‘We fools esteemed their life madness, and their end
without honor. Behold, how they are numbered among the children of God, and
their lot is among the saints. Therefore we have erred from the way of truth,
and the light of justice hath not shined unto us, and the sun of understanding
hath not risen upon us.’ (Wisdom 5:4-6)
Continuing with our study of the messages of Fatima,
we come to the most difficult: the vision of hell.
July 13, 1917
Now, above the little tree, the Lady
stood. Her beauty taxed their senses. To Jacinta and Francisco, who had never
doubted, it was joy renewed. But to Lucia it was more than that. It was a
confirmation. It was a homecoming for the heart and spirit. It was everything.
It was the Light of God reflected in His Mother. It was knowledge. It was the
end of doubt.
“Lucia,” Jacinta said, “speak. Our Lady
is talking to you.
“Yes?” said Lucia. She spoke humbly,
asking pardon for her doubts with every gesture, and to the Lady: “What do you
want of me?”
“I
want you to come back here on the thirteenth of next month,” the Lady said. “Continue
to say the Rosary every day in honor of Our Lady of the Rosary, to
obtain the peace of the world and the end of the war, because only she can
obtain it.”
“Yes,” said Lucia, “yes.” “I would like
to ask who you are,” she said to the Lady, “and if you will do a miracle so
that everyone will know for certain that you have appeared to us.”
“You must come here every month,” the
Lady said, “and in October I will tell you who I am and what I want. I will
then perform a miracle so that all may believe.”
“Make
sacrifices for sinners,” she instructed them, “and say often, especially while
making a sacrifice: O Jesus, this is for love of Thee, for the conversion of
sinners, and in reparation for offences committed against the Immaculate
Heart of Mary.”
As she spoke these words (Lucia tells
us in her memoirs), the Lady opened her hands, as she had in the preceding
months, but instead of the glory and beauty of God that her opened hands had
shown us before, we now were able to behold a sea of fire. Plunged in this
flame were devils and souls that looked like transparent embers; others were
black or bronze, and in human form; these were suspended in flames which seemed
to come from the forms themselves there to remain, without weight or
equilibrium, amid cries of pain and despair which horrified us so that we
trembled with fear. The devils could be distinguished from the damned human
souls by the terrifying forms of weird and unknown animals in which they were
cast.
Ti Marto, who was witnessing the
actions of the children by the little oak tree in the Cova da Iria that day,
recalls that Lucia gasped in sudden horror, that her face was white as death,
and that all who were there heard her cry in terror to the Virgin Mother, whom
she called by name.
The children were looking at their Lady
in terror, speechless, and unable to plead for relief from the scene they had
witnessed. Sadly, but kindly now, the Lady told them:
“You have seen hell, where the
souls of sinners go. It is to save them that God wants to establish in the
world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If you do what I tell you, many
souls will be saved, and there will be peace. This war will end, but if men do
not refrain from offending God, another and more terrible war will begin. And
when you see a night that is lit by a strange and unknown light, you will know
it is the sign God gives you that He is about to punish the world with war and
with hunger, and by the persecution of the Church and the Holy Father. To
prevent this, I shall come to the world to ask that Russia be consecrated to my Immaculate
Heart, and I shall ask that on the First Saturday of every month Communions of
reparation be made in atonement for the sins-of the world.
“If my wishes are fulfilled,” the Lady
continued, “Russia will be converted and there will be peace; if not, then
Russia will spread her errors throughout the world, bringing new wars and
persecution of the Church; the good will be martyred and the Holy Father will
have much to suffer; certain nations will be annihilated. But in the end my
Immaculate will triumph. The Holy Father will consecrate Russia to me, and
she will be converted, and the world will enjoy a period of peace. In Portugal
the faith will always be preserved. Remember, you must not tell this to anyone
except Francisco.” http://fatima.ageofmary.com/overview/full-story/july/
Fatima
is not the only place where Mary revealed the horrors of hell. As recently as
the visions at Kibeho in Rwanda in the 1980’s, Mary showed the visionaries
glimpses of hell. St. John Bosco tells
us he had a dream where an angel told him:
“Bad companions, bad books, and bad habits,” my guide
exclaimed, “are mainly responsible for so many eternally lost.”
“Then is there no way to save these unfortunate lads? Please, tell me what I
can do for them.”
“They have superiors; let
them obey them. They have rules; let them observe them. They have the
sacraments; let them receive them.”
“They surely do. They have been warned a thousand times, but
they still choose to rush into the fire because they do not detest sin and are
loath to forsake it. Furthermore, they despise and reject God’s incessant,
merciful invitations to do penance. http://fatima.ageofmary.com/hell/st-boscos-vision-of-hell/.
God does not permit
these visions in order to frighten us into believing in Him and His word. He is
simply allowing us to see what is. We don’t frighten our children by telling
them that fire burns; we warn them so that they won’t hurt themselves. Mary is
a loving, merciful mother. She knows we don’t want to believe hell exists. She
knows we want to justify our sinful behavior and that without proof, we would
never believe there is a consequence to it. Simply put, she is showing us that
if you do not spend eternity with God, you spend it alone, knowing the beatific
vision and yet never, ever being able to be a part of it. That alone will
consume you in a fire of envy and hate for eternity. Give it up, encourage your
loved ones to give it up, pray and sacrifice for the world to give it up, and
come to the beauty and glory of living in the glow of God’s love, here, and
forever in heaven.
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