2023-08-13 07:33:00
August 13, 2023 / 12:33 am
On August 13, 1917, exactly 106 years ago, the little shepherds Lucía dos Santos (in the process of beatification), and the cousins San Francisco and Santa Jacinto Marto could not see the Virgin of Fátima because they were retained by a Freemason mayor.
Arturo de Oliveira Santos, mayor of Ourem, was also a Catholic who had apostatized from his faith and wanted the little shepherds to tell him the secret that Our Lady of Fatima entrusted to them.
For that he devised a plan that would allow him to retain them and prevent them from seeing the Mother of God.
The Freemason offered them a car so that they could move safely among the crowd that accompanied them at each apparition.
De Oliveira Santos told the children that the parish priest of Cova de Iría wanted to see them and took them to the rectory. There he revealed his deception to them and threatened them with death to force them to talk.
He then locked them in a cell with criminals so that they would tell him the secret, but nothing made the seers speak. They never gave in, despite the fact that he threatened to kill them in a cauldron with boiling oil.
As had happened in other months, a crowd was waiting for the children at the place of the apparitions, but they never arrived because they were prevented by the mayor, who finally let them go on August 15, the feast day of the Assumption of the Virgin Mary.
Since the little shepherds could not see Our Lady of Fatima on August 13, the meeting took place on the 19th in a place called Valinhos.
“Come again to Cova da Iria on the thirteenth of next month, my daughter, and continue to say the Rosary every day. On the last day I will perform a miracle so that everyone believes”, the Virgin of Fatima told them that day.
The other apparitions of the Virgin of Fatima
The first apparition occurred on May 13, 1917. That day the Mother of God told them that she would return every 13th of the following months, always at the same time.
In her second apparition, on June 13, the Virgin of Fatima told them that Francisco and Jacinta would soon die and that Lucia would live to bear witness to the apparitions. Sister Lucía Dos Santos passed away on February 13, 2005.
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On July 13, in the third apparition, the secret of Fatima was revealed to little Lucia.
After the events of August, the little shepherds saw the Virgin Mary again on September 13 in Cova de Iría.
The sixth and last apparition of the Virgin of Fatima occurred on October 13, 1917. That day the so-called “Miracle of the Sun” occurred before thousands of people present.
After a heavy rain, the clouds dissipated and it was possible to see the sun that looked like a silver disk. Its rays took on different colors and it was seen in a kind of “dance”.
It also seemed to fall on the thousands of people, who fell to their knees.
Walter Sánchez Silva is a senior writer at ACI Prensa, with more than 15 years covering Church events in Europe, America and Asia.
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