Fátima is a city in the municipality of Ourém, in the Central Region and Médio Tejo intermunicipal community of Portugal, with 71.29 km² of area and 11,788 inhabitants (2011). Its population density is 162.7 inhabitants/km². The homonymous civil parish encompasses several villages and localities of which the city of Fátima, with a population of 7,756 residents, is the largest.
The civil parish has been permanently associated with the Marian apparitions that were purportedly witnessed by three local shepherd children at the Cova da Iria in 1917. The Catholic Church later recognized these events as “worthy of belief”. A small chapel was built at the site of the apparition, now known as Our Lady of Fátima, beginning in 1918, and a statue of her installed. The chapel and statue have since been enclosed within the Sanctuary of Our Lady of Fátima, a shrine complex containing two minor basilicas. Associated facilities for pilgrims, including a hotel and medical centre, have also been built over the decades within and around the Sanctuary. The city has become an important international destination for religious tourists, receiving between 6 and 8 million pilgrims yearly.
The economy of the town relies on religious tourism because the world devotion through Our Lady of Fátima attracts millions of Christian pilgrims. The locals have numerous shops and stalls devoted to the sale of religious articles and souvenirs. In addition, services for tourists, hotels, restaurants and other retail also benefit from the visitors. Other economic activities in the region include: marble sculpturing, saw-milling, carpentry, civil construction, commerce, and services.
The Sanctuary of Our Lady of Fátima, in Cova da Iria, is the principal focus of all visitors. Annually, at least five million Catholic pilgrims fill the country roads leading to the Marian shrine. Numbers can reach hundreds of the thousands on 13 May and 13 October, the most significant dates of the apparitions in Fátima.
