Fatima

Traveling to a Dream Come True:

Basilica of Our Lady of Fatima (Aug, 2011)

  Everyone may have one or two dream places they would love to travel to in their life time. However, how many of these wishes come true? Not very often, I think. Fortunately, at only the age of 19, I was able to go to one of my dream travel places.

  Fatima, almost like the size of Banff in Alberta, Canada, is considered one of the most holiest cities in the World as many catholic believers believe that the  Virgin Mary (Jesus' mother) had appeared to 3 poor Shepherd Children Jacinta, Francesco, and Lucia.

  It has always been a dream of mine to be able to visit such a holy place. As a young child, my mother would always read me bible stories and teach me how to pray the "Hail Mary" prayer. She would often tell me in Chinese "The Virgin Mary is like our Mother, we must respect and pray to her often."

  I never really understood why such a "heavenly woman" was always prayed to. However, being only a young child of five years old, I would often follow my mother and pray the *Rosary with her, not caring about the true meaning behind such actions. It was up until I was about 10 years old, when at school, during religion class, our teacher showed us a short video of the amazing story of how the Virgin Mary appeared to three Children in Portugal. At first, I doubted that such a significant event happened, after all my mother would always say that she "lives in heaven" when I was young. So I always thought would such a "heavenly figure" ever appear to such humble children? However, as I grew up I began to become very interested to be able to visit this place. I was further educated about the significance of story in Sunday School at church. As a result,  even before I knew that I would be participating in World Youth Day, I would go online and search up information about Fatima. For some reason, the story of the three children who saw the Virgin Mary really began to grow close to my heart and it surprised me that it happened only a century or so ago. I wanted to be able to see what the three children had seen. I became extremely determined to be able to visit this holy place, I wanted to be closer to the "heavenly woman" that I have been taught to pray to all my childhood.

  On August 9th, after a short two day tour of Lisbon, the capital, I and along with 12 other friends from my Parish rode on a bus to the small town of Fatima. The scorching summer heat did not hold back my excitement at all. "At last," I thought, "I am here." I was amazed, awed. When we arrived at the Beautiful Basilica of Our Lady Fatima. There were perhaps hundreds of people from all over the world there praying, singing, and kneeling. The place was very peaceful. I was not only captivated by the amazing architecture but also at how the people were so concentrated into praying and worshiping. At the basilica, I felt free and joyful, I for the first time, was determined to stay and just pray, to express my faith with pride. At that moment, my doubts vanished and felt more connected to my catholic faith.

Basilica of Our Lady of Fatima (August 2011)

  Back at home in Calgary I would often resent myself from praying in public, as I feel that it is awkward to show my religious beliefs to others in the open. Oftentimes, I would feel that it is embarrassing to pray before a meal at a restaurant because I would feel that people around me would be staring at what I do. However, at the Basilica, all of those awkward feelings vanished and for the very first time, I felt comfortable in praying in the public. In fact, I felt proud to be catholic.

*A Rosary is a chain of 5 decades of beads that many Catholics use to pray to the Virgin Mary.