Interview with Professor Joaquim Fernandes, PhD in History, at the University Fernando Pessoa, Porto, Portugal
1.What led you to the research of the Fatima Apparitions?
From long time the Fatima Apparitions story was considered controversial and a lot of authors and thinkers thought that they were supported more by political than religious reasons and motivations. Then, we wanted questioned what really had happen there by accessing the original archives and documents.
2. What kind of difficulties and obstacles did you find during the research?
The main obstacle was to access to the Fatima sanctuary documents, namely the so-called Formigao archive, that were classified until the end of the 1970’s when we proposed to study them. Following having the chance to read them, one of the authors (Fina d’Armada) was badly punished in her professional career.
3. Did you find any kind of surprises there?
The main surprise was that the extraordinary events could not gave been invented. In our opinion they occurred in fact. (more…)