PRAY FOR RUSSIA

Phil
13 minutes ago
6 min read

May 13th is the day the Church honours Our Lady of Fatima and her appearances. What's that got to do with Russia? Rather a lot, it would appear!

On May 13th, 1917, in Fatima, Portugal, three young children, Lúcia dos Santos and her cousins Francisco and Jacinta Marto, were going about their normal daily routine, tending their family’s sheep.

Out of nowhere “A Lady, all in white, more brilliant than the sun… indescribably beautiful,” stood above them, and appeared again to them on the 13th day of each month until October 13th 1917. These were just three young, uneducated children, who knew lots about sheep, but little else.

Their monthly accounts began to attract interest, and when it became known that Our Lady would visit the children for the last time on October 13 that year, with a sign that would convince the world she had appeared, nearly 70,000 people journeyed there. Many were prepared to dismiss it as rubbish, but on that day

all who were there witnessed some amazing, incomprehensible things.

Portuguese Newspaper Report October 1917

The sun appeared to perform some frightening displays, rolling as if totally out of control; which gave credibility to the previous apparitions the children witnessed.

Much later on, In August 1941, Sister Lúcia, who had been one of the children,

who had since entered the religious life, described the apparition of 13 July 1917. She said that the Virgin told them:

" The [First World] war is going to end; but if people do not cease offending God,

a worse one will break out during the pontificate of a future Pope

(which happened during the pontificate of Pius XI).”

"When you see a night illumined by an unknown light,

know that this is the great sign given you by God

that the world is to be punished for its crimes.

Pray for Russia, and there will be peace.

If not, she will spread her errors throughout the world,

causing wars and persecutions.

The good will be martyred,

the Holy Father will have much to suffer;

various nations will be annihilated.”

In short – this is what had been revealed over a hundred years ago.

Firstly, a prophecy of the outbreak of World War II;

Secondly, and most-importantly, the prediction of the immense damage

that Russia would do to humanity. These apparitions were seen by ordinary shepherd children in the very year of the Russian Revolution (the Bolshevik revolution that year in October 1917, only days after the last apparition)

Pope John Paul II attacked on the Feast of Our Lady of Fatima, May 13th, 1981

Thirdly - the vision of “a Bishop clothed in white,” who “falls to the ground, apparently dead, under a hail of gunfire…….well, on May 13th, 1981 a gunman attempted to kill Pope John Paul II. The Pope credited Our Lady of Fatima for his protection on that day,her day, the day in 1981 which happened to be her feast day!

The man who attacked Pope John Paul II and nearly killed him

As a child, I was drawn to the Roman Catholic Church at the age of twelve (it has happened again and again since then). I distinctly remember cards on tract stands in Catholic Churches entitled “Prayers for Russia”, asking the prayers of Mary.

…. and it began to look as though her prayers were being answered. In May 1985, Mikhail Gorbachev delivered a speech in Leningrad (now St.Petersburg) in which he publicly criticised the inefficient economic sysytem of the Soviet Union, making him

the first Communist leader to do so. In February 1986 in a speech to the Communist Party Congress, he spoke about the need for political and economic restructuring, or perestroika, and called for a new era of openness, or glasnost. As reforms under glasnost revealed both the horrors of the Soviet past, and its present-day inefficiencies, Gorbachev pushed through measures calling for the first truly democratic elections ever in the USSR. Almost 75 years after the Russian Revolution, the Soviet Union ceased to exist, and the Cold War was over. When the Berlin Wall fell, the world cheered!

To the faithful it seemed that prayers through Our Lady had accomplished what had seemed like the impossible in promoting greater freedom throughout the former Soviet Union and the Soviet bloc of satellite countries.

But presently it’s as if the old Soviet system is back, that the Cold War has returned, and that the world has become once again a frightening place. We feel helpless; we need to do whatever we can to redress the balance, the shift. Russia’s onslaught in Ukraine—in particular the bombing of a maternity hospital in Mariupol, schools, nurseries, hospitals; each day’s news brings fresh feelings of incredulity, anger and helplessness.

It is a good time to return to the story of Fátima and to think about how Mary’s message might lead us back to pray for peace and the conversion of Russia, and to cope with the magnitude of human suffering that constantly invades our news and social media feeds. What does Fátima have to do with Russia? Asking Mary’s intercession for the conversion of Russia has been a recurrent priority of the church in the last 100 years. At Fátima, Mary asked that Russia be consecrated to her Immaculate Heart. In 1929, she renewed her request in an appearance to Lucia, who was then preparing to become a sister of a religious order.

The apparitions of Our Lady of Fatima talk about the recitation of The Rosary.

When was the last time you used yours for prayer? Have you ever used the Rosary as an aid to prayer? You and I are not powerless. We can build up, with the Church across the world, a bank of prayer, to overcome the darkness with light.

With global peace in mind - St Teresa of Kolkata encouraged the daily recitation of the following prayer, the Universal Prayer for Peace….

Lead me from death to life,

from falsehood to truth;

lead me from despair to hope,

from fear to trust;

lead me from hate to love,

from war to peace.

Let peace fill our hearts,

our world,

our universe.

Peace….Peace…..Peace.

The story of Fátima speaks to our time because we can take the present horrors in Ukraine, Gaza and the suffering we have witnessed in the world over the past century, and place them in Mary’s hands at the foot of Christ’s cross, where all suffering is transformed by Christ’s work of redemption.

Why would Mary ask three Portuguese children to deliver to the world a message about Russia? Why am I compelled to pray for the people of Ukraine and, bewilderingly, also for the Russian aggressors? This is, I suppose, where fear and helplessness meet the mystery of prayer. I pour out my anxieties and place my trust in Mary’s intercession. Mary, with me alongside of her, pray to the Prince of Peace to overwhelm the evils of these times.