Marian apparitions
From Freepedia
Marian apparitions are events in which the Virgin Mary is purported to have supernaturally appeared to one or more persons, typically but not always Christians, often Catholics in various settings. They are often given names based on the town in which they were reported, or on the soubriquet which was given to Mary on the occasion of the apparition, or on her reported clothing and hairstyle. They have been interpreted as psychological (pareidolia), and as religious phenomena, occasionally as theophanies. Apparitions sometimes recur at the same site over an extended period of time. Marian apparitions sometimes involve statues or images of Mary; of particular note are weeping statues, witnessed as producing tears.
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List of Marian apparitions
This is a list of some of the more noteworthy Marian apparitions. The veracity of these claims is difficult to establish and not all have been approved by the Catholic Church.
| Date | Location | To whom | Reference |
|---|---|---|---|
| 352 | Rome, Italy | patrician and his wife | Basilica di Santa Maria Maggiore |
| 1061 | Walsingham, England | Richeldis of Walsingham | |
| 1214 | Saint Dominic, recommending the Rosary | ||
| 1251 | England | Saint Simon Stock, instituting the scapular | Our Lady of Mount Carmel |
| 1382 | Czestochowa, Poland | The Black Madonna | |
| 1531 | Villa Guadalupe, Mexico | Juan Diego, an indigenous farmer | Our Lady of Guadalupe |
| 1634 | Quito, Ecuador | Our Lady of Good Success | |
| 1717 | Aparecida, Brazil | A group of fishermen | Our Lady of Aparecida (Appeared) |
| 1830 | Paris, France | St. Catherine Labouré, a nun of the Sisters of Charity convent | Our Lady of the Miraculous Medal |
| 1846 | La Salette, France | two cowherder children | Our Lady of La Salette |
| 1858 | Lourdes, France | Bigourdane peasant girl Bernadette Soubirous | Our Lady of Lourdes |
| 1871 | Pontmain, France | Eugene and Joseph Barbadette & friends (five children and one baby) | |
| 1879 | Knock, Ireland | numerous witnesses, along with Saint Joseph and Saint John the Evangelist | Our Lady, Queen of Ireland |
| 1900 | Beijing, China | Our Lady of Beijing | |
| 1900 | Santai, China | ||
| 1900 | Donglu, China | Our Lady of China | |
| 1917 | Fatima, Portugal | Lucia dos Santos & Jacinta and Francisco Marto | Our Lady of Fatima |
| 1933 | Beauraing, Belgium | five schoolchildren | |
| 1933 | Banneux, Belgium | schoolgirl Mariette Beco | |
| 1961-1965 | Garabandal, Spain | four country girls | |
| 1968-1971 | Zeitoun, Egypt | thousands of people, on a church roof | |
| 1955 | Sabana Grande, Puerto Rico | three children | |
| 1973 | Akita, Japan | Sister Sasagawa | [1] |
| 1968-1995 | Bayside, New York | Veronica Lueken | Our Lady of the Roses |
| 1981 | Medjugorje, Herzegovina | to five children | |
| 1987 | Hrushiv, Ukraine | Josyp Terelya, Maria Kizyn and thousands of others | |
| 1990-1995 | Litmanová, Slovakia | Katka Ceselkova & Ivetka Korcakova | Our Lady of Immaculate Purity |
| 1990-1998 | Conyers, United States | ||
| 1994 | St. John's, Antigua | on a grilled cheese sandwich to Diana Duyser. | Virgin Mary grilled cheese |
| 1996-2004 | Clearwater, Florida | to thousands of visitors, on the side of a glass-walled office building | |
| 2000-2001 | Assiut, Egypt | to millions of people, approved by Coptic Orthodox Church | Our Lady of Assiut |
| February 2003 | Sydney, Australia | (shown to be an illusion) | [2] [3] |
| June 2003 | Boston, United States | seen by many in a hospital window. | [4] |
| November 2004 | Accra, Ghana | [5] | |
| April 2005 | Chicago, United States | seen by many on wall of I-90's Fullerton Avenue underpass. | [6] |
| July 2005 | Acerra, Italy | Church statue moves and turns pink. | [7] |
| 1998-present | Montreal, Canada | Apparitions to a Montreal Carmelite sister. | [8] |
Papal Marian apparitions
It has been claimed that apparitions were experienced by a number of popes, including Pope Leo XIII in 1884, Pope Pius XII at various stages during his papacy, and Pope John Paul II in 1981, while he recovered from an assassination attempt which occurred on the anniversary of the Fatima apparition. John Paul II's particular devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary was indicated in his coat of Arms (image, left), which contains a large letter "M" standing under the cross. He also visited many of the most famous alleged apparition sites, notably Fatima, Lourdes, and Knock, and according to some reports may have experienced another visitation on his last visit to Lourdes in 2003.
Possibly the best-known apparition sites are Lourdes and Fatima. Over sixty out of thousands of reported spontaneous healings at the Lourdes Spring have been classified as "inexplicable" by the physicians of the highly critical Lourdes Bureau. The so-called Three Secrets of Fatima received a great deal of attention in the press.
Not all claims of visitations are dealt with favourably by the Catholic Church. For example, the so-called apparitions of Our Lady, Jesus Christ and various saints at Bayside, New York were never condoned or sanctioned in any way, nor were those at Necedah, Wisconsin. The behavior of the women who claimed these heavenly favors does not compare favorably with the quiet pragmatism of Bernadette Soubirous. Church authorities are said to use Bernadette as a model by which to judge all who purport to have visitations. When the Church does approve a visitation, Catholics are not required to believe in it: it is called "worthy of belief".
Criticism of Marian apparitions
The Holy See has officially confirmed the apparitions at Guadalupe, Lourdes, Fatima and Knock. However, the vast majority of Marian apparitions cannot be confirmed because usually it is only a few people that see her. The exception to this is Zeitoun, where thousands claimed to have seen her over a period of three years.
Marian apparations are criticized by many non-believers as the result of Christian (and particularly Catholic) superstition. This is particularly the case when apparitions occur in mundane locations, such as water-stained plaster; or when they turn out to have a conventional explanation, such as the occasion when an indistinct image of Mary on the side of a church which had attracted crowds of people and then turned out to be a poster of Boxcar Willie that had been whitewashed over.
Supposedly spontaneous healings reported at apparition sites such as Lourdes are also disputed by scientists and skeptics, who say that most of these are far from spontaneous, often taking place some time after the visit or over a period of weeks or months (rather then being instantaneous, as required for a miraculous healing). Also many of these healings are incomplete, leaving the sufferer with disabilities or chronic illness. Hence such healings are (critics say) the relatively rare but entirely unmiraculous spontaneous remission of illness or injury, as would be expected to occur in a few of the large numbers of ill (and perhaps credulous) people who visit such sites.
Further reading
- Josyp Terelya with Michael H. Brown, Witness to Apparitions and Persecution in the USSR: An Autobiography, Faith Publishing, 1991, trade paperback, ISBN 1877678171
