disciples with the words: «Go and ask if He is the one who is to come?»⁵. Understand therefore that even John the Baptist, who had such greatness and was formed in the spirit, had to walk in faith, only in faith; in faith that was then confirmed, as to all who walk in faith, with signs. He saw the dove descending, the Holy Spirit. It is not that he was totally… he was formed and – I think I read it at Anna Emmerick – fed by animals, visited by the faithful brothers and sisters in the desert, so none of these dimensions were new to him, but in faith.

However, today I wanted to emphasise a few things: he is the forerunner of Jesus, St Michael the Archangel is the forerunner of Jesus’ second coming, and I say the people, we – the Church of Jesus Christ of the Universe – are the forerunners of Jesus’ glorious return.

The readings we have read, from the prophet Isaiah above all⁶, emphasise something that, believe me, is at the heart of everything: recognising that we are children of God. That reading from Isaiah says what we know: it speaks of the yes to God at conception, that already at conception the Lord calls us, calls us to be His children; He calls us, He gives us a mission, He gives us our identity. That reading refers to Jesus, but it refers very well to John the Baptist, if we look at it, if we listen to it; and it refers to each one of us.

There is a passage that, if we do not do it, we cannot understand the whole journey: we are children, God’s children; to feel children, to feel God’s fatherhood, His fatherhood that does not depend on us and our works. We are children insofar as He has created us and He has made it possible for us to rediscover this sonship. It is important. I know we all say it, we are all children, but we have to feel this fatherhood. He is Father beyond everything, it is only up to us to welcome Him as such. But when do we accept Him? When we make an act of faith where we say: “I am certain that God is my Father”. I repeat: try to see it and do it but with a certainty on the level of St Francis when he leaves his robes and says: “I have only one Father in heaven”; that is discovering that fatherhood, which does not mean denying earthly fatherhood, but discovering that of the true Father. This starts a whole life within.

Accepting this fatherhood is the centre of the Christian journey because Jesus came to show us the Face of the Father⁷, eternal life is to know the Father⁸. So if we do not take the first step in faith, the whole dynamic of healing within us does not start.

The forgiveness that Jesus brought, His redemption, is precisely to open us up to meet the Father, our identity. If we, too, were to accept Jesus’ forgiveness, welcome all the Angels, all the Saints, all the righteous, but this dynamic of the Fatherhood of God, of the Father, does not start in us, we achieve nothing, we do not heal, we do not rise. We accept forgiveness but do not attain resurrection. It is that dynamic that we all often have in us, I think, of not fully experiencing the resurrection, that dynamic of not entering into the awareness that we are children, but not just any children: children of God. That dynamic melts away all the problems we can have. With this awareness that we can turn to a Father, that we can turn to our Father, that we have a Father who carries us on His hands, who guards us like the pupils of His eyes, who does everything He can for us, who removes the stones in front of us, we can face the worst things in life. So if we stumble, that means it is OK. We have a Father. To meet Christ is to get there.

So the more we enter into this certainty of being children of God, and we must succeed in doing so without – because here on earth it is unfortunately not self-evident – that we are children, regardless of our merits. We do not have to conquer this love. It is He who conquered us, it is He who wanted us. Unlike so many children on Earth who are rejected, God the Father shows us that not only did He not reject us after having generated us, but He sends His Son, He sends all the prophets, He sends Mary Most Holy in Her apparitions because He loves us and wants to recover us. He does not reject us.

So, we have to feel that we are children, regardless if we deserve it or not; because look, when we come to “whether we deserve it or not” it is always a judgement that starts from the wrong vision that we have of love, that we have of the Father, given by our experience. But precisely to heal from all this level we have to say: “I have a Father without ifs and buts, I have Him, and I know I am loved”. That is the first step. Having made that passage I guarantee that we will feel within us what He says in the prophet Isaiah. This feeling of being welcomed, wanted, desired will start within us. It will start, it is obligatory.

In the readings it is said again and again – and it is also said of John the Baptist: to be the light of the nations⁹. Here too in my opinion there is a difference between the Baptist and us, between the prophets of the Old Testament and us. The Baptist is a witness to the light; we are light, or at least we should be. We are not witnesses to the light, we are light, because this dynamic of the children of God begins. And we become children again in the Son, something that John the Baptist could not do. Why is it that, for those who welcome the Kingdom of God, we are greater even than he who, I said before, is so great? Because being children of God begins, because this sonship with the Father begins, which has been reopened only with Jesus. Therein lies the greatness, but we must welcome it; not conquer it, welcome it, that is different; not earn it, welcome it.

We, by the way, are here in this Sanctuary of God the Father, which He wanted, and He wanted it precisely for this reason. He wanted it by saying that it is from here that that grace starts that must reach humanity, that primary energy that must bring to humanity that there is a Father who loves, a Father who guides, a Father who will leave nothing unfinished to save all. Because Jesus Christ, Mary Most Holy, the Holy Spirit, the whole Church also move on the Father’s desires. They do it out of love for the Father, a Father who wants to gather His children. It is all the work of the Father’s grace. This is what starts here.

He also wants – better desires – something more: He would like us to collaborate with Him to improve the world, to save the world; He wants, together with us – would like, desires – to rewrite history. Here too, if we start with the fact that we have a Father with whom we are willingly with, by whom we feel loved, by whom we know that He is all-powerful, that He wants us to participate in His work – let us call it that, all by grace – that He loves us, that He loves us in the same way and with the same intensity with which He loved all the saints; with which He loved St John the Baptist, St Francis, St Clare, St Joseph (put them all) in the same way and with the same intensity with which He loved His Son Jesus Christ who was the first-born, but He loves us just the same way. He loves us that way because we are His children; it is not that He only loves the saints. He loves. If we feel loved, we are holy; if we feel children, we are holy. We do not have to do miracles or works of asceticism to be holy: we are holy if we recognise that we are children of God; then we are holy and He loves us. And precisely because He loves us, He also has a plan for us, a place for us. There is a place for every one of us in His house, but also already here, without waiting to find Him later.

So, feeling children, knowing the Father, following what He has thought for us, envisaged, is life, is true life. So, excuse me for repeating myself, the first step is: I recognise myself as a child. This starts a dynamic that He will use all our lives to finally bring us into what life is. It sounds like I am saying the same, but it works like this. He will use everything, everything will turn out well for us, everything will be planned, everything will be calculated to bring us into true life. We can only resist to that. We do not have to do anything, we should not do anything, that would already be great.

Look that Mary Most Holy came to Medjugorje precisely for this. She has been trying to say this for forty-three years. She came to prepare Her children, to let them understand that they are children of God, children of the Father. She came to prepare them for the newness of life, and the newness is the Father. There is no other newness. The only newness is God the Father, because He is not known.

Knowing the Father is where all healing starts and also all mission starts. As I said before, the forgiveness of the Father that we receive and rediscovering that we are children, is the faith that we must use to live every trial, every wound, even from the past, in the awareness of being children of God, and that is the healing. All healing starts from there. Without this awareness there is no healing, there is no medicine, there is nothing. However, with this awareness and by participating in life and these healings that start within us in our life, we too become witnesses, we become apostles.

And what are we witnessing? The Father’s love. Which came to us how? By accepting the Son. And we return to the only thing that must be announced: Lord Jesus died and rose again for us, He will return and lead us to the Father, but in a concrete manner, not only in words. Therefore, by participating in this way we become apostles, we become witnesses, instruments for others. As I always say, or often at least: God’s love for us is so great that He expects nothing but our desire to participate. Besides, He has already foreseen everything. By simply living we are apostles, we are saints, we are children, we are resurrected, we are healing, we are transforming, we are writing history, we are doing it all, simply by living. Tell me if this is not love.

So, on the eve of Mary’s apparitions, I ask You, O Mother, truly, that what You have brought to Medjugorje be realised within us, this openness to the newness of having a Father, so that truly each one of us may become that light which is not our own, but a reflection of the Father’s light, of being children of God, in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.