Aaron

I was rooted in faith. My parents put the seeds down, and my community. I went to Catholic school growing up, my grandparents are religious, I grew up in a Catholic community, but I didn’t really take it seriously until more recently.

I felt like I was called to take it more seriously. 

It’s interesting that I’ve wanted to come to Medjugorje for this long. I’ve read about Lourdes and Fatima, but something about this place specifically stands out. 

I decided in October, “If I’m going to go, I need to go now. Why wait?”

It was just something inside like, “I should go,” and I just did. 

I’m not that kind of person. I don’t think I would ever go to the beach alone or out west in the United States alone, but here it’s different because I was coming for myself, coming for a spiritual retreat. 

My favorite thing, I mean it’s all been good so I hate to pick favorites but, climbing Apparition Hill every day. 

I figured I’m only here for five days, I might as well go up there and take advantage of it.

Last night I was up there for an hour. It’s so peaceful. Actually, the two nights I’ve climbed, I’ve been up there all by myself. I like that. 

I went up there last night after I went to Confession. It was peaceful to walk up there just to be with Our Lady. 

Cross Mountain was really pretty at the top. I tried to pay attention to what our guide, Miki, was saying, and meditate on that. I thought about Jesus on His way to Calvary, and how good life is, my life is so easy and good. 

I was not expecting all the rocks. Even things I’ve seen online, I knew it was kind of steep, but it’s a lot steeper than I thought with pointy rocks. 

I don’t think my friend expected it to be that steep either. At the bottom of the hill, she was like, “It’ll be easy. I think I can get to the top.” I don’t think we were to the third Station yet, and she was like, “I can’t do this.”

I saw her over there. She was having a hard time so I said, “She definitely needs some help.”

I went over there and I asked and she said, “Yes please. Give me your hand.” Then I pretty much held her hand all the way up. 

This whole place, I think it’s awesome that everybody in town goes to church every day. Every day, down at the church, it’s packed, and the whole town is in on it. Every day you go to church, you see young people, old people, kids. The confessional lines are always long. The community here was awesome.