2 1/2 Euros 100th anniversary of Fátima, Silver

The apparitions at Fátima began in May 1917, when three shepherd children reported visions of the Virgin Mary on a hillside outside the village — drawing increasingly large crowds across six successive months and culminating in the so-called Miracle of the Sun on October 13th, witnessed by an estimated 70,000 people. Portugal was then a secular republic hostile to the Church, and the gatherings were viewed with deep suspicion by local anticlerical authorities, who briefly detained the children in August of that year.

Pope Francis visited the shrine in May 2017 to mark the centenary, canonizing two of the three visionaries — Francisco and Jacinta Marto — on the same occasion.