On July 13, 1917, Our Lady appeared for the second time to the three children of Fatima. She promised to work a miracle on October 13, so that everyone would believe. Then, she asked the children to sacrifice themselves for sinners and to pray the following prayer when doing so: “O Jesus, it is for love of you, for the conversion of sinners, and in reparation for the sins committed against the Immaculate Heart of Mary.” These three young children were already familiar with the conception of praying and making sacrifices in order to make up for sin. God had sent an angel to them the year before, to prepare them for the apparitions of Our Lady. This guardian angel of Portugal taught the children about their mission: it was for them to do prayer and penance for the conversion of sinners and in reparation for sin, to stop sin from being committed in the future and to repair for sin already committed in the past. Later, Our Lady came to ask for the practice of the five first Saturdays devotion. This is a devotion of reparation for the offenses committed against Our Lady’s Immaculate Heart. There are five first Saturdays because there are five types of blasphemies that are committed against Our Lady. The fourth type is the “blasphemies of those who seek openly to foster in the hearts of children indifference or contempt for this Immaculate Mother.” These facts about the message of Fatima show us that Heaven takes very seriously the offenses committed against the Immaculate Heart of Mary. Our Lady would not come down on earth, speak to the three children, and work incredible miracles for no reason. Another thing that we learn is that the work of reparation is very important. Every sin is a crime against God, an injustice. Every sin deserves a punishment to make up for the injustice. There are many sins being committed around the world all the time. God looks for souls who are willing to pay for the sins of mankind. Our Lord and Our Lady, of course, paid a great price for the sins of the world, enough to wipe them all away. However, God did not want to leave us with nothing to do in the supernatural order. Rather, God asks that we unite with the work of Our Lord and Our Lady to do something to pay for sin ourselves. He asks for the work of “reparation”, making up for sin by prayer and sacrifice. This is what the Sacred Heart asked of St. Margaret Mary and us. This is what the Immaculate Heart asked of the three children of Fatima and us. Doing this work is part of living a Catholic life. The most important sins for us to make reparation for are sins of blasphemy. St. Thomas says that blasphemy is “the disparagement of some surpassing goodness, especially that of God”. What Fr. Pagliarani and Fr. Fullerton are asking us to do is to make reparation for a sort of blasphemy against the Mother of God in the form of the document Mater Populi Fidelis of the Dicastery of the Doctrine of the Faith. This document disparages a surpassing goodness, namely, the roles of Our Lady as Co-Redemptrix and Mediatrix of All Graces.
