The words of the Angel of Peace, “Console your God”, impressed Francisco very deeply and guided his life. He wanted to be the ‘Consoler of Jesus’ primarily by praying the Rosary and adoring the Hidden Jesus in the Tabernacle of the parish church.

Francisco was born on the 11th of June 1908, in Aljustrel, Portugal. He was baptized in his parish church in Fatima on June 20th. Peaceable by nature, he loved games and spent hours playing his flute. He was a born lover of nature. Francisco was the brother of Jacinta and cousin of Lucia.

During the apparitions of the Angel of Peace and of Our Lady, he could see everything but could hear nothing. Lucia and Jacinta told him what the Angel and Our Lady had said.

Blessed Francisco always desired to keep Jesus company in his parish church. He would always say “you go ahead; I am going to keep the ‘hidden Jesus’ company.” He understood that sin is the cause of God’s sadness. “I love God so much!” he said, over and over again. “But He is so sad because of so many sins. We must never commit any.”

Francisco fell sick in October 1918. When his family assured him that he would soon get better, he would promptly reply: “It is no use. Our Lady wants me in heaven with her!” When he was no longer able to pray, he asked his cousin Lucia and his sister Jacinta to pray the Rosary aloud so that he could accompany them in his heart. On the last morning of his life he once again asked pardon of his family for all his faults. Then he said to his mother: “Look Mother, do you see that beautiful light over there by the door?” It was the 4th of April, 1919. At ten o’clock in the morning, as the sun shone brightly into his small and humble room, Francisco departed for heaven to be forever with Our Lady whose beauty had so won his heart.

From the homily of Pope John Paul II of May 13, 2000:

“What most impressed and absorbed Blessed Francisco was God in that immense light which penetrated the hearts of the three shepherds. However only to him God revealed Himself ‘so sad’ as he used to say.

One night his father heard him moaning and asked him why he was crying. The child replied: ‘I was thinking about Jesus Who is so sad because of the sins committed against Him.’ He lived motivated by only one desire – so expressive of how children think – to console Jesus and make Him happy. ”

Saint John Paul II

Beatifications of the Little Shepherds of Fatima

“I feel Our Lord within me. I understand what He says to me, although I neither see Him nor hear Him, but it is so good to be with Him.”

Jacinta was Francisco’s sister and Lucia’s cousin. At the time of the apparitions of the Angel, she was only six years old. She was the youngest of the little seers. During the apparitions she saw and heard everything, but she never spoke either to the Angel or to Our Lady.

Being intelligent and very sensitive, she was profoundly impressed when she heard Our Lady say: “The Lord our God is already so much offended,” and on another occasion: “Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners.”

After the vision of hell, she decided to offer herself completely for the salvation of souls. Jacinta was no different than so many little children. She loved to play. She loved to hear her voice echoing down in the valleys. One of her favorite amusements was to climb to the tops of the hills, sit down on the biggest rock she could find, and call out different names at the top of her voice. The name that echoed back most clearly was “Maria”. Sometimes Jacinta used to say the whole Hail Mary this way, only calling out the following word when the preceding one had stopped re-echoing.

All the children loved to sing as well. Interspersed among the popular songs – of which they knew quite a number – were Jacinta’s favorite hymns: ‘Salve Nobre Padroeira’ (Hail Noble Patroness) and ‘Anjos, Cantai Comigo’ (Angels, sing with me.) Jacinta was fond of dancing, and any instrument she heard beginning to be played by the other shepherds was enough to set her off. Jacinta, tiny as she was, had a special aptitude for dancing.

The children were told to say the Rosary after lunch, but as the whole day seemed too short for play, the children worked out a fine way of getting through it quickly. They simply passed the beads through their fingers, saying nothing but “Hail Mary, Hail Mary, Hail Mary…” Jacinta loved to hold the little white lambs tightly in her arms, sitting with them on her lap, fondling them, kissing them, and carrying them home at night on her shoulders so that they wouldn’t get tired.

This was the nature of our Saint Little Jacinta. But let us revisit the nature of this little girl of 7 following the apparitions of the ‘Angel of Peace’ and Our Lady herself.

Sweet Heart of Mary, convert sinners, save souls from hell… Saint Jacinta

To save souls from the fires of hell, she spared herself no sacrifice. She denied herself water in the heat of summer; she gave her lunch to children poorer than herself; she endured the torture of a piece of rope tied tightly around her waist with three knots pressing against her tender skin; she underwent exhausting interrogations. She did all this without the slightest complaint. “I’m so sorry for sinners!” she would say.

“If only I could show them hell! How happy I would be if they could all go to heaven.”

In the hospital, Jacinta was favored with three visits from Our Lady. While there, the little girl uttered words of wisdom far beyond her age, both as to their delivery and their content. She spoke of priests, statesmen, doctors, persecutors of the Church, the obedience of religious, marriage, riches, poverty…These were surely ideas that came from above.

Finally, on the night of February 20th, 1920, the promise of Our Lady brighter than the sun was fulfilled: “I shall come to take you to heaven,” she had said.

Jacinta was buried in the cemetery of Vila Nova de Ourem, and later in 1935, in the Fatima parish cemetery.

On March 1st, 1951, her mortal remains still preserved, were placed in a side – chapel to the left of the high altar of the Fatima Basilica.

Saint Jacinta and her brother Saint Francisco were both beatified by Pope John Paul II in the Jubilee year 2000.

On the 30th day of March, 1907, a female child was baptized, of the name Lucia, born at Aljustrel… on the 22nd day of March of the same year, at 7 o’clock in the evening. » This is the wording shown in the Parish Register. Her parents were António dos Santos and Maria Rosa, residents of Aljustrel, a hamlet belonging to the parish of Fatima. As the youngest of seven children, six girls and one boy, Lucia was the family favorite and was surrounded with affection from her earliest childhood. Although the family met with many troubles and misfortunes, Lucia’s mother bore them all in an exemplary Christian spirit.

At the age of six, Lucia received her first Holy Communion, the account of which will move our readers to joy and wonder. Family circumstances obliged her to start out in life straight away as a shepherdess. At first, in 1915, her companions were the girls and boys of Aljustrel and its surroundings.

As from 1917, her cousins Jacinta and Francisco Marto were her sole companions. That was the year in which the Blessed Virgin appeared. Lucia had a special role during the apparitions, as the Vision spoke only to her, and gave her a message which was only to be revealed at a 9 future date. She lived and suffered, together with Francisco and Jacinta, on account of the apparitions. She alone has remained on earth for a longer period, in order to fulfill her mission. The Blessed Virgin actually requested her to learn to read… She started attending school, however, only after the apparitions; but with her talents and her good memory she learned to read and write very quickly. As soon as the apparitions were over, of course, Lucia found herself in the position of a “visionary”, with all the dangers resulting therefrom. Something, therefore, had to be done about her.

One of the primary interests of the new Bishop of the re-established Diocese of Leiria was her education; he tried to keep her away from the dangers threatening her in an atmosphere so permeated with the extraordinary. On the morning of June 17th, 1921, she entered the College of the Sisters of St. Dorothy at Vilar, which is now a suburb of Porto. We are giving a description of what she looked like in those days which, by the way, corresponds perfectly to the well-known photographs: “High and broad head; large brown, lively eyes; thin eye-brows; flat nose, wide mouth, thick lips, round chin. The face radiates something supernatural. Hair light and fine; of slight build, but tall for her age; 13 years and six months. Strong features, but a likeable face. Lively, intelligent, but modest and without presumption. Hands of normal size, roughened by work.”

As a young girl of 14 years and three months, Lucia entered the College of Porto, and there she received an excellent moral and religious formation. Her schooling was rather inadequate however, as it went barely beyond elementary levels. From the beginning, she was thoroughly trained in domestic work. Nevertheless, with her great ability, her good memory, her perseverance and her serious behavior, this young girl succeeded in acquiring a fairly complete education.

Even before she entered the College, Lucia already felt drawn to dedicate herself to God in the religious life. The intensely pious life of the College, however, caused her to reflect more deeply, and her first thought went to the Carmelites… But the example of her teachers and her gratitude towards them made her decide to enter the Institute of St. Dorothy.

The Portuguese Novitiate was at that time, 1921-1925, at Tuy, where Lucia entered on October 24th, 10 1925, at the age of 18. She went first to the house at Pontevedra, where she spent some months as a postulant. This house was situated in a side street known as “Travesía de Isabel II”, and there she stayed from the 25th October, 1925, to the 20th July, 1926. She then went to the Novitiate House of Tuy to complete her postulancy, and began her novitiate with her Clothing on 2nd October, 1926.

After two years, she made her profession of Vows on the 3rd October, 1928. She remained on in the same house, but with the professed Sisters, until she took her Perpetual Vows on the 3rd October, 1934. A few days later, she was transferred to the Convent of Pontevedra and only returned to Tuy in May, 1937, where she remained until she was sent to Portugal at the end of May, 1946. After a few days’ visit to the Cova da Iria and Aljustrel, where she identified the places of the Apparitions, Sister Lucia was assigned to the house at Sardão in Vila Nova de Gaia near Porto.

And finally, when the desire she had had for a long time to live in seclusion and solitude re-awakened, she received, by kind favour of Pope Pius Xll, permission to change over to the Discalced Carmelites, whom she joined on March 25th, 1948. And there she lived a life of prayer and penance until her holy death, which occurred on 13 February 2005, at the great age of almost 98 years.