c. 2007 Religion News Service

WASHINGTON TOWNSHIP, N.J. _ About 3,500 people are expected to descend Saturday (Oct. 13) on an isolated Catholic shrine to celebrate the 90th anniversary of what they regard as a miracle: sightings of the Virgin Mary in Fatima, Portugal, by three shepherd children in 1917.

There’s some added buzz as the anniversary draws near. Last month, late one afternoon at the shrine, known as the National Blue Army Shrine, some people in the crowd of 1,000 reported seeing the sun change colors and dance in the sky.

Some claimed to have seen the Virgin Mary and Jesus in the sun; others, the letter M. The crowd, most of them Filipino-Americans, had come to the shrine in honor of the birth of Mary, which Catholics celebrate on Sept. 8.

People have been calling each day to ask about what happened, said Michael LaCorte, executive director at the National Blue Army Shrine.

“We have no expectations” of similar visions occurring Saturday, said LaCorte, who was not at the shrine Sept. 8. “We have no understanding of what happened in the first place.”

Among those to have told LaCorte they saw something special that day above the shrine’s grassy grounds was Pilar Veru of Clifton, N.J., who took pictures for a magazine she edits.

About 5:45 p.m., after a rosary procession capped a day of religious events centered around Mary, “the sun became really, really orange and almost beet red,” she said. “ … It started dancing and started moving, up and down, to the left, to the right. It seemed almost that it was going to come out of heaven.”

She took pictures, which she said show no unusual colors or movement, but in which her husband later noticed “one cloud that has the perfect image of the Virgin Mary. I didn’t see it that … particular moment, which I’m happy about, because I would have fainted.”

Victoria Tancio of Leonia, who organized bus tours for the event, said the colors changed mainly at the sun’s ring.

“It started from purple, to green, blue-ish, yellowy, and orange, and then when it changed to orange it appeared like a moon, and there was like a veil that covered it. It lasted like two minutes. Then another cycle. There were three cycles. … While the color changes, the sun goes up and down, left and right … And it spins very fast. It was like pulsating.”

She said she also saw an image in the sun of Mary and Jesus facing each other, with a cross in the middle.

Such a “miracle of the sun” would have had pointed meaning for the worshipers. The most celebrated reported sighting from 1917 included reports of unnatural sun colors.

The Portuguese shepherd children _ Lucia Santos and her cousins Jacinta and Francisco Marto _ had said they saw visions of Mary, and heard essential messages from her about the world, on the 13th day of each month in 1917, from May to September. On Oct. 13 of that year, a crowd of about 70,000 gathered for what the children said would be the sixth appearance. Many who were there reported seeing the sun change colors and dart around the sky.

LaCorte did not give an opinion about the reports, but said the shrine can encourage contemplation that stirs emotional responses.

“Many people come here and feel a strong sense of rejuvenation,” LaCorte said. “I say this place recharges the spiritual batteries for many.”

(Jeff Diamant writes for The Star Ledger in Newark, N.J.)

KRE/LF END DIAMANT550 words