The Casa das Candeias Museum, which belongs to the Francisco and Jacinta Marto Foundation, is much more than an exhibition to see the works of art and present interesting objects;  this is like home, a familiar place where we feel welcomed.

 

Francisco and Jacinta are “two lamps which God lit to illumine humanity in its dark and anxious hours.” This is how Pope John Paul II referred to them on the day of their beatification in Fatima on 13th May 2000. The light that irradiates from these children has the contours of the message that the Lady of the Rosary entrusted them in Cova da Iria. The light of these lamps, who accepted the challenge of offering their lives to God, is a lasting memory of a path to holiness also challenging us today. It is this light we would like to evoke here.

 

These children, who allowed themselves to be fascinated by the Lamp of Our Lord, the sun, and the lamp of Our lady, the moon, were in such a way witness to the Light of God that they themselves became Lamps lit by God. In the words of a neighbour of the  Little Shepherds back then: “the life of these children is a mystery”. And it still is...This space invites us to live and deepen the mystery of their lives and understand how in fact “holiness does not destroy childhood, it perfects it.” (C. Bobin).