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One hundred and six years ago, Our Blessed Mother made her sixth and final appearance to the three children at Fatima, Portugal. In light of this occasion and recent events, now would be an appropriate time to offer some words about Our Blessed Mother’s role in human history and in particular about her appearances at Fatima in 1917.
No human has been more loving and more devoted to Jesus Our Savior than his Blessed Mother. She bore him and with St. Joseph raised him. She loved and supported him throughout his life and during his public ministry. She was there at the foot of the Cross as he suffered in agony for our sins. She was there when his lifeless body was taken down from the Cross and placed in the tomb. She was with him after his Resurrection. On Pentecost, she received the Holy Spirit from her Son along with the Apostles. She was greeted in Heaven by him at her Assumption. Now, she performs a vital role in the history of salvation in cooperation and support of her Son.
Blessed Mary ever Virgin is also devoted to us and loves us in a way like no other person. She is Mother to us all and she has been pleading for centuries, for millennia, for us to turn our hearts to her Son.
Mary’s role in human salvation did not end with her Assumption into Heaven. Over the millennia since her Assumption, Mary Mother of God has been actively assisting her Son and the Thrice Holy God in preparing humanity for the triumphant return of her Son in glory. Over the millennia but with greater frequency and urgency in the last couple centuries, Mary has been appearing to individuals and small groups to motivate people to turn their hearts, minds and souls to God, to love Him and serve Him with greater devotion. Many of these apparitions have been approved either locally by the bishops and/or by the Vatican. Some of these apparitions have become an integral part of Catholic belief: Guadalupe, Lourdes, Fatima. Others like Medjugorje and Garabandal are still under review and consideration. The frequency and the intensity of her appearances ought to impress upon us the necessity of paying heed to the signs of the times.
In one of his prophetic dreams, St. John Bosco saw the great persecution of the Church as a ship beset by storms and enemy warships. The ship endured because the Pope secured the ship to twin columns representing the Eucharist and the Blessed Mother.
During her 21 November 1993 interior locution to the late Father Stefano Gobbi, Our Blessed Mother emphasized her special role in salvation. She said
"Your heavenly Mother wants to enfold each one of you in the secure refuge of her Immaculate Mother, to protect you in the time of the great trial and to prepare you to receive Jesus, who is about to return to establish his glorious reign among you." (To the Priests: Our Lady’s Beloved Sons. 17th English Edition. Published by the Marian Movement of Priests in 1996).
Pope St. John Paul II was utterly convinced of Mary’s vital role in humanity’s salvation. In his epic Crossing the Threshold of Hope, the Pope wrote:
"‘Be not afraid!’ Christ said to the apostles (cf.Lk 24;36) and to
the women (cf. Mt 28:10) after the Resurrection. According to
the Gospels, these words were not addressed to Mary. Strong
in her faith, she had no fear. Mary’s participation in the
victory of Christ became clear to me above all from the
experience of my people. Cardinal Stefan Wyszynski told me
that his predecessor, Cardinal August Hlond, had spoken these
prophetic words as he was dying: ‘The victory, if it comes,
will come through Mary.’ During my pastoral ministry in
Poland, I saw for myself how those words were coming true."
"After my election as Pope, as I became more involved in the
problems of the universal Church, I came to have a similar
conviction: On this universal level, if victory comes it will be
brought by Mary. Christ will conquer through her, because He
wants the Church’s victories now and in the future to be linked
to her." (Pope St. John Paul II. Crossing the Threshold of Hope. NY: Alfred A. Knopf, 1994. See page 220.)
Pope St. John Paul II had a most loving devotion to our Blessed Mother, a devotion that we would do well to emulate. He especially placed a high importance on her 1917 appearances in Fatima, Portugal.
Beginning on 13 May 1917, Our Blessed Mother communicated to humanity in a powerful and extraordinary way through three poor children in Fatima, Portugal: Lucia dos Santos and Jacinta and Francisco Marto. Over the next six months, Our Blessed Mother delivered some of the most powerful and urgent messages for humanity since Jesus’s Ascension. She delivered messages calling humanity to immediate repentance and turning our hearts to God and warned us of the coming consequences of humanity’s turn away from God. For more about Fatima, see EWTN’s website https://www.ewtn.com/catholicism/saints/our-lady-of-fatima-423
Our Blessed Mother was very much concerned about Russia and its role in the world. She called for Russia to be consecrated to her Immaculate Heart; otherwise Russia would spread “spread her errors throughout the world.” Tragically, Russia, both as the Communist Soviet Union and in its current reiteration, have done just that. There is much debate over whether Russia has actually been consecrated as Our Blessed Mother intended.
Our Blessed Mother’s sixth and final appearance at Fatima occurred on 13 October 1917. Over 70,000 people gathered to witness the event. Those present witnessed a miracle in which the Sun changed colors and danced in the sky. Lucia, Francisco and Jacinta saw not only Mary in the appearance of Our Lady of Mount Carmel but St. Joseph and the Infant Jesus as well. Our Blessed Mother advised “People must amend their lives and ask pardon for their sins. They must not offend our Lord any more, for He is already too much offended!”
After much discernment and prayer, the Catholic Church approved these apparitions and authorized devotion to Our Lady of Fatima. Francisco and Jacinta have subsequently been canonized and Lucia has been declared a ‘Venerable’ by Pope Francis I. Fatima has become a popular pilgrimage site and hosted the most recent World Youth Day this past August. Popes St. Paul VI, St. John Paul II, Benedict XVI and Francis I have all visited Fatima while serving as Pope, and Popes St. John XXIII and Blessed John Paul I visited Fatima as well prior to becoming Pope.
On 13 May 1981, Pope St. John Paul II was nearly assassinated during a public event in St. Peter’s Square. He attributed his survival to the intervention of Our Lady of Fatima. On the first anniversary of the assassination attempt on his life, St. Pope John Paul II traveled to Fatima. In his Homily for the Mass said at Our Lady’s Basilica, the Pope spoke of the importance of her appearances there. He said
"If the Church has accepted the Message of Fatima, it is above all because that message contains a truth and a call whose basic content is the truth and the call of the Gospel itself.
"Repent, and believe in the gospel" (Mk 1:15): these are the first words that the Messiah addressed to humanity. The Message of Fatima is, in its basic nucleus, a call to conversion and repentance, as in the Gospel. This call was uttered at the beginning of the Twentieth Century, and it was thus addressed particularly to this present century. The Lady of the Message seems to have read with special insight the "signs of the times", the signs of our time.
Many of our Protestant brethren do not recognize the important role that Our Blessed Mother continues to play in the history of salvation. Catholics are often criticized by some Protestants for worshipping Mary. We Catholics do not worship Mary. She, like us, is a creation of the Father. We worship the Creator, the Thrice Holy God, not the creation. We Catholics do honor and love our Blessed Mother in a special way because she is the Mother of our Lord and Savior. We look to her for inspiration and guidance in how better to love and follow her Son.
To survive in this world of darkness and make it to Heaven, we need all the help we can get. Our Blessed Mother offers us her help and we do well when we accept her loving assistance. Our Blessed Mother can help each of us to be a light for Christ and to share his light with a world so desperately in darkness.
Therefore, let us increase our devotion to our Blessed Mother as way of preparing ourselves for the coming tribulations and as a way to draw closer to her Son.
In closing, I offer the words of the traditional Catholic prayer Sub Tuum Praesidium
We turn to you for protection,
Holy Mother of God.
Listen to our prayers
and help us in our needs.
Save us from every danger,
glorious and blessed Virgin. Amen.
Bryan J. Dickerson is an author and historian specializing in military and naval history, and Catholicism. He earned his BA in History from Rowan University (NJ), MA in American History from Monmouth University (NJ) and a graduate Certificate in Archival Studies from Louisiana State University. His writings have appeared online and in print in such publications as Columbia (the magazine of the Knights of Columbus) and Celebrate Life (the magazine of the American Life League). He is a 4th Degree member of the Knights of Columbus and a Past Grand Knight of a council in New Jersey. His book The Liberators of Pilsen: the U.S. 16th Armored Division in World War II Czechoslovakia was published by McFarland Books in 2018 and his book Dive Bomber Down: James A. Nist Naval Aviator in the Pacific War is now available from McFarland Books. He has also self-published sixeen books, including In the Name of COVID: The Assault on Religious Freedom in 2020. A former U.S. Navy Reserve Religious Program Specialist 1st Class (Fleet Marine Force), he mobilized and deployed in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom twice. He and his wife Lisa have four children and live in southern New Jersey.
