Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
FAITH ON THE DECLINE
The percentage of Portuguese who consider themselves Catholics (around 85%) ranks among the highest in
Western Europe. The number of the faithful, however, has been on a steady decline since the 1970s, when over
95% of the nation was Catholic. Today nearly half a million residents describe themselves as agnostic, and less
than 20% of the population are practising Catholics.
Regional differences reveal a more complicated portrait: around half of northern Portugal's population still at-
tend Sunday Mass, as do more than a quarter in Lisbon - with noticeably fewer churchgoers on the southern
coast.
The Three Secrets
Much mystery surrounds the three secrets told to the children at Fátima on 13 July 1917.
Lúcia revealed the first two in 1941 at the request of the Bishop of Leira, who was pub-
lishing a book on Jacinta. The first secret depicted a vision of demons and human souls
suffering in the fires of hell. The second secret predicted that an even more disastrous war
would follow WWI should the world - and in particular Russia - not convert. Given
months before the Bolshevik takeover in St Petersburg, this secret was considered particu-
larly inflammatory, as it went on to say that if her call for repentance goes unheeded Rus-
sia will spread its terrors through the world, causing wars and persecution of the church.
Lúcia was reluctant to reveal the third secret, claiming that she was told by the Virgin
Mary never to reveal it. Stricken with illness and convinced she was going to die - and
under pressure from the Bishop of Leira - Lúcia finally agreed to write the secret down in
1944.
The bishop who received the secret then passed it on to the Vatican, who kept it hidden
away for decades. Lúcia requested that the last secret be revealed in 1960 or upon her
death, whichever came first. She picked 1960 as she figured that by then the secret would
be more clearly understood. The Vatican, however, had other plans and announced in
1960 that the secret would probably remain sealed forever. Fátima followers meanwhile
offered wild speculations on what the third secret might reveal - from nuclear holocaust to
WWIII, catastrophic global financial crisis, famine or the apocalypse. The church kept
them in suspense until 2000, when it was finally revealed.
The last secret was the most mystical and controversial of the three. Lúcia described
seeing an angel holding a flaming sword who pointed at the earth and cried out 'penance'.
Then she saw a ruined city full of corpses and beyond that a steep mountain, up which
climbed a bishop dressed in white - whom she took to be the pope. At the top he knelt be-
