Mel Gibson plans film on disputed Marian visions

BY FREDDY GRAY
HOW WOOD director and actor Mel Gibson is reportedly planning to make a film about Medjugorje, the controversial shrine in Bosnia where the Blessed Virgin Mary has allegedly been appearing to a group of six people for more than 20 years.
Bosnian Catholic priests have said that Mel Gibson, who in 2004 directed and produced the hugely acclaimed The Passion of The Christ, will visit Medjugorje in March to begin work on the film.
A scriptwriter, Carol Cook, has already visited the shrine, according to the Vecernji List newspaper.
The news is likely to cause alarm in some Catholic circles. The Vatican has never officially recognised the shrine and local bishops do not believe the claims of the seers. They have repeatedly ruled that there is no evidence of manifestations of divine origin in Medjugorje.
Bishop Ratko Peric of Mostar-Duyno, the southern Bosnian diocese under which Medjugorje falls, issued a statement in 2004 which said: "The Church, from the local to supreme level, from the beginning to this very day, has clearly and constantly repeated: Non constat de supernaturalilate [not established as supernatural]. No to pilgrimages that would ascribe a supernatural nature to the apparitions, no shrine of the Madonna, neither authentic messages nor revelations, no true visions."
But the actor Jim Caviezel, a friend of Gibson who played Jesus in The Passion of The Christ. believes firmly in the miraculous nature of the shrine. "The catharsis for me to play this role was through Medjugorje," he said of his performance.
He added: "When I came [to Medjugorje], I knew immediately, from what I was feeling in my heart, that it was real. I haven't seen signs or anything, but I have been a Catholic for my whole life and I had never felt in confession as I felt when I was here. It was a tremendous healing."
Medjugorje made headlines in 1981 after six schoolchildren each said they had seen an apparition of the Virgin Mary.
More than five million people are thought to have visited Medjugorje since the claims were first made, while the seers themselves tour overseas, often claiming to experience visions of the Virgin while travelling.