The Feast of Our Lady of Fatima

Here's an excerpt from Finding Grace, with some of Grace's musings on the subject of Fatima after she learns that her dear elderly neighbors, the Perlmanns, are Holocaust survivors:

          And something was nagging at the back of her mind.  What dire warning had Mary given to Francisco and Jacinta Marto and Lucy Santos, the three peasant children to whom She'd appeared at Fatima?  Wasn't it that there would be a terrible war, worse than the most recent one the world had witnessed?  Our Blessed Mother had appeared to the three Portuguese children in 1917, not long after the Great War, the "War to End All Wars": World War I.  Through three poor, humble, young shepherds, the Mother of God had sought to warn the people of the world that if they didn't change their ways and consecrate themselves to Her Immaculate Heart, an even more terrible holocaust would be visited on the earth.
          The horrible chastisement to which She referred was World War II!
          Aside from just the testimonies of the three children, there was tangible physical evidence that the visions were authentic: Mary had promised and then performed a spectacular miracle, "The Miracle of the Sun," and it had been seen by at least 70,000 people.  The sun had turned colors and danced in the sky, and then appeared to be crashing toward the earth as these awestruck witnesses cowered in fear.  After that irrefutable proof that the children had been telling the truth, how could anyone still insist on disregarding the words that Our Lady had communicated to the world through the three little seers?
          And if only people had heeded Mary's words!  If they'd simply followed Her instructions
--and one of them was to pray the Rosary daily!--Hitler might never have come to power, and the terrible tragedy that had led to the deaths of millions of souls...might never have come to pass.
          Why did God's children ignore the Fatima message?  How different would the course of history have been if they'd heeded it?  What if everyone on earth had fervently prayed the Rosary every single day as Mary had instructed?  Was that too much to ask?  Peace in the world had been promised by the Mother of God Herself, yet the Fatima admonitions had fallen on mostly deaf ears.
          But how was she, Grace, any better than every other person who'd ignored the message of Fatima?
          [Feeling very guilty, and now filled with an interior fire that she wishes she'd felt sooner, Grace begins to pray a Rosary.]


It's so easy to get caught up in our peaceful, happy, everyday lives and forget all about the message of Fatima, as Grace realizes she's done; our Rosary beads lay hidden in drawers, collecting dust.  But we must remember that the most powerful weapon that can be employed to attain peace throughout the world is not a gun or a missile or a battleship; it's the Rosary.  That's the answer, the Rx to all the world's ills: the Rosary.  As the loving, obedient, and trusting children of Our Lady of Fatima, we must PRAY THE ROSARY!