Can you imagine seeing a deceased loved one, while in a wakening state?

Not as a vision; not as a fading memory; not as a vague dream. But in person?

Precisely this allegedly happened on several occasions to Ivanka Ivankovic-Elez, one of six visionaries at the famous site of apparition called Medjugorje in Hercegovina (and perhaps the quietest of the seers).

On May 7, 1985, according to a witness account by a local named Draga Vidović, Ivanka told those present for what was to be her last daily apparition from the Blessed Mother: “As every day, Our Lady came and greeted me, saying, ‘Praised be Jesus!’ and I answered, ‘Praised be Jesus and Mary forever!’

“Never before had I seen the Blessed Virgin Mary more beautiful than this evening.

“She was so gentle and so beautiful! Today, she wore the most beautiful dress that I had ever seen in my life. This dress was shining in silver and gold, as were Her veil and Her crown. There were two angels with Her. They too, were dressed like Our Lady. Our Lady and the angels were so beautiful that I cannot describe it in words. One simply has to experience this.”

Added Ivanka, as quoted in the book, Salvation of Mankind, “Our Lady asked me if I had any particular wish. I asked her if I could see my earthly mother. Our Lady smiled and nodded.

“Then, suddenly, my mother appeared. She was smiling. Our Lady told me to stand up. I stood up. My mother embraced and kissed me, and said: ‘My daughter, I am so proud of you!’ My mother kissed me once more and disappeared. After this, the Blessed Virgin Mary said, ‘My dear child, today is our last meeting.’“

On hearing that, Ivanka, who had been seeing Mary daily since June 24, 1981, had “cried for a long time.” She felt lonely and sad.

The house of Ivanka’s granny, where that final daily visit with Our Lady occurred (Ivanka still sees her on her birthday), was “old and there is nothing attractive about that house.”

But take note of this from Vidović‘s book: “Our Lady appeared to Ivanka more beautiful than ever before in such a house.

“Also, some of the visionaries saw Jesus as an adult for the first time in that house. It was in the second year of the apparitions on Good Friday. He was all in blood and wounds with a thorny crown on His Head.”

This is the sort of simplicity—such a home—that Our Lady seems to favor (see the living circumstances at places such as Fátima, Lourdes, and Guadalupe during those famous apparitions).

Ivanka also had an apparition during which one of her children, at the time an infant, also seemed to see Mary.

Asked how she felt when she saw and touched her mother, as well as how it felt to touch Our Lady, Ivankovic-Elez, at the time a youngster, said: “If I had seen my mom amongst thousands of women, I would have recognized her. She was the same, but much prettier, there was no suffering on her face because she used to suffer for years. When she embraced and kissed me, her body was not like our bodies are on earth. I remember my mom’s body; I touched her so many times. But when I touched Our Lady, her body was not like ours, and it was not like my mom’s either. She is the Mother of God.”

Ivanka added: “My mom died two months before the apparitions. God has given me the grace to see her five times in these years. Last time I saw her was in 1990. Many people do not believe that there is life after this life. But I am here, as a living witness, and I can say: THERE IS LIFE AFTER THIS LIFE, because I was indeed able to see my mom.

“This witness is not just for me, but for the whole of mankind.”

[resources: books on Medjugorje and Salvation of Mankind]