Light a candle as a sign that in your home lives a pilgrim of Fatima by the heart. Our Lady watches over your way.
Prayer of the Angel of Peace: My God, I believe, I adore, I hope, and I love You. I ask pardon of You for those who do not believe, do not adore, do not hope and do not love You.
- The seventh day of this pilgrimage by the heart, calls you to your deepest self, beyond your worries and distractions, and also beyond your suffering. Go to the fountain of grace springing from the Holy Spirit, which turns into a river running over your days, to eternity. From the source of grace, light flows - drink in the light. Try to silence everything around you, awaken the hearing of your heart. If it helps, close your eyes so you can concentrate more profoundly and see that which is only visible by your heart. In silence, God’s light will penetrate your darkness and you will discover your truth and see yourself as a beloved child of God and of Our Lady of Fatima, who in the Cova da Iria appeared to the three little shepherds, and now opens her hands to you - hands full of grace and light that comes from God. Open yourself to the light of God and listen again to the last part of the dialogue from the May apparition and find out what happened next:
“Are you willing to offer yourselves to God and bear all the sufferings He wills to send you, as an act of reparation for the sins by which He is offended, and of supplication for the conversion of sinners?” Yes, we are willing. Then you are going to have much to suffer, but the grace of God will be your comfort.” As she pronounced these last words: “the grace of God will be your comfort,” Our Lady opened her hands for the first time, communicating to us a light so intense that, as it streamed from her hands, its rays penetrated our hearts and the innermost depths of our souls, making us see ourselves in God, Who was that light, more clearly than we see ourselves in the best of mirrors.”
- There is so much beauty in the experience of oneself in the light of God through the hands of Mary. It is she who communicates the reflected the light of God Himself, who by her hands penetrates the hearts and souls of Lucia, Francisco and Jacinta, almost like it once entered the history of humankind through her womb. Listen to the Gospel of Luke 1: 28, 30-32, 35
“And coming to her, he said, “Hail, favored one! The Lord is with you.., Do not be afraid, Mary, for you have found favor with God. Behold, you will conceive in your womb and bear a son, and you shall name him Jesus. He will be great and will be called Son of the Most High. The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadow you. Therefore the child to be born will be called holy, the Son of God.”
- Imagine the immense and profound silence in which the Virgin saw herself in God and from Him received Her truth. In that silence, Mary listened and learned who She was and what She was called for, what was Her place in the plan of salvation. God communicated himself to her and She communicated God to the world, giving birth to Him who is the light of the world.
- The little shepherds saw themselves in God’s light, and like Mary, saw more clearly than in the best of mirrors who they were, what they were called for and what was their place in the plan of salvation.
- God does not exclude anyone from His light - No! You, as little as you may be, are desired, and God wants to fill you up with His light. You who make yourself a pilgrim by the heart, do you want to see yourself in God? Today and each day, the light which is God offers itself to you. During this pilgrimage by the heart, you have been asked to practice retreating to the inner silence inspired in Mary’s silence - the silence of the heart’s prayer - i.e., contemplative prayer, which is pure gift and brings you into the light of God.
- To be enlightened by the light which is God, get close to the hands of the Lady of the light. Get close to Her, full of grace, who reflects the light which is God and drink the light from Her hands. The light which is God reflects in Her and communicates itself to you intimately, and enlightens you from within, allowing you to see yourself in God.
- In God’s light you will know who you really are and what you are called to be, because only God knows you wholly and accepts you unconditionally. He knows you as much as he loves you and calls you to fulfil what you are in His plan of salvation for everyone, like the little shepherds of Aljustrel, who, seeing themselves in God, became through Him the little shepherds of the world. It is not simply a question of giving a place to the light of God in you. It is about surrendering to the light which is God. The One who lives in you is offering you to live in Him, who is the light.
My God, You inhabit the innermost of my heart and You call me to become a pilgrim by the heart and to meet You there. I thirst for light, the light of grace, the light which you are and that is reflected and offered to me by the hands of Mary, the full of grace, the One who saw Herself in the light which You are and gave birth to Your son, light of the world. I ask for Your Spirit, the source of grace in the deepest part of me, to lead me while learning the way of silence of the heart, the prayer born from silence, the one that allows me to listen and learn from You who I am and what You are calling me to.
In these times of crisis that reveal our fragility as well as the fraternity that bonds us in the responsibility for each other, grant that we may see ourselves in the light which You are, more clearly than in the best of mirrors, and following Saint Francisco and Saint Jacinta Marto, may we long for heaven, a broad heaven for all, just like the earth, too, a world for all.
I am a pilgrim by the heart, in silence I long to see myself in the light that You are. I want to go on a pilgrimage by the heart into Your mother’s heart, mother of mine, Our Lady of Fatima. In Her heart, You will be waiting for my heart. And today, away from the Little Chapel in Fatima, I make myself a pilgrim by the heart: I shall follow my heart and in our Mother’s immaculate heart I shall listen to the merciful beating of Your heart. Amen.
Hail Mary, full of grace, the Lord is with you. Blessed are you among women, and blessed is the fruit of your womb, Jesus. Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners now and at the hour of our death. Amen.
Mother of Heaven, be attentive to the supplications of a world facing tribulation. Answer the cry of the poor and the sick, give comfort and hope to all those who suffer, give strength and compassion to all those who work and care for those who are suffering. Bring peace to the world. In your immaculate heart, be for all your children a refuge and a way to God. Our Lady of Fatima, pray for us. Saints Francisco and Jacinta Marto, pray for us.