Location

Fatima and its Location
Fatima, the largest parish in the municipality of Ourém district of Santarem, is an important pilgrimage center for the Catholic world.

It lies about 11 km from Ourém, 25 km from Leiria, 120 km from Lisbon, 180km from Porto and is approximately 300 meters above sea level, right in the limestone massif Extremaduran. The formations of the Serra de Aire Lamps and give it a barren landscape, a rocky soil and limestone where only holm oak, Portuguese oak, the arbutus, the buckthorn or zanguinho, fig and olive tree can withstand adverse weather conditions and territory present.
The name Fatima has topographic Moorish because Fatima was the name of the daughter of Muhammad, the great prophet of Islam Today, Fatima indicates the central town, seat of the parish of the same name that still retains remnants of its rural in tanks, mills wind and other elements of the architecture made of stone and lime, as can be appreciated in the villages of Aljustrel, Eira da Pedra, Mulberry, Giesteira, Boleiros, Ramil, Cage, Quarry, Young Sick and Moita, among others, all worth visiting.

The Town of Fatima was founded in 1568, after their break-up of Collegiate Ourém. Until 1917, Fatima was born an unknown village in a clearing, facing pastoralism and rainfed agriculture. Striking were the religious phenomena of the Apparitions of Our Lady to three shepherd children who triggered the establishment of people that have gone by trade, restaurants and hotels, in response to requests from pilgrims, abandoning the traditional subsistence agriculture in favor of the new jobs emerging.

Fatima was a town in 1977 and the city in 1997 and currently has about 10,000 inhabitants. Serves residents of all social amenities of a city, but also tourists and pilgrims, with quality hotels and restaurants, museums and shops, and an excellent road network, in which A1 is the main port of entry.


About two kilometers from Fatima, is Aljustrel, the small village where they were born three children to whom Our Lady appeared in 1917. Two miles west of Fatima, extends the Cova da Iria, where Our Lady appeared five times to the visionaries, the first time May 13, 1917, when grazing a flock in the Cova da Iria. Lucia de Jesus, Francisco and Jacinta Marto, 10, 9 and 7 years respectively, saw an oak tree on a light involving a lady who spoke to them asking them to pray and invite them to come back in subsequent months. To the west, near Aljustrel, on a hill where the prevailing culture of olive trees, rises to the Cabeço, tiny cluster of rocks where, once in spring and once in autumn 1916, the angel appeared to three shepherd children.

Among Aljustrel and the Cabeço in a small valley called Valinhos, we found the place where the Virgin also appeared to three shepherd children since the August 19, 1917.

Fatima, Altar of the World, Results of a whole evolutionary process supported in watersheds such as the construction of an arch with a wooden cross to mark the spot of the apparitions. The small tree was gradually disappearing carried by pilgrims. The August 6, 1918, with the alms of the faithful began building a small chapel in honor of Our Lady, made of lime stone and tile-covered with 3.30 meters long, 2.80 meters wide and 2.85 meters tall. It was the first building of the current venue of prayer. The first official ceremony of the Bishop of Leiria occurred in the Cova da Iria in 1927, the foundation stone of the Basilica in 1928, coming to the shrine of Pope Paul VI in May 1967, the visits of Pope John Paul II in 1982, in 1991 and 2000 on the occasion of the beatification of Jacinta and Francisco Marto, more recently, the construction of Holy Trinity Church to open in May 2007 and repatriation of the body of Sister Lucia, the Carmelite Convent of St. Teresa in Coimbra to Basilica of Fatima, on February 19, 2006.

Today the Shrine of Fatima on pilgrimage and prayer houses many thousands of people from around the world. From May to October, the 13th day of each month and throughout the year about six million pilgrims visit annually the paths of Fatima to be closer to where three little shepherds - Jacinta, Francisco and Lucia - claim to have seen the Virgin Mary.

In the simplicity of its universal message of Peace, Fatima is a place of silence and meditation. Fatima awaits us ...

http://www.rodotejo.pt/

source Portal Tourism Leiria-Fatima