Our Lady of Fátima

The apparition of Our Lady of Fátima figured PROMINENTLY in the library of St. Aloysius elementary school when I was a child. PROMINENTLY. So, I could not go to Portugal without visiting Fátima. The site where the Virgin Mary appeared to the three children in 1917 was first marked by a tiny chapel. Over the years, it's expanded to a massive pilgrimage site - they say they had 6.3 million pilgrims in 2019, and they get hundreds of thousands of visitors at a time on major pilgrimage days. I visited on a regular day, so it was easy to get around the massive plaza and big churches. The gift store -- which of course sells rosaries and glow-in-the-dark statues of Virgin Mary -- however, was still packed with nuns.Read more