(RNS) — Every Sunday, in Flushing Meadows Park in Queens, New York, a group of followers of Veronica Lueken, a Catholic housewife who said she saw visions of Mary starting in 1968, gather around a statue of Mary placed on a park bench and pray the rosary. A rival group, which split after Lueken’s 1995 death, gathers on a nearby traffic island.During her life, Lueken said she received messages that challenged the post-Second Vatican Council Catholic Church and warned people to repent.
While alleged Marian apparitions are plentiful, most, like Lueken’s, go without official recognition by the Catholic Church. Only 25% of apparitions have been recognized by the local bishop in the church’s 2,000-year history. Of those, the Vatican has only recognized 16.
This Friday (May 17), the Vatican will release a document with new norms for discerning Marian apparitions and other supernatural phenomena, the first time those norms have been updated since 1978.
In explaining the importance of Marian shrines, Robert Orsi, who holds the Grace Craddock Nagle Chair in Catholic Studies at Northwestern University, cites a gas station attendant in Knock, Ireland, the site of an officially recognized Marian shrine, who told Orsi, “Here the transcendent broke into time.”
Robert Orsi. (Photo by Tony Rinaldo)
The sites are so beloved that people replicate them around the world. The tourism website for Lourdes, another site of a well-known and officially recognized apparition, says there are more than 765 replica sites in France and another 321 in the rest of the world.
At the Our Lady of Lourdes Grotto in the Bronx, near where Orsi grew up, people know the water they’re collecting to take back to their sick …
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While alleged Marian apparitions are plentiful, most, like Lueken’s, go without official recognition by the Catholic Church. Only 25% of apparitions have been recognized by the local bishop in the church’s 2,000-year history. Of those, the Vatican has only recognized 16.
This Friday (May 17), the Vatican will release a document with new norms for discerning Marian apparitions and other supernatural phenomena, the first time those norms have been updated since 1978.
In explaining the importance of Marian shrines, Robert Orsi, who holds the Grace Craddock Nagle Chair in Catholic Studies at Northwestern University, cites a gas station attendant in Knock, Ireland, the site of an officially recognized Marian shrine, who told Orsi, “Here the transcendent broke into time.”
Robert Orsi. (Photo by Tony Rinaldo)
The sites are so beloved that people replicate them around the world. The tourism website for Lourdes, another site of a well-known and officially recognized apparition, says there are more than 765 replica sites in France and another 321 in the rest of the world.
At the Our Lady of Lourdes Grotto in the Bronx, near where Orsi grew up, people know the water they’re collecting to take back to their sick …nnDiscussion:nn” ai_name=”RocketNews AI: ” start_sentence=”Can I tell you more about this article?” text_input_placeholder=”Type ‘Yes'”]