Our Lady of Fatima, El Ni?o and La Ni?a

Last Monday, May 13, the world celebrated the Feast of Our Lady of Fatima, the 107th anniversary “of the first of the six apparitions of the Blessed Mother to three shepherd children- Lucia dos Santos and her cousins, Francisco and Jacinto Marto-at the Cova de Ira in Fatima, Portugal in 1917.”

This May 13th Feast is one of the most important Marian apparitions approved by the Catholic Church. During this first apparition, Mama Mary requested the three children to pray the Holy Rosary, to perform acts of penance for the conversion of sinners, and for devotion to her under the title, Immaculate Conception.

Pope Benedict the XVI (the former Cardinal Ratzinger) summarized the important messages of Fatima that included “the exhortation to prayer as the path of ‘salvation for souls’ and the summons to penance and conversion.”

As May, the merry month of Mama Mary, will soon come to an end, alerts have again been raised for all to prepare for the exit of El Ni?o this May and the coming of La Ni?a by June!

Very few as yet may be paying any attention to the coming of the “little girl”- La Ni?a in Spanish.

All are still doing their best to bear each day the record-breaking high heat indexes brought by the little boy- El Ni?o in Spanish.

Understandably, preparing for La Ni?a now is not everyone’s priority.

All are doing their best to beat/survive the ongoing heat and are praying that forecasts about higher heat index and continuing hotter days will not happen.

Each day, everyone is reminded that El Ni?o has brought the following problems/ costs - no water, no rain, drought, less but more expensive agricultural produce, school closures, school schedules altered, and many more health and harmful impacts.

Not only here in the Philippines but elsewhere in the world, the current El Ni?o has been described as among the strongest ever experienced by humans.

Consider these; wildfires/droughts/floods in South America, warmest winter on record in the United States, heavy rain/extreme dry conditions in southern Africa with crops destroyed (which placed millions at risk of hunger), highest levels of heat of our world’s oceans and tallest peak of global temperatures ever recorded!

Then now, there is global warning about the onset of La Ni?a in June!

To review, La Ni?a and El Ni?o both refer to climate patterns in the Pacific Ocean. La Ni?a takes place when sea-surface temperature decreases by more than 0.5 degrees Celsius (0.9 degrees Fahrenheit) for at least five successive three-month seasons.

Everyone throughout the world should already be preparing adequately/effectively for La Ni?a, most especially, if no preparations have been started and done at all despite much earlier warnings/alerts!

Why?

Scientists are warming that “climate change and the outgoing El Niño will likely ignite more weather extremes!”

Filipinos are told to expect more rains with La Ni?a.

Having had no rains for so long, who would not want to welcome much-awaited rains, the sooner the better, right?

Yes, but not when the forecasts warn of possible more hurricanes in the Atlantic Ocean, more rains that will cause floods and landslides, harm and damage to fields/crops/ people and communities, among other more extreme destructive impacts.

In combination with climate change, there is really no certainty about how harmful the forecasted La Ni?a will be.

To mitigate and avert huge harm to people and resources, however, best for us all to prepare well, now!

Collaboration /partnerships among all stakeholders, genuine/effective response/ action especially among the duty-bearers in government, should already be in place by now to harness/manage the unwanted harmful rains.

Time for rain harvesters/catchments, for effective action/responses like waste management, for clearing up of all water passages/drainage systems, and more, for protecting all vs harmful La Ni?a.