Day 4 - 8 May / 8 October

In Fatima… On Sunday May 13th 1917, the feast of Our Lady of the Blessed Sacrament, Our Lady appeared to Lucia, Jacinta and Francisco for the first time. The children had been to Mass early and were looking after their sheep at the Cova da Iria, (which means “the Valley of Peace”) when suddenly, at noon, they saw what seemed to be a flash of lightning. Thinking that a storm was on its way, they quickly gathered the sheep together but then there was another flash and they saw before them on a small holm-oak tree a lady dressed in white. This is how Lucia

described her: 

“She was more brilliant than the sun, and radiated light more clear and intense than a crystal glass filled with sparkling water, when the rays of the burning sun shine through it.” 

The children were amazed, standing only a few feet from the lady, bathed in the light which radiated from her. The lady said to them, “Do not be afraid, I will do you no harm.”

Lucia was the first of the children to speak (indeed, she would be the only one to speak), simply asking the lady, “Where are you from?” The lady replied, “From heaven.” Lucia then asked, “What do you want of me?”

The lady replied: “I want you to return here on the thirteenth of each month for the next six months, and at the very same hour. Later I shall tell you who I am, and what it is that I most desire. And I shall return here yet a seventh time.”

Lucia then asked another question: “Shall I go to heaven?” The lady replied, “Yes, you will.”   

“And Jacinta?”   “She will go also.” “And Francisco?”   “He will go there too, but he must say many Rosaries.”

Then Lucia asked about two of her friends who had recently died - Maria, aged 16, and Amélia, who was a  little older:

“Is Maria das Neves in heaven?”  “Yes, she is.”“

And Amélia?” “She will be in purgatory until the end of the world.”

Then the lady announced to them the mission which God willed for them: “Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the sins by which he is offended, and of supplication for the conversion of sinners?”

“Yes, we are willing!” the children replied. With these words the children began their “working relationship”with Our Lady, giving their “yes” to the plans of God. But the lady immediately warned them of the consequences of this “yes”:

“Then you will have much to suffer but the grace of God will be with you and strengthen you.”

Then as the lady was speaking to them, she opened her hands and an intense light came from those hands which seemed to penetrate right into their souls. Lucia later described what the children experienced: “We were bathed in a heavenly light that appeared to come directly from her hands. The light's reality cut into our hearts and our souls, and we knew somehow that this light was God, and we could see ourselves embraced in it. By an interior impulse of grace we fell to our knees, repeating in our hearts: "Oh, Holy Trinity, we adore You. My God, my God, I love You in the Blessed Sacrament."

The children remained kneeling in the flood of this wondrous light, until the lady spoke again, with these final words:

“Say the Rosary every day, to bring peace to the world and an end to the war.”

The lady then began to rise gently towards the east, until she disappeared into the sky. The children were left in a state of awe - although once again, as with the apparition of the Angel of Peace the previous year, it turned out that Francisco had been able to see the lady but not hear her words. So Lucia had to explain to him everything that the lady had said. 

Reflection… We see how Our Lady in her first encounter with the children deepens the graces which they had received through the Angel of Peace. For example, the light which came from her hands touched  the hearts of the children so deeply that it brought them to their knees in adoration of the Holy Trinity and  the Eucharist. Illuminated with the light of heaven, they spontaneously fell to their knees and prayed: “Oh, Holy Trinity, we adore You. My God, my God, I love You in the Blessed Sacrament."

Our Lady also led the children into a deeper appreciation of the power of prayer, in particular revealing to them the importance and fruits of the Rosary. They had already been praying the Rosary but their own shortened form of it, so now Our Lady urges them to pray the full Rosary devoutly every day.

Finally, in answering Lucia’s question about her two recently deceased friends, Our Lady helps the children to understand the reality of heaven and purgatory. And that to reach heaven we need to live good lives with hearts freed from sin. Thus the children are given the foundations of a life of holiness - faithful obedience to God, a disciplined prayer life, love of Christ, especially in the Eucharist, a sense of awe and wonder before the Holy Trinity and a readiness to suffer for the salvation of others.  They are given a ‘peephole’ into heaven - but at the same time taught that the path to this place of perfect union with God is perilous and demanding. 

What steps do I need to take to truly walk this path of holiness? What do I need to be liberated from in my life? What do I need to surrender? How can I love God and others more?