Fatima profaned

TIME and again, in my anguish, I hoped that perhaps the Pope might make a pilgrimage to Fatima. I wrote on December 8, 1964: “ Let us hope that before long the Pope may go on pilgrimage to Fatima in order to reveal to us the Secret of Mary. ” Such an encounter of the Vicar of Christ with Our Lady and with the Blessed Sacrament would, so it seemed to me, be the Sign from Heaven assuring us that God in His grace and mercy would yet save everything and restore it to its ancient splendour.

All the scandals, the air of schism that hung so heavily about us, would disperse if only you made a pilgrimage to Fatima. All our confidence, our filial love, would be restored as in a baptism of grace. Once there, you would – you could not do otherwise than – pray to the Blessed Virgin Mary together with that whole vast crowd of loyal, traditional Catholics, and after that you would let her speak, the Mother of God and our Mother and Protector; and you would tell us her Third Secret and accede to her requests. And then the world would become converted, beginning with us, your own sinful priests and people. In that prospect lay our hope !

You did go to Fatima, it is true. It was on May 13, 1967, fifty years to the day after the Heavenly Apparition. “ Our eyes fixed on the screen, our hearts torn with anguish, the rosary between our fingers as we mingled our Aves with those of our brethren over there, we awaited what should have been the Event of the century...

“ Alas, five hours later, there was no hope of peace left, and the final grace which we had hoped might follow mysteriously upon this meeting between the Vicar of Jesus Christ and His Blessed Mother had been squandered. ” (Letter No. 191, p. 6, May 13, 1967)

Why this feeling of certain disillusionment ? Because it was only too clear from beginning to end that you had come, not to see, but to be seen, not to listen, but to speak, not to fall on your knees, but to be honoured by millions prostrated at your feet, not to receive instructions from Heaven, but to impose your own earthly projects, not to implore the Blessed Virgin Mary to give us peace, but to ask men to bring it about, not to sanctify your heart and purify it after having allowed it to be soiled by Manhattan, but rather to spread the atmosphere of Manhattan, of the World, even in this spot sacred to Mary. You had come in order to desecrate Fatima !

It was clear from the beginning that you intended to remain true to your own self. President Salazar is not President Obote – he is White, and civilised and Christian – one of the most outstanding Christians of the present century, and a great benefactor of civilisation – and Portugal is the one country in the world that has remained true to its Catholic Faith, which is proclaimed boldly and with pride in its Constitution and safeguarded by its Concordat. And therefore, pretending you had come on a hasty pilgrimage. with no time to spare, you slighted both the country and its Head of State, so that the progressive press was able to broadcast throughout the world how you had seen fit to show your contempt for this noble people.

You had arranged to celebrate Mass in Portuguese – despite the fact that people of all tongues and all races the whole world over were watching or listening – because you wished to show the tradition-loving country of Portugal that you were on the side of the innovators, that you supported change and were prepared to place your own desires above the glory of God. The Mass was a sad and hurried one, impossible to follow – a cold and “ mumbled ” (term used by Fr. Laurentin in a French daily) ceremony.

You had also planned in advance a series of audiences which were to take up all your time. One in particular – an ecumenical meeting with the “ representatives of the non-Catholic communities ” - was highly significant. There were however only two – Presbyterians – with whom, as they did not understand the French in which you had prepared your discourse, you could only exchange a few useless words, while any number of good Catholics would have been only too pleased to speak to you, to pray with you, but were not allowed to come near you.

Your visit, taken up with your political and ecumenical daydreams, was not a pilgrimage at all, and herein lies the terrible scandal. In all those discourses we find hardly any references – and those only cold and superficial – to the Apparitions of 1917. In not wishing to visit the actual site of the apparitions in the Cova da Iria, you gave the impression – perhaps intentionally ? – that you did not really believe in them. On your arrival, receiving the acclamations of the crowds for over an hour as you passed them, you failed to salute Our Lady of Fatima. Nothing escapes the television screen. Mounted on the platform, you did salute – the crowds. But Our Lady – No. You had passed her who was the object of your pilgrimage, without raising your eyes. I saw it. Nor did you recite the Rosary with the crowd, and, if you did say a single Ave, this was neither televised nor reported in the press.

Then came the moment of that great confrontation which for me – and for many others in a vague sort of way – was the last hope: your meeting with the Child of Fatima, with Lucy, the last survivor of the saintly little visionaries of 1917. For the love of mankind, for the love of the Church and of us poor lost children, for the love of your own self, Most Holy Father, you were being offered this grace by Heaven: Lucy requested a few moments of private talk with you. She had something which she wished to tell you – and no one else – in secret. One does not refuse such a request. One does not refuse to listen to the shepherdess of Fatima, to the little messenger of Heaven confirmed in grace and wisdom by fifty years in a cloister.

YOU REFUSED THAT GRACE

“ At one moment ”, your interpreter, Fr. Almeida, said in an interview with Radio Vatican, “ Lucy expressed the wish to tell the Pope something in private but the Pope replied: ‘ No, not now. If you have something to tell me, let your bishop know and he will pass it on. Obey your bishop and have confidence in him. ’

“ And the Pope gave his blessing to Sister Lucy as a father gives his blessing to a beloved child whom he knows he will never see again. ” (Documentation Catholique, 67, 1243)

Yes, there are certain graces which come your way once, and then never again...

Six days previously, on May 7, you had manifested an entirely different sort of interest towards Claudia Cardinale and Lollobrigida when they visited St. Peter's in a flood of publicity. And four days later, on May 17, you were to listen with great attention to what the Jewish president of the occult Temple of Understanding and her deputy had to say to you. But you would not listen to the message which the Blessed Virgin had the goodness to address to you personally through the mouth of Lucy, her child of predilection. And I must point out to you the wicked joy shown by all the progressive papers and the various anti-clerical media at this news. They heaved a sigh of relief ! The Pope had remained firm, he had not allowed himself to be bowled over by some Heavenly Vision or Voice from On High, like the first Paul. For him it had not become the Road to Damascus !

But what was it that the child had wished to say to you, and which you had been so afraid to hear ? Amongst all the heresy, schism, and scandal of which you have been guilty we could choose many possibilities. However, one probability stands out far above the rest: that this Messenger of Heaven wished – as she certainly must do – to remind you of the Will of that Authority which alone is above yours – I mean, God's Will – that you should publish to the world the Third Secret of Fatima. For the date on which it was intended to be published was 1960, and your pilgrimage took place in 1967. Today, we are in 1973, and the world is heading for its punishment.

“ Your silence can have no other result ”, as I explained in my study (Lettres à mes Amis, No. 247) on the true Message of Fatima, soon after your pilgrimage, “ than to transform into terrible reality the threats of new punishments which form beyond doubt the essence of the Third Secret, if only by analogy with the first two. If it is not allowed to know the terrible fate with which it is threatened by Heaven, the world will not become converted, and will drift unchecked into a mire of filth and a bath of blood. There will be a Third World War, Communism will spread its persecutions, atomic war will bring its untold ravages, and there will come the Great Apostasy of Christians. And because they have not received the warning and been called to conversion, the peoples will lose not only their lives but also their faith. ”

“ We are waiting for the Sign of Jonas since 1960. All the supposed reasons against publishing the Secret only increase the responsibility of those who know it and remain silent. No, the prophetic message is neither insignificant, nor reassuring, nor restrained. It was intended to be made known to all in 1960, and the intention remains. If it was too terrifying to be made known then, it is no less so today. It remains, nevertheless, the one word capable of averting the scourge which is on the way.

Certainly, as Barthas writes, it is the threats and promises by the Queen of Heaven which are largely responsible for that anxious interest, mingled with fear and hope, with which the world regards the 'mystery' of Fatima. But nobody has the right to disappoint the world in its anxious expectation. There is rather an obligation to keep it informed of the words spoken by the Queen of Heaven. That the Message is indeed for all of us is proved by an account given by Canon Barthas which dates from 1952: “ Regarding that which remains hidden: when is the third element of the ‘ secret ’ to be revealed to us ? Already in 1946, both Lucy and His Lordship the Bishop of Leiria gave me the same reply, without any hesitation or further comment: In 1960. And when I made so bold as to ask why we had to wait until then, I again received the same reply from each: Because that is the wish of the Blessed Virgin. ” We are now in 1967. As the wishes of Heaven do not change, I believe that Sister Lucy wanted to implore the Pope, the other day, to make known to the world the warnings of Our Lady and that, perhaps, she had been charged with making this request as a sort of final appeal, an ultimatum. The cup is overflowing, iniquity has reached its fill. It is absolutely vital that the entire Church should be made aware into what abyss of sin mankind is sinking.

But why did you go to Fatima ? By your pilgrimage, so it would seem, you killed it dead. No. one speaks about it any more – neither about the Divine Requests which had been made known there, nor about the conversion of Russia, nor about the Secret, nor about the devotional practices recommended – and least of all, about “ praying the Rosary for Peace", which Lucy had personally asked you to “ intensify ” on that famous May 13. (La Croix, June 5, 1967, published this information, given by Fr. Almeida, the Pope's interpreter)

What did you do there ? There reply is simple: You replaced the Message of the Queen of Peace with your own. In place of the Design of God which was revealed to us at Fatima: “ You must tell the whole world that God wishes to accord His graces through the Immaculate Heart of Mary, that men must have no hesitation in asking them of her, and that the Sacred Heart of Jesus desires to be venerated together with the Heart of His Mother; that men must pray for peace to this Immaculate Heart because God has entrusted it with this task ”, you have put your own Great Design – as you had revealed it at Manhattan – which consists in asking peace of the hearts of men, for it is in these you have put your trust.

Moreover, you did not hesitate to further your aims by letting it be inferred that you had been blest with a heavenly revelation. Speaking from the window of your apartments at the Vatican on the evening of your return, you said: “ At Fatima We asked the Madonna what paths we are to follow in order to attain peace, and we received the reply that peace was indeed attainable. ” The general impression gained in Rome from these words is summed up by a reporter writing for the Messagero: “ It would be easy to read our own meaning into such an unusual turn of phrase, but we may be allowed to think that, in the course of his pilgrimage to Fatima, Paul VI had a moment of what one might term inward communication with our Advocate, the Mother and Guardian of a mankind striving for peace. ”

And that was just the impression you wished to give: that you had been assured of the support of Heaven in your striving for the attainment of your Great Design, in your summoning of all men to build a new Peace, not by the only means recognised by our Catholic Faith – through prayer and penance – but through the new means revealed to you – Peace and Progress, or Populorum Progressio... You tried to make Heaven endorse your own infernal message, which you have been repeating over and over again since Manhattan, that peace is possible because men are good, that peace can be attained by the joint efforts of all men, under the direction of the international Judaeo-Masonic organisations. In your message the Cult of Man replaces that of God.

That is why the highlight of your visit was not a prayer to God but a strange, a scandalous Prayer to Men.

“ Yes, Peace is a gift of God, and presupposes the intervention of His action which is so good, so full of mercy, and so mysterious. But it is not necessarily a miraculous gift; it is a gift which accomplishes its wonders within the secret of men's hearts; a gift which requires their free acceptance and their free co-operation. And therefore, after having addressed Our prayer to Heaven, we now address it to all men throughout the world:

“ Men, make yourselves worthy of the divine gift of Peace. “ Men, be men. “ Men, be good, be wise, be open to the interests of the general well-being of the world. “ Men, be generous... “ Men, begin to come closer to one another in your desire to build a new world. “ Yes, a world of true men which can never come about without the sun of God upon its horizon. ”

This is a discourse of Antichrist. You came to Fatima in order that She who is able to crush the head of the serpent should be crushed in her turn, and that her Message – wherein lies mankind's last hope of being saved – should be destroyed by another message contrary to it, in which you call upon men to build a new world upon a foundation of pride.

If I am telling lies, prove it ! Prove that you are not of Satan but of Christ by publishing the Third Secret of Fatima, by calling all Christians to Prayer and Penance, by asking that the recitation of the Rosary for Peace should be intensified, and by pronouncing the Consecration of the World to the Immaculate Heart of Mary upon which depends peace – “ because God has entrusted It with this task ”.