“Do not be afraid”: the Virgin Mary addressed these words to three Portuguese shepherd children from Aljustrel on May 13, 1917. It was a splendid Sunday morning; Lucia Dos Santos (10 years old) and her cousins Francisco and Jacinta Marto (9 and 7 years old), after attending Mass at the parish of Fatima, took their sheep to graze on the slopes of the Cova da Iria. As was their custom, upon hearing the Angelus bell, they recited the Rosary, and later, while playing, they were startled by a sudden flash.

Mistaking it for lightning and fearing an approaching storm, they began to head back with the flock. Shortly after, a new glow stopped them, and before them, they saw a beautiful Lady dressed in white, standing over a holm oak, radiant with light. “I have come to ask you,” she told them, “to come here for six consecutive months, on the 13th day, at this same hour. Later, I will tell you what I want.” The Lady wore a dress adorned with golden edges, a gold cord as a belt, a pure white mantle, and held a rosary with white beads in her hand. Lucia was the one who spoke; Jacinta listened to the conversation, while Francisco heard nothing. “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?” Mary asked. “Yes, we are,” Lucia replied. And Mary said: “Then you will have much to suffer, but the grace of God will be your consolation.”

The Apparitions in the Cova da Iria

Lucia ordered her cousins not to tell anyone what had happened, explaining, “no one would believe us.” However, Jacinta, fearing punishment for bringing the sheep back early from grazing, told everything to her mother, who did not believe her. Lucia, Francisco, and Jacinta were scolded by their parents. Nevertheless, the news spread, and for the appointment on June 13, a small crowd gathered with the three children. Mary asked for much prayer and told Lucia to learn to read and write to transmit her messages.

During the third apparition, two thousand people gathered and left monetary offerings at the Cova da Iria. The Virgin renewed her invitation to the shepherd children to appear on the 13th of each month at the same location, reiterated her exhortation to pray for humanity, and showed them a vision of hell. Lucia, Francisco, and Jacinta were ridiculed by skeptics; the parish priest doubted the truth of their accounts, and the mayor of Villa Nova de Ourém (the municipality in charge of Fatima) tried to make them recant. On August 13, held in custody, they were unable to go to the Cova da Iria, but Mary appeared to them unexpectedly on August 19 while they were grazing the flock in Valinhos, not far from Aljustrel. Lucia asked what should be done with the offerings left by the faithful, and the Virgin replied that a chapel should be built right there. The apparition repeated punctually on September 13, and for the final meeting, Mary promised a miracle so that all might believe.

“I am the Lady of the Rosary”

October 13 was a cold and gray day; rain lashed down on 70,000 people, including journalists, photographers, and international press. “I am the Lady of the Rosary,” the Lady revealed to Lucia, Francisco, and Jacinta while the rain continued to fall. After the apparition, the promised miracle occurred: the miracle of the sun. The sun could be observed without difficulty; it took on various colors, spun on its axis, and appeared as if it would plummet toward the earth. When the extraordinary event ended, the people’s clothes, which had been soaked by rain just moments before, were perfectly dry.

Only 13 years later, on October 13, 1930, ecclesiastical authorities declared the apparitions “worthy of belief” and authorized the cult of Our Lady of Fatima.

• Francisco died on April 4, 1919.

• Jacinta died on February 20, 1920.

• Lucia entered the Sisters of St. Dorothy on June 17, 1921. More than 10 years after her perpetual vows, she chose to enter the Carmelite monastery in Coimbra. She died on February 13, 2005, at the age of 97.

Francisco and Jacinta were beatified on May 13, 2000, by John Paul II and canonized by Pope Francis on May 13, 2017.