Catholic Stories

It all began May 13, 1917, when three young shepherds—Lúcia dos Santos and her cousins Francisco and Jacinta—reported seeing the Virgin Mary in a field at Cova de Iria, near the village. The Virgin promised to return on the 13th of each month for the next five months, and amid much controversy and skepticism, each time accompanied by increasingly larger crowds, the three children reported successive apparitions. This was during a period of anticlerical sentiment in Portugal, and after the sixth reputed apparition, in October, the children were arrested and interrogated. But they insisted the Virgin had spoken to them, revealing three secrets. Two of these, revealed by Lúcia in 1941, were interpreted to foretell the coming of World War II and the spread of communism and atheism. In a 1930 Pastoral Letter, the Bishop of Leiria declared the apparitions worthy of belief, thus approving the "Cult of Fátima."

In May 2000, Francisco and Jacinta were beatified in a ceremony held at Fátima by Pope John Paul II, on what was his third and final visit to the shrine. The third secret, which was revealed after the beatification, was interpreted to have foretold an attempt on the life of the pope. In May 2017 the brother and sister were finally canonized by Pope Francis as part of the Fátima centenary celebrations; by then the process to beatify Lúcia, who died in 2005, was well underway, having been fast-tracked in 2008 by Francis's predecessor, Benedict XVI.

On the 13th of each month, and especially in May and October, the faithful flock here to witness the passing of the statue of the Virgin through the throngs, to participate in candlelight processions, and to take part in solemn Masses.