Scotland’s rise in anti-Catholic crimes prompts call for government action

Fatima, Portugal, May 11, 2017 / 05:02 am (CNA/EWTN News).- The niece of Fatima visionary Sr. Lucia dos Santos said her aunt was a normal person like everyone else, but shared some personal advice that her saintly relative used to give: to pray at least something every day.  

“She always asked me to pray the rosary every day, because there were many who did not pray,” Maria dos Anjos, niece of Fatima visionary Lucia dos Santos, told CNA in an interview.

“This was what Our Lady asked: that we pray the rosary every day. Because there were many who didn’t pray and because of this many souls went to hell because there was no one to pray for them,” she said.

Anjos, who only saw her aunt when they went to visit her in the convent, said the advice Lucia always gave her was to pray daily, and “that I not forget.”

She recalled that in a few of the conversations she had with her aunt, she confessed to not finishing the rosary because she was tired, having worked hard in the fields all day.

In response, Lucia didn’t reproach, but instead told her to “always start it, and if you don’t finish, Our Lady will finish it.”

Anjos, 97, is the daughter of one of Lucia’s older sisters. She grew up in the house directly across the street from where Lucia and her family used to live, and continues to live there with one of her sons today. Every evening she can be seen sitting on the front porch area with a rosary in hand.

While now there are paved streets and cars driving past the houses and tourist shops set up near Lucia’s house, which is now preserved as a museum and is open to the public for visits, Anjos said that when she was growing up, “there wasn’t anything here…just a mountain and some sheep and donkeys.”

Although she was only one year old at the time Lucia entered the convent, Anjos said her family would go to visit whenever they could.

Lucia, she said, “was a sister like the others. There was no difference. She was just like the other sisters who were in the convent,” and was always “joyful” – both as a child and as a religious sister.

Recalling memories that her mother had shared of her and Lucia’s childhood, Anjos said Lucia was a normal child like everyone else, and never lacked playmates.

“Many children came to play with her because their parents went to the wine estates and left their children here, because there was always someone at the house of Lucia’s mother who looked after the kids,” Anjos said.

Her grandmother and mother to Lucia, Maria Rosa Farreira, was catechist, and would also teach the children who came to the house while their parents were away.

Faith was always a big part of their family, even before the apparitions, Anjos said, explaining that “we always prayed the rosary, we went to Mass every Sunday, we did what we saw that could be done.”

After the apparitions of Mary, “we continued, doing more, and remembering that Our Lady asked us to pray more and to make more sacrifices,” she said, jesting that “we do our homework well.”

She recalled being able to attend Mass with Pope John Paul II during one of his three visits to Fatima, saying she was able to receive communion from him alongside her aunt, Sister Lucia.

“When communion came, I received communion from his hands, from the hands of the Holy Father. I liked it a lot,” she said, adding “you always like good things, do you not?”

Though she wasn’t able to speak with John Paul, Anjos said she was still “very happy,” and is equally content to welcome Pope Francis during his May 12-13 visit for the centenary of the Fatima apparitions.

During the visit, Francis will also canonized the two other Fatima visionaries – Francisco and Jacinta Marto – who were Lucia’s younger cousins, but died shortly after the apparitions took place.  

“I am very glad they will be canonized,” she said, explaining that in her and her family’s mind, the siblings were already saints. Though it will now become official, she said she believes devotion to them will be “the same,” since people had already viewed them as holy.

While she’s sad she won’t be able to attend this Mass personally, Anjos said she’ll be watching it on TV, which she said is enough to make her happy.

Noting an uptick in visits to the shrine, Anjos said that many people, her family included would pray the rosary and visit the shrine after the apparitions, but “it seems that we have more devotion.”

“I think that faith has increased here and in the whole world,” she said. “At least I think it has, because many people come here, and that’s why we have to (pray) more and more. I think it did a lot of good for people to have Our Lady appear here.”

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Russian Orthodox Metropolitan Hilarion of Volokolamsk speaks at the International Eucharistic Congress in Budapest, Hungary, Sept. 6, 2021. / Screenshot from 52nd International Eucharistic Congress YouTube channel.

Denver Newsroom, Mar 24, 2022… […]

Rome Newsroom, Oct 1, 2020 / 09:00 am (CNA).-  

The tomb of Venerable Carlo Acutis was opened for public veneration Thursday ahead of the computer-programming teen’s beatification. 

A spokeswoman for Acutis’ beatification told CNA that the entire body was present, but “not incorrupt.”

“Today we … see him again in his mortal body. A body that has passed, in the years of burial in Assisi, through the normal process of decay, which is the legacy of the human condition after sin has removed it from God, the source of life. But this mortal body is destined for resurrection,” Archbishop Domenico Sorrentino of Assisi said at a Mass at the opening of the tomb Oct. 1.

The bishop explained that Acutis’ body was “reassembled with art and love.”

Acutis, who died of leukemia in 2006 at the age of 15, was known for his computer-programming skills, and love of the Eucharist and the Virgin Mary.

The heart of Acutis, which can now be considered a relic, will be displayed in a reliquary in the Basilica of St. Francis in Assisi. His mother said that his family had wanted to donate his organs when he died, but were unable to do so because of the leukemia.

“Carlo is a boy of our time. A boy of the internet age, and a model of holiness of the digital age, as Pope Francis presented him in his letter to young people around the world. The computer … has become a way of going through the streets of the world, like the first disciples of Jesus, to bring to hearts and homes the announcement of true peace, that which quenches the thirst for the infinite that inhabits the human heart,” Sorrentino said.

The rector for the Sanctuary of Spoliation in Assisi, where Acutis’ tomb is located, told EWTN that reconstruction work on Acutis’ face was necessary before the public viewing of the tomb. 

Acutis had brain hemorrhaging at the time of his death, and he offered his suffering for the pope and the Church. 

“His body was discovered to be fully integral, not intact, but integral, having all its organs. Work was done on his face,” Fr. Carlos Acácio Gonçalves Ferreira said.

“In some way, his earthly face will be seen again. But that face — let us not forget — by now does not point to itself, but to God,” Archbishop Sorrentino said.

Acutis’ tomb is open for public veneration Oct. 1-17 in Assisi to allow as many people as possible to make a prayerful visit in the weeks before and after his beatification Oct. 10, despite coronavirus measures limiting attendance.

In his interview with EWTN, Ferreira lauded Acutis as a witness that holiness is attainable for teenagers. 

In the tomb, Acutis is dressed in the casual clothes he wore in daily life. While he was not buried in this clothes, it is hoped that they will give evidence of the teen’s life.

“For the first time in history we will see a saint dressed in jeans, sneakers, and a sweater,” the rector said.

“This is a great message for us, we can feel holiness not as a distant thing but as something very much within everyone’s reach because the Lord is the Lord of everyone.”

In the year before he died, the Italian teen researched Eucharistic miracles to create a website cataloging and sharing this information with others.

As part of the 17-day celebration of Acutis’ beatification in Assisi, two churches are hosting exhibitions of the Eucharistic miracles and Marian apparitions cataloged by Acutis. 

Acutis’ tomb is in Assisi’s Sanctuary of the Spoliation, where a young St. Francis of Assisi is said to have cast off his rich clothes in favor of a poor habit.

“Carlo Acutis, like St. Francis, had in common, in addition to love for Jesus and in particular for the Eucharist, a great love for the poor,” Archbishop Sorrentino said as he announced Oct. 1 that a soup kitchen would be opened near the Sanctuary of the Spoliation in remembrance of Acutis.

Carlo’s mother, Antonia Salzano (pictured above), said that she was very moved by the opening of her son’s tomb for public veneration.

“We are thrilled that finally Carlo’s tomb has been opened, especially because the faithful that Carlo has scattered around the world will be able to see him and to be able to venerate him in a stronger and more engaging way,” she said.

“We hope that through the exposition of Carlo’s body, the faithful can raise their prayers to God with more fervor and faith who through Carlo invites us all to have more faith, hope, and love for him, and for our brothers just as Carlo did in his earthly life. We pray that Carlo will intercede for all of us with God and obtain many graces for us.”

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