Fátima and the Politics of Devotion

Abstract

Zimdars-Swartz examines devotions in and associated with the apparition of the Virgin Mary at Fátima, Portugal, in 1917. She examines how the apocalyptic “secret” that was published in the midst of the Second World War provided a narrative framework that became a key to interpreting the historical crises of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. In the divine drama codified by this secret, the performance of the devotions commanded by the Virgin has both religious and political consequences. Zimdars-Swartz demonstrates how the devotions in the Fátima messages—praying the Rosary, fasting and making reparation for sin—became politicized and even militarized in subsequent apparitions like those at Amsterdam, Lipa, Necedah and Medjugorje.