By Kath and Terry Payne
In this Month of Mary, and close to Mother’s Day when we ponder on Mary as our Mother, we were reflecting on some impressions made during our visit to Fatima. We knew from schooldays about the appearances of Our Lady to the 3 children at Fatima and the messages She brought of the importance of prayer and penance. We said the family Rosary at home, and learning the Mysteries was part of our faith learning journey, reinforced by teachers, parents and grandparents. Over the years since (many years!) we gained an adult appreciation of the Rosary. The invitation to join in a Pilgrimage to Fatima and Lourdes was a welcome one and we joined a group of 12 like-minded people, with Fr.Peter from Wagga diocese leading us on a faith filled journey, deepening our love of Mary, the Rosary and more appreciation of Her message.
Whereas a lot of Christian shrines commemorate an incident long past, Fatima by comparison is modern history. Sr.Lucia, the oldest, at 10, of the three visionaries of Fatima died only a few years ago in 2005 age 97. We were struck at Fatima by this modernity of Mary’s Apparitions. The family homes of the children, the sites where they saw the visions, their Parish Church and other well documented landmarks can be visited. (Our guide pointed out to us a relative of Lucia still living in Adjustrel village, the visionaries home town.) This closeness to our time seemed to reinforce for us the immediacy of Our Lady’s messages of the importance of the daily Rosary, penance and praying for sinners, ‘Pray very much’.
The centre of veneration is the huge Fatima Sanctuary Square, which has the Basilica of Our Lady of the Rosary at one end and the modern (2007) Basilica of the Holy Trinity at the other end, built to seat 8,600 pilgrims. The Square is built adjacent to the small Chapel of the Apparitions containing a statue of Our Lady, positioned over the spot where the tree in which She appeared stood until removed in bits by relic hunters. We were proudly told that the area can hold more people than Vatican Square. To those of us from Melbourne who measure crowd numbers in terms of the capacity of the MCG, this doesn’t mean much until we learn that Fatima Square can hold three times a packed MCG!
What struck us most at Fatima and Lourdes was the devotion of pilgrims. We experienced two weeks of prayer, of the mutual faith of thousands of pilgrims from around the world joined in praying to the Mother of God, and all believing, asking, thanking her in unison. Unlike other Christian sites we have visited, there was not the numbers of tourists/pilgrims intent on photos, particularly the all-important ‘selfie’ in front of the shrine, blocking clear views of whatever it is and preventing a prayerful appreciation. Each evening, the Rosary is said in the Chapel of the Apparitions, each decade, or half decade, being recited in a different language. After this, there is a candle-lit procession of the Our Lady’s statue around the Square to a stage in front of the Basilica of Our Lady for Mass. We were in Fatima mid-October (during a commemoration of 100 years since the last Apparition on 17th Oct 1917), towards the end of the season, and the Square was only about one MCG full. An example of the love shown Mary was apparent after the next morning’s International Mass, when, as the statue of Mary is returned to the Chapel of Apparitions, the crowd wave hankies in farewell, the ‘Adios’ spectacle – a remarkable sight.