‘A light in Spain’: Vatican approves devotion to WWII apparition of Our Lady of Sorrows

The Vatican has approved the devotion to the Spanish Marian shrine of Our Lady of Sorrows of Chandavila where the Virgin Mary reportedly appeared to two young girls at the end of World War II.

[...] Devotion to Our Lady of Sorrows of Chandavila is based on the reported appearances of the Virgin Mary shortly before the end of World War II in 1945 to two young Spanish girls, 10-year-old Marcelina Barroso Expósito and 17-year-old Afra Brígido Blanco. The appearances took place where the shrine now stands in the village of La Codosera, right by the border with Portugal.

It is recounted that the girls could not but notice that Mary’s beautiful face bore every mark of deep pain and overwhelming sadness when she appeared to them.

Marcelina recounts that, at first, she saw a dark shape in the sky. At other times, it became more apparent that this shape was the Virgin of Sorrows, with a black mantle full of stars, on a chestnut tree. More than the vision itself, this girl had the profound experience of feeling the embrace and the kiss that the Virgin gave her on the forehead.

This call of the Virgin, to trust in her love, gave this poor and suffering girl hope, and also the experience of feeling dignified. It was an experience of beauty because the Virgin appeared surrounded by luminous constellations, like those that could be admired at night in the clear sky of the small villages of Extremadura, Spain.

Extremadura is one of Spain’s least populated and poorest regions. Its desolate wide open plains toward the center of the region are where many of the country’s bulls are reared.

There is a haunting beauty and an intimidatingly brutal type of splendor to Extremadura’s arid vistas and open spaces. The somewhat infamous – due to its length and toughness – Via de la Plata Camino pilgrimage passes northward through the region on its way from Seville in the region of Andalusia, to Extremadura’s south, all the way to Santiago de Compostela 1,000 kilometers farther on in northwestern Galicia.

After the alleged visions, the two girls led a discreet and inconspicuous life and both dedicated themselves to works of charity, especially to caring for the sick, the elderly, and orphans, thereby transmitting to those who are suffering the sweet consolation of the Virgin’s love that they had experienced.

Many positive aspects indicate an action of the Holy Spirit in so many pilgrims who come, both from Spain and Portugal, in the conversions, healings, and other valuable signs in this place.

While the Vatican dicastery did not make a ruling about the nature of the apparitions themselves, it concludes: “There is nothing one can object to in this beautiful devotion, which presents the same simplicity that we can see in Mary of Nazareth, our Blessed Mother.”

James Jeffrey, August 24, 2024

Adapted from: www.catholicherald.co.uk