Sanctuary of Fátima

(left) with her cousins Francisco and Jacinta Marto, 1917. apparition to the three little shepherd children of Fátima, Portugal. , near Fátima, Portugal. In 1916, on three occasions, Lúcia Santos and her two cousins, Francisco and Jacinta Marto, began reporting apparitions of an angel in the region of Valinhos. These alleged visitations began on the 13 May 1917 when, while tending their family's sheep in Cova da Iria, they said they witnessed the apparition of what they later assumed was the Virgin Mary, and began doing penance and self-sacrifice to atone for sinners. Many flocked to Fátima and Aljustrel to witness these alleged apparitions along with the children, but not before the children were jailed for being politically disruptive. The shrine attracts a large number of Roman Catholic pilgrims, from Portugal and all around the world every year. This international stature gave Fátima the title of "Shrine of the World". Every year pilgrims fill the country roads that leads to the shrine with crowds that approach one million on May 13 and October 13, the most significant dates of the Fátima apparitions. Overall, about four million pilgrims visit the basilica every year. On January 28, Storm Kristin caused an estimated damage of more than €2 million, as more than 500 medium and large trees were destroyed at the Sanctuary of Fátima. ==Architecture==

The Sanctuary at Fátima was constructed over time in or near the area of Cova da Iria, where the three children witnessed the Marian apparitions of Our Lady of the Rosary (later known as Our Lady of Fátima by parishioners and pilgrims). The sanctuary includes various buildings, shrines and monuments to the religious, political and social consequences of the event, dispersed throughout a complex of open panoramas and vistas dominated by the Basilica of Our Lady of the Rosary and the Basilica of the Holy Trinity. Central to the complex is the small Chapel of the Apparitions and its shelter, where legend suggests many of the events of the apparitions took place and where the first pilgrims venerated the Marian apparitions. Basilica of Our Lady of the Rosary inside the Basilica of the Rosary. . The basilica consists of a tall centralized bell-tower and nave, approximately in height, and decorated by a crown of bronze of , similar in style to the Clérigos Church, surmounted by an illuminated cross. It was Gerardus Samuel van Krieken, from Holland, who was born in Rotterdam, and educated in Geneva that designed the church. He came to Portugal in 1889 to teach at the Escolas Técnicas Industriais (Industrial Technical Schools), where he was appointed to the Escola Industrial Infante D. Henrique (Infante D. Henrique Industrial School), to be professor of ornamental arts, but later married and settled in the city of Porto. Many of the events of the Marian apparitions at Fátima are depicted in the stained glass windows in the basilica, while fifteen altars within the church are dedicated to the fifteen mysteries of the Rosary. At the four corners of the basilica are statues of the four great apostles of the Rosary and to their devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary: Saint Anthony Mary Claret, Saint Dominic, Saint John Eudes and Saint Stephen, King of Hungary. A five-section organ (grande organ, positive, recitative, solo and echo) controlled by a console of five keyboards and pedals is installed in the choir. It has 152 registers and approximately 12,000 lead, tin and wood tubes, with the largest in height and the smallest . Near the entrance to the Fátima Sanctuary, south of the rectory, is a segment of the Berlin Wall intended to emphasize the belief that the Rosary prayers influenced the fall of the Berlin Wall related to the Consecration of Russia based on the Our Lady of Fátima messages. Other buildings include the Hostel/Retreat House of Our Lady of Sorrows (), the rectory, the Hostel/Retreat House of Our Lady of Mount Carmel (), monuments to Fathers Formigão and Fischer, a High Cross (by artist Robert Schad), and individual monuments to Pope Paul VI, Pope Pius XII, Pope John Paul II and Dom José Alves Correia da Silva (who had important roles in the history of the site) and the Pastoral Centre of Paul VI (). ==See also==