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Mexico City, Mexico (Wednesday, May 2, 2018, Gaudium Press) A hundred years after the apparitions of Our Lady in Fatima, many expected some sort of supernatural manifestation of the Mother of God as a confirmation of the warnings made in 1917 to the three little shepherds, Lucia, Saint Francisco and Saint Jacinta.
As the world did not listen to the requests made a century ago, many expected that something would happen in order to stir the conscience of a humanity so steeped in sin that no admonition from Heaven seems to be able to awaken.
And while mankind seems not to heed any warning from above, God also seems to have turned his back to the world, letting things run their own course, such that contemporary society draws on towards an uncertain and ominous future, marked by chaos, war and violence.
Such a situation has led many to wonder, in anguish, whether God has not have left the world to its own fate. For these, more worrisome than the death throes of contemporary chaos is this apparent silence of Providence, giving the impression that the Lord is absent from the current course of events.
But God, who is the true master of history, has his unfathomable designs and patiently waits for the most appropriate time to intervene. Sometimes He does so through natural phenomena, otherwise through supernatural ones. It is necessary, therefore, to be attentive to these signs of the times.
Could one such sign given to us by Divine Providence be the inexplicable shedding of tears of statues of the Blessed Virgin and of Saint Joseph that occurred recently in Costa Rica and Guatemala?
This is what came to the mind of the young aspirant at the formation house of the Heralds of the Gospel in the village San José Pinula, near Guatemala city when, at around 3:30 pm on April 25, he noted with surprise that the virginal eyes of the pilgrim statue of Our Lady of Fatima was shedding abundant tears.
Without losing an instant, he ran to call his fellow students and the superior of the house, who also were astonished to witness the inexplicable phenomenon, whose supernatural origin they were unable to doubt. In itself the fact is entirely extraordinary. And would be enough to touch the heart of anyone with faith. But the signs from heaven did not stop there.
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Also in the city of San José, the capital of Costa Rica, an identical phenomenon occurred at the House of the Heralds of the Gospel. A pilgrim statue also started to shed tears.
The boy who first witnessed the phenomenon ran to call his superior, telling him what was happening. And foretold that another statue in Costa Rica would also shed tears. And that in Guatemala the same would occur.
Astonished at these facts, the superior asked this young aspirant how he knew with such certainty what was happening. The reply was that a lady full of goodness told him.
Another extraordinary weeping occurred with a picture of Our Lady of Good Counsel on April 26, her liturgical feast day, also in Costa Rica at the House of the Heralds of the Gospel, while in Guatemala a statue of St. Joseph shed abundant tears on that same day.
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In Spain, a small image of Our Lady of Fatima, bought by a girl participating in an excursion of the female branch of the Heralds of the Gospel to the Sanctuary of Our Lady in Fatima, Portugal, shed tears of blood on the return trip to Madrid.
In all, there are already 11 statues that shed tears in abundance.
The photos here published speak for themselves. Whereby we leave the interpretation of this phenomenon, so extraordinary and unique in contemporary history, to the reader’s own acumen. That a statue shed tears is something that has been seen in the past in diverse circumstances. But that 11 statues shed tears almost simultaneously, and within the same institution, is something entirely unheard of.
A new and more intense call to the world on the eve of the 101st anniversary of the apparitions of Fatima? Or also a sign of encouragement for those who put their hope in the Message of Fatima and in the promises of triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary?
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Making himself manifest by means of statues of his Blessed Mother and of Saint Joseph, God does not turn his back on the world but, on the contrary, traces his footprints more vigorously in the course of history.
It is the Lord who draws near. Blessed are they whom He finds prepared.
By José Antonio G. Dominguez, Gaudium Press correspondent in Mexico
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