What is Fátima to a Child?

If you live in Ludlow, Massachusetts or follow the Catholic church, you may have heard of the children pictured. Every year Ludlow holds a large festival called FESTA, which is a cultural event with Portuguese food, music, local vendors, children carnivals, law enforcement, and dignitaries. Among these great things, the Catholic church hosting the event promotes an apparition speaking to two of three young children in Fátima, Portugal in 1917. But too few ask about the children: what did the apparition say to the children?

A Catholic press article [1] on FESTA summarizes two-fold: “The Blessed Mother told the children to pray the rosary daily for peace and to offer up their suffering for the conversion of souls.” That is precise but requires unpacking. A more comprehensive account by John de Marchi and reviewed by the sole surviving child is on EWTN [2], and this author was also featured at the 2024 fair. Leaving aside the rosary part for now, the following passage elaborates on the suffering:

Once, returning from the Cova da Iria, they passed a pond belonging to a family named Carreira It was a dirty pool of water where some women washed their clothes and others brought their animals to drink. Jacinta was weak from ordeal: her throat and her tips were parched.

“My head aches so, Lucia; I’m terribly thirsty, I think I’ll take some of this.”

“Not from here, Jacinta, please. My mother forbids it, anyhow. She says it might make me ill. We can go and get good drinking water.”

“I don’t want to drink good water.” The little girl was determined. “If I must drink something I will take this water and offer it to our Lady.”

The refusal of fresh fruit, with its nourishment and thirst-killing juices, was another means of self-denial. Lucia tells of Jacinta accepting grapes and figs from her mother, concealing, rather than consuming them, then giving them to children they met along the road. And finally, there was the penitential cord that each child wore.

This practice began when Lucia found a length of abandoned rope. Experimenting with it, as a child will, and wrapping it around one arm, she noted the pain its tension brought. She thought about this for a little while, then spoke to the others.

“This is something we could use as a sacrifice,” she said.

“We can knot cords like this and wear them around our waists.”

It may not seem to many a happy thought, but it is a documented record of Fatima that a tightened cord around each of their waists was a daily chastisement. Even at night they did not spare themselves until our Lady, during the September apparition, told them they must not wear the cords to bed.

If you sense a tinge of discomfort & apology in the author, the account Fatima in Lucia’s own Words [3] is more explicit: “This cord had three knots, and was somewhat stained with blood. I kept it hidden until I finally left my mother’s home. Then, not knowing what to do with it, I burned it, and Francisco’s as well,” and “As a matter of fact, this water was filthy. People washed their clothes in it, and the animals came there to drink and waded right into it. That was why my mother warned her children not to drink this water.” Two of the children did soon die of illness, said to be influenza [2], water not proven to be a factor, but the apparition did predict their deaths, not that unlike their mother (complicated), and would “fetch” the remaining child later to allow her to “establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart” [2], i.e. the apparition’s sinless heart.

The interaction is conveyed as follows to the common press:

“God sent his Blessed Mother to these three poor shepherd children with a message for the world – a message of mercy, love, salvation and peace… a more unified, loving humanity,” — priest conveying to a Springfield newspaper, Aug 29, 2024.[5]

At this point, there is much to say. Mary, the mother of Jesus of the Bible, who this is claimed to be, protected her child and fled to Egypt (Matthew 2:13-15) – hail Mary! The charming writing style of this de Marchi account is directed at children (likening itself to a “story-book”) and concerns how the children hid these things from their parents. Should this apparition or her biographers babysit your children? Now, the Springfield diocese has had trouble distinguishing good and bad bishops towards children [4], but how will they fare with discerning apparitions?

The children convinced themselves this way, repeated uncritically by these adults: “it couldn’t couldn’t be the devil! People say that the devil is ugly and lives under the earth in hell, but that Lady was so beautiful, Lucia, and didn’t we see her go up into heaven?” [2] Granted, the Catholic church has doubts about Fátima (“worthy of belief”) and more so about other apparitions like in Yugoslavia, and even Lúcia had been tormented by dreams of the “devil laughing at having deceived me” [3] — i.e. whether Mary and the apparition are separate.

The author’s own interest stemmed from attending the festival in 2022 and reading the story. Also notable that year (but no longer present) was a vendor selling flags and signs of I love Jesus next to those of a politician peeing on another and conveying that sexual organs are weapons, not far from the big apparition statue, as children, priests, and surely thousands of people walked by. Finding this odd for a church festival but also the context unsettling on various levels, and should I even mention other news articles of police being called on children doing to the statue of the apparition what the apparition encouraged children to do to themselves… I picked up the two signs and inquired why people pee on each other if we love Jesus. Not able to buy a sign, I bought holy water and child statues and left it there for whoever finds it as a testimony, sacred shrine, that children shouldn’t drink dirty water. The children had been wrapped in plastic in protection from the rain, evidence His truth — we know — shines more brightly.

There are other dimensions to this, e.g. an article on its interaction with the political history of Portugal [6] (the ambassador of Portugal attending [7]), the “consecration of Russia,” the “bullet” mentioned at the FESTA worship service, or the “third secret” which Pope Benedict surmised could be related to sin within the church.

We can dwell much in those intrigues, but some things are obvious, like a Fátima cookbook (I advise buying a copy), page 4, recommends using the freshest ingredients and cleaning away any dirt and insects. That’s a bold statement because the apparition “does have a way of scoffing at the hygienic fears of the meticulous,” approving rather that “They dug up the earth near the tree and rubbed the sick with it. Some people ate it and were better afterwards.” [2] Meanwhile, Dr. Alves who pushed for and obtained improvements to the water “full of dirt and microbes” [2] was not thanked, nor was mother who forbid.

If this revelation is troubling, I hope not to leave you empty in this conclusion, and if there is something deficient in my analysis, I hope someone would tell me. People process things in different ways.

Among a sea of doubt or unanswerable questions, I find it helpful to ask: What do you know, can stand firmly on? Is it that children should not drink dirty water? That is a deep instinct within but also informed by our senses, both given us, and I assert that. If the story had no such thing, how about priests or towns accepting of bloody ropes? What the Catholic church does not doubt, nor other churches for that matter, is that God conquered sin and death for his children when he came down to Earth, was executed on a cross at the hands of mankind, and raised to life. For many, this cross is foundational, Paul’s “but we preach Christ crucified.” It captures the love and goodness of God toward you: the “forgive us” mercy, which you may pray and Christ prayed for man when crucified. This is the character of the Christian life and conveys the sense of a prisoner on his side pardoned and rope burned, despite those who would retie it on us less a seven year old. But grace is more than mere mercy: a joy that you, prodigal, are now a beloved son or daughter of the living God, meant for better than eating dirt like the snake in the garden [8]. The child whose mother Mary fled [9] later gave his first recorded sermon (Matthew 5-7, starting with blessed are the) which provides a foundation of truly good to build upon against the coming rain, e.g. the forgive us and the hunger and thirst rather for righteousness.

[1] “Thousands flock to Festa for outdoor Mass, procession.” Catholic Communications News (Sep 5, 2022) https://iobserve.org/2022/09/05/thousands-flock-to-festa-for-outdoor-mass-procession/

[2] Fr. John de Marchi, I.M.C. The True Story of Fatima. https://www.ewtn.com/catholicism/library/true-story-of-fatima-5915

[3] FATIMA in Lucia’s own Words. https://www.piercedhearts.org/hearts_jesus_mary/apparitions/fatima/MemoriasI_en.pdf

[4] “Report of Findings of Credibility of Allegations of Sexual Abuse of a Minor.” https://diospringfield.org/osevacrediblyaccused/

[5] “Festa 2024: Portuguese celebration returns to Ludlow.” MASSLive / The Republican. Aug 29, 2024. https://www.masslive.com/westernmass/2024/08/festa-2024-portuguese-celebration-returns-to-ludlow.html

[6] Paul Christopher Manuel. “The Marian Apparitions in Fátima as Political Reality: Religion and Politics in Twentieth-Century Portugal,” Saint Anselm College https://ces.fas.harvard.edu/uploads/files/Working-Papers-Archives/CES_WP88.pdf

[7] OLOF Festival, Ludlow MA. https://www.facebook.com/OLOFFesta/

[8] Gen 3:14,19; Micah 7:17-19 – The serpent (Satan) was debased on his belly toward the ground to “eat” or lick dust, as the expression goes, and man too returned to dust in the ground, both due to sin, until the serpent’s head was crushed underfoot.

[9] To her credit, my own mother removed me from my childhood church, where we used to sing This Little Light of Mine, due to what a few men were doing to their wives — and to the body of Christ.