The Mother of God has been seen — by a widower on a hill outside Mexico City, by shepherd children, by a housemaid dying in Berry, by a sacristan in the Nicaraguan mountains, by fifteen villagers on a wet Irish evening. This is every one of those visits the Church has judged credible: who saw her, what she said, and exactly what the Church has said about it. And, because a list of successes is an advertisement rather than a reference, the claims she has left open or set aside.
Before Lourdes or Fátima, the Mother of God was seen in eleven places the New Testament names — Nazareth to Patmos. These are the first apparitions, and every later one is one of these scenes again. The places and their grades are the Gospels map’s own; the words are the Douay-Rheims.
Behold the handmaid of the Lord: be it done to me according to thy word.
What it founds: Her free consent, on which the Incarnation waits — and 'full of grace', the angel's greeting that became the first words of the Hail Mary. Everything the Church says of her begins in this room. (CCC 494)
Seen again: Lourdes, 25 March 1858 — the Annunciation's own feast — when the Lady finally gave her name: 'I am the Immaculate Conception.'
Whence is this to me that the mother of my Lord should come to me?
What it founds: The first Marian title, spoken by Elizabeth four centuries before the Council of Ephesus made it a dogma: the mother of my Lord. And the Magnificat — the poor girl's song that the Church has sung every evening since. (CCC 495)
Seen again: Guadalupe: a mother who comes to the door of the poor. 'Am I not here, who am your Mother?'
And she brought forth her first born son, and wrapped him up in swaddling clothes, and laid him in a manger: because there was no room for them in the inn.
What it founds: The Mother of God in a stable, and shepherds for her first visitors. She comes to the poor in every apparition because she was one.
Seen again: Fátima's three shepherd children; La Salette's cowherds; Laus's shepherdess. The shepherds of Bethlehem, again and again.
And thy own soul a sword shall pierce, that, out of many hearts thoughts may be revealed.
What it founds: The Sorrowful Mother: Simeon's sword is the pierced heart on the Miraculous Medal and the Seven Sorrows of the Rosary. Her share in the Cross is announced when the Child is forty days old. (CCC 529)
Seen again: La Salette's weeping Lady; Kibeho's Rosary of the Seven Sorrows; the sword through the Heart on the Medal of 1830.
And entering into the house, they found the child with Mary his mother, and falling down they adored him.
What it founds: The nations come to the Child and find him with his Mother — the shape of every pilgrimage shrine since. Then the road into Egypt: the Mother of God as a refugee.
Seen again: Zeitoun, 1968, over a church on the Holy Family's road into Egypt; Guadalupe, where a nation came to the Child through the Mother.
And his mother kept all these words in her heart.
What it founds: The pondering heart. Twice Luke says she kept the words in her heart; the Immaculate Heart is that heart — the one that keeps the Word and never let it go. (CCC 534)
Seen again: The First Saturdays: fifteen minutes 'keeping her company' in the mysteries — her own habit, asked of us.
His mother saith to the waiters: Whatsoever he shall say to you, do ye.
What it founds: Her intercession, and its entire content. She notices the need, she asks, and then she points away from herself to him. These are the last words of hers that the Gospels record. (CCC 2618)
Seen again: Every approved apparition ends here. The Church has never approved a message that ended anywhere else.
Blessed is the womb that bore thee… Yea rather, blessed are they who hear the word of God and keep it.
What it founds: Why she is blessed. Not chiefly for bearing him but for believing — Augustine: she was more blessed in receiving the faith of Christ than in conceiving his flesh. Her greatness is the greatness offered to everyone. (CCC 506)
Seen again: Champion, 1859: 'I am the Queen of Heaven, who prays for the conversion of sinners — and I wish you to do the same.'
Woman, behold thy son… Behold thy mother. And from that hour, the disciple took her to his own.
What it founds: Her motherhood of the disciple — and, the Church has always read, of every disciple. Simeon's sword, fulfilled. The refuge she offers at Fátima is the one given here. (CCC 964)
Seen again: Fátima, 13 June 1917: 'My Immaculate Heart will be your refuge and the way that will lead you to God.' John took her to Ephesus; the Church took her to its own.
All these were persevering with one mind in prayer with the women, and Mary the mother of Jesus, and with his brethren.
What it founds: The Church at prayer with her, waiting for the Spirit — the last time Scripture shows her, and the scene the Rosary continues: the disciples gathered around the Mother, praying for Pentecost. (CCC 965)
Seen again: Every apparition asks for the Rosary; Pontmain's 'But pray, my children'; Gietrzwałd's 'I wish you to pray the Rosary every day.'
A woman clothed with the sun, and the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars.
What it founds: The Woman of the end, read of the Church and of Mary together, and the Church's first reading on the Assumption. The crown of twelve stars is on the Miraculous Medal and in the margins of this site; the sun and moon are on the tilma.
Seen again: Guadalupe, 1531 — the image on Juan Diego's cloak is Revelation 12 painted: clothed with the sun, the moon under her feet, stars on her mantle.
Paul has the whole of it in seven words: “God sent his Son, made of a woman” (Galatians 4:4).
Everything the Church believes was revealed once, in Christ, and closed with the death of the last apostle. Nothing Our Lady has said at Lourdes or Fátima adds a syllable to it. What the Church calls a private revelation — even one she approves — is a help to living the faith in a particular age, not a new article of it. The Catechism puts it plainly: their role is 'not to improve or complete Christ's definitive Revelation, but to help live more fully by it in a certain period of history' (CCC 67).
That is why the Church can be so generous in approving apparitions and so firm that no one is obliged to believe them. Approval means: the events are credible, the message contains nothing contrary to faith and morals, and the fruits are good — so the faithful may believe, and may go on pilgrimage, and the bishop may build a shrine. It never means: you must.
For most of the Church's history the judge has been the local bishop, and the test was set out by Prospero Lambertini — later Benedict XIV — in the 1730s: the honesty and balance of the witnesses, the content of the message measured against Scripture and the Church's teaching, and the fruits in the lives of the people. The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith wrote those criteria into its Norms of 1978, which governed every judgement from Kibeho to Champion.
On 17 May 2024 the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith replaced them. Under the new Norms for Proceeding in the Discernment of Alleged Supernatural Phenomena, a bishop no longer declares an apparition supernatural at all — only the Pope may do that, by a special procedure. Instead the bishop proposes, and the Dicastery confirms, one of six findings, from nihil obstat — nothing stands in the way of the devotion — down to a declaration that the events are not supernatural. The first cases decided under them came within months: Trevignano (not supernatural, June 2024), Pellevoisin (nihil obstat, August 2024) and Medjugorje (nihil obstat, September 2024).
Approved by the Holy See or by the diocesan bishop, whose judgement it properly is. Each card says which, and when, and links to the catalogue entry and the map.
Seen by St. Juan Diego Cuauhtlatoatzin, a widower of fifty-seven
'Am I not here, who am your Mother? Are you not under my shadow and protection?' — and her image left on his tilma.
The Church: Archbishop Montúfar's inquiry (1556); Benedict XIV, who approved the patronage and granted the feast (1754); John Paul II, who named her Patroness of the Americas (1999) and canonized Juan Diego (31 July 2002) — 1556 · 1754 · 1999 · 2002
Seen by Tomasz Michałek, a brewery worker
Mary, with St. Joseph, asks that a church be built on the spot where she stood.
The Church: The Bernardine shrine founded on the site (1608); the image crowned by papal privilege (1752); the church raised to a minor basilica — 1608 · 1752
Seen by Mother Mariana de Jesús Torres, a Conceptionist nun
Prophecies of a crisis of faith in the twentieth century, and the promise that her intercession would bring it through; a statue made at her request.
The Church: Bishop Salvador de Ribera of Quito, who approved the apparitions to that date and had the statue enthroned — 1611
A local approval of the seventeenth century; the prophecies have never been the object of a Holy See judgement.
Seen by Shepherd children, and then the Calvinist catechist sent to rebuke them
Weeping over a rock: 'Here once my beloved Son was honoured; now the people plough and sow.' The buried Catholic deeds were found beneath it and the parish restored.
The Church: Pope Pius VI, by decree — 17 August 1775
Seen by The Cospes chief Coromoto and his wife
She asks the chief to go to the Spaniards and be baptised; when he refuses, she appears again and leaves a tiny image in his hand.
The Church: Pius XII, who declared her Patroness of Venezuela; the image canonically crowned (1952) — 1944 · 1952
Seen by Benoîte Rencurel, a shepherdess, over fifty-four years
A refuge for sinners: she asks for a chapel where 'many sinners will be converted', and sends Benoîte to bring people to confession.
The Church: Bishop Jean-Michel di Falco Léandri of Gap, with the approval of the Holy See — the first apparition recognised in France in the twenty-first century — 4 May 2008
Seen by María Mueces and her deaf-mute daughter Rosa
The child, healed, sees 'the Mestiza' in the cave; an image of Our Lady with the Rosary is found on the rock face, unpainted.
The Church: The Diocese of Ipiales; the image canonically crowned (1952); the sanctuary a minor basilica (1954) — 1952 · 1954
Seen by Catholics hiding in the jungle from the persecution of Cảnh Thịnh
A Lady with the Child, promising to hear those who pray to her on that spot, and showing them leaves to boil against the fever.
The Church: Never formally judged; honoured by John Paul II, who in 1988 asked that the basilica be rebuilt for the bicentenary, and by the bishops of Vietnam, whose national shrine it is — 1988
The Holy See has recorded no documentation of the apparition; the devotion is approved, the events are not.
Seen by St. Catherine Labouré, a novice of the Daughters of Charity
'Have a medal struck on this model. All who wear it will receive great graces.' — the Immaculate Conception, twenty-four years before the dogma.
The Church: Archbishop de Quélen's canonical inquiry (1836); Catherine canonized by Pius XII (1947) — 1836 · 1947
Seen by Alphonse Ratisbonne, a Jewish banker wearing the Miraculous Medal on a dare
No words: the Lady of the Medal, and a conversion complete in the time it took to see her.
The Church: A canonical inquiry in Rome under Cardinal Patrizi, which found the conversion miraculous — 1842
Seen by Mélanie Calvat and Maximin Giraud, cowherds of fourteen and eleven
A weeping Lady: 'If my people will not submit, I shall be forced to let fall the arm of my Son.' Blasphemy and the profaned Sunday; a warning of famine — which came.
The Church: Bishop Philibert de Bruillard of Grenoble — 19 September 1851
Seen by St. Bernadette Soubirous, fourteen, in eighteen apparitions
'Penance, penance, penance.' 'Go and drink at the spring.' And, on 25 March: 'I am the Immaculate Conception.'
The Church: Bishop Bertrand-Sévère Laurence of Tarbes; the feast extended to the whole Church by Pius X (1907); Bernadette canonized (1933) — 18 January 1862
Seen by Adele Brise, a Belgian immigrant of twenty-eight
'I am the Queen of Heaven, who prays for the conversion of sinners, and I wish you to do the same. Gather the children in this wild country and teach them what they should know for salvation.'
The Church: Bishop David Ricken of Green Bay — the first apparition approved in the United States; a solemnity granted for 9 October (2023) — 8 December 2010
Seen by Magdalena Kade, thirty-one, bedridden for years
'My child, from now on you are healed' — and she was.
The Church: The commission of Bishop Augustin Pavel Wahala of Litoměřice, which found the cure miraculous; the church a minor basilica (1926) — 1866 · 1926
Seen by Four children, as the Prussian army approached Laval
Written across the sky: 'But pray, my children. God will hear you in a little while. My Son allows himself to be moved.' The army turned back that night.
The Church: Bishop Casimir Wicart of Laval — 2 February 1872
Seen by Estelle Faguette, a dying housemaid of thirty-two, in fifteen apparitions
'I am all-merciful.' Estelle is healed and shown the scapular of the Sacred Heart; asked for calm, for confidence, and for the scapular to be spread.
The Church: The Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, confirming the nihil obstat proposed by the Archbishop of Bourges — one of the first decisions under the 2024 norms; her cure had been recognised as miraculous in 1983 — 22 August 2024 · read it
Nothing stands in the way of the devotion; under the 2024 norms this is not a declaration that the apparitions were supernatural.
Seen by Justyna Szafryńska, thirteen, and Barbara Samulowska, twelve
In Polish, under the Prussian ban on the language: 'I wish you to pray the Rosary every day.'
The Church: Bishop Józef Drzazga of Warmia, on the centenary — Poland's only approved apparition — 11 September 1977
Seen by Fifteen witnesses, aged five to seventy-five, for two hours in the rain
No words at all: Mary, St. Joseph and St. John the Evangelist beside an altar with a lamb and a cross — the Apocalypse, seen from a gable wall.
The Church: Two diocesan commissions (1879, 1936) found the witnesses trustworthy; honoured by John Paul II's pilgrimage (1979) and by Francis (26 August 2018) — 1879 · 1936 · 1979 · 2018
Knock has never received a formal decree in the Lourdes style; its approval is the Church's continuous honour.
Seen by Lúcia dos Santos, ten, and Sts. Francisco and Jacinta Marto, nine and seven
'I am the Lady of the Rosary.' The Rosary daily; penance; devotion to her Immaculate Heart; the consecration of Russia. 'In the end, my Immaculate Heart will triumph.'
The Church: Bishop José Alves Correia da Silva of Leiria; honoured by every pope since Pius XII; Francisco and Jacinta canonized (2017) — 13 October 1930
Seen by Five children of two families, in thirty-three apparitions
'I am the Immaculate Virgin… the Mother of God, Queen of Heaven. Pray always.' She shows a heart of gold.
The Church: Bishop André-Marie Charue of Namur — 2 July 1949
Seen by Mariette Beco, eleven, in eight apparitions
'I am the Virgin of the Poor.' Leading her to a spring: 'This spring is reserved for all nations — to relieve the sick.'
The Church: Bishop Louis-Joseph Kerkhofs of Liège — 22 August 1949
Seen by Hundreds of thousands — Christian and Muslim — over three years, and the cameras
No words: a luminous figure of a woman on the domes of the Coptic church of St. Mary, bowing to the crowd, sometimes with doves.
The Church: Pope Kyrillos VI of the Coptic Orthodox Church (4 May 1968); affirmed by the Coptic Catholic Patriarch, Cardinal Stephanos I, for his own faithful — 4 May 1968
Approved by the Coptic Orthodox Church, not by the Holy See; the Catholic patriarch of Egypt concurred. The site records it because it is the most-witnessed apparition in history.
Seen by Sister Agnes Sasagawa, a deaf nun, before a wooden statue that wept 101 times
Three messages from the statue: prayer and reparation; a warning of chastisement 'greater than the deluge'; the Rosary as the weapon against the devil's work within the Church.
The Church: Bishop John Shojiro Ito of Niigata, by pastoral letter, after consultation with the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith — 22 April 1984
Seen by María Esperanza de Bianchini, and on 25 March 1984 more than a hundred people together
'I am Mary, Virgin and Mother, Reconciler of all Peoples and Nations.' Reconciliation, the Rosary, the family.
The Church: Bishop Pío Bello Ricardo of Los Teques, by pastoral instruction, after interviewing nearly five hundred witnesses himself — 21 November 1987
Seen by Bernardo Martínez, a sacristan of fifty, months after the Sandinista revolution
'Pray the Rosary every day, in the family… Nicaragua has suffered much since the earthquake; it will continue to suffer if you do not change.'
The Church: Bishop Pablo Antonio Vega of Juigalpa, by official statement — 13 November 1982
Seen by Alphonsine Mumureke, Nathalie Mukamazimpaka and Marie Claire Mukangango, schoolgirls
'Nyina wa Jambo' — Mother of the Word. Repentance, and the Rosary of the Seven Sorrows, 'because a tragedy is coming to Rwanda': a vision of rivers of blood, five years before the genocide.
The Church: Bishop Augustin Misago of Gikongoro, with the approval of the Holy See — the only approved apparition in Africa — 29 June 2001
Seen by Gladys Quiroga de Motta, a housewife with four years of schooling, in some 1,800 messages
The Rosary, the Eucharist, Scripture; a mother gathering her children in the last hour: 'I am the door of Heaven.'
The Church: Bishop Héctor Cardelli of San Nicolás — 22 May 2016
Set the approved apparitions side by side and the striking thing is not their variety but their sameness. She comes to the poor — a widower on a hill outside Mexico City, a shepherdess, three children minding sheep, a sacristan, a housemaid, a nun in a chapel — almost never to the learned or the powerful. She asks for prayer, and from 1830 on she asks for the Rosary by name. She asks for penance and the conversion of sinners. She warns — of war, of chastisement, of a tragedy coming to Rwanda — and the warnings have a way of being kept. And she leaves a spring, a medal, a scapular, an image on a cloak, so that the visit outlasts the visionary.
The other constant is that she points away from herself. Guadalupe's 'Am I not here, who am your Mother?' is the mother's part; Cana's 'Do whatever he tells you' is the whole of it. Every approved message ends at the Eucharist, at confession, at the Cross. The Church has never approved an apparition whose message ended anywhere else.
The famous claims the Church has not approved — one with a nihil obstat for its devotion, one unresolved for sixty years, two judged not supernatural. Stated exactly, because a reader who meets these names elsewhere deserves to know what the Church has actually said.
Seen by Ida Peerdeman, in fifty-six reported apparitions
A prayer, and a demand that the Church define a fifth Marian dogma: Mary as Co-Redemptrix, Mediatrix and Advocate.
The Church: The Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith (1974), a judgement approved by Paul VI; reaffirmed in 2020 after a local bishop had contradicted it, and confirmed again by the Dicastery in 2024 — 1974 · 2020 · 2024
Devotion to Mary under the title is permitted; the apparitions and messages may not be promoted as authentic.
Seen by Four girls aged eleven and twelve, some two thousand reported apparitions
Prayer, sacrifice, the Eucharist; a promised 'warning', 'miracle' and 'chastisement' still awaited.
The Church: Every Bishop of Santander since 1961: the supernatural character 'is not established'; private prayer at the site permitted since 1987, public promotion not — 1961 · 1965 · 1987
Neither approved nor condemned — the Church's oldest unresolved case of the modern era.
Seen by Six young people, from 24 June 1981; several report apparitions to this day
Peace, conversion, prayer, fasting, confession — 'the five stones'.
The Church: The Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, in the note The Queen of Peace, approved by Pope Francis — after the Zadar declaration of the Yugoslav bishops (10 April 1991: 'non constat'), the Ruini commission (2010–14), and the authorisation of official pilgrimages (12 May 2019) — 19 September 2024 · read it
The devotion is approved and pilgrims may come; the Church has made no ruling that the apparitions are supernatural, and cautions against following the visionaries' messages as if it had.
Seen by Gisella Cardia, before a statue said to weep blood
Monthly messages of chastisement and warning.
The Church: Bishop Marco Salvi of Civita Castellana, by decree ('constat de non supernaturalitate'), confirmed by the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith — the first case decided under the 2024 norms — 6 March 2024 · June 2024
Every judgement on this page — who approved what, and on what date — was checked against a source before it was written, and the documents are linked where a public text exists. Where the Church has spoken, the page says so; where she has not, it says that too.
