Everyone knows her story. Few people know her words…It was recently announced that “the diocesan phase of the canonization process for Sister Lucia, one of the three seers who saw and conversed with Our Lady of the Rosary at Fatima, came to an official close on February 13.” This announcement marked a major step for Sister Lucia’s canonization process, which began almost 10 years ago.
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After the official positio document is written, the cause will be forwarded to Rome, where the Vatican Congregation for the Causes for Canonization will review what has been collected and determine whether Sister Lucia lived a life of “heroic virtue.” (It is her life as a follower of Jesus like any one of us, not her role in the apparitions of Our Lady, that is examined.) If the decision is favorable, Sister Lucia would then be declared “Venerable.”
The initial phase of Sister Lucia’s canonization process took nine years to finish because Sister Lucia lived a long life, dying at the age of 97. According to the National Catholic Register, it took 30 full-time employees to examine the life of Sister Lucia, sifting through all of her writings as well as gathering testimonies from 60 witnesses.
Read more: 20 Memorable lines from Mother Angelica
She lived a full life, generally hidden from the world in a Carmelite convent in Portugal, but left us a wealth of wisdom that we can all learn from. Here are seven powerful quotes from Servant of God Sister Maria Lucia of Jesus and the Immaculate Heart, who desired above all things to bring souls closer to God through the hands of the Blessed Virgin Mary. [Author’s note, except where indicated, the quotes below are from Sister Lucia’s book, Calls from the Message of Fatima.]
Rosary
“When lovers are together, they spend hours and hours repeating the same thing: ‘I love you!’ What is missing in the people who think the rosary monotonous is Love; and everything that is not done for love is worthless.”
“The Most Holy Virgin in these last times in which we live has given a new efficacy to the recitation of the Rosary to such an extent that there is no problem, no matter how difficult it is, whether temporal or above all spiritual, in the personal life of each one of us, of our families… that cannot be solved by the Rosary. There is no problem, I tell you, no matter how difficult it is, that we cannot resolve by the prayer of the Holy Rosary.”
“Since we all need to pray, God asks of us, as a kind of daily installment, a prayer which is within our reach: the Rosary, which can be recited either in common or in private, either in church in the presence of the Blessed Sacrament or at home, either with the rest of the family or alone, either when traveling or while walking quietly in the fields. A mother of a family can say the Rosary while she rocks her baby’s cradle or does the housework. Our day has 24 hours in it. It is not asking a great deal to set aside a quarter of an hour for the spiritual life, for our intimate and familiar converse with God.”
Daily Sacrifices
“Putting up with any sacrifices that are asked of us in our day-to-day lives becomes a slow martyrdom which purifies us and raises us up to the level of the supernatural, through the encounter of our soul with God, in the atmosphere of the presence of the Most Holy Trinity within us. We have here an incomparable spiritual richness!”
Message of Fatima
“Hell is a reality. It is a supernatural fire and not physical. It cannot be compared to fire that burns wood or charcoal… Continue preaching about hell because Our Lord himself spoke about hell, and it is in Sacred Scripture. God does not condemn anyone to hell. God gave men the liberty to choose, and God respects this human liberty.” [Christus Magazine Interview]
“Let us all willingly endeavor to follow faithfully the path that He has mapped out for us. Yes, because it was out of love that God sent us this pressing call from his mercy, in order to help us along the way of our salvation.”
The End-Times
“The final battle between the Lord and the kingdom of Satan will be about marriage and the family. Do not be afraid, because anyone who works for the sanctity of marriage and the family will always be fought and opposed in every way, because this is the decisive issue. However, Our Lady has already crushed his head.”
Read more: Fatima visionary to Cardinal: “Final battle between God and Satan will be over marriage and family”
