June
Father Ferreira, the pastor of Fatima, himself had shoulders strong enough to wrestle a horse, but that was not what troubled him now. He began to suspect that he was scheduled for a catch-as-catch-can match with the devil, an opponent of proved and enduring talents. A sincere and dutiful priest, Father Ferreira simply didn’t know what to do with these three very small and difficult parishioners. They kept confounding every sane effort to rid them of their illusions. If one could conclude them to be crazy or irresponsible, Father Ferreira reasoned, it would reduce or even obliterate their blame. But there seemed to be a cool, even diabolic, calculation in their cunning. They were able to handle any and all inquisitors without once trapping themselves in the net of their lie. Obviously, great danger rested in their capacity to persuade ignorant and emotional people to accept them as bona fide seers. The dignity of his Church, in a nation already rife with religious scepticism, imposed a hard responsibility on any pastor whose sheep, however small, were displaying the guile of wolves.
Some days earlier, talking to Lucia’s mother, Father Ferreira had advised her to allow her daughter to visit the Cova da Iria on the feast of St. Anthony, if the girl insisted, but he recommended too, that shortly thereafter she should conduct Lucia to the rectory where they would endeavour to bury this nonsense once and for all. As the father of Jacinta and Francisco, Ti Marto received similar instructions from the priest.
On the night before their scheduled interview with Father Ferreira, Lucia visited the Marto house. Exactly what would happen to them when they visited their pastor, Lucia did not know. Facing her mother’s accusations had been fierce enough, but she had never been obliged to face the challenge of anyone as overpoweringly important as Father Ferreira.
“What’s going to happen to us, Lucia?” the other children asked.
Lucia thought about it. “I don’t know,” she said, “but at home they are doing their best to frighten me. Are you going to the pastor’s house?”
“We have to,” Jacinta said. “Our mother was told to bring us.” For a while she tried to ponder what terrible punishments might befall. Then she turned to Lucia and Francisco. She was resigned, and no more than half-scared. “Why should we worry, anyhow?” Jacinta said. “If they beat us, or anything like that, we can suffer it for our Lord and, like the Lady says, for the conversion of sinners.”
On the next day (according to Ti Marto), it was Maria Rosa who took both girls to see Father Ferreira, and I think she brought Francisco with her too. I remember when Maria Rosa came back she said to me, “Well, I took them to see the priest. He kept asking your Jacinta questions, but she wouldn’t tell him a thing. ‘You don’t seem to know anything,’ he said to her, ’so you can sit down there, or run away; do anything you like.’ All your little Jacinta did was take out her Rosary and begin to say the beads while Father Ferreira questioned Lucia, who answered him very well. But every once in a while, while Lucia was talking, Jacinta would get up and remind Lucia that she must be sure to explain things properly. This was too much for Father Ferreira, who then said to Jacinta crossly, ‘When I was asking you questions, you didn’t know anything; you wouldn’t say anything, but now we can’t shut you up. Why don’t you speak for yourself?’”
The interview did not bring any satisfaction to the troubled pastor. All he had gained from Lucia was a restatement of the Lady’s beauty, and once again, the Lady’s recommendation of the daily Rosary. This was a little more than the reverend gentleman was willing to swallow. His reasoning told him that our Lady was not likely to journey down from heaven just to tell people they should say the Rosary. After all, the recitation of the Rosary was an almost general practice in the parish, and the world was full of places in greater need of such advice. And another thing disturbed him. The history of divine communication with individual souls was almost invariably marked by God’s further instruction that such sacred tidings be revealed by the chosen few to their confessors or parish priests. Contrary to this tradition, Lucia claimed to be holding some secret to herself. The devil, Father Ferreira became more and more convinced, was working with all his sly and ancient skill. Father Ferreira said aloud, for the first time:
“It could be the work of the devil!”
That was enough. The suggestion did it. For reasons unknown to us, Father Ferreira’s speculation placed a very real cloud between Lucia and her beloved Lady.
I began at the time to doubt (Lucia has written), and to wonder if these manifestations of the Lady could be from the devil, trying to deceive me. I had always understood the devil brought with him all kinds of disorder and war, and it was true that since the Lady had first appeared there had not been any happiness or peace in my home. How terribly I suffered. Later I told Jacinta and Francisco of my doubts, but Jacinta would not hear of them. “No, no,” she said, “it 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?”
But such reassurance from the seven-year-old was not equal to banishing Lucia’s doubts. It became truly a trial of a soul in the darkest of nights. It was a violated kind of love that Lucia carried in her heart. The ardour for willing sacrifice and mortification had withered to apathy. Lucia travelled so close to despair, that she was tempted to end the whole affair with a false confession to her mother. A solitary lie could purchase peace, she now believed.
“Please, Lucia, don’t do it,” Jacinta and Francisco pleaded. “Can’t you see how terrible that would be?”
But Lucia saw nothing very clearly in this period. She was obsessed with notions of the devil, and her troubles were compounded by a dream.
In this dream (she has told us) I saw the devil laughing at his success with me and he was trying to drag me down to hell with him. Terrified by the nearness of his reaching hands, I began to scream and call for our Lady. I remember that my screams awakened my mother who came running in to me, wanting to know what it was. I can’t recall what I said to her, but I do know I was far too terrified to sleep again that night. The dream left a cloud of fear and apprehension in my soul.
Actually, the only moments of peace enjoyed by Lucia and her cousins were in the Cova da Iria, close beside the oak tree where their Lady had appeared. Here solace was sustained. Here too they had the comfort and companionship of Senhora Carreira (Maria da Capelinha) who joined them each day at their prayers. Maria, as we have said, was the earliest champion of Fatima. From the beginning, although weak with illness, she began to beautify the honoured place of visitation as well as she knew how.
On the evening of the feast of St. Anthony (Maria has confided), when my daughters returned from the celebrations at Fatima, they said to me, “Well, mother, was it interesting today in the Cova da Iria?” I told them I was sorry they had not been there themselves. “Did our Lady appear?” they asked, and then I told them all that had happened on that 13th of June. My daughters said, “We must go there on Sunday,” and so we did. After a while we saw two people approach whom we knew had come from Lomba de Egua. We remained out of their sight so that we could watch them, and we could see them placing carnations on the branches of the little tree. After that we watched them kneel and say the Rosary, and we were very happy, because we knew, somehow, that it was a holy place. From then on, believe me, I always went to the Cova da Iria. If, at home, I had no strength, I knew that when I got to the Cova, I would be renewed; I would be almost like someone else. I began to clean up around the tree, removing the gorse and prickles and making a little path with a pruning saw. I hung a silk ribbon on one of the branches of the tree, and I continued to place flowers there. Yes, yes, it was always a holy place.
Fatima is a dreadful ultimatum to the world to stop sinning. The enormity of mankind's rebellion against God and God's infinite hatred of sin is the foundation of the Fatima message. In His infinite mercy, God gives the world one last hope in the Immaculate Heart of Mary (