In a moving display of faith and devotion, nearly 200,000 pilgrims from more than 30 countries filled the Sanctuary of Our Lady of Fatima on October 13, 2025, for the anniversary of the Blessed Virgin Mary’s final apparition. As candlelight flickered against the night sky and hymns rose through the air, the gathering became a living witness to the enduring power of Marian devotion.
“The faith is alive,” observed the Catholic Sat X account in response to the massive turnout, according to LifeSiteNews.
Remembering a Miracle That Changed the World
The annual pilgrimage honors the apparitions of the Blessed Virgin Mary to three shepherd children—Lucia, Francisco, and Jacinta—between May and October 1917. On the final day of those apparitions, Our Lady fulfilled her promise of a public miracle.
As LifeSiteNews recounts, “the sun begins to spin, gyrate on its axis, and then threw off various colors, and then it starts to dance in the sky, and then it comes hurtling toward the earth.” Witnesses—an estimated 70,000 people, including journalists—“thought they were all going to die,” only for the sun to return to its place and “everything [to be] dry, like there was no rain.”
This “most stupendous public miracle in the history of the world,” as LifeSiteNews described, remains one of the most dramatic and well-documented supernatural events in modern history.
Our Lady’s Warnings and Requests
At Fatima, the Blessed Mother warned of coming disasters, including the rise of Communism and the Second World War, and called for prayer, repentance, and the consecration of Russia to her Immaculate Heart. According to LifeSiteNews, she appeared again in 1929 to Sister Lucia, asking that the Pope, together with all bishops, perform this act of consecration to prevent these evils.
Although several popes have carried out consecrations, “they have failed to carry it out in one aspect or another, either not mentioning Russia specifically or not involving all of the bishops of the world,” LifeSiteNews reported.
Our Lady’s requests form part of what became known as the Three Secrets of Fatima—prophecies concerning war, the loss of faith, and persecution of the Church. The third, long shrouded in mystery, has stirred debate since the Vatican published a version of it in 2000.
The Mystery of the Third Secret
Author Joshua Charles explained that “there are good reasons to believe we have not yet seen the full text of the Third Secret,” citing testimony suggesting that the unreleased portion contains “an apocalyptic warning to the Church.”
Italian journalist Antonio Socci, in The Fourth Secret of Fatima, concluded that the secret involves “a matter that literally terrorized different Popes.” He wrote that the Fatima story has “so many questions without answers as to color it a ‘detective story,’” one involving “not only the Vatican, great powers, and their secret services,” but “the proximate destiny for all humanity and for the Church.”
Priest and exorcist Fr. Chad Ripperger also commented that Vatican officials had once suggested the Third Secret warned against “Vatican II” and “adding extraneous elements to the liturgy.” According to LifeSiteNews, he found it “kind of interesting because supposedly Our Lady wanted it to be released in 1960 which would have averted a lot of the stuff that we have seen.”
LifeSiteNews noted that Cardinal Raymond Burke and other respected clergy have likewise hinted that the Third Secret concerns “apostasy” within the Church.
A Century-Old Prophecy That Still Speaks
Decades before he became Pope Pius XII, Cardinal Eugenio Pacelli expressed grave concern about the Fatima message. “This persistence of the Good Lady in face of the danger that threatens the Church is a divine warning,” he said, calling it a warning “against the suicide that the alteration of the Faith, in its liturgy, its theology, and its soul, would represent.”
He warned that innovators who sought to “dismantle the Sacred Chapel” would only cause the Church to “dig her own grave.”
Faith That Endures
The 2025 pilgrimage to Fatima is not just an anniversary—it is a reminder. In a world still torn by war, secularism, and confusion, the sight of hundreds of thousands praying the rosary together proclaims a timeless truth: Heaven has not been silent.
Our Lady’s words still echo: “Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to hell because there are none to sacrifice themselves and to pray for them.”
As the night procession came to an end and the lights of 200,000 candles dimmed, one truth shone brighter than ever—the faith is indeed alive.
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