FROM MELTING POT TO MOSAIC

When I first arrived in California in 1974 there was a song calling California a «melting pot». This was the American concept. America, that was full of immigrants from all over the world, was considered a «melting pot». Different cultures were supposed to be «melted» and integrated in one culture only. It was like a juice maker. We put oranges, apples, bananas and any kind of fruit together and each one was supposed to lose its identity and become one kind of juice with one kind of color and one kind of taste.

In 1976 the American Bishops wrote a Pastoral letter and stated that America was not a «melting pot» but a «mosaic» with different colors, different cultures, different languages, and so on.

To emphasize this beautiful concept of respect for diversity we built, in my parish, what we called a «Marian Garden». All nationalities were invited to paste on the outside walls of the church in a garden that looked like a cloister, on tile, the image of their patroness with her name, a story of the image and the Hail Mary in their language.

I was surprised to find out that some people, when I asked them the name of their patroness they answered that it was «Our Lady of Fatima». One day, in Madeira, I was with a group of Portuguese people and also asked the name of our Patroness and the answer was the same. It was Our Lady of Fatima when it is the Immaculate Conception.

When I heard that Pope Francis was coming to Fatima to preside to the First Centennial Celebration of the Apparitions I became convinced that he was going to proclaim Our Lady of Fatima the Patroness of the World or the Patroness of all Nations. He is not going to do it but People already did it. FATIMA IS THE ALTAR OF THE WORLD. During these last two days all the world, Catholic and non Catholic, had their eyes on Fatima.

2

On May 13, 1917 Mary, the Mother of Jesus, appeared to three little Shepherds: Lucia, Francisco and Jacinta. It happened between two world wars. My father was an illiterate and simple military man, who spent 4 years in the military life. He married my mother in March 1917, two months before the Apparitions. I heard him many times talking about the Apparitions saying: «We heard that Our Lady had appeared and had said that the war was going to end and the soldiers were going home».

I still feel my father´s emotions when I was a small child hearing the same story so many times without ever getting tired of his repetition. Especially «the soldiers are going home».

Maybe because of this little story told by this small man in this small place I always associated Fatima with the suffering of the world. «The soldiers are going home» always meant for me the end of the human suffering.

3

Pope Francis is coming to Fatima as a pilgrim to celebrate with the entire world the first Centennial of the Apparitions. It is not an official visit to Portugal. Just a pilgrim to remind the world the message of Fatima. He is bringing a message of Mercy and Peace and also to canonize the two youngest Shepherds who saw Mary, Mother of God and our Mother.

Love and Peace,
Fr. Bernardino Andrade