Michael ONeill - 20 Answers - Apparitions & Revelations

Of all the supernatural phenomena the Catholic Church has investigated throughout its history, the most complicated are those that deal with private revelationsmessages that people, holy and otherwise, have attributed to God, the Virgin Mary, or the saints.

Private revelation is different from public revelation, which comes to us from God through Sacred Scripture and Sacred Traditionvalid for all time and meant for all, it ceased with the death of the last apostle. All revelatory miracles and messages that have occurred since are considered private revelation. Such messages do not belong to the deposit of faith, and belief in themeven those approved by the Churchis not required.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC) states:

Throughout the ages, there have been so-called private revelations, some of which have been recognized by the authority of the Church. They do not belong, however, to the deposit of faith. It is not their role to improve or complete Christs definitive Revelation but to help live more fully by it in a certain period of history. Guided by the magisterium of the Church, the sensus fidelium knows how to discern and welcome in these revelations whatever constitutes an authentic call of Christ or his saints to the Church (67).

In his apostolic exhortation Verbum Domini , Pope Benedict XVI speaks of the unique value of private revelation:

The value of private revelations is essentially different from that of the one public revelation: the latter demands faith.... Private revelation is an aid to this faith, and it demonstrates its credibility precisely because it refers back to the one public revelation.... A private revelation can introduce new emphases, give rise to new forms of piety, or deepen older ones. It can have a certain prophetic character and can be a valuable aid for better understanding and living the gospel at a certain time; consequently, it should not be treated lightly. It is a help which is proffered, but its use is not obligatory.

The dogmatic constitution Dei Filius from the First Vatican Council (18691870) reminds us that miracles are external signs God provides as arguments on behalf of revelation and condemns any denial of the possibility of miracles, an error that would put a person outside communion with the Church:

If anyone should say that there can be no miracles, and that all accounts of them, even those contained in Sacred Scripture, are to be thought of as fables and myths; or that miracles cannot be certainly known; or that they can never be rightly used to prove the divine origins of the Christian religion: let him be anathema.

While it is necessary to establish the proper role of miraculous phenomena as leading the faithful to Christ, it would be a mistake to underestimate and devalue the importance of miracles in the life and history of the Church. They inspired the earliest Christians to follow Christ and have bolstered the faith of believers ever since.