The second great pilgrimage site so dear to faithful Catholics is the village of Fatima in Portugal where Our Lady appeared to three young children from May 13 to October 13, 1917. During the First World War, Pope Benedict XV made frequent but unheeded appeals for peace. Finally, in May 1917, he made an earnest appeal to the Queen of Heaven that she would intercede and bring peace to a war-ravaged world.
The response to this request was the first appearance of Our Lady in Fatima, just 70 miles north of Lisbon. This took place one week after the appeal of the Pope when the three children—Lucia, Francisco, and Jacinta—saw Our Lady for the first time on May 13, 1917.
This event was prepared a year earlier by three separate visits of the Angel of Portugal to the children. The angel held in his hands a chalice, above which was suspended a host from which droplets of the Precious Blood were falling into the chalice. The angel left the chalice suspended in the air, saying to them: “Take, drink the Blood of Jesus Christ, horribly outraged by ungrateful men; repair their crimes and console your God.” Then he prostrated himself once more and left.
During the apparitions Our Lady asked for devotion to her Immaculate Heart and Communions of reparation on the first Saturday of the month. This special request is related to the vision of hell that was given to the children. The request to consecrate Russia to the Immaculate Heart is at the center of the present prolonged crisis of the Church. If this request is ignored Russia will continue to spread her errors, wars will follow, the Church will be persecuted, the good will be martyred, the Holy Father will have much to suffer, and various nations will be annihilated. In the end the Immaculate Heart of Mary will triumph.