Archdiocese of Milwaukee's Marian Shrine (Unofficial Web Site)

from a pamphlet which I received in November 1997. Some of the information may be old. The text is almost verbatim.

This a brief story of the Shrine of Our Lady of Fatima at North Sixty-eighth and West Stevenson Streets, Milwaukee, Wisconsin. The Shrine is adjacent to the convent of the cloistered, contemplative Dominican Sisters of the Perpetual Rosary. This bran of the Dominican Order (the Order of Preachers) originated in Calais, France, May 20, 1880 under Reverend Damian Marie Saintourens, O.P. The first American foundation was in Union City, New Jersey, in December 1891. Six years later a group of Sisters left Union City to establish the Milwaukee Convent. Father Saintourens founded the Sisters, firstly, to recite the Rosary without interruption, thus forming a guard of honor of the Blessed Virgin Mary; secondly, to aid in the organization and propagation of the Perpetual Rosary. By the unique and happy arrangement of a public shrine in connection with their convent, God has provided for them a very workable means of carrying out their designated role in His Holy Church.

In a cloister in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, there are Sisters who pray the Rosary all the time. They are daughters of St. Dominic, that great medieval lover of Mary, who was commissioned by her to preach the Rosary.

One bright day in August, 1939, God planted in this enclosed garden a new seed. Like all God's seeds, it was small, seemingly insignificant, yet teeming with mystery and love. The seed God chose this time was an intense desire to find a way to make his Holy Mother, under her favored title ­ Queen of the Most Holy Rosary ­ and the Rosary itself ­ known and loved by countless more souls everywhere. He sowed this desire deep in the heart of this religious community

On the eve of the Immaculate Conception Feast, 1941, our country entered World War II. In the following February a lay friend asked the Sisters to help fulfill Our Lady1s Fatima requests by holding public Rosary vigils for peace, in their convent chapel. To the Sisters, this seemed to be Our Lady11s provision for the tangible expression of their desire of many months. On the Feast of the Patronage of St. Joseph, April 22, 1942, Archbishop Moses E. Kiley's approbation was through the Rt. Rev. Msgr. William J. Bonner, to have a public 24 hour vigil every month with exposition of the Blessed Sacrament and the uninterrupted recitation of the Rosary by the Laity. These peace vigils were inaugurated on the following May 13, the date hallowed by the Blessed Virgin1s first apparition at Fatima 25 years before. And by a tender touch of Providence, our late Holy Father, Pope Pius XII, who called himself the Pope of Fatima, had been consecrated a bishop on that sacred day, May 13, 1917.

To increase devotion, the Sisters would arrange a shrine of Our Lady of Fatima for the vigils. The statue used at first was from their community room, but soon an exact replica of the one at Fatima was provided and a permanent shire erected in the chapel. Mannequins in Portuguese attire portrayed the three shepherd children until replaced by the present imported wood carvings.

Our Blessed Mother drew more and more hearts to this center of prayer to become children of her Rosary. They registered their names in the Golden Book. Every day since then, others have been doing the same. It is like writing their names in Mary's Heart, for St. Thomas says that Our Lady is God's Golden Book in which He wrote His Eternal Word.

The leaders of the vigils hours form the Fatima Society under Father Adolph M. Klink. In discussing ways and means to heed the Fatima message they decided to sponsor public Rosary processions, In 1945, ecclesiastical permission was granted. Since then, on eves of May 13 and October 13, the statue of Our Lady of Fatima is carried in procession while thousands of pilgrims, with lighted candles and praying the Rosary aloud, went their way through Milwaukee's streets. To the joy and inspiration of his flock, Archbishop Albert Gregory Meyer (later Cardinal in Chicago), preached at the October procession in Mary's own year (1954).

The first of these procession was the occasion of a miracle of grace. A Catholic girl and her non-Catholic fiance, on their way to attempt marriage before a Justice testimony of Faith. They saw Our Lady's statue being borne aloft; they heard the fervent Hail Marys echoing through the nigh. Grace triumphed. They turned back. Some months later they were married at a Nuptial Mass, the young man having become a Catholic.

At the May procession in 1949, Rev Patrick J. Payton, CSC, extolled the practice of the family Rosary in his usual simple, convincing ardor. It was during this exhortation that a zealous devotee of Our Lady resolved to provide Rosaries for all who would promise to pray the family Rosary. There were thousands of responses to this offer. The Sisters are privileged to make and distribute these Rosaries. It is thus that Mary spreads her net that souls happily entangle in it may be caught in the throes of her endless mercy.

For many years, a priest-son of St. Dominic, Father Thomas a'K. Reilly, OP, came from Chicago to conduct closing services of the monthly peace vigils. His fervent love and devout zeal drew countless hearts to God and Mary. Father made the Fatima message live and throb and spread. He sponsored the devotion in its infancy and so he is aptly and reverently referred as "Godfather." On the Feast of the Ascension, May 30, 1957, Father Reilly entered eternal life.

For the first few years, the processions ended with solemn Benediction at a temporary altar erected outside of the convent chapel. The ever-increasing number made a permanent shrine desirable. The spirit of Fatima is diffusive. Our Lady seems to desire center everywhere to re-echo her plea for prayer and penance. In the spring of 1947, Archbishop Kiley approved the proposal for Milwaukee1s Fatima.

The Sisters owned some nondescript lots, bordering their cloistered wall. Repeated attempts to sell the property had always terminated in unaccountable failure, but God1s wise preservation was unmistakable. He had kept the location for His Mother1s honor. The site was selected for the new shrine and by another touch of Providence, it was on the Feast of St. Dominic, August 4, 1947, that the first load of ledge rock arrived and construction began.

The Most Reverend Roman R. Atkielski, Auxiliary Bishop of Milwaukee, dedicated the shrine at the close of the Rosary procession the eve of May 13, 1948. It rained in torrents all during the ceremony, but the thousands of drenched pilgrims joyfully participated in this gift to the Queen of the Rosary: a beautiful, sacred edifice where she could dispense treasures of grace and light and love in this ‘vale of tears1 and draw to her Eternal Son the hearts of their children by the strong, sweet bonds of the rosary.

Eternity dwells in the depths of time, and as time flies back to him, it pleases the God of Eternity of spread the rays of this glowing center of devotion to His Mother. The Sisters happily respond to the requests for spiritual help and material information coming from all over the world. Semi-annually, since May 1949, they publish Echoes of Fatima issued in Fatima, Portugal. Echoes is a simple little bulletin diffusing the Fatima message, recording the local Shrine activities, and conveying relevant current happenings. Fr. Klink, the late spiritual director of the Shrine, wrote a timely, pungent article for each issue. This unpretentious publication finds its way gratis into over 6,000 homes, rectories, and institution at present, and the Sisters gladly note a constant increase in the mailing list.

Sins is the only sadness, for God is the source of every true joy. Sin bars His triumph in the heart of the sinner. Our Lady beholds this sad spectacle and grieves at sin1s fearful folly and malice which pierce Jesus1 Heart and her own. Little Jacinta bore witness to this, exclaiming, "Poor Blessed Mother! I pity her so much!"

Reparation for sin is of the essence of devotion to Our Lady of Fatima. Each year on the Feast of the Immaculate Heart, August 22, a solemn Mass is celebrated in reparation at the Shrine. A low Mass is offered on each first Saturday in the convent chapel for the same intention. Since the Holy Year (1950), all first Saturdays are days of perpetual Rosary vigils, too, from midnight to midnight. And there is the evening Rosary at the Shrine (begun in 1948); in pouring rain or piercing cold, insultry summer and in brisk autumn, as well as in fair, beautiful weather, as each day ends, Mary1s Heart deigns to be comforted by these fervent Hail Marys coming from the hearts of her devotees, whole families, individuals and other groups who come faithfully for this evening rendezvous with their Mother Mary. And only God and Mary know the countless acts of reparation offered by those Christians who join that perpetual, unplanned (but, oh so fruitful) pilgrimage to the Shrine: children after school, teenagers on a date, bridal couples seeking Mary's blessing on their sacramental union inn her Son, housewives shopping, working men, like other Joseph's on their way to and from their labors at any hour of the day or night, cab drivers between calls, business men going home to lunch, and the old and decrepit, whom the world regards as useless, but who grope their way to the Shrine to help heal that same world's only sadness. Thus, all these lovers of Our Lady of Fatima hasten the glorious fulfillment of her promise at Fatima, "In the end my Immaculate Heart will triumph!"

No matter how great in talent, beauty, wealth, power, or reputation men may be, spiritually they are children in Mary's arms. Children are always in need. They cry to their mother and she responds as only a mother can. And so earnest petitioning is heard at this throne of Grace, where the most loving and most powerful of mothers responds to her poor and needy children. They come from far and near, in groups and singlely, for short visits, for holy hours, for pilgrimages, for recollection days.

For all the afflicted in soul or body, Mass is celebrated solemnly at the Shrine every May and October 13 (since 1948), the anniversary dates of the first of final apparitions of Our Lady of Fatima. Their intentions are included in the first Saturday Mass in the convent chapel, and in the perpetual Rosaries of the Sisters. Our Lady is prodigious with the help she gives her children, who confidently seek her powerful supplication with her Eternal Son.

A child can never repay his parents for all their goodness, but each token of gratitude rejoices their hearts. Devotees at the Shrine give grateful testimony to God's infinite goodness, which He manifests through Mary. Each stone, each flower, each blade of grass, each big and little part of that beautiful panorama, tells Heaven ­ and the whole wide world ­ a glad, unceasing, "Thanks be to God and Mary!"

On the original structure, 60 feet wide and 15 feet high, rests the central marble figure of Our Lady of the Rosary of Fatima with the three shepherd children and their sheep. Shrubbery and plants grown all around here give their rich greenness to this Queen of all creation, and water falling crystal-clear over the rocks joins in the perpetual canticle of praise. To the left is the harbinger of the apparitions, the Angel of Peace. St. Joseph with the Holy Child is near, as in the final Fatima apparition. Three altars hold in white marble stillness the sacred beauty of the fifteen Rosary mysteries. They invite, urge, convince, every pilgrim to embrace joy, sorrow and glory of his own life in the Rosary. They proclaim in silence the message of Fatima. And lest the sorrowful portion be overlooked, there is across the way, the life sized Crucifixion group and the Stations of the Cross. The Ten Commandments are there, carved in tables of stone that all beholders may etch these basic laws of Love more deeply in their hearts.