SATURDAY, JUNE 24, 1961: A MYSTERIOUS "NOTICE" AT THE FEET OF THE "ANGEL"

They had barely reached the calleja when the Angel showed himself to the girls with a placard (escritorio) at his feet. The visionaries deciphered only the first two words of the firstlive, "Hay que" (It is necessary that . . ."), and the last line of Roman numerals, "XVIII - MCMLXI". . . The children were soon to learn from the Blessed Virgin that this was a Message. 

The term "Message" was never formally used at Lourdes nor at Fatima, where only "the words pronounced by the Blessed Virgin", her "exhortations," even, "symbolic actions," were mentioned. On the contrary, at Garabandal, the word "Message" was clearly used by the Angel, by Our Lady, by Christ Himself, to designate, as in the Bible, the "word of God (Yahweh) to His people." 

In Scripture, the angels and the prophets are called "Messengers of God." Here, the fact that an Angel came to bring a Message is most significant. 

Thus this apparition occurred on the Feast of St. John the Baptist for profound and obvious reasons. Vested with "the power and spirit of Elijah," John the Baptist was indeed the one who had already, at least in some way, proclaimed the Gospel, that mega-Message. Elijah, for his part, represented the "mystery - past and future - of Carmel!" These two major figures embodied the two summits of biblical prophetism. This dimension was to reveal itself as essential to Garabandal, where the Blessed Virgin, "Queen of Angels and Prophets," was to appear precisely under the form and title of "Our Lady of Mount Carmel." 

[Excerpted from "Garabandal" Book, page 36.] 


And of course, for me, this was the great link between Fatima and Garabandal: In the last apparition at Fatima on October 13, 1917, Our Lady appeared in the sky clothed as Our Lady of Mount Carmel, holding out the Brown Scapular to the world. When Our Lady appeared at Garabandal, as we shall hear later on, she came under the title "Our Lady of Mount Carmel," with the Brown Scapular hanging from her wrist! I immediately saw the connection and believed! Sort of makes me like St. John the Apostle, (ha-ha) when he looked into the empty tomb, where Jesus was lain, saw the burial clothes, and believed in the Resurrection!
Deacon John