Marlboro
It all started when Barbara and I went to a Marian shrine in Marlboro, New Jersey in the beginning of June 1993. Barbara led me to the shrine because I could hardly walk. It did not mean anything to me then, however, because my family did not believe in God and had never followed any religion.
As we walked around to the back of the house, I saw people sitting on the bench. I asked Barbara, “Why did you lead me to a picnic?” She told me to sit down and be quiet. As I was sitting there, I noticed statues and I told her, “I know that’s Jesus on the Cross, but who is that lady statue?
She whispered, “That’s the Virgin Mary, Mother of God.”
Then I said, “I don’t care. Get me out of here.”
She told me, “Be quiet and sit there.”
After most of the people left, she went up to the statue of Jesus on the Cross. Then she went to the Virgin Mary. Finally, she stood up and began heading for the car.
I asked her, “What should I do?”
She answered, “Do what you want.”
I stood up and went to Jesus on the Cross. I knelt down and said, “I know what it’s like being hung on a Cross, for I feel your pain. When I was a child, my hands were tied together and hung on a nail near the ceiling. I was whipped with a belt. Well, that’s all I have to say.” I got up and went to the car.
Barbara and I drove to a Chinese restaurant. She asked me if anything had happened to me.
I replied, “No.”
Then she said, “Did you feel any peace?”
I said, “A little bit.” Then she drove me home.
Three weeks later, near the end of June 1993, she drove me back to Marlboro against my will. Again, I could hardly walk, and I was feeling a lot of pain in my back. I could hardly sit on the bench. Barbara got up and started praying near the Cross of Jesus. She prayed so hard, sweat ran down her face, and I said to myself, “Please give her what she wants.”
Next, she stood up and went to the Virgin Mary. As she walked to the car, I asked, “What do I do now?”
She gave me the same response as last time: “Do what you want.”
Go To the Virgin Mary
I was ready to leave, but for some reason, I went and knelt at the foot of the Cross. My mind was completely blank, and I just looked up at Jesus. All of a sudden, I could not move my eyes from the nail in His feet. My eyes were frozen there. Around my head, I heard a voice that whispered, “Touch it. Go ahead. Touch it.” I started to raise my right hand to touch the nail in Jesus’ feet with my index finger.
All of a sudden, I said to myself, “What am I doing?” I pulled my hand away.
Then the same voice whispered gently again, “Touch it. Touch it.” A strong force propelled my hand forward to touch the nail in Jesus’ feet. I felt a warm sensation that filled my stomach and then quickly rose up towards my head. As it reached my eyes, tears came flowing out, and then the sensation continued upward to the top of my head.
Then I heard a deep male voice, gentle but strong, inside my head say, “Go to the Virgin Mary.” I wiped my eyes with my hands. I got up, and I was able to walk fast and easily without any pain. I went to the statue of the Virgin Mary.
I stood in front of the statue and said, “I have to get to know you.” Then I left.
Afterwards, Barbara and I, again, went to the same Chinese restaurant.
As we were talking, I blurted out to her, “I have to get to know the Virgin Mary.”
She said, “What? Tell me what happened!” I told her that at the foot of the Cross, something had gone through me as I touched the nail, and a voice had said, “Go to the Virgin Mary.”
Then Barbara said, “Marjory, don’t tell anybody; everyone will think you are crazy.” Then she took me home.
A Deep Love and Peace
In the days that followed, I began to feel a deep, deep love and peace within me. Whenever I would hear church music on the radio, I would feel touched by the music. I would listen to it for hours and hours, trying to sing along with the songs. When the music stopped playing, I would call the radio station and ask it to play more.
Then I began driving to the beach. My diet started changing too. I started craving fish, baked bread, and water. This was quite unusual for me, since I had always hated fish. On my way to the beach, I would stop for plums, grapes, and water. I began to lose weight. I was fasting, but I did not know it at the time.
A week later, I invited my friend Carol to my house. I excitedly told her all that had happened to me at Marlboro. She didn’t say anything, but she gave me a set of Rosary beads. She said, “I feel these are for you.” I put the Rosary beads around my neck because I thought they were a necklace. Then she gave me a booklet, which explained how to pray the Rosary. I stayed up all night learning how to say the “Hail Mary” prayer.
As time went by, I began staying up all night praying while I slept at intervals during the day. On July 4th, I drove to the beach and stayed for two hours. On the way home, I had a strong desire to return to Marlboro. To my surprise, the road was blocked by police officers. Disappointed and confused, I drove home and called Barbara. I told her that I had wanted to go to Marlboro, but the road had been blocked by police officers. She replied that the Virgin Mary was appearing to the visionary, Joseph Januszkiewicz, on this day. She told me that people had to park their cars quite a distance from the shrine and then walk about two miles on foot to the area.
I called Carol and pleaded with her to go to Marlboro, but Carol made fun of me, saying the Virgin Mary was up in the clouds drinking a cup of coffee.
I said, “I know she’s there, and if I read about her in the paper, I will not be your friend anymore.”
So, reluctantly, I kept my promise to go with Carol to the fireworks near her house. It was boring. While I was watching the display in the sky, I prayed to the Virgin Mary, promising her I would come to the apparition in August.
I continued my trips to Marlboro. As I prayed and fasted, many different emotions began to surface. I started to reflect on my past. The beautiful experience of peace and love that I felt at the shrine contrasted sharply with my childhood remembrances of abuse in my family. I knew the Blessed Virgin Mary and Jesus wanted to heal me, and that I was being asked to go to some places in my memory that were blocked. Doors to the past were being opened for me now. I cried my heart out until I had no more tears.
The Childhood from Hell
When I was a child, I remember my mother always leaving me. She would leave me with my grandmother and take off without telling me. The worst times were when she would leave me with strangers. Some of them were very bizarre, and I felt scared all the time. When I lived with my mother, I remember there was a steady stream of men into her bedroom. I would just fall asleep on the couch.
One day, I was hungry and there was no food in the house. I met a friend on a street corner, and we stole some food from a neighborhood grocery store to get something to eat. Every time my mother left me, I never knew if I would ever see her again. I withdrew from everyone.
When my mother married the third time, we moved to the country. I was five years old. Both my mother and my stepfather drank heavily. He would often beat my mother. If she tried to escape, he would find her and drag her back home in a rage.
Once, we hid in my aunt’s home. I remember my aunt telling me and my brother to hide under the bed because my father had a shotgun and was threatening to kill all of us. As my father entered her home, he grabbed the hair on my mother’s head and began to drag her out the door. My aunt called the police. When they came, my stepfather started running through the woods with his rifle. The police chased him and caught him. All they said to him was, “You shouldn’t threaten anyone with a gun.” They let him go. Can you believe it?
As a result of the stress and abuse that my brother and I experienced daily, we began to wet the bed at night. One day my stepfather accused us of wetting the bed because we were too lazy to get up. He warned us that he would take care of this problem if it ever happened again.
The next time we wet the bed, he told us to come out. As I watched, my stepfather tied my brother’s hands together with a rope. Then he tied my hands the same way. He had each one of us stand on
a chair. There was a big nail in a wooden beam above us where he would hang animals after he had killed them for their skins. He lifted us high over his head and hung us one at a time on the nail in the beam. As we were hanging in the air, he took off his belt and whipped us across our backs.
I was begging, “Please don’t hang me, Daddy! I promise I will not wet the bed anymore.”
In school, I colored my pictures all black. I told my teacher that my stepfather would hang us, whip us, and beat us. No one believed me. To this day, I get angry when people don’t believe me when I am telling the truth.
My mother was an alcoholic. My stepfather put her into mental hospitals. He would take us to visit her. He would say, “Look, your mother is in that room there. She’s crazy.”
When I was thirteen, I was so depressed that I couldn’t take it anymore. I fell on my knees crying, pleading, “If there’s anything to help me – a rock, God, a force, anything – get me out of here!” About five or six months later, in the summer, my grandmother asked me to come and visit. I was with her all summer. When my mother and stepfather came to pick me up, I asked my grandmother if I could stay. She replied, “Ask your grandfather.” He said yes.
I lived with my grandmother until I was sixteen. I never knew my prayer got me there because I didn’t believe in God. I was just desperate. I thought it was luck.
The Rebellious Teen Years
At age sixteen, I started skipping school, and I was sent back to live with my mother and stepfather. I left school and began working as a chambermaid. I met some people there who introduced me to pot. I gradually became more and more involved with drugs.
One day they held me down and stuck a needle in my arm. I left my mother’s home and started living with them. They kept skin-popping me with heroin until I was addicted. Then I started mainstreaming, and I lost a lot of weight. I didn’t feel as if I had much longer to live. None of my family came to help me. I had nothing left.
One day, my grandfather arrived to take me home to my mother in the country. I was emaciated. My mother took me to the doctor because I was vomiting. The whites of my eyes were yellow. My skin was jaundiced, and my urine was the color of Coca-Cola. The doctor told me that I had Hepatitis B. When my stepfather saw me, he cried. He told my mother that I was going to die, and he told me that I was going to die. I also had all the symptoms of withdrawal from heroin. I had diarrhea and pain all over my body. I’d wake up sweating profusely and shaking. I would vomit every half hour. I’d just walk around in circles. My mother would drive me for hours in the car. After a month, I began to feel better. I was healing.
Drug & Alcohol Rehab
I never used hard drugs again, but, as time went by, I began to drink. The thought that I might start using drugs again haunted me, and I felt I was losing control. On a date with a…
Read the rest of this article and how Marjory found healing and saw the Virgin Mary in Marlboro in Signs and Wonders Volume 28#1/2!
