Why Our Lady of Fátima Still Matters 109 Years Later

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Why Our Lady of Fátima Still Matters 109 Years Later

Angeline Tan [slightly abridged and slightly adapted - not all hyperlinks included from original] | May 13, 2026

Each year on May 13, the Catholic Church commemorates one of the most significant interventions of Heaven in modern history: the very first apparition of the Blessed Virgin Mary under the title of Our Lady of Fátima in 1917.

Appearing to three humble shepherd children in Portugal, namely, Lúcia dos Santos, as well as her cousins Francisco and Jacinta Marto, the Blessed Virgin Mary did not come to merely to propose a way out of the horrendous effects of World War I plaguing Europe at that time. Rather, Our Lady came with a warning, a plan, and a plea—one that remains not only unfulfilled in its entirety, but has become even more pressing in our own day.

To fully grasp the essence of devotion to Our Lady of Fátima is to understand that it is not solely a private or optional devotion or a vestige of pre-Vatican II piety.

As the Fatima Center rightly pointed out, Fátima  is Heaven’s diagnosis of the current crisis facing the Church and the world today, as well as its prescribed remedy. The message of Fátima  touches on sin, punishment, repentance, and reparation—realities that are usually watered down, dismissed, or even denied by many in the world, and even within Holy Mother Church Herself.

However, Our Lady at Fátima did not mince any words: if men do not amend their sinful lives, they will be punished. Remarkably, Our Lady showed the three children a vision of hell—not as a metaphor, but as an inevitable reality if Man does not repent of his sinful ways. In her Memoirs, Sister  Lúcia recalled the vision of hell that Our Lady disclosed:

“She opened Her hands once more, as She had done the two previous months. The rays [of light] appeared to penetrate the earth, and we saw, as it were, a vast sea of fire. Plunged in this fire, we saw the demons and the souls [of the damned]. The latter were like transparent burning embers, all blackened or burnished bronze, having human forms. They were floating about in that conflagration, now raised into the air by the flames which issued from within themselves, together with great clouds of smoke. Now they fell 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 fright (it must have been this sight which caused me to cry out, as people say they heard me). The demons were distinguished [from the souls of the damned] by their terrifying and repellent likeness to frightful and unknown animals, black and transparent like burning coals. That vision only lasted for a moment, thanks to our good Heavenly Mother, Who at the first apparition had promised to take us to Heaven. Without that, I think that we would have died of terror and fear.”

During the July 13 apparition, Our Lady cautioned the three children that unless humanity ceased offending God, the world would face punishment through war, famine, and persecution directed against the Church and the Holy Father, with Russia serving as the instrument of this chastisement. She further revealed that, in order to avert these calamities, she would later request the consecration of Russia to her Immaculate Heart, assuring them that through this act Russia would be converted and peace would be granted to the world.

It is noteworthy that Our Lady entrusted the specific act of consecrating Russia to Her Immaculate Heart to the Pope in union with the bishops of the world.

Unless Our Lady’s requests are obeyed, “Russia will spread its errors throughout the world, raising up wars and persecutions of the Church. The good will be martyred, the Holy Father will have much to suffer and various nations will be annihilated.”

Notably, Our Lady’s warnings were not abstract but were prophetic declarations that have unraveled with chilling accuracy over the past century.

Arguably, the most unsettling aspect of the Fátima message lies not only in the chaotic conflicts beleaguering the world, but in what has taken place within the Church itself. [...]

Bearing in mind the dismal state of events in the world and (especially) in the Catholic Church, it is impossible to deny that we are living in such tumultuous times. Evidently, the diabolical disorientation in the Catholic Church is no longer under wraps. Instead, such confusion has been made public, institutional, and extremely disorienting to the faithful.

Consider the current kerfuffle in the Church concerning  the German bishops, the latter who unabashedly promote doctrines and practices that go against perennial Catholic teaching on morality, sexuality, and the nature of the Church. These bishops are not fringe actors in a remote part of the world, but are successors of the Apostles who are touting controversial positions that would have been definitively anathematized by previous popes, particularly those before Vatican II.

Simultaneously, the Vatican seems either unable or unwilling to unequivocally correct such abhorrent deviations. Consequently, the Church risks having a splintering of authority, along with an increasing perception that Her unity—so fundamental to Her divine calling to save souls—is being pushed to its limits.

Paradoxically, while heterodoxy appears to be condoned or even celebrated by certain segments of the Vatican, faithful Catholics trying to preserve Catholic Tradition frequently encounter scrutiny and sanctions. The Society of St. Pius X (SSPX), for instance, declared its plans in February this year to consecrate bishops in what it presents as an effort to safeguard the traditional priesthood and sacraments. Predictably, the SSPX’s announcement was greeted with strong resistance from the Vatican, sparking debate on why the defense of Catholic Tradition is regarded with wariness by the Roman authorities in the “Church of Accompaniment”, while doctrinal innovations can usually flex their muscles with comparative freedom.

Even more obfuscating are moments of symbolic confusion—such as the recent episode of Anglican “Archbishop” Sarah Mullally, giving a “blessing” at St. Peter’s tomb with a Catholic archbishop present. participating in gestures that blur the lines between Catholic and non-Catholic orders. For generations, the Catholic Church has taught unambiguously that Anglican orders are invalid. Nonetheless, contemporary actions that appear to contradict this teaching appear to be allowed by the Roman authorities, giving rise to greater doctrinal bewilderment.

Such circumstances are not only a case of ecclesiastical politics, but rather symptomatic of a profound spiritual crisis besieging the Catholic Church Herself. And this crisis is exactly the type of crisis that  And it is precisely the kind of crisis that Our Lady of Fátima Herself predicted more than a century ago.

At its very heart, the spiritual crisis plaguing the Catholic Church and the rest of the world today is due to both individual and institutional sins, as well as an erosion of compunction or a sense of sin. When sin is no longer preached in the pulpits of the “Church of Accompaniment” and the “Synod of Listening” , repentance becomes merely an option rather than an absolute necessity for entrance into the Kingdom of Heaven. Once repentance is glossed over, the need for reparation also fades away. Accordingly, when reparation is put on the backburner, Divine Justice offended by the sins of mankind remains unsatisfied.

In view of these immutable realities,  Our Lady of Fátima reminds us of these fundamental truths of sin, repentance, prayer, penance, and reparation.  At Fátima, Our Lady requested for prayer—particularly the Most Holy Rosary—penance, and sacrifices offered in reparation for sin. Furthermore, Our Lady also called on men to practise the First Saturdays devotion, a practice explicitly linked to making reparation to Her Immaculate Heart. Addressing Sister on the importance of the First Saturdays devotion, Our Lady said:

“Look My daughter, at My Heart, surrounded with thorns with which ungrateful men pierce Me at every moment by their blasphemies and ingratitude. You at least try to console Me and announce in My name that I promise to assist at the moment of death, with all the graces necessary for salvation, all those who, on the First Saturday of five consecutive months, shall confess, receive Holy Communion, recite five decades of the Rosary, and keep Me company for fifteen minutes while meditating on the fifteen mysteries of the Rosary, with the intention of making Reparation to Me.”

The message of Our Lady of Fátima is not ultimately about geopolitical analysis. It is about souls.

Our Lady did not come to Fátima merely to warn governments about the horrors of war, but to save sinners. In particular, the Holy Virgin Mary asked the three children for sacrifices: “Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to hell because there is no one to sacrifice themselves and pray for them.” This is a remarkable request from Our Lady, for it divulges that the salvation of souls is, in some mysterious way, according to the ineffable wisdom of God, reliant on our cooperation.

Reparation, in particular, assumes renewed significance as it is not a notion typically mentioned today in the mainstream Church, yet it lies at the crux of Catholic spirituality. To make reparation is to recognize that sin is a grave affront to the infinite majesty and dignity of Almighty God, Who is all goodness, and injures the Mystical Body of Christ. Such sins cry out to Heaven for vengeance, and for amends to be made, for we cannot claim to love God without wanting to console Him for being so greatly offended. Hence, through acts of penance, prayer, and devotion, Our Lady Fátima exhorts us to console the Sacred Heart of Jesus and the Immaculate Heart of Mary.

Our Lady of Fátima reminds us that Heaven has not abandoned us despite our sinful miseries. On the contrary, God has given us, through His Immaculate Mother, a clear path of return to Him via prayer, penance, and uncompromising fidelity to the perennial teachings of the Catholic Church.

The confusion of our time, as serious as it is, does not negate the promises of Our Lady of Fátima, for Our Lady assured us that “in the end, my Immaculate Heart will triumph.” Such words do not provide us with a vague glimmer of hope, but of a definite victory – yet one that urges for our willing cooperation.

On this great feast of Our Lady of Fátima, the issue is not whether the Blessed Virgin Mary’s pleas are relevant to us in this day and age. Rather, the question  is whether we are willing to heed and obey Our Lady’s requests. After all, Our Lady of Fátima’s requested devotions are not optional devotions, but a necessary remedy to a world—and a Church—in crisis.

The crisis suffocating the world and the Catholic Church is real. But so is Heaven’s remedy that has been given to us, by the Queen of Heaven Herself, on May 13.

Mary, Our Lady of Fátima, pray for us.