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Mary Mother of God, Our Patroness
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This page is a work in progress... More coming.
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Marian Apparitions
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Our Lady appeared to Bernadette Soubirous 18 times in the grotto of Massabielle in Lourdes, France, from the 11th of February until the 16th of July in 1858. During the March 25th apparition, she revealed herself to be the Immaculate Conception. In 1862, the church confirmed the authenticity of the apparitions, and approved honoring Our Lady of Lourdes.
Statue in the grotto
This is the oldest known photograph depicting the Grotto at the University of Notre Dame. This photograph, taken in 1896 shows the grotto at that time, along with a number of Holy Cross brothers and priests engaging in prayer.
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Our Lady appeared in Fatima, Portugal, beginning on May 13, 1917, to three children, Lúcia de Jesus dos Santos, Francisco Marto and Jacinta Marto.
They reported seeing a woman "brighter than the sun, shedding rays of light clearer and stronger than a crystal goblet filled with the most sparkling water and pierced by the burning rays of the sun." The woman wore a white mantle edged with gold and held a rosary in her hand. She asked them to devote themselves to the Holy Trinity and to pray "the Rosary every day, to bring peace to the world and an end to the war".
Our Lady appeared on the 13th of the next 5 months.
The 3 secrets of Fátima, given during the 3rd apparition on July 13th.
It was during the third apparition, on July 13, 1917, that Our Lady revealed the three parts of the secret of Fatima to the three children, asking them at the same time not to reveal them immediately.
Lucia (Lúcia dos Santos), the holder of the secret, revealed the first two parts publicly in 1941 on the occasion of the publication of her Memoir on the apparitions. The third part was written on a letter in 1944, given to the bishop of Leiria (Portugal) and then transmitted to the Vatican's secret archives in 1957 after Lucia's approval and the commitment not to open it before 1960. It was not publicly revealed until 2000.
It is this third part and the secrecy surrounding it that will give rise to all the suppositions, fantasies and elucidations. So what about it?
In fact, these three parts of the same revelation remain rather obscure and require interpretation. These interpretations have been numerous, often different and sometimes contested.
The first part of the secret of Fátima was a revelation of a horrible vision of hell with a supplication that could be translated as :
"You have seen the hell to which the souls of poor sinners go. To save them, God wants to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If we do what I am going to tell you, many souls will be saved and there will be peace "
The second part of the secret of Fatima concerns Russia and its consecration to the Immaculate Heart of Mary and a warning that could be translated as follows:
"If my requests are accepted, Russia will be converted and we will have peace. If not, she will spread her errors throughout the world, provoking wars and persecutions against the Church. The good ones will be martyred, the Holy Father will have much to suffer, various nations will be destroyed. In the end, my Immaculate Heart will triumph. The Holy Father will consecrate Russia to me and it will be converted, and the world will be granted a certain time of peace. ".
The third part of the secret of Fátima is presented as a disturbing allegorical vision :
"We saw various other bishops, priests, religious men and women climb a steep mountain, on top of which there was a large cross made of rough trunks, as if they were made of cork oak with their bark; before reaching it, the Holy Father passed through a large city half in ruins and, half trembling, with a wavering step, afflicted with suffering and pain, he prayed for the souls of the corpses he found on his way; When he reached the top of the mountain, prostrated on his knees at the foot of the great cross, he was killed by a group of soldiers who fired several shots with a gun and arrows; and in the same way bishops and priests, religious men and women and various laymen and women of different classes and social categories died one after the other ."
If the first 2 parts, in spite of many different interpretations, did not pose any problem, it is not the same for the 3rd part.
The controversies are numerous and concern the authenticity of the message unveiled by the Vatican, the completeness of the message made public, whether it is outdated or not, its different interpretations, and even the existence of a fourth part.
On August 13th, the children were not present, they were being interrogated by authorities for disturbing the peace, but those present did see meteorological phenomenon. Our Lady appeared to the children on the 19th instead, after they had been released.
At the 6th Apparition, on October 13th, during an intense downpour, Mary appeared and the rain ceased. The crowd of more than 50,000 people experienced the "Miracle of the Sun", where the sun changed colors, turned on itself, then moved towards the earth, then back into it's place.
One of the children announced that the war would end soon and that the Virgin asked that a chapel dedicated to Our Lady of the Rosary be erected on the site of the apparitions.
The church officially recognized the apparitions of Fatima and the approval of the honoring of Our Lady of Fatima on 13 October 1930.
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Our Lady appeared 4 times in 1531 to Juan Diego and once to his uncle Juan Bernardino. In the first vision, Mary identified herself as the "Mary, mother of the very true deity". She requested that a church be built at that site in her honor.
Juan Diego went to the Archbishop with her request and was denied. Mary appeared a second time and requested that he insist. This time the Archbishop requested a sign.
Mary appeared a third time and requested that Juan return the next day. He failed to do so due to his uncle becoming deathly ill. He tried to avoid meeting Mother Mary so as not to be delayed in aiding his uncle, but she appeared none the less a fourth time. Juan explained what happened and Mary responded: "¿No estoy yo aquí que soy tu madre?" ("Am I not here, I who am your mother?").
She assured him that his uncle would recover and told him to gather flowers from the summit of Tepeyac Hill and to bring them to the Archbishop. The flowers were Castile Roses, not native to Mexico and not able to bloom in the cold of winter. She arranged the flowers in his tilma. When he opened his tilma before the Archbishop, the flowers fell to the floor, and on his tilma was the image of the Virgin Mary.
The next day, Juan Diego discovered that his uncle was indeed completely recovered, and had been visited by the Virgin Mary himself. She instructed him to inform the Archbishop of his miraculous healing and that she wished to be known under the title of Our Lady of Guadalupe.
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