Featured this month:  The Vision of Hell and the Need for Reparation, Reparation explained, Feasts of St Francisco and St Jacinta

Dear Readers,

February newsletter theme is based upon the Seers vision of Hell, which they witnessed during the July 1917 apparition, and the need for reparation. 
We hope you enjoy reading the articles and the latest Fatima news both locally and internationally. 

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Spiritual reflections from Canon Jason Jones 

Dear WAF family  

The month of February brings with it the solemn start of Lent on Ash Wednesday 18th February followed by the feast of the little shepherds of Fatima two days later on 20th February.  

The Life of the Saints are proposed to us by the Church not just as a reminder to seek their intercession but also as a model and pattern for living.

It is fitting that at the very start of Lent, the feast of St Jacinta and St Francisco, can inspire us for the observance of the traditional Lenten disciplines of Prayer Fasting and Abstinence.  

20th February 1920 is the actual date of death of little Jacinta the youngest of the visionaries, so this month it is good to focus on her and to learn from her example and how she rose to such holiness and wisdom in a short period of time.  

This Ash Wednesday we will be marked with Blessed Ashes “Remember you are dust” Lent is the sacred time to allow ourselves to be born again. Jesus tells us “Unless you become like little children you will not enter the kingdom of Heaven” 

The apparitions at Fatima began in the Spring of 1916 with the Angel and by Feb 1920 Jacinta died and is now a Saint. This alone should wake us up to realise that in 4 years, by cooperating with the Grace of God, great things can also be accomplished in our own lives. We look at a little child - Jacinta, so as to become like a little Child. Lent with its call to repent and be recreated, combined and inspired with the example of little Jacinta, can show us how to do this. 

St. Jacinta was only 7 years old when Our Blessed Lady appeared at Fatima. She would die of the Spanish Flu on February 20, 1920. Lucia relates this story: Jacinta’s thirst for making sacrifices seemed insatiable. One day a neighbour offered my mother a good pasture for our sheep. Though it was quite far away, and we were at the height of summer, my mother accepted the offer made so generously and sent me there…It was a lovely day, but the sun was blazing, and in that arid, stony wasteland, it seemed as though it would burn everything up. We were parched with thirst, and there wasn’t a single drop of water for us to drink! At first, we offered it up generously for the conversion of sinners, but after midday, we could hold out no longer. As there was a house quite near, I suggested to my companions that I should go and ask for a little water. They agreed to this, so I went and knocked on the door. A little old woman gave me not only a pitcher of water, but also some bread which I accepted gratefully. I ran to share it with my little companions, and then offered the pitcher to Francisco, and told him to drink. “I don’t want to,” he replied. “Why?” “I want to suffer for the conversion of sinners.” “You have a drink, Jacinta!” “But I want to offer this sacrifice for the conversion of sinners too.” Then I poured the water into a hollow in the rock, so that the sheep could drink it, and went to return the pitcher to its owner. The heat was getting more and more intense. The shrill singing of the crickets and grasshoppers coupled with the croaking of the frogs in the neighbouring pond made an uproar that was almost unbearable. Jacinta, frail as she was, and weakened still more by the lack of food and drink, said to me with that simplicity which was natural to her: “Tell the crickets and the frogs to keep quiet! I have such a terrible headache.” Then Francisco said to her: “Don’t you want to suffer for the conversion of sinners?” The poor child, clasping her head between her two little hands, replied: “Yes, I do! Let them sing!” 

 
Lucia then relates, shortly before Jacinta sets off to the hospital at Lisbon and where she would die, sent for me to come and see her at once. I ran over. “Our Lady came to see us,” Jacinta said. “She told us she would come and take Francisco to heaven very soon. She asked me if I still want to convert more sinners. I said I did. She told me I would be going to a hospital where I would suffer a great deal; and that I am to suffer for the conversion of sinners, in reparation for the sins committed against the Immaculate Heart of Mary, and for love of Jesus. I asked if you would go with me. She said you wouldn’t, and that is what I find hardest. She said my mother would take me, and then I would have to stay all alone!” After this, she was very thoughtful for a while, and then added: “If only you could be with me! The hardest part is to go without you. Maybe, the hospital is a big dark house, where you can’t see, and I’ll be there suffering all alone! But never mind! I’ll suffer for the love of Our Lord, to make reparation to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, for the conversion of sinners and for the Holy Father.” 

We know from various accounts, that the final hours of little Jacinta life became a mirroring of the death of the Lord who died as the Saviour of sinners. 

Jacinta who wanted to save sinners from hell, would die alone, from an opening in her side due to her illness and operation and just at the foot of the cross of the Lord, Our Blessed Lady was there.

Jacinta thirsting due to her illness, satiates the thirst of Jesus by offering her life for sinners. 
 

Photos from the exhumation of Jacinta when her body was to be moved from the cemetery to the Basilica in 1935 reveal that she is incorrupt.

Through dying to self. Jacinta was born again to eternal life. Having put death, her old self out of love for the conversion of sinners, she now beholds the Face of the Lord in company with Our Lady. 

As we observe Lent in this centennial year of the first Saturdays of Reparation, may St Jacinta help us all though our Lenten disciplines to not only die to self but to have the intention of offering all things up that we may obtain the crown of Easter and life eternal.

Fr Jason

Canon Jason Jones

WAF National Spiritual Director - England and Wales

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