Teresita Castillo

Castillo celebrated her 21st birthday by "escaping" early in the morning at five from her father's house without permission to enter the Carmelite convent of Lipa.

Teresita's entrance into the Carmel was not well received initially by the family, who tried all means to get her back.

Teresita steadfastly refused to return home.

Teresita Castillo y Lat (4 July 1927 – 16 November 2016) was a Filipina who said she had Marian visions.

Castillo was a Discalced Carmelite postulant in the late 1940s and could not stay in Carmel due to the controversies surrounding the apparitions Lipa, Batangas, Philippines in the year 1948.

She claimed that around 5 p.m. on September 12, 1948, the Feast of the Most Holy Name of the Blessed Virgin Mary, she saw a vine in the garden shake though there was no wind at all.

A woman's voice told her to kiss the ground and return for fifteen consecutive days.

The next day, September 13, Monday, again at five in the afternoon, Castillo returned to the place, knelt down and intended to say the Hail Mary.

She had only reached the words "full of grace" when again the vine moved.

A beautiful lady appeared, a golden rosary hanging on her right hand.

The lady's dress was simple and pure white, held at the waist by a narrow cloth belt.

Her feet were bare and resting on clouds about two feet above the ground.

On September 14, Tuesday, the first shower of rose petals took place.

Some nuns found fresh rose-petals of exceptional sweetness, strewn around their rooms or outside their doors.

Meantime, the prioress, Mary Cecilia of Jesus, decided to consult Alfredo Obviar, auxiliary bishop of Lipa and spiritual director of Carmel.

The bishop instructed her to tell Castillo to ask from the Blessed Virgin some proof that the apparition was from heaven.

Days, after the first shower of petals, total blindness afflicted the postulant.

The prioress heard a voice telling her that the only way Castillo's blindness would be healed was for her to kiss the eyes of the postulant.

So, one day in the presence of Obviar, the prioress lifted the veil of Castillo and imparted a kiss on her eyes.

Instantly, Castillo's blindness was cured.

Obviar doubted no more that the apparitions were heavenly.

In her last apparition to Castillo, the Blessed Virgin identified herself: "I am the Mediatrix of all graces" Reportedly, many conversions and healings occurred.

The stress from the investigation resulted in long illness for Castillo, who eventually had to voluntarily leave the convent as she failed to complete the required length of stay for a novice.

She later assisted in compiling and transcribing an English-Tagalog dictionary.

The prioress of the convent, Mary Cecilia of Jesus, was sent to another convent.

An initial investigation report in 1951 was signed by six Filipino bishops and declared the Lipa apparitions as "non-supernatural".

Pope Pius XII in 1951 decreed her claims of apparition as both fraudulent and non—supernatural.

On 22 January 1951, Auxiliary Bishop Obviar, the spiritual director of Carmel Lipa, was installed as Apostolic Administrator of the new Diocese of Lucena.

Initially, permission to venerate Mary under the title of "Our Lady, Mediatrix of all graces" was granted by then Bishop Alfred Versoza.

In 1951 the Philippine church hierarchy declared that there was no supernatural intervention in the reported happenings in Lipa.

Verzosa's successor, the apostolic administrator Rufino Santos, ordered that no petals be given to anyone by the Lipa Carmelite community and the statue of Our Lady, Mediatrix be withdrawn from public view.

A re—investigation was made in 1991.

Castillo, in the reinvestigations of 1991 documents formally submitted to the Holy Office reconfirmed that she encountered the Devil and was heavily tortured under demonic affliction.

In 2015, the apparitions were declared as "supernatural in character and worthy of belief" by the Archbishop of Lipa.

In 2016, the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith referred to Pope Pius' decision, which was final.

Castillo died in November 2016, aged 89.

Castillo came from an educated and religious family that may have influenced her interest in religious works.

She was the youngest of seven children of former Governor of Batangas, Modesto Castillo.

At the time of the apparitions, Teresita's father was judge of the Court of Industrial Relations.

The Castillos were very influential in Batangas province, Philippines.