CAPG's Blog 

John Martin  (1789–1854)

"As Our Lady spoke these last words, she opened her hands once more, as she had done during the two previous months. The rays of light seemed to penetrate the earth, and we saw as it were a sea of fire. Plunged in this fire were demons and souls in human form, like transparent burning embers, all blackened or burnished bronze, floating about in the conflagration, now raised into the air by the flames that issued from within themselves together with great clouds of smoke now falling back on every side like sparks in huge fires, without weight or equilibrium, amid shrieks and groans of pain and despair, which horrified us and made us tremble with fear. (It must have been this sight which caused me to cry out, as people say they heard me).

This vision lasted but an instant. How can we ever be grateful enough to our kind heavenly Mother, who had already prepared us by promising, in the first Apparition, to take us to heaven. Otherwise, I think we would have died of fear and terror.

The demons could be distinguished by their terrifying and repellent likeness to frightful and unknown animals, black and transparent like burning coals.

Terrified and as if to plead for succour, we looked up at Our Lady, who said to us, so kindly and so sadly: You have seen hell where the souls of poor sinners go. To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved and there will be peace." Source:  Sister Lucia, July 13th, 1917

"Those people burning in hell, don't they ever die? And don't they turn into ashes? And if people pray very much for sinners, won't Our Lord get them out of there? And if they make sacrifices as well? Poor sinners! We have to pray and make sacrifices for them!" Source: Jacinta. Fatima in Lucia's own words 1976

"And so we come to the final question: What is the meaning of the «secret»‌ of Fatima as a whole (in its three parts)? What does it say to us? First of all we must affirm with Cardinal Sodano: «... the events to which the third part of the 'secret' of Fatima refers now seem part of the past»‌. Insofar as individual events are described, they belong to the past. Those who expected exciting apocalyptic revelations about the end of the world or the future course of history are bound to be disappointed. Fatima does not satisfy our curiosity in this way, just as Christian faith in general cannot be reduced to an object of mere curiosity. What remains was already evident when we began our reflections on the text of the «secret»‌: the exhortation to prayer as the path of «salvation for souls»‌ and, likewise, the summons to penance and conversion.   

I would like finally to mention another key expression of the «secret»‌ which has become justly famous: «my Immaculate Heart will triumph»‌. What does this mean? The Heart open to God, purified by contemplation of God, is stronger than guns and weapons of every kind. The fiat of Mary, the word of her heart, has changed the history of the world, because it brought the Saviour into the world - because, thanks to her Yes, God could become man in our world and remains so for all time. The Evil One has power in this world, as we see and experience continually; he has power because our freedom continually lets itself be led away from God. But since God himself took a human heart and has thus steered human freedom towards what is good, the freedom to choose evil no longer has the last word. From that time forth, the word that prevails is this: «In the world you will have tribulation, but take heart; I have overcome the world»‌ (Jn 16:33). The message of Fatima invites us to trust in this promise. "

Source: Joseph Card. Ratzinger Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith