What Is The Official Position Of The Catholic Church On The Apparitions At Fatima?

The local representatives of the Church were not at all pleased by the childrens' claims to have seen an apparition of the Virgin Mary. Indeed, the local priest told one the children that she might be a "little devil child" and pressured her to admit her claims were false. This she refused to do. Popular sentiment about the happenings at Fatima continued to gather, however, and the Church was unable to stop it. Official church inquiries into what happened at Fatima took place in the 1920s and in 1930 the Church declared officially that it believed the apparition was real. Catholics were allowed to believe in it but were not required to do so.

In recent times, the Church is often said to have looked a little askance at the forms of  worship which are popular at Fatima, such as women walking on their knees towards a statue of Mary. Some in the Church hierarchy are said to feel that Marian devotion has become a kind of sub-cult within Catholicism, and are not happy about it.