- CONYERS (Reuters) - Thousands of Catholic pilgrims gathered Sunday at
a Georgia farm where they believe the Virgin Mary will give a final message
to a woman who claims to have spoken to her regularly for seven years.
``We decided to come because this is her last apparition,'' pilgrim Bob
Kehler said. ``She (the Virgin Mary) is the commander-in-chief, the one
who represents Jesus, and it has been delegated to her to gather up all
her children.'' Kehler drove to the farm near Atlanta from Westminster,
Maryland, about 500 miles away, and said he would stay until Tuesday, when
former nurse Nancy Fowler says she will receive a final message from the
Virgin Mary.
Fowler claims to have had hundreds of visions of both Mary and her son,
Jesus Christ, since 1991, but said last year that this year's message would
be the last. Initially, messages from Mary came on the 13th of each month,
but in 1994 they began to come only on Oct 13, the anniversary of Mary's
reported appearance to three shepherd children in Fatima, Portugal, in
1917, she says. The Roman Catholic Church recognizes the validity of the
Fatima apparition, but the church in Atlanta has distanced itself from
Fowler's claims. An Atlanta group that supports Fowler and calls itself
Our Loving Mother's Children Inc. said it expected 100,000 people to gather
by Tuesday. Rockdale County public affairs director Lance Carter said based
on the number of buses expected for the event, that estimate would likely
prove accurate. About 3,000 people had assembled by Sunday night and some
of those attending a sunset mass said they believed stones would turn into
gold and healings and other miracles would occur Tuesday. But Fowler spokesman
Richard Pfundstein said the visions and messages had nothing to do with
such beliefs. ``While a lot of people, including non-Catholics, want to
idolatrize the blessed mother, the blessed mother is actually like my eyeglasses,''
Pfundstein told Reuters. ``The only thing she does is help bring Jesus
into focus. That's her whole job.''
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