Anecdotes about the Virgin Mary

"The miracle of the sun at Fatima"

Fatima (Portugal) (1917)

In 1917, three shepherd children from Cova da Iria, in Fatima—Lucia dos Santos and her cousins Francisco and Jacinta Marto—claimed that the Virgin Mary appeared to them on the 13th of each month, from May to October. From the first apparition, the message was clear and constant: penance, conversion, and above all, praying the Rosary every day for peace and for an end to the war that was then ravaging Europe.

In the September apparition, the Lady announced that in October she would perform a great sign "so that all may believe." And on October 13, 1917, before an immense crowd gathered in the rain, what is known as the "miracle of the sun" occurred.

That midday, some seventy thousand people claimed to have seen the sun "dance" in the sky, change colors, and appear to plunge toward the earth. The phenomenon was witnessed by believers and skeptics alike, and reported by the Portuguese press of the time, even by newspapers that were usually anticlerical. The Church interpreted it as supernatural confirmation of the apparitions; some scholars have proposed natural explanations, but the sanctuary continues to venerate it as a miracle.