On Monday, February 20, Saints Francisco and Jacinta Martos, two shepherd brothers who, together with their cousin Lucia dos Santos, claimed to have seen six apparitions of Our Lady of Fatima in 1917, were commemorated. The place where these apparitions took place was the Cave of Iria, in Fatima, Portugal, where the Shrine of Fatima is located today.
Francisco and Jacinta were very young when they had these visions—only seven and nine years old, respectively. Despite the fact that the Portuguese government was strongly anti-clerical at the time, the children were brave in their witness, despite the confusion of their families and neighbors.Even when Our Lady revealed the Secret of Fatima to them in the third apparition, in which she showed them hell, Jacinta was terrified and became obsessed with saving as many sinners as possible through penance and sacrifice. Francisco, on the other hand, preferred to pray in solitude.
After the apparitions, the three children returned to their normal lives, but the lives of Francisco and Jacinta were short. Francisco died at the age of eleven on April 4, 1919, while his sister died a year later, barely ten years old. According to his cousin LucÃa, Francisco was a quiet boy and fond of music, while Jacinta was more affectionate and very spoiled, but emotionally more fragile.
The Spanish flu, which ravaged the world at that time, took the lives of both siblings. Both practiced hard penances, such as prolonged fasting, which caused their defenses to be very low. Their dedication to God was so great that even in the face of death, they did not lose their faith and their hope in eternal life: “If they kill us, it doesn’t matter, we are going to heaven.”
The process of beatification of the brothers began in 1946, and it was in 2000 when they were beatified by Pope John Paul II during his visit to the Shrine of Fatima. Finally, they were canonized by Pope Francis in 2017. Lucia dos Santos, the brothers’ cousin, died in 2005 at the age of 98 after a long life dedicated to the service of God.