Fatima News POPE REFLECTS ON FATIMA MESSAGE - from Vatican Update [MAY. 17, 2000] Catholic World News Service VATICAN (CWNews.com) -- At his regular weekly public audience on May 18, Pope John Paul II spoke to a group of 40,000 pilgrims in St. Peter's Square about the third secret of Fatima. The fundamental message of the Virgin Mary at Fatima, the Pope said, is "an invitation to believers to pray constantly for peace in the world, and to do penance in order to open hearts to conversion." That message, he said, is also the essential message of the Gospels. And the message is particularly apt in our time, "which has been particularly tested by past events." The Holy Father also drew a connection between the message of Fatima and the special May 7 ceremony at which the Vatican honored the Christians who had died for the faith during the 20th century. The history of the past century--"that very tormented historical period"--lends a "singular eloquence" to the pleas of Our Lady of Fatima, he said. The powerful witness of those who gave their lives in the past century helped to sustain the Church through that difficult century, along with the daily prayers and sacrifices requested by the Virgin at Fatima. Next the Pope pointed to the witness offered by Francisco and Jacinta Marto, the two newly beatified Fatima seers. Although they each died at an early age, he observed, they offered an important example to older Christians by "how they conformed their lives, in a simple and generous manner, to the transforming action of divine grace." Finally the Pope said that, as he nears his 80th birthday, he gives thanks to the Virgin of Fatima for preserving his own life. He added: "My pilgrimage to Fatima was in thanksgiving to Mary for what she communicated to the Church through those children, and for the protection she gave me during my pontificate." Before closing, the Pope made an observation about the capacity for silent prayer that he noticed among the hundreds of thousands of pilgrims who were with him at Fatima. When he first arrived at the shrine, he had been greeted by thunderous applause. But as soon as he knelt in prayer before the famous statue of the Virgin Mary in the Fatima shrine, the crowd became absolutely silent. THIRD SECRET DISCREDITS RIGHT-WING GROUP, ARCHBISHOP SAYS [MAY. 17, 2000] PORTO ALEGRE, Brazil (CWNews.com) - Archbishop Dadeus Grings, Coadjutor of Porto Alegre, said that the revelation of the Third Secret of Fatima puts an end to catastrophic speculations and discredits "the political manipulation of Our Lady of Fatima." "Since Cardinal Sodano has revealed the contents of the Third Secret (of Fatima), it is now clear that the importance of Fatima's message is one of conversion, penance, and the renewal of Christian life," said Archbishop Grings, who arrived yesterday in Porto Alegre, where he will be installed as Archbishop Coadjutor on May 27. "The secret of Fatima was never central for the Catholic Church, because all the revelation needed was already there, available for each Christian," said the archbishop at his first press conference. "Nevertheless, the secret was used and manipulated by political groups who pursued ideological goals." The Coadjutor Archbishop was most likely referring to a right-wing Catholic group close to the late schismatic Bishop Marcel Lefebvre known as Tradition, Family, and Property (TFP). The group, founded in Brazil by the late Plinio Correa de Oliveira, a wealthy developer, promotes a harshly anti-Communist message using Fatima's messages as a support to their views. "The revelation of the Third Secret puts an end to a mystery that has never been key to our faith, but also demonstrates that the message of Fatima is one the Church has always been proclaiming: if Catholics abandon prayer and permanent conversion, we will lose our own identity and society will suffer the consequences by the way of wars, destruction, injustice, and any kind of imaginable social evil," he concluded. Above items reproduced with permission from Catholic World News Service. Catholic World News is available via email for personal use only. To subscribe or for further information, contact or visit our Web page at http://www.cwnews.com. Catholic World News (c) Copyright Domus Enterprises 2000. For more information about Fatima see: Fatima, Russia and John Paul II, by Timothy Tindal-Robertson

Theotokos Catholic Books - Fatima News Section - www.theotokos.org.uk