The Apparitions at Fatima
The Apparitions at Fatima
The apparitions had their roots in a series of mystical events that began in 1915. Three young children, Lucia dos Santos, age nine, and her two younger cousins, Francisco and Jacinta Marto, were tending a flock of sheep in the fields outside Fatima when Lucia thought she saw a translucent cloud that seemed to be shaped in the form of a human body. It moved across a clear sky and finally hovered above a pine grove.
A year later, in the summer of 1916, the children were guiding their flocks of sheep to a meadow called Couza Velha when they were caught in a sudden rainstorm. Ducking into the shelter of a nearby cave, they decided to eat their lunch and wait until the rain stopped before collecting their herd. After completing an abbreviated Rosary, the rain stopped suddenly and, within moments of leaving the cave, they were greeted by a strong wind blowing across the pines. When they turned to discover what might be causing such a wind, they saw again the translucent cloud that Lucia had seen the previous year. This time the cloud moved toward them and finally became distinguishable as a transparent "young man" about fourteen years of age. The young man identified himself to the astonished children, "Don't be afraid. I am the Angel of Peace. Pray with me." He then knelt on the ground, bending forward until his forehead touched it, and prayed: "My God, I believe, I adore, and I love You! I beg pardon of You for those who do not believe, do not adore, do not hope and do not love You!" He said this prayer three times. When he stood he then said to the children: "Pray thus. The hearts of Jesus and Mary are attentive to the voice of your supplications." Saying that, he vanished from sight. The children were overwhelmed and in a state of ecstasy. They repeated this prayer for a long time as the angel had done - on their knees.
The children decided not to tell anyone of their experiences fearing ridicule and censure by their parents and friends. Several weeks later, the angel appeared again and requested that they pray a great deal, offer sacrifices to the Most High and accept whatever sufferings which the Lord sent to them. In his third and final appearance in October, the angel brought with him a Chalice and suspended above it, a Host. Before offering the Host to Lucia, the only one who had received First Communion, he prostrated himself on the ground and said:
"Most Holy Trinity, Father, Son, Holy Spirit, I adore You profoundly and offer You the most Precious Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of Jesus Christ, present in all the tabernacles of the earth, in reparation for the outrages, sacrileges, and indifference with which He Himself is offended. And through the infinite merits of His Most Sacred Heart and of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, I beg of You the conversion of poor sinners."
He repeated this prayer three times and then rising up, lifted the Host before his eyes and said: "Take and drink the Body and the Blood of Jesus Christ, horribly insulted by ungrateful men. Make reparation for their crimes and console your God." With this, he gave the Host to Lucia and let the other children drink from the Chalice.
In Fatima, the children continued to pray and offer whatever sacrifices they could as the angel had requested. On May 13th - eight days after the Pope directly asked for heaven's intervention - the little shephards were moving their flocks to the meadows of the Cova da Iria when they were startled by a very bright flash. Thinking it was lightning, they ran for the nearest cover they could find near a large oak tree. A second bright flash once again frightened them and they ran from the tree toward the east seeking better shelter. They were startled to see a bright globe of light hovering over a small evergreen that stood directly in their path. At the center of the light stood a Lady dressed in brilliant white, holding her hands against her breast in a prayerful repose; in her right hand she held a Rosary.
The Lady spoke to them in a soft, melodious voice,
"Don't be afraid, I won't hurt you!"
Lucia asked the Lady where she came from, to which she replied,
"I am from heaven."
Hearing this, Lucia asked the Lady what she wanted of her. The Lady replied,
"I come to ask you to come here for six months in succession, on the thirteenth day at this same hour. Then I will tell you who I am, and what I want. And afterwards I will return here a seventh time."
Lucia then asked if she would go to heaven, and the Lady responded,
"Yes, you will."
She then asked if Jacinta and Francisco would go to heaven also.
The Lady responded,
"Also. But Francisco will have to say many Rosaries!"
After Lucia asked about the state of two girls who had died recently, the Lady spoke again,
"Do you wish to offer yourselves to God, to endure all the suffering that He may please to send you, as an act of reparation for the sins by which He is offended, and to ask for the conversion of sinners?"
The children replied, "Yes, we do." The Lady then told them that they would have much to suffer, but that God's grace would be their comfort.
Jacinta, the youngest of the children, was struck by the gentleness and beauty of the Lady. When the apparition ended she kept on repeating, "Oh, such a pretty Lady".
Even though they had agreed not to talk to anyone about her appearance at the Cova, Jacinta could not resist telling her mother about the "pretty Lady" she had seen. Her mother was at first skeptical of her story but her father's response, after hearing both his children describe the events at the Cova, was succinct, "Well, if the youngsters did see a lady dressed in white...who could it be but Our Lady?" The following morning, Lucia met one of her sisters, Maria, who greeted her, "Oh Lucia, I hear you have seen Our Lady at Cova da Iria! Is it true?" Lucia could only respond, "Who told you?" Maria didn't believe the story nor did the rest of Lucia's family. Her mother, Maria Rosa, was particularly hard on Lucia thinking the young girl was lying about the whole affair.
As promised, Mary appeared to the children on the 13th day of each month for six months. The children did have much to suffer. In her July apparition, the Blessed Mother promised to perform a miracle in October so that all those coming to the Cova would truly believe that she was present there. She also asked them to pray:
"Sacrifice yourselves for sinners, and repeat often, especially whenevr you make a sacrifice for them: 'O Jesus, it is for love of You, for the conversion of sinners and in reparation for the sins committed against the Immaculate Heart of Mary"
In her appearances at Fatima, Mary told the children to ask people to pray, convert their lives to God and honor her appearances there. During the July apparition, Mary gave the children three Secrets which were not to be revealed until she authorized their disclosure. She also promised a miracle at the end of her appearance in October that would assist everyone in believing in her visits to Fatima. After giving them the Secrets, she said:
"When you pray the Rosary, say after each mystery: 'O my Jesus, forgive us, save us from the fire of Hell. Lead all souls to Heaven, especially those who are most in need.'"
The apparitions were beginning to draw unwelcome attention to this rural part of Portugal which the mayor did not like, so in August, just before the next scheduled apparition, he kidnapped them, interrogated them, had them thrown in the local jail, and threatened them with execution. All this in response to their refusal to change their story about the beautiful Lady in white and their refusal to reveal the Secrets entrusted to them by her several weeks earlier.
The local townfolk who had gone to the Cova unaware that the children had been kidnapped reported that at noon they heard a clap of thunder which appeared to come from underground, saw the sun lose its brilliance, witnessed the atmosphere become hazy and observed a small white cloud form around the trunk of the tree where the apparitions had occurred. Once this happened, they saw the clouds near the sun turn crimson in color and then rapidly change through all the colors of the rainbow. After several minutes of witnessing this, everything in the Cova returned to normal.
During the last apparition, on October 13, 1917, the Lady of light revealed herself to be Our Lady of the Rosary. The 70,000 rain-soaked pilgrims who came to witness Mary's final appearance saw the sun spin out of its orbit, emitting a rainbow of color as it gyrated; finally, when this display ceased, the sun was seen plunging toward the earth causing the pilgrims to scream in terror. When the sun eventually resumed its normal behavior about twelve minutes after it began this inexplicable display, many of these rain-soaked people found their clothing completely dry. Further, a number of pilgrims who came with medical problems found their ailments either completely healed or significantly alleviated. In addition, the more than ten thousand people in the surrounding villages who chose not to go to the apparition site also saw the sun dance in the sky.
One of the principal anti-clerical publications of the day was O Dia, a major Lisbon newspaper. On October 17th, O Dia reported the following:
At one o'clock in the afternoon, midday by the sun, the rain stopped. The sky, pearly gray in color, illuminated the vast arid landscape with a strange light. The sun had a transparent gauzy veil so that eyes could easily be fixed upon it. The gray mother-of-pearl tone turned into a sheet of silver which broke up as the clouds were torn apart and the silver sun, enveloped in the same gauzy gray light, was seen to whirl and turn in the circle of broken clouds. A cry went up from every mouth and people fell on their knees on the muddy ground. The light turned a beautiful blue as if it had come through the stained-glass windows of a cathedral and spread itself over the people who knelt with outstretched hands. The blue faded slowly and then the light seemed to pass through yellow glass. Yellow stains fell against white handkerchiefs, against the dark skirts of women. They were reported on the trees, on the stones and on the serra. People wept and prayed with uncovered heads in the presence of the miracle they had awaited.
After nearly thirteen years of examination by a commission comprised of clergy, physicians and scientists, the Catholic Church pronounced the Fatima apparitions as worthy of belief on October 13,1930 with the declaration by the Bishop of Leiria:
"We deem well: 1) to declare worthy of credence the visions of the shepherds at the Cova da Iria, in the parish of Fatima of this diocese, on the thirteenth day of the months from May to October 1917; 2) to give official permission for the cult of Our Lady of Fatima."
The Secrets communicated in this apparition were only disclosed in 1942, well after they were committed to writing in four separate memoirs between 1935 and 1941, by the surviving seeress - Lucia. The Secrets revealed by the Blessed Virgin in 1917 were:
• A vision of the reality of hell, previously described, which so horrified the visionaries that they willingly took on every penance and mortification they could imagine, if it could only prevent souls from going there. Mary said to them, "You have seen hell where the souls of poor sinners go. To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart."
• "World War I will end soon. However, if humanity does not stop offending God, another and worse war will break out in the reign of Pius XI. When you see a night illuminated by an unknown light, know that this is the great sign that God gives you, that He is going to punish the world for its crimes by means of war, hunger, persecution of the Church and of the Holy Father. To forestall this, I shall come to ask consecration of Russia to my Immaculate Heart and the communion of reparation on the First Saturdays. If my request is heeded, Russia will be converted, and there will be peace. If not, Russia shall spread her errors throughout the world, promoting wars and persecution of the Church; the good will be martyred, the Holy Father will have much to suffer, various nations will be annihilated; in the end my Immaculate Heart shall triumph. The Holy Father will consecrate Russia to me which will be converted, and some time of peace will be given to the world."
With the establishment of devotion to her Immaculate Heart, Mary states that her intercession can obtain from her Son the salvation of souls who otherwise would be condemned. Devotion to Mary's Immaculate Heart increased dramatically following World War II after the Secrets became more well known. However, these devotions have been declining during the last twenty years. The principal elements of the second Secret have since come to pass.
Pope John Paul II finally completed the dedication of the world, including Russia, to Mary's Immaculate Heart in 1984....and shortly thereafter, the USSR collapsed and Soviet communism faded as the major ideology of eastern Europe and the former USSR countries. Unfortunately, communism still exists as a viable political force in Russia and as the dominant state ideology in China, North Korea, Vietnam and Cuba. The last of the Secrets has never been revealed. The most informed speculation, by Fr. Joaquin Alonzo, points toward a crisis of faith overtaking the Christianity after 1960 leading to an apostasy similar in nature to the one predicted by St. Paul. Since Lucia's letter containing the Secrets starts the section containing the third Secret with, "In Portugal, the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved; etc..(secret portion of text)..", the unstated remainder of this sentence seems to imply that the dogma of Faith will not be preserved in other nations. With this observation, we have been given a means to ascertain which dogma are acceptable to Heaven - look to what is practiced in Portugal. In any event, the Secret's contents were forwarded by Lucia in a sealed envelope to the local Bishop in 1944. Eventually, the local Bishop's successor forwarded the Secret, still sealed, to the Vatican in 1957.
Not as well known as the Third Secret of Fatima is an interior locution reported in a letter written by Sister Lucia in 1943. In this letter, Sister Lucia stated that Our Lord had asked her to convey His concerns to the Bishops of Spain. Her letter states, in part:
"Because of the act of consecration made by His Holiness (on October 31, 1942), He (our Lord) promises that the war will end shortly. Bit since it (the consecration) was incomplete, the conversion of Russia will be postponed. If the bishops of Spain do not heed His wishes, it (Russia) will once again be the scourge with which God will punish them."
THE THIRD SECRET
“J.M.J.
The third part of the secret revealed at the Cova da Iria-Fatima, on 13 July 1917.
I write in obedience to you, my God, who command me to do so through his Excellency the Bishop of Leiria and through your Most Holy Mother and mine.
After the two parts which I have already explained, at the left of Our Lady and a little above, we saw an Angel with a flaming sword in his left hand; flashing, it gave out flames that looked as though they would set the world on fire; but they died out in contact with the splendour that Our Lady radiated towards him from her right hand: pointing to the earth with his right hand, the Angel cried out in a loud voice: ‘Penance, Penance, Penance!'. And we saw in an immense light that is God: ‘something similar to how people appear in a mirror when they pass in front of it' a Bishop dressed in White ‘we had the impression that it was the Holy Father'. Other Bishops, Priests, men and women Religious going up a steep mountain, at the top of which there was a big Cross of rough-hewn trunks as of a cork-tree with the bark; before reaching there the Holy Father passed through a big city half in ruins and half trembling with halting step, afflicted with pain and sorrow, he prayed for the souls of the corpses he met on his way; having reached the top of the mountain, on his knees at the foot of the big Cross he was killed by a group of soldiers who fired bullets and arrows at him, and in the same way there died one after another the other Bishops, Priests, men and women Religious, and various lay people of different ranks and positions. Beneath the two arms of the Cross there were two Angels each with a crystal aspersorium in his hand, in which they gathered up the blood of the Martyrs and with it sprinkled the souls that were making their way to God.
FATIMA, IN LUCIA'S OWN WORDS:
J.M.J.
Your Excellency.
Prologue
Prayer and Obedience
Having implored the protection of the most Holy Hearts of Jesus
and of Mary, our tender Mother, and sought light and grace at the
foot of the Tabernacle, so as to write nothing that would not be
soley and exclusively for the glory of both Jesus and the Blessed
Virgin. I now take up this work, in spite of the repugnance I feel
since I can say almost nothing about Jacinta without speaking either
directly or indirectly about my miserable self. I obey, nevertheless,
the will of Your Excellency which for me, is the expression of the will
of our Good God. I begin this task, then, asking the most Holy Hearts
of Jesus and Mary to deign to bless it, and to make use of this act of
obedience to obtain the conversion of poor sinners, for whom Jacinta
most generously sacrificed herself.
I know Your Excellency does not expect a well written account from me,
for you know how incapable and inadequate I am. I am going to tell you
then, what I remember about this soul, for by God's grace, I was her
most intimate confidante. I have such a high regard for her holiness,
that
I greatly esteem and respect her and dearly cherish her memory.
Keeping Secrets
In spite of my good will to be obedient, I trust Your Excellency will
permit me
to with-hold certain matters concerning myself as well as Jacinta, that
I would not wish to be read before I enter eternity. You will not find
it strange that I should
reserve for eternity certain secrets and others matters. After all, is
it not the
Blessed Virgin herself who sets me the example? Does not the Holy
Gospel
tell us that Mary kept all things in her heart? And who better than
this Immaculate
Heart could have revealed to us the secrets of Divine Mercy?
Nonetheless she
kept them to herself as in a garden enclosed, and took them with her to
the
Palace of the Divine King.
I remember, besides, a saying that I heard from a holy priest, when I
was
only eleven years old. Like so many others, he came to question me, and
asked among other things, about a matter of which I did not wish to
speak.
After he had exhausted his whole repertoire of questions, without
succeeding
in obtaining a satisfactory answer on this subject, realizing perhaps
that he
was touching on too delicate a matter, the good priest gave me his
blessing
and said "You are right my child. The secret of the King's daughter
should
remain hidden in the depths of her heart".
At the time, I did not understand the meaning of what he said, but I
realized he
approved of my manner of acting. I did not forget his words, however
and
I understand them now. This saintly priest was at that time Vicar of
Torres
Novas. Little does he know all the good that these few words did for my
soul,
and that is why I remember him with such gratitude.
One day however, I sought the advice of a holy priest regarding my
reserve
in such matters, because I did not know how to answer when they asked
me
if the most Blessed Virgin had not told me anything else as well. This
priest,
who was then Vicar of Olival, said to us: "You do well my little ones,
to keep
the secret of your souls between God and yourselves. When they put that
question to you , just answer, 'Yes, she did say more but it is a
secret.' If they
question you further on this subject , think of the secret that this
Lady made
known to you, and say 'Our Lady told us not to say anything to anybody;
for
this reason we are saying nothing.' In this way, you can keep your
secret under
the cover of Our Lady's".
How well I understood the explanation and guidance of this venerable
old priest!
I am already taking too much time with these preliminaries and Your
Excellency
will be wondering what is the purpose of it all. I must see if I can
make a start
with my account of what I can remember of Jacinta's life. As I have no
free time
at my disposal, I must make the most of the hours when we work in
silence, to recall
and jot down, with the aid of paper and pencil which I keep hidden
under my sewing, all that the most Holy Hearts of Jesus and Mary want me to
remember.
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