Greg Daly explores one of the Portuguese appartions’ most intriguing aspects In the decades following the apparitions, Fatima was mainly known, like Lourdes and other Marian sites, as a place of healing. However, in her 1941 memoirs, Sr Lucia wrote about how during Our Lady’s third apparition, she gave the children a message in three…

Greg Daly examines the lives of the Fatima visionaries Remarkable though the Fatima apparitions were, last weekend’s canonisations owed less to the visions witnessed by Saints Francisco and Jacinta Marto than to how their lives were transformed by their encounter with Our Lady. “The apparition of the Virgin Mary was an occasion, but it has…

Those who had wondered what miracle prompted the canonisations last weekend of Ss Jacinta and Francisco had their questions answered ahead of Pope Francis’ arrival in Fatima. Speaking at a press conference at the shrine, the Brazilian parents João Batista and his wife Lucila Yurie described the miraculous healing of their son after a terrible…

Stephen Bullivant Stephen Bullivant considers how the Fatima visions sought to speak to the modern world Sunday, May 13 1917 would prove an auspicious day, both for the Catholic Church, and for the whole tumultuous course of the 20th Century. In the Sistine Chapel, Pope Benedict XV consecrated Eugenio Pacelli as archbishop, prior to sending…

Stephen Buttivant My first visit to Fatima was on a whim. In September 2005, my dad and I had walked 200 miles across northern Spain to Santiago de Compostela. With a few days to kill before our flight from Madrid, a quick coach trip down to Lisbon sounded like fun. And seeing as how we’d…

Fatima was central to the spirituality of St John Paul II, writes Greg Daly “In the designs of Providence there are no mere coincidences,” declared St John Paul II in Fatima on May 12, 1982, a day short of the first anniversary of Mehmet Ali Agca’s attempt on the then Pope’s life in St Peter’s…

While St John Paul II’s devotion to Fatima may be proverbial, and while Pope Francis’ visit to the shrine may be filling the headlines, it is always worth remembering that their devotion to Fatima is one shared by countless Catholics – and even, as described below, Muslims! Some four million people visit the Portuguese shrine…

Philip Kosloski As we celebrate the 100th anniversary of the apparitions of Our Lady of Fatima, one aspect that could easily go unnoticed is the subtle connection with Islam. The Blessed Virgin Mary appeared to the three shepherd children near the village of Fatima, Portugal, a place named after both a Muslim princess and the…

Junno Arocho Esteves When it comes to Marian apparitions, the Catholic Church takes a prudent approach that focuses more on the message than the miracle. Supernatural phenomena, like the alleged miracle of the Sun in Fatima, Portugal, nearly 100 years ago, are not the primary factors in determining an apparition is worthy of belief. In…