Story of Fatima
The Fatima story revolves around six apparitions of the Lady of Fatima, three secret prophecies of startling accuracy and a miracle that astonished even the non-believers who were there to see it. It began on a springtime morning about a century ago in a quiet Portuguese valley called Cova da Iria where three young children were tending sheep.
As it was a Sunday the children - Lúcia Santos and her cousins, Jacinta and Francisco Marto, aged just ten, nine and seven – had been to Mass in the morning and then set out with their flocks to watch over them while they grazed in the fields. According to Lúcia they had just eaten their lunch and were playing when there was a blinding flash of light. Thinking it was lightning they gathered their flocks and set off home. They had just reached a holmoak tree when there was a second flash which revealed a beautiful woman dressed in white.
Lady of Fatima
The apparition, now known as the Lady of Fatima, told them not to be afraid and asked if they were willing to offer themselves to God. Even though she warned that it would involve suffering they said yes without hesitation. The Lady of Fatima then led the children in prayer and asked them to return to the same place on the 13th day of each of the next five months, promising that she would reappear, and then rose into the sky and disappeared
Back home in Fatima the children were initially reluctant to say anything for fear of being ridiculed but after the youngest let slip what had happened they told their parents the story. News spread quickly and the villagers were not slow to scoff at the children’s unbelievable story and to taunt their families. Even so a small crowd gathered on June 13, the day of the promised second apparition. The Lady of Fatima is said to have appeared again, dressed in white, but only the children saw her. She instructed them to pray, do penance, make sacrifices and say the rosary daily, and said she would come soon for Jacinta and Francisco. Lúcia, she said, would remain on earth for a long time as God wished her to establish devotion to the Virgin Mary throughout the world.
Miracle of Fatima
By the time of the third apparition on July 13 there was widespread scepticism but the story had brought crowds to the village. Some were believers while others saw it as the work of the devil and were there to see the unmasking of what they thought to be a hoax. When the Lady of Fatima appeared, Lúcia asked her to work a miracle so that people would believe that the children were telling the truth. The Lady of Fatima agreed, promising to identify herself in October and to perform a miracle ‘for all to see and believe’.
Although bystanders could not see the apparition, many confirmed the effect on the children of what happened next. The Lady of Fatima is said to have opened her hands and revealed a vision of hell which made them gasp out loud and grow pale in the face. She then revealed to the children the famous three secrets of Fatima, prophecies that included a warning that even though the First World War would come to an end it would be followed by an even worse war if people did not cease offending God.
Apparitions at Fatima
By the time of the fourth apparition of the Lady of Fatima the story had attracted national interest> Newspapers joined the clamour by accusing the authorities of doing nothing to stop what was regarded as the ‘farce’ of Fatima. Despite this, thousands of people converged on the village hoping for visions and miracles until the provincial administrator – an atheist – decided he had had enough. He threw the children in jail and interrogated them in an attempt to get details of the three secrets, even threatening to boil them alive in a vat of oil if they did not comply. The children resisted and were eventually released.
After another apparition of the Lady of Fatima in September there was intense interest in the promised miracle on October 13. On that day over 70,000 people were gathered in the village when a strange phenomenon filled the sky and appeared to make the sun dance, radiate with unusual colours and rotate like a fire wheel. It wasn’t just fervent believers who saw what became known as the Miracle of the. Some of the most compelling accounts came from hard-headed journalists, teachers and even an eye specialist.
Revered Sister Lúcia
Although these events made the children famous and revered throughout the country, things did not improve much for the two cousins. Within three years both Francisco and Jacinta were dead, victims of the Spanish Flu epidemic, as was predicted by the Lady of Fatima during the second apparition. Inexplicably the young children are reported to have been very happy about knowing they were going to die young, and to have ecstatically repeated the prediction to their mother and visitors on many occasions.
Lúcia entered a convent and spent the rest of her life as a nun. In the late thirties she finally released details of the first and second secrets of Fatima, but the third was kept under wraps by the Vatican until this century, sparking huge controversy and dozens of conspiracy theories about its contents. The eventual release of the third secret in 2000 did little to dampen the speculation as many believe it is not the full text of the original secret. Sister Lúcia is reported to have been visited several more times by the Lady of Fatima during her lifetime and her memory is so revered that since her death in 2005 there have been moves towards her eventual canonization.