Yeah, it's pretty unusual. The Church is extremely loathe to prognosticate the future with regard to Revelation. The essence is that Christ will triumph over Satan when all is said and done.
Aquinasfan makes a good point regarding the perspective of time from the eternal standpoint. The second millienium may have been just the opening act for the third millenium. But the urgency of the messages of Fatima, Lourdes, LaSallette, and other accepted apparitions of the Virgin Mary, coupled with events going on around us (natural disasters, accelerating social decay, rejection of God in Europe and certain segments of our culture, the rise of al Qaeda and Iran) the invocation of the Apocalypse was not taken lightly, I assure you.
It took this article soaking in my head for a few hours before I had some mental "clicks".
Earlier in the day, I had been thinking about Fatima because a little girl showed up at my son's daycare with that name. And I was sort of musing that Lucia must still be alive, since I hadn't heard anything to the contrary (I'm sure my mother would have told me if she had died!). Anyway, before the onset of WWII, there was an unusual display of Northern Lights very far south in Europe, and Lucia said that they were the sign foretold in 1917 of the great conflict.
When I was about 10-12 in the seventies and reading the Fatima stories and prophecies, I read about the downfall of the Soviet Union, and it was utterly inconceivable. I mean, the USSR was a super-power and the Communists didn't seem like they were going anywhere. They are gone.
What struck me yesterday was the fact that Lucia is still alive (must google that....) and what is the average life-span of a Portugese Carmelite nun? Mary wasn't kidding when she told Lucia she had to stick around.
Finally, I should believe the pope when he revealed the third secret. But I sort of don't. And the reason I don't is because I had already known from previous reading just about everything that was "revealed" a couple of years ago. My gut is telling me that there might be more to that secret.
Is Lucia still alive to see the fulfillment of what she was told? And how much longer could she possibly live? She must be 100 by now!
I don't recall the messages from Lourdes being Apocalyptic in nature.
As I said before, the Pope making these comments gives me chills.