The greatest alleged miracle of the twentieth century has to be the miracle of the sun at Fatima in 1917. Though science found the sun did not move, thousands of people at Fatima are said to have thought it magically did move thanks to the long dead mother of Jesus appearing there and making it move.
Some books would have you think that it had no less than 70,000 witnesses (eg. Fatima Revealed and Discarded, page 168). But if you look at the photographs you see that this was an exaggeration.
The papers gave a range of between 30,000 and 100,000 people. That they couldn't get their figures half right is a warning bell. If you look at the press photographs you will remember that photographers would have snapped the largest part of the crowd. Bearing that in mind we see that the crowd was not as big as the Church and the papers and the priests tried to make out. Also, there were a lot of children there. Why are there no accounts of children going berserk during the scary part of the alleged miracle?
FROM FATIMA BOOK THE TRUTH ABOUT FATIMA:
DID EVERYBODY SEE IT?
Did all the pilgrims present at the Cova da Iria, without exception, see the solar miracle? Such is the question we must now try to resolve.
CONTRADICTING TESTIMONIES? «Others», writes Gerard de Sede, «saw nothing at all. This was the case with the parish priest of Penacova, who could not bring himself to believe in the miracle, even during the dance of the sun.» Where did that come from? Gerard de Sede is careful not to indicate the precise source of his information! But here it is: during the canonical process Manuel Antonio de Paula related that the parish priest of Penacova, even though he saw perfectly well «a little cloud, which was fairly dense» above the holm oak, could not be convinced that it was not of smoke.
«Even during the dance of the sun, he could not bring himself to believe in the miracle. Seeing the colour red on the clothes of the people, he explained to Mr. de Paula: “They are all wearing red shawls.” The witness charitably corrected him, showing him it was impossible for so many people to be wearing the same colour clothing. Moreover, the ecclesiastical sceptic soon saw the same immense crowd clothed in a golden yellow.»
So the parish priest of Penacova saw perfectly well the phenomena observed by everybody else! They seemed so objective, so “natural” to him, that he naively refused to believe that there was a miracle!
There is another discordant testimony put forward by G. de Sede: that of the lawyer, Pinto Coelho. In the Catholic journal A Ordem, he plays the devil’s advocate and claimed that there was no miracle. Yet it is certain that our lawyer saw the same phenomena as all the other witnesses. He himself admits as much:
«The sun, at one moment surrounded with scarlet flame, at another aureoled in yellow and deep purple, seemed to be in an exceedingly fast and whirling movement, at times appearing to be loosened from the sky and to be approaching the earth, strongly radiating heat.»
Here is the important fact, which alone concerns us. The explanations advanced by our lawyer are so poor that we need not even examine them: «A collective psychology was established in the crowd, etc.» We have heard that tune before!
Finally G. de Sede quotes... the testimony of Lucy, who declared on several occasions: «I myself saw nothing!» Indeed, absorbed by the Vision that she contemplated during this time, contrary to all the other pilgrims, she did not see the solar miracle in all its successive phases. That is easily understandable.
And that is all! It is astonishing that G. de Sede was unable to quote a single valid testimony of somebody who clearly affirmed that he saw nothing!
“THE CASE” OF IZABEL BRANDAO DE MELO. Yet there is such a case – the only one, as far as we know. It is the case of Izabel Brandao de Melo. On October 31, 1917, in a letter to a Swiss priest, Father Gelase, after having described the prodigy she continued:
«This is what was said by those around me, and what thousands of people affirm that they saw. As for myself, I saw nothing! I could indeed look at the sun and I was terribly agitated to hear everybody shouting that there were extraordinary signs in the sky. I believe that I was not found worthy by Our Lord to see these phenomena, but in my soul I had no need to see them to believe in the apparition of the Holy Virgin to the children.»
In 1950, Father Martindale mentioned “two English ladies” who had not seen anything either. What, exactly, was he referring to? In 1974, it seemed that they had metamorphosized... for the same author then wrote: «We know of two devout Portuguese women who saw nothing at all...»
The information is vague. Undoubtedly it refers once again to the same Izabel Brandao de Melo, who had decidedly become the star witness! In his article against Fatima, the future Cardinal Journet did not fail to mention her: «I have heard of a very cultured Portuguese lady who, for her greater desolation, saw nothing.»
Is this one witness enough to be able to say, with Dom Jean-Nesmy: «There are however some discordant voices. Some people saw nothing.» For is it not already surprising that this devout lady affirms: «I was able to stare at the sun.»? Now it was a clear sky. Is not this fact by itself extraordinary and abnormal? She also confesses that she was «terribly agitated...»
Father A. Richard writes, and with reason: «If a few persons in this huge crowd claim they saw nothing, that can be explained by the peculiarities and inattention of certain people, and still more by their fear when faced with these unusual phenomena on October 13, to the point where all their powers of sensation were hindered, so that they could not testify to anything – like the victim of an accident who no longer remembers anything.
«A few years ago we questioned a Portuguese woman who later became a nun, and who was present at the Cova da Iria on October 13. At that time she was a young woman of nineteen. She could not remember at all “the beautiful colours of the rainbow” which were described by so many witnesses. She had realized only one thing: she was going to die, the world was going to end. Right near her two people had fainted. The terrible anguish that gripped her had kept her from discerning all the rich diversity of the phenomenon.»
This case is not unique: «My wife – we had been married only a short time – fainted, and I was too upset to attend to her», recalls Alfredo da Silva Santos. «My brother-in-law, Joao Vassallo, supported her on his arm. I fell on my knees oblivious of everything and when I got up I don’t know what I said. I think I began to cry out like the others.»
A few other discrepancies in details, have been found in various statements of the witnesses. This is completely normal when it is a question of such varied phenomena, whether simultaneous or successive, and moreover such unusual and impressive ones.
Thus after examining the question we can affirm – at least until solid witnesses to the contrary appear – that everybody present at the Cova da Iria, as well as Alburitel, could see the prodigious solar phenomenon.
At the end of his investigation Father de Marchi could write: «Up to the present we have not met a single person among the many we have questioned who has not confirmed the phenomenon.»
In 1958, Father Richard noticed the same unanimity among all the witnesses he had encountered: «For them, there was no question. They could not even imagine anyone asking the question whether somebody had not seen anything.» The same goes for Alburitel. «Did everybody around you see it?» Canon Lourenço, who was nine years old in 1917, answered this question of Father Richard without hesitation: «I am absolutely sure that everybody saw it.»
In 1960, John Haffert reached the same conclusion: all those who simply bothered to look saw the great solar sign.
In conclusion, it would be astonishing if it had been otherwise. On July 13 Our Lady had promised: «In October, I will work a miracle so that all may see and believe.» The most faithful Virgin kept Her promise.
COMMENT: Despite what the vision said, many did not see. And it is baffling that only a handful would say what they supposedly saw! The miracle is how few accounts there are. Most of them appeared too long after the event.
During the miracle which would have been terrifying if real, why are those witnesses below all so calm?
If you study the photos, a lot of witnesses were shielding their eyes during the miracle and squinting. No wonder they were able to look at the sun!
The Crowd During the Miracle of the Sun – from www.fatimaconference.org
Notice that the photos show they were taken in ordinary light.The miracle then didn’t show up on camera!Some people had to shield their eyes to look at the sun.Others look too relaxed to be seeing a miracle. Some are not looking at the sun at all.
Our photographer didn’t see much when he was so interested in photographing the people!
This photograph plainly shows some people were looking at the sun during the "miracle". Others were completely disinterested because nothing was happening.
The story of the rain and the people drying miraculously is a hoax. The photos show no evidence of anybody getting wet or being wet at all. And that includes the photos from minutes before the Miracle.
Despite all the photographers who were present there
are no photos of the sun or changes in the sky or any physical evidence. It is
psychologically unthinkable that with the photographers who were there none
attempted a photo of anything other than the crowd. The photographer who
could snap the sky during the miracle and present a photo with nothing out of
the ordinary would have been a hero with the secularist regime that desperately
wanted to believe the Fatima tale was delusion. There is nothing to
indicate that anything odd happened in the sky. The best the defender can
do is produce photos of eclipses in far away lands! (page 78, The Evidence for
Visions of the Virgin Mary). The photo directly above is an example of one
such fake. The Vatican's own newspaper was guilty of promoting a lie.
It appeared in 1951 by L’Osservatore Romano. Interestingly according to
some the picture seems to hail from 1925 when it was thought the sun was
behaving oddly at a town in Portugal. It is easily seen though that the
picture itself does not look that strange which makes one wonder was there a
culture of imagining signs in the sky.
The absence of any solar picture either for or against the solar miracle is a far bigger wonder than the miracle itself.
The Church promotes the lies even today.
