THE THIRD APPARITION OF OUR LADY OF FATIMA

[FRIDAY, JULY 13TH 1917]

The date of the next apparition was approaching; Jacinta and Francisco were the happiest children in the world.  Lucia’s heart, however, was filled with gloom and despair.  Though Jacinta’s words revived her courage but in the hostile atmosphere of her family, her doubts returned very quickly that on July 12th  she told her two companions of her decision not to go to the Cova the next day.  “We are going!” they answered her. “The Lady told us to go there.”  “I will speak to her”, Jacinta declared breaking into tears.  “Why are you crying?” Lucia asked.  “Because you don’t want to go”.  “No, I am not going, Look! If the Lady asks for me, tell her I am not coming because I fear she is the devil” and then Lucia, grief-stricken, hurried away.

On the morning of Friday, July 13th, towards eleven O’clock, Lucia felt herself urged to go to the heavenly rendezvous.  She went to the home of her two cousins whom she found in tears kneeling at the foot of the bed, reciting the Rosary.  “Have you not gone yet?” she asked.  “It is time to go”
“Oh!, they replied, “We had not the courage to go without you.”
“Well then, let us go together”.

So, off they went, the three of them walking happily through the crowds of people that jammed the road to Cova.  They could not hurry, because many people stopped them, asking them to speak to our Lady and ask special favors for them.

At Cova da Iria, the people already gathered were estimated to be from four to five thousand.  The children recited the Rosary kneeling, with the people and the vision appears again.

For joy or rather frightened perhaps by the trials she had undergone, Lucia looked at the Lady without daring to say a word.  But the fearless Jacinta, nudging her said: “Go on Lucia speak!  Do you not see that she is already there and that she wants you to speak?

Thus encouraged, Lucia asked the Lady:  “What do you want of me?” “I want you to return here on the thirteenth of next month,” the Lady said “Continue to say the Rosary everyday in honour of Our Lady of the Rosary to obtain peace for the world and the end of the war; for she alone can save it”.

Lucia thinking of her mother and the words of the Pastor, wishing to clear up the doubts of people, spoke again in her own childish manner,  “will you please tell us who you are and perform a miracle so that everyone will believe that you really appear to us?”
“Continue to come here every month.  In October, I will perform a miracle all shall see so that they believe”.

Gaining courage, Lucia then asked her to be so kind as to cure a cripple, to covert a family of Fatima and to take to heaven a sick person of Atouguia.  The Lady answered that if she did not cure the cripple person, she would give him other means of earning a livelihood but for that, he must recite the Rosary every day; that the sick person should not be in a hurry to die, that she know better than he did when she should come to take him; that the other persons’ requests would be granted the following year, but that they must recite the Rosary.

Then to remind the children of their special vocation and to inspire them to greater favour and courage for the future the Lady said:

“Sacrifice yourselves for sinners; and say often, especially when you make some sacrifice: O Jesus, it is for love of you, for the conversion of sinners, and in reparation for the offenses committed against the Immaculate Heart of Mary”

“As Our Lady spoke these last words, she opened her hands once more, as she had done during the two previous months.  The rays of light seemed to penetrate the earth and we saw as it were a sea of fire.  Plunged in the fire were demons and souls in human form, like transparent burning embers all blackened or banished bronze, floating about in the conflagration, now raised into the air by the flames that issued from within themselves together with great clouds of smoke, now falling back on every side like sparks in huge fires, without weight or equilibrium, amid shrieks and groans of pain and despair which horrified us and made us tremble with fear.  [It must have been this sight which caused me to cry out, as people say they heard me].  The demons could be distinguished by their terrifying and repellent likeness so frightful and unknown animals black and transparent like burning coals”.

In her third Memoir, Lucia added: “that vision lasted only a moment, thanks to our Good Mother of Heaven, who at the first apparition, promised to bring us to Heaven.  Without that, I think we would have died of terror and fear”.

Terrified and as if to plead for succor, we looked up at Our Lady, who said to us, so kindly and so sadly:  “You have seen hell where the souls of poor sinners go.  To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart.  If what I say to you is done many souls will be saved and there will be peace.  The war is going to end; but if people do not cease offending God, a worse one will break out during the reign of Pius XI.  When you see a night illumined by an unknown light, know that this is the great sign given you by God that he is about to punish the world for its crimes, by means of war, famine and persecutions of the Church and of the Holy Father”.

“To prevent this, I shall come to ask for the consecration of Russia to my Immaculate Heart, and the Communion of Reparation on the first Saturdays.  If my request are heeded, Russia will be converted, and there will be peace; if not, she will spread her errors throughout the world, the Holy Father will have much to suffer various nations will be annihilated.  In the end, My Immaculate Heart will triumph.  The Holy Father will consecrate Russia to me, and she will be converted, and a period of peace will be granted to the world.  In Portugal, the dogma of the faith will always be preserved; etc… Do not tell this to anybody.  Francisco, yes you may tell him,”  “When you pray the Rosary, say after each decade: O MY JESUS, forgive us our sins, save us from the fire of hell, lead all souls to Heaven, especially those who are in most need of your mercy!”

After this, there was a moment of silence, and then Lucia’s heart aching to do something heroic for her Lady, once again said to her, in childlike abandon “Don’t you want anything else from me?”  “No; today I desire nothing else from you”.

Then, as before our Lady began to ascend towards the East until she vanished into the immensity of the firmament.  As soon as the children recovered from the spell of emotions, a ruthless, inquisitive crowd surrounded them, all saying at once, “Lucia, what did the Lady say to make you look so sad?”  “It is a secret” she responded.
“Is it something good?”  “For some, it is good; for others, it is evil”  “Won’t you tell it?” they pressed.   “No I cannot tell it.  She answered with convincing determination.

The people kept pushing so much that they almost smothered the children.  Jacinta’s father, frightened for the safety of his children, perspiration rolling down his face from the excitement of the occasion, elbowed his way close to the children, picked up Jacinta in his strong arms and sheltering her from the sun with his hat, started for the road home.  Francisco was picked up by a relative while Lucia was being carried by a very tall man, so tall in fact that Lucia’s mother from where she was hiding with Jacinta’s mother was distracted from her worry and blurted out. “Oh, what a big man.”

SACRIFICES AND SUFFERINGS

After this third Apparition of Our Lady the three children yearned more and more to be left alone to say their prayers and make their sacrifices for Our Lady; but whenever they were seen on the streets the crowds of people gathered to ask them all sorts of questions about the apparitions.  To avoid these questions, they had to wend their way to their pastures over back roads and deserted lanes.  So filled were they with the thought of pleasing the Lady that nothing else counted, neither singing nor dancing nor even the flute playing of little Francisco.  “What are you thinking about, Jacinta,” Lucia asked one morning, noticing a cloud of sadness veiling her face.   “I am thinking of Hell, and poor sinners.  How sorry I am for the souls that go to Hell…. The people there, alive, burning as wood in the fire…. Lucia, why is it that Our Lady does not show Hell to sinners? If they saw it, they would not commit any more sins, so they would not go there”.  Lucia, puzzled, could find no word to answer.  But Jacinta insisted, “why did you not tell Our Lady to show Hell to all these people?”

“I forgot,” Lucia admitted.

Jacinta then knelt on the ground, while she raised her folded hands towards Heaven, sighing out the prayer that the Lady taught them to say”.  “O MY JESUS, forgive us our sins, save us from the fire of hell, lead all souls to Heaven, especially those who are in most need of your mercy”.  Lucia and Francisco both followed suit kneeling as they said the Lady’s prayer with Jacinta.  Jacinta, however, was so engrossed in her prayer, she did not realize that Lucia was praying with her, and she spoke up “Lucia, Francisco, are you praying with me?  We must pray a great deal to save souls from Hell.  So many go there!”

The thought of Hell and the souls suffering in its fire so filled the child’s mind, she could not fathom the reasons for it.  “Lucia”, she went to Lucia in all her problems.  “Lucia, What have these people done to go to Hell?”

“I don’t know! Maybe they sinned by missing Mass on Sunday.  Maybe they said ugly words, stole, swore….”  “How easy it was for them to have held their tongues or go to Mass!  How sorry I am for them!  If I could only show them Hell….”

Tired and weary from kneeling so long, they got up and walked to the shade of the large holmoaks to think some more on the words of their Lady.  Francisco spoke up this time:  “Why did Our Lady hold in her hand a heart spreading upon the world that great light that is God?  Lucia, you were with Our Lady in the light that came towards the earth; but  Jacinta and I in the light that went up to Heaven.”  You and Jacinta will go to Heaven soon, but I have to stay in the world longer”
“How many years?’
“I don’t know, but for many”
“Was it the Lady who told you?”
“No, but I saw it in that light that she sent into our hearts”  “That’s true”.    Jacinta spoke up, “I also saw in that way.  I am going to Heaven but you are going to stay here.  If Our Lady lets you tell everyone what Hell is like, so that they won’t sin any more.  So many people falling into Hell, so many people….”  “You don’t have to be afraid,” Lucia said, “you are going to Heaven.”  “Yes, I shall go: but I want everybody to go there too”.

The cool hours of the morning gave way to the stifling heat of the day.  The children burned with thirst, but there was not a drop of water near.  Instead of complaining, seven years old Jacinta seemed happy.  “How good it is,” she said: “I am thirsty but I offer everything for the conversion of sinners”.  Lucia the oldest of them, realized she should look after her cousins, so she went to a nearby house to fetch some water.  When she returned, she offered it first to Francisco.
“I don’t want to drink,” the nine-year-old boy said; “I want to suffer for sinners.”
“Jacinta, you drink it”.
“I also want to offer a sacrifice.”  So Lucia poured out the water into the hollow of a rock for the sheep to drink and returned the empty jug to the house.

Jacinta however became very weak and was almost fainting.  The rhythmic noises of crickets, frogs and insects began to pound in her ears like thunder.  Holding her head in her hands, she cried out in utter desperation, “My head aches so.  Tell the crickets and frogs to stop”.  “Don’t you want to suffer this for sinners?”  Lucia asked.  “Yes, I do Lucia; let them sing.”  “Lucia” Jacinta continued, “the Lady said that her Immaculate Heart shall be your refuge and the way that shall lead you to God.  Doesn’t that make you happy?  I love her Heart very much”.  “I should like to go with you.”  Lucia confessed, thinking of the beautiful joys of Heaven.  “Lucia, don’t you remember… the Heart of Our Lady encircled by thorns?  How pitiful! I am so sorry for her… . She asked for the communion of reparation, but how could I do it if I can’t receive communion yet?”  Filled with such thoughts the days sped by for these three children.

One time Jacinta was alone near the well, while Lucia and Francisco went to look for some wild honey.  All at once a vision of the Pope came before her.  Thinking that the others would see everything she did, she called them back, Lucia! Francisco! Did you see the Holy Father?”  “I don’t know how it happened.”  Jacinta went on.  “I saw the Holy Father in a very big house.  He was kneeling before a table, holding his face in his hands and he was crying.  Outside, there were many people, some were throwing stones at him, others were swearing at him and saying many ugly words to him.  How pitiful it was! We must pray a lot for him”.

Another time while they were in the cave of the Cabeco, saying the prayer of the Angel, Jacinta suddenly got up, her eyes filled with tears, “Lucia”, She sobbed, “don’t you see all those roads and lanes and fields covered with people crying from hunger, without anything to eat?  And the Holy Father in a Church praying before the Immaculate Heart of Mary?  And all those praying with him?” 

As the news of these extraordinary events flashed through the country, arousing curiosity everywhere the number of visitors to Fatima increased daily all wanted to see the Cova da Iria and to speak to the three children.

The Marto family was much more understanding of Jacinta and Francisco than was Lucia’s family of her.  They questioned Lucia and ridiculed her even more than outsiders.  They made life so unbearable for her.  Being a family of ordinary means, her mother in particular made her pay for the loss incurred because of the Cova da Iria events.  In which they had a few pieces of land where they raised their vegetables and food, potatoes, corn, beans and olives.  So many people that visit the Cova da Iria trampled upon the farm and everything was ruined.  Her mother would not spare her for this “when you want to eat, you can go now and ask that Lady?”  And her sisters would say,  “you should eat only what grows in the Cova da Iria.”

This nagging became so distressing that the poor child hardly dared to pick up a slice of bread to eat.

Meanwhile the ecclesiastical authority feigned ignorance of the events and held itself resolutely aloof.

THE ANTICLERICAL REACTION

The enemies of the Church on the contrary understood almost instinctively the capital importance of the religious movement of Fatima.

Since the revolution of 1910, which had driven from Portugal the king, Dom Manuel, the Free thinkers had seized power, expelled all religious from the country, oppressed the secular clergy and were constantly persecuting the Church by impious laws, the avowed aim of all this being the prevention of recruiting among the clergy and the destruction of the Faith.  Therefore, as soon as these prodigies of Fatima began to electrify the crowds, they felt that this religious movement threatened to ruin in a day, all the work of dechristianisation that they had been doing for many years.  The Grand Orient of Lisbon hastened to make its plan and to launch its attacks.

The attack began with a press campaign, clearly organized, which increased steadily in virulence until the fall of the regime in 1926.  The liberalist and impious newspapers began to describe at length the apparition of Fatima, introducing circumstances both false and ridiculous in order to throw discredit on the events.  According to the accounts, it was nothing but a “Jesuitical farce,” A sordid exploitation of the people, a money-making affair and a plot to arouse the masses against the “Republican” government.  As to the mysterious happenings reported at Fatima, they added that this was all a question of pure suggestion.

The clearest result of this mischievous campaign was to make Fatima known throughout the country and to make many decide to go and judge for themselves.

OPPOSITION FROM THE CIVIL AUTHORITY

The press campaign really prepared the ground for the entirely anticlerical.  The village of Fatima belongs to the county of Ourem.  The Sub-prefect [Administrator of the Town Council] was Arthur d’Oliveira Santos, son of the local blacksmith, a man with a primary school education, a tinsmith by trade.  He had been in politics since his youth.  A baptized Catholic, he had abandoned the Church at the age of twenty to join the Masonic Lodge of Lerria, later, he found a lodge at Ourem [“centre of Carbonari” a kind of popular free-thought group] of which he was the head.  He published a local newspaper by which he endeavored to undermine the faith of the people in the Church and the Priests.  This was enough for the Republic of 1910 to raise him, at the age of twenty-six, to the post of sub-prefect, president of the council of the department and deputy judge of the district.  The accumulation of these high offices made of this half-educated tinsmith the most influential and most feared man of the region.

On Saturday, August 11th, the parents of the three little seers were cited by the sub-prefect to appear before him at Ourem with three children.  In the morning compadre Antonio and his daughter Lucia went to Ti Martos house so that they would go together with the children.  On arriving Lucia’s first question was “Aren’t Jacinta and Francisco going too?”  “Why should such little children go there?”  Marto replied, “No, I will answer for them”

Although the citizenry of the county did cringe in fear before this all powerful magistrate, but not Ti Marto who feared no one when the good of his children and the good of the Church was threatened, he would stand up boldly before any man in the interest of truth and justice.

Lucia ran to Jacinta’s room to inform her cousin of the summons they had received and how she feared she would be killed. “If they kill you, tell them that Francisco and I are like you and that we want to die too” Jacinta cried.  Lucia’s father did not want to take a chance on being late and arousing the anger of the magistrate.  He left before Ti Marto.  As Lucia rode the donkey along, she thought how different her father was from Ti Marto and her other uncle.  “They put themselves in danger to defend their children but my parents turn me over with the greatest indifference so that they can do with me whatever they wish.  But patience!” Lucia comforted herself.  “I expect to have to suffer more for thy love, O my God, and it is for the conversion of sinners.”

The magistrate submitted Lucia to a long examination, ordering her to reveal the Lady’s “Secrete”, and to promise not to go any more to the place of the apparitions.  When the child persisted in her refusal, he threatened the parents and sent them away saying that he knew well how to attain his purpose even if he had to do away with these wicked good-for-nothings.

THE CHILDREN ARE ARRESTED

Two days later on August 13th, the sub-prefect could see the endless stream of people who passed his window from early morning on their way to the scene of the apparitions.  Conquering his feelings of contempt, he got into his carriage and went to Aljustrel, to the home of the little seers.

“I have come to be present also at the apparition”, he declared “like Thomas, I want to see in order to believe”.  “You are right”. Said Jacinta’s father.  “The best way to decide is to see for yourself”.

The sub-prefect insisted on taking the children in his carriage to Cova da Iria.  “No, no,” they cried, “we always go on foot”.  “Well,” said he to their parents, “let them go to the Pastor’s house; I shall await them there to ask them a few more questions.”

When the children arrived, the sub-prefect asked the Pastor to question Lucy in his presence, especially about the “secrete”.  The Pastor, who was hearing about the secret for the first time, insisted on her telling it to him.

“The Lady has forbidden us to tell it”, replied the girl, “but if you wish I shall ask her today if she will allow me to tell it to the Priest, and if she does, I shall tell it”.

It was wisdom that spoke in the mouth of the child.

“Good,” said the sub-prefect, “These are supernatural things; let us leave them aside.  It is time to go to Cova da Iria.”

The children started down the stairs.  Meanwhile the carriage was brought right up to the last step, which enabled the sub-prefect to in a moment perfectly decoy the children into it.  He kidnapped them.  On arriving home, he tried all means to draw the secret from the children but all to no avail.  He pushed them into a room and locked them up.  “You won’t leave this room until you tell me the secret” he warned them.

“If they kill us”, Jacinta consoled the other two when they were alone, “it doesn’t matter.  We will go straight to Heaven.”  On the following morning an old woman came to chat with them and to try to draw the secret from them by surprise, but in vain.  They were then taken before the bureau of administration and submitted to a regular cross-examination.  They related quite simply the story of apparitions but declared that they could not tell the secret, because the Lady had forbidden them to do so.  Tricks, promises and threats were used, but they remained inflexible.

Shortly after noon they were put into the public prison and told they would soon be taken out and burnt alive!  Little Jacinta, hardly seven begins to weep. Lucia tries to encourage her.  “Jacinta are you weeping?”

“We are going to die without ever again seeing our parents.  None of them have come to see us, neither yours nor mine.  They don’t care for us anymore.  I want to see my mother at least.”
“Don’t weep Jacinta” Francisco interrupted, “Let us offer this sacrifice for sinners.”  And joining his hands he say, “O Jesus, it is for love of you, and for the conversion of sinners.”  Jacinta still in tears joins her hands in twin and lifting her eyes to heaven -
“also for the Holy Father and for the offences committed against the Immaculate of Mary”.  

Moved by this scene, the other prisoners interpose:

“But why do you not tell the secret? What does it matter if the Lady has forbidden it?”  “O never,” replied Jacinta fearlessly.  “We should rather die”.

Occupied as they had been, the children had not yet recited the Rosary.  Jacinta then takes out a medal and asks a prisoner to hang it on a nail on the wall.  Then kneeling before this improvised alter, they recite the Rosary with all their souls, while the prisoners overcome with emotion fall on their knees.  One man still kept his hat on.   Francisco got up, and went to him and said, “When we pray, we take our hats off.”  The man took it off and dropped it on the floor.  Francisco picked it up and laid it on the bench.

THE THREAT OF DEATH

The children were later on that 15th of August taken back to the county house where the Magistrate [Sub-prefect] recoursed to a last stratagem.  He roughly, get into a terrible rage and shouted at the children; If you will not obey willingly; you will do so by force.” Turning towards a guard he ordered that a huge cauldron of boiling oil be prepared in which to roast them.  While the guard has gone to carry out the order, they were shut into a little room.  What moments of anguish for the little martyrs, who prepare themselves for the sacrifice!  Jacinta was called in first, “The oil is already boiling.  Tell the secret…otherwise…” Jacinta, like Our Lord before the judges, remained silent.

“Take her away and throw her into the tank!”  Yelled the inquisitor.  The guard grabbed her arm swung her around and locked her in another room.

While waiting their turn, Francisco confided to Lucia, “if they kill us, we shall soon be in Heaven.  Nothing else counts.  I hope that Jacinta does not get scared.  I should say a Hail Mary for her”.  He took off his cap and said a prayer.

The guard, watching the children, was puzzled at the boy’s behaviour.  “What are you saying?” he demanded.

“I am saying one Hail Mary for Jacinta, to give her courage”.

The other guard came back, and led Francisco into the Magistrate’s [Sub-prefect] office.  Grabbing hold of the little boy, he shouted, “Spite out the secret.  The other one is already burned up; now it’s your turn. Go ahead, out with it”.

“I can’t” he replied, looking calmly into the eyes of this new Nero.  “I can’t tell it to anyone”

“You say you can’t.  That’s your business.  Take him away.  He’ll share his sister’s lot.”  The boy was taken into the next room, where he found his little sister, safe and happy.

Lucia was convinced that she was next to be thrown into the burning cauldron of oil, she trusted in her Heavenly Mother not to desert her, but to give her the courage to be loyal and courageous even as Francisco and Jacinta were.

Though Lucia did tell the Magistrate some thing of what happened in the visions, even as she had told her parents and the Pastor, she kept the secret part to herself.  It was a solemn promise to Our Lady and she would rather die than break it.  The Magistrate was not satisfied with this little bit.  He wanted to know the secret.  After her inquisition, Lucia too was locked in the room where the other two were and how happy they were for their unwavering fidelity to Our Lady.

The Magistrate did not yet give up.  The guard came to remind them that soon they would be thrown into the burning oil.  The thought of being able to die together for Our Lady made them all the happier.  The Magistrate finally admitted, after further fruitless questioning, that he could accomplish nothing.

Surprised at the constancy, in such young persons, the sub-prefect had them mentally examined by a doctor who found nothing abnormal.   

The children were taken back to Fatima by the sub-prefect himself in his carriage.  He took them to the presbytery.  The day was 15th of August.  The Church was celebrating the feast of the Assumption.  Many people were at the Mass.  After the Mass, the people filed out of the church and congregated in the yard as usual on the Holy Day.  They were inquisitive of what has become of the little seers.  Ti Marto had hardly finished the little information he got about the children, when they were spotted at the rectory balcony.  The Magistrate who was still there would have been mobbed if not the timely intervention of Ti Marto and the Pastor whom they falsely suspected of connivance in the arrest of the innocent children.

However it is important to note that the interrogation of the children served one purpose that was providential.  Since every thing becomes a matter of official record, the Magistrate unwillingly made the existence of a secret revelation undeniable.