The Miracle and the Message. John C. Preiss

1941. It reveals the first two parts of the Secret imparted by Our Lady on July 13, 1917: the vision of hell and God’s desire for devotion to Mary’s Immaculate Heart. Finally, a fourth memoir, again written at the request of Sister Lucia’s superiors, was begun on October 7 and completed on December 8, 1941. This is how Sister Lucia’s principal testimony came to be written.

      Quite another matter, however, was the very slow way in which these writings were made known to the general public. As a result, the events of Fatima remained shrouded in secrecy and silence. Bishop D. José Alves Correia da Silva, however, instructed Sister Lucia to write down the best-kept third part of the “secret” in January 1944, when she was seriously ill and it was feared she might die. Responding to the bishop’s request, Sister Lucia leaned against the mattress in her monastic cell, and wrote down four pages that documented the last part of the vision received by the three little shepherds on July 13, 1917.

      This last part of Lucia’s writings could well be entitled “The Great Martyrdom of the Church in the Twentieth Century.” The document contains a prophetic description of an attempt against the life of Pope John Paul II which ultimately occurred on May 13, 1981, in Saint Peter’s Square in Rome. This third part of the secret would not be revealed until the beatification of Francisco and Jacinta, on May 13, 2000. With its publication, the whole of Our Lady’s message has been made known. There is nothing further to be revealed, as Sister Lucia herself declared shortly before she died.

      When Sister Lucia was asked how she viewed the message over time, she stated:

      If the message was chosen by men, it would have been the first to be rejected. Think of it: for such a message, a rural hillside, a stony place, devoid of natural beauty, with no means of transport, without shelter of any kind to protect people from the hot sun in the summer or the torrential rain and storms in the winter. No one would go there! Often what men reject is what God chooses, because his is the power, the wisdom, the grace and energy that is at work in souls, moving them and carrying them as he wishes.⁴

      While she was still living, many people longed for a face-to-face interview with Sister Lucia. Such meetings were almost never granted. In order to visit her at the cloistered Carmel in Coimbra where she lived, one needed a permit issued by the prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. The prohibition against receiving visitors had been imposed on her to protect her life of prayer as a contemplative Carmelite nun. While Sister Lucia made use of every possible means for making the Blessed Virgin “better known and loved,” she always abided by this order, despite the many people who wanted to see her. She did, however, receive thousands of letters over the eighty-eight years between the time of the apparitions and her death. When she discussed this with Pope Paul VI during his visit in 1967, he suggested she write a long letter in response, which became the book “Calls” from the Message of Fatima (Apelos da Mensagem de Fatima). “Calls” was published on December 13, 2000, on the authority of Pope John Paul II and endorsed by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.

      In “Calls,” Sister Lucia tells us that the first call that God addresses to us through Fatima is a call to faith:

      Faith is the basis of the entire spiritual life. It is by faith that we believe in the existence of God, in his power, his wisdom, his mercy, his work of redemption, his pardon and his fatherly love. It is by faith that we believe in God’s Church, founded by Jesus Christ, and in the doctrine the Church transmits to us and by which we shall be saved. It is by the light of faith that we see Christ in others, loving, serving and helping them when they are in need of our assistance. And it is also our faith that assures us that God is present within us, that his eyes are always upon us.⁵

      While Catholics are not required to believe in the extraordinary events that occurred at Fatima, those who do have found their faith renewed.

       Fatima Today

      Before the Blessed Virgin Mary appeared to the children at Fatima, they were visited by an angel. Sister Lucia would later recall:

      God began the preparation of the instruments that He had chosen when they, utterly carefree, were praying and playing, by causing to pass before their eyes, gently and slowly, what seemed to be white as snow in the shape of a human being. The purpose was to draw our attention to it.

      And in fact, even to this day I don’t know. But the events that followed make me believe that it must have been our Guardian angel who, without showing himself clearly, was preparing us for the accomplishment of God’s plan.⁶

      This first appearance of the Angel occurred in 1915. With no verbal message for the children, it made the children aware of the supernatural. God was preparing them for the incredible events that were about to unfold. This, too, has relevance for us today. God often allows us to be touched in a special way in order to help us to become more aware of his presence and how he is working in our lives.

      Over the course of his visits, the Angel taught the children to pray in union with Christ present in the Eucharist. “The message of the Angel in the ‘Loca do Cabeco,’ as well as the way the shepherd children received him, is a pressing invitation for us today. It calls us to remember that adoration and consecration to the Most Holy Trinity are the end goal of our Christian life.”⁷

      Prayer is at the very heart of the message of Fatima because it is at the heart of growing in a personal relationship with God. From the first apparitions of the Angel, the children were asked to pray. When Our Lady appeared for six consecutive months in 1917, she asked the children to pray the Rosary every day for peace. Those of us living in the twenty-first century can take this request to heart. The peace Our Lady asks us to pray for is not only peace between nations, but peace within our hearts and homes. Now, more than ever, we need prayer.

      The message of Fatima is a message of hope for all of us as we prepare for the coming triumph of Our Lady’s Immaculate Heart. It is a message that can be applied to our everyday lives of faith. As we look deeper into the meaning of these visits from the Angel of Peace and Our Lady, we will discover that Fatima is not just a nice, entertaining story. It is a message that can transform our spiritual lives if we are open to it. Fatima’s message of prayer, penance, and sacrifice changed the lives of three shepherd children one hundred years ago. That very same message can strengthen us for our own spiritual journeys.

      Chapter 1

      Fatima from the Beginning

      Three significant appearances of the Angel of Peace at Fatima took place in the spring, summer, and fall of 1916 — a year before the more famous apparitions of Mary. Lucia, Francisco, and Jacinta were playing games and watching their flocks at the time of the apparitions. They were simple, normal children. Francisco loved to play with sticks and throw rocks. Jacinta enjoyed dancing. Lucia, the oldest, was the ringleader. After playing, the children would say the Rosary but would modify it so that it would not last very long and they could resume playing. Many of us can relate to this. Sometimes we get too busy doing other things and avoid the things that are most important for us. In fact, the message the Angel brought to the children applies to us all.

       How It All Began

      According to Sister Lucia, the exact dates of the apparitions are not known: “At the time I did not know how to reckon the years, the months, or even the days of the week.” However, by recalling the weather outside, she was able to indicate the season when each of the three apparitions took place.

      When the Angel first appeared, Lucia had just turned nine, Francisco was barely eight, and Jacinta was only six years old. But why three simple children? If we consider the nature of children — their ability to absorb and retell a story in detail without any preconceived notions or agendas — we can see how this works for God’s plan. If the message of Fatima had been given to three adults, it may well have been distorted by pressures from the outside world.

       “I Am the Angel of Peace”

      One spring day, while tending their sheep in a property that was known as the Chousa, Lucia and her cousins, Jacinta and Francisco, had led their flock to the