The Five First Saturdays devotion is one of the principal points of
the Fatima message. It centers on the urgent need for mankind to offer
reparation and expiate for the many injuries that the Immaculate Heart
of Mary suffers from the hands of both impious and indifferent men.
History
During the third apparition on July 13, 1917, Our Lady revealed that
she would come to ask for the consecration of Russia to her Immaculate
Heart and for the Communion of Reparation of the Five First Saturdays.
Consequently, she asked for the devotion in 1925 and the consecration in
1929.
While staying at the House of the Dorothean Sister in Pontevedra,
Portugal, Sister Lucia received a vision on December 10, 1925 where the
Blessed Mother appeared alongside a Boy who stood over a luminous cloud.
Our Lady rested one hand on the Boy’s shoulder while she held on the
other hand a heart pierced with thorns around it.
Sister Lucia heard the Boy say,
"Have pity on the Heart of your Most Holy Mother which is covered with
thorns with which ingrate men pierce it at every moment with no one to
make an act of reparation to pull them out."
Our Lady expressed her request in the following words,
"See, my daughter, My Heart surrounded with thorns with which
ingrates pierce me at every moment with blasphemies and ingratitude.
You, at least, make sure to console me and announce that all those who
for five months, on the first Saturdays, go to confession, receive
Communion, say five decades of the Rosary and keep me company for 15
minutes meditating on the mysteries of the Rosary, with the purpose of
making reparation to Me, I promise to assist them at the hour of death
with all the graces necessary for the salvation of their souls."
A few days afterward, Sister Lucia detailed this vision in a letter
addressed to Monsignor Manuel Pereira Lopes, her confessor when she
resided in the Asylum of Vilar in the city of Oporto, Portugal.
Why Five Saturdays?
Sister Lucia’s confessor questioned her about the reason for the five
Saturdays asking why not seven or nine. She answered him in a letter
dated June 12, 1930. In it she related about a vision she had of Our
Lord while staying in the convent chapel part of the night of the
twenty-ninth to the thirtieth of the month of May, 1930. The reasons Our
Lord gave were as follows:
The five first Saturdays correspond to the five kinds of offenses and
blasphemies committed against the Immaculate Heart of Mary. They are:
a. Blasphemies against the Immaculate Conception
b. Blasphemies against her virginity
c. Blasphemies against her divine maternity, at the same time the refusal to accept her as the Mother of all men
d. Instilling , indifference, scorn and even hatred towards this Immaculate Mother in the hearts of children
e. Direct insults against Her sacred images
Let us keep the above reasons firmly in our minds. Devotions have
intentions attached to them and knowing them adds merit and weight to
the practice.
Modifications to the Five First Saturdays Devotion to facilitate its observation
The original request of Our Lady asks one to confess and receive
Communion on five consecutive first Saturdays; to say five decades of
the Rosary; to meditate during 15 minutes on the mysteries of the Rosary
for the purpose of making reparation to the Immaculate Heart of Mary in
reparation for the sins of men.
In subsequent private visions and apparitions however, Sister Lucia
presented to Our Lord the difficulties that devotees encountered in
fulfilling some conditions. With loving condescension and solicitude,
Our Lord deigned to relax the rules to make this devotion easy to
observe:
- Confession may be done on other days other than the First Saturdays
so long as one receives Our Lord worthily and has the intention of
making reparation to the Immaculate Heart of Mary.
- Even if one forgets to make the intention, it may be done on the
next confession, taking advantage of the first occasion to go to
confession.
- Sister Lucia also clarified that it is not necessary to meditate on
ALL mysteries of the Rosary on each First Saturdays. One or several
suffice.
With much latitude granted by Our Lord Himself, there is no reason
for the faithful to hesitate or delay this pious practice in the spirit
of reparation which the Immaculate Heart of Mary urgently asks.
This devotion is so necessary in our days
The culture of vice and sin remains unabated even as one reads this.
Abortion, blasphemy, drug abuse, pornography, divorce and bad marriages,
religious indifference, the advances of the homosexual agenda and
others are just some of society’s many plagues that cut deeply into the
Immaculate Heart of Mary.
We must console Our Lady amidst all these insults and injuries to her
and her Divine Son. She asks for reparation, she pleads for our
prayers, she hopes for our amendment of life. Let us listen to her
maternal pleas and atone for the ingratitude of men.
The First Five Saturdays devotion stimulates the spirit of
reparation; it instills a tender love for the Holy Sacraments of
Confession and the Blessed Eucharist. It nurtures a holy affection for
the Immaculate Heart of Mary and the Rosary. Above all, it is an
excellent means to maintain one in the state of grace while immersed in
the daily spiritual battles and prosaic existence in the neo-pagan world
that we live in.
Let us not delay in observing this devotion for it too gives us hope for eternal salvation.
REFERENCE:
Solimeo, Luiz Sergio, Fatima, A Message More Urgent than Ever
(Spring Grove, PA: The American Society for the Defense of Tradition, Family, and Property-TFP, 2008.)
