Thank you and may God Bless You!
Praise be Jesus
Now and Forever!
The Fatima Children
From the age of 14, Maria da Costa was paralyzed until her death on the Feast of Our Lady of Fatima on October 13, 1955. Her handicap resulted from jumping out of a window was escaping a man who was trying to molest her. Offering herself as a victim soul while paralyzed, she had visions and locutions from Jesus and Mary, over and above being physically attacked by the devil for 10 years ...
She lived and died in the village of Balasar, Portugal. She was a devotee of Fatima and lived the Fatima message in an heroic way.
Alexandria is referred to as a "victim soul". All that she did and suffered, she did for Jesus in order to be a victim, "to cooperate with Christ in saving souls."
At the age of 14, she was pursued by a rapist and she jumped out of the window in her home to escape so that she may preserve her purity. She became an invalid, total paralysis set in and she offered herself to God for the conversion of souls. "She dedicated herself to the Rosary, penance, and the Eucharist in order to ward off Divine Justice for the sins of mankind." ...
"Our Lord began to bless her with supernatural conversation with Him and unusual ecstasies." An example: "Witnesses saw her recover the use of her limbs and leave her bed imitating the motions of Christ from Gethsemane to Calvary. The cross was invisible, her weight only 70 pounds, yet strong men could not lift her." ...
Her spiritual director relates how the devil tormented her ... "The worst moments occurred form midday until three in the afternoon (while she was praying for priests), and after nine in the evening (when she was praying for those sinning against purity." ...
For the last 13 years of her life, Alexandrina's love for the Eucharist was rewarded by the Lord allowing her to live on the Eucharist alone - no food or drink passed her lips, only the "little, white host". The doctors, over a period of 40 days of testings, "were convinced that this was 'scientifically inexplicable' as abstinence from all food during such a long period of time is incompatible with life" ...
Alexandrina is buried in the parish Church in Balasar. As you kneel before the tomb, you will read, "Do not sin anymore, never again offend our dear Lord ... Convert yourselves. Do not lose Jesus for all eternity. He is so good."
"Let us thank Mary for Fatima and for souls like the Blessed Alexandrina who lived the Fatima message." ... Father Edmund McCaffrey
[Excerpts taken from article, Balasar and the Fatima Connection, Soul Magazine, May-June 2000] Visit them at www.bluearmy.com
Beatified April 25th, 2004: Blessed Alexandria Maria da Costa
Saint Jacinta, Saint Francisco, and
Sister Lucia, Discalced Carmelite, now 95 years young!
Saint Francisco and Saint Jacinta Marto
Beatification May 13, 2000; Feast Day will be celebrated on February 20th
Canonization: May 13, 2017 in Fatima
On May 13, 1917 three shepherd children of Aljustrel, a village near Fatima, Portugal, were tending a small flock at the nearby Cova da Iria (in today's Diocese of Leiria-Fatima). They were Lucia de Jesus, aged 10, and her cousins, Francisco and Jacinta Marto, aged 9 and 7.
At about noon, after reciting the Rosary as they usually did, they started building a little house with stones. The basilica stands in this place today. Suddenly they saw a great light. Thinking that it was lightning, they decided to leave, but another flash lit up the clearing, and above a small holm oak (today the site of the Chapel of the Apparitions, the "capelhina") they saw a "Lady brighter than the sun", from whose hands hung a white rosary.
The Lady told them that they should pray frequently and invited them to return to the Cova da Iria for five consecutive months on the 13th day. The children did so; and on 13 June, July, September and October the Lady appeared again and spoke with them. On 13 August the children were unable to come because they had been taken away by the mayor of Villa Nova de Qurem, to whose district Fatima belonged. The mayor threatened them in various ways to make them confess that they had lied. But they received an unexpected apparition on 19 August, while grazing their flock in the "dos Valinhos".
During the last apparition, 13 October, in the presence of about 70,000 people, the Lady told them that she was "Our Lady of the Rosary" and asked that a chapel be built in her honour on that site. After the apparition everyone present witnessed the miracle promised to the three children in July and September. The sun appeared as a disc that gave off various colours and could be looked at without difficulty; it spun like a fireball and looked as if it would fall to the earth.
Later, when Lucia was already a Dorothean sister, Our Lady appeared to her again in Spain (10 December 1925 and 15 February 1926 at the Convent of Pontevedra, and again during the night of 13-14 June 1929 at the Convent of Tuy), asking her for the devotion of the five First Saturdays (to pray the Rosary, to meditate on its mysteries, to confess and to receive Holy Communion in reparation for sins committed against the Immaculate heart of Mary) and for the consecration of Russia to her Immaculate Heart. This request had already been made during the apparition of 13 July 1917 in the so-called "secret of Fatima".
Several years later, Lucia also revealed that between April and October 1916 an angel had appeared three times to them: twice in the Loca do Cabeco and once at the well in the garden of her family house. In these apparitions the angel invited them to pray and do penance.
The little shepherds of Fatima.
St. Francisco Marto was born on 11 June 1908 in Aljustrel. He died a holy death on 4 April 1919 at his family home. Deeply sensitive and contemplative, he offered all his spiritual life and penance to "console the Lord". His mortal remains were buried in the parish cemetery until 13 March 1952, when they were taken to the basilica at the Cova da Iria and placed in the chapel to the right of the main altar.
St. Jacinta Marto was born in Aljustrel on 11 March 1910. After a long and painful illness, she died a holy death on 20 February 1920 in Lisbon, offering all her sufferings for the conversion of sinners, for peace in the world and for the Holy Father. On 12 September 1935 her body was solemnly taken from the family tomb of Baron Alvaiazere in Qurem to the cemetery of Fatima and placed near the mortal remains of her little brother, Francisco. On 1 May 1951, Jacinta's mortal remains were placed with great simplicity in the tomb prepared in the basilica at the Cova da Iria in the side chapel to the left of the main altar.
The beatification process for the Fatima seers Francisco and Jacinta Marto began in 1952 and was finished in 1979. On 15 February 1988 the final documentation was presented to Pope John Paul II and to the Congregation for the Causes of Saints. They were declared "venerable" on 13 May 1989 and Blessed on May 13, 2000 in Fatima by His Holiness, Pope John Paul II. Declared Saints on May 13, 2017 by Pope Francis
Lucia de Jesus was born on 22 March 1907 in Aljustrel. On 17 June 1921 she entered the College of Vila (Porto), run by the Religious of St. Dorothy. She was then sent to Tuy, Spain, where she made her perpetual profession on 3 October 1934. In 1948 she moved to Coimbra, where she entered the Carmel of St. Theresa, taking the name of Sr. Maria Lucia of the Immaculate Heart. On 31 May 1949, she made her solemn vows. Sr. Lucia has returned to Fatima several times: May 1946; 13 May 1967; in 1981 to direct, at the Carmel, a painting of the Fatima apparitions; and on 13 May 1982 and 13 May 1991 for the two visits of the Holy Father, John Paul II.(Photo courtesy AP, Reuters)