Bogoslovska smotra, Vol. 88 No. 2, 2018.
Original scientific paper
The Challenge of History in the Fatima Message
Valerija Nedjeljka Kovač
orcid.org/0000-0002-7535-1951
; Catholic Faculty of Theology, University of Zagreb, Zagreb, Croatia
Abstract
The article discusses the understanding of history in the Fatima message in view of God’s call to the human being to be his collaborator. It is shown that history is not pessimistically determined by negative forces of evil, but instead represents a challenge to human beings to shape it with their lives and activities in the light of God’s call to conversion. This thesis is developed in the article under a few aspects: the article emphasises that God shows himself as present in history through the prophetic charisma of Marian apparitions; it analyses the manner in which Mary participates in history as the mediator of God’s messages to human beings – as caring, warning, and urging us to conversion; it reads the »signs of the times« in the Fatima message, adding a note that it is sometimes too narrowly interpreted; it reflects on the manner in which the human being is summoned to assume responsibility for the history of humanity. Finally, the article »filtrates« from the Fatima message the very understanding of human history. That history is realised in the ambivalent presence of good and evil, but due to God’s salvific activity, its positive eschatological outcome is guaranteed.
Keywords
Fatima; Mary; apparitions; history; God’s activity; signs of the times; sin; conversion
Hrčak ID:
204183
URI
Publication date:
26.7.2018.
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