The Miracle of the Sun

[yukoncpa]

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Hi Bigdaddydvo,

I thought about posting about the Miracle of the Sun after being reminded of it during a sermon I heard recently. I wouldn't call myself a believer as I am very skeptical of such things. Nevertheless, I have never heard anyone give a reasonable explanation for this event. I didn't post because I figured all I would get was a bunch of retard responses with no content.

I have my own ideals but they are very incomplete. If anyone has a reasonable explaination for this "miracle" or a least a worth while comment about it I would love to hear it. If all you can do is scoff don't waste my and your time.

Stu


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Miracle of the Sun - wiki

Hi Stu, In wiki, under criticisms, it does appear the phenomena is explainable as a sun dog, or as particles in the atmosphere, but what is most interesting is that this possible meteorological event occurred at the time it was predicted to occur.

My question is ( and sorry if this has been covered ) if God did create a miracle on this day, why such a mundane miracle? Also, Evangelicals apparently believe this miracle, but attribute it to Satan. So why would God perform a miracle that didn't directly help people out ( which I presume wouldn't be attributable to Satan, by these pesky evangelicals)

[scorcher863]

I don't see the point in trying to find a reasonable explanation for this story. There is nothing reasonable (key word being reason) about this story. Either you believe a miracle occurred or it was made up. And yet, you post this in a subtopic that includes the word science. Then, you proceed to call the people who are cynical of this "miracle" retards. What else do you want us to say? There is nothing to be scientifically debated about 3 kids talking to angels, the sun spinning(is it possible to distinguish if the sun is spinning, even if it is?), and spontaneous rapid evaporation.

But since you asked so nicely...

"Reasonable" explanations
-intervention by god
-everyone was on acid
-alien visitors
-complete fabrication

[Bigdaddydvo]

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How are people who believe this not flat broke from all the late night info-mercials? Do they all stop watching after making the Ginsu knife purchase?

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Lestat,

I'm well aware of your generally skeptical disposition, but you're a much better poster than having to resort to a barb akin to "OMG people who have Faith suck at life."

If I remember correctly you've posted about having a former Catholic background, so I'd surmise you'd have some interest in the story. Humor me, then. I'd like you to offer your best explanation of what happened. We're not talking about something like the Resurrection where Faith is needed...this is a documented historical event, at the time widely reported in numerous secular newspapers, and which is no older than the First World War.

[Phil153]

I don't understand the hate. On the face of it, it's a pretty amazing occurrence. But I actually spent some time investigating it a while back, and I came to a couple of conclusions.

Firstly, almost all the literature on this comes from a certain Catholic priest, John De Marchi. I've tried hard to find evidence independent of this guy, and there is little.
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The most widely-cited descriptions of the events reported at Fatima are taken from the writings of John De Marchi, an Italian Catholic priest and researcher. De Marchi spent seven years in Fatima, from 1943 to 1950, conducting original research and interviewing the principals at undisturbed length

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While De Marchi's states that "Reports do vary; impressions are in minor details confused", Kevin McClure states that he had never seen such a collection of contradictory accounts of a case in any of the research he had done in the previous ten years

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If you actually read the newspaper account from the day, a few things seem odd:

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Identical scenes are repeated in other places and a woman shouts, bathed in tears and almost suffocated:

--What a shame! There are still men who don’t take off their hats in the presence of such a miracle!

And next they ask each other if they have seen or not seen. Most confess that that they have seen the dancing of the sun; others, however, declare they have seen the smiling face of the Virgin herself.

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Something doesn't seem right. Perhaps it's a poor translation, but the article doesn't ring true.

Anyway, do you know of independent reports that don't come from the chronicles of a Catholic Priest 35 years later? World newspapers that picked the story up? These seems like an incredible and world changing event, but there seems to be little independent interest in it. For example, if I search the google news cache for Einstein or War from the 1910s and 1920, heaps of hits come up. But a search of google new archives for 1915-1920 turns up a single catholic site. Odd that such an event wasn't reported in the major media - especially given the religiosity of the day.

I'd appreciate any references.

[Bigdaddydvo]

Phil,

I'll try to find the primary sources to support these quotes, but EWTN has a decent compilation of witness and newspaper accounts:

http://www.ewtn.com/fatima/apparitions/October.htm

[Phil153]

Yes, that's the only thing that comes up on google news search. But it's not an unbiased source - it's a global catholic network website.

The only newspaper reports that I can find was in two local newspapers referenced on that site, and only excerpts. One only mentions the changing of colors and nothing else, which is suprising given that the sun careening toward the earth would have been a huge event, and the drying of clothes is also miraculous but not reported.

Why only two local newspapers? There should be more and I'd like to read their accounts if they exist. Everything else was reported by Catholic priests, with the major interviewing occurring 35 years later.

I'm not suggesting a conspiracy - far from it - but some independent facts, reports and investigations would be very useful. It seems downright bizarre that I can't find any. Catholics of a history of becoming hysterical about a lot of dubious miracles (we had one in Australia a few years back, which definitely wasn't a miracle), and people in general are unreliable as witnesses, especially during a time of mass hysteria. So I'm looking for independent evidence of some of the more fantastic accounts, because the simpler ones can be explained by naturalistic means.