| Editor : Abbé Georges de Nantes | N° 80 – May 2009 |
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« POOR HOLY FATHER! »
When he announced in March that the commission responsible for the cause of Sister Lucy’s canonisation was going to meet, the Bishop of Coimbra warned that « everything would go very slowly ». Why? Because there are many documents. Really! So? So, we cannot foretell the time that will be necessary to… to do what? To gather, analyse and send all of this to Rome. If you say so.
There will also be a commission of theologians « who must keep absolute secrecy » Really! Now that there is no longer a secret on the part of the Blessed Virgin, the theologians are going to create a new one! We are informed that their role will be decisive. To what end? To determine whether the devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary is theologically acceptable (we know that in 2000, Cardinal Ratzinger appeared very hesitant)? To determine whether the reparatory devotion of the First Saturdays of the month, which the Church’s hierarchy cannot bring itself to recommend, deserves recommendation? To determine whether the consecration of Russia to the Immaculate Heart of Mary is diplomatically correct?
To these two commissions will be added forty persons who lived with the Servant of God or who spent time with her in one way or another. They themselves will be submitted to an individual inquiry.
This is why this process of canonisation cannot be concluded in a day, the bishop specified. Thank you for informing us… But what is immediately obvious in daily current events for whoever knows how to read the « signs of the times » is that the “secret” that was entrusted to the little seers on 13 July 1917, as well as in several other visions, is being fulfilled before our eyes.
THE HOLY FATHER’S SORROW
« One day, Sister Lucy related, we went to spend the hours of the siesta near the well of my parents.
« Shortly afterwards, Jacinta called me:
«Didn’t you see the Holy Father?
– No!
– Well, I don’t know how it was, but I saw the Holy Father in a very big house, kneeling by a table, with his head in his hands and weeping. Outside, there were many people and some of them were throwing stones, others were cursing him and using bad language against him. Poor Holy Father!
« We must pray very hard for him! »
How are we not to see in the media’s hate-filled cries the fulfilment of this prophetic vision? Pope Benedict XVI has been its victim since he lifted the excommunication of the four bishops whom Mgr Lefebvre consecrated in 1988.
He has not yet fallen to his knees, « with his head in his hands and weeping », but he complains in the letter that he addressed to the bishops of the Catholic Church on this subject last 10 March:
« I was saddened by the fact that even Catholics thought they had to attack me with open hostility. » Saddened and surprised, the Pope quotes the Epistle to the Galatians in which St. Paul warns Christians: « If you bite and devour one another, take heed that you are not consumed by one another! » (Ga 5:15).
He adds:
« I am always tempted to see these words as another of the rhetorical excesses that we occasionally find in St. Paul. » Here is a remark that is worthy of the Modernist exegete Joseph Ratzinger, who judges St. Paul in the light of his – allegedly “scientific – reason! Benedict XVI is far from renouncing this method: « To some extent that may also be the case. »
Yet, here is the beginning of repentance:
« But sad to say, this “biting and devouring” also exists in the Church today, as expression of a poorly understood freedom. » We traditionalists can relate to that!
By recommending to us to pray for the Holy Father, Jacinta spontaneously repeats what St. Luke relates in the Acts of the Apostles, when St. Peter was arrested by King Herod, who was prepared « to bring him before the people » knowing that « this was pleasing to the Jews » – already media pressure!
« Peter thus was being kept in prison, but prayer by the Church was fervently being made to God on his behalf. »
So, is the Pope grateful for the prayers that are made to God on his behalf:
« And so I would like to offer heartfelt thanks to all the many Bishops [not all of them? No! far from all…] who have lately offered me touching tokens of trust and affection, and above all assured me of their prayers. My thanks also go to all the faithful who in these days have given me testimony of their constant fidelity to the Successor of St. Peter. »
The Holy Father does not know – he does not want to know, « it is a matter of principle », Cardinal Ratzinger once declared – but God knows that the prayer for the Sovereign Pontiff is made in our chapel to ask that he be « useful in his word and example in order that he may lead the flock that is entrusted to him to eternal life ».
Our prayer becomes all the more earnest because this does not seem to be Benedict XVI’s present concern!
I. PETER’S REPENTANCE IS THE CONDITION
FOR THE CONVERSION OF THE JEWS
In fact, he writes: « The first priority [sic! a “priority” is “first”, by definition. It is a pleonasm that paves the way for the “second priority” that the Pope is going to impose on us] for the Successor of Peter was laid down by the Lord in the Upper Room in the clearest of terms: You… strengthen your brethren. » (Lk 22:32) Benedict XVI’s tongue or pen slipped, because Jesus said:
« Once you have turned back, strengthen your brethren. »
The precise aim of the Pope’s letter to the bishops is to reassure them that there is no question of turning back… to the Catholic religion from before the Council. To have believed so for a moment comes from a simple « misunderstanding », and the Pope thanks « our Jewish friends, who quickly helped to clear up the misunderstanding and to restore the atmosphere of friendship and trust which – as in the days of Pope John Paul II – has also existed throughout my pontificate and, thank God, continues to exist ».
Are « his Jewish friends » on the verge of converting, so as to procure such consolation to the Holy Father? Not in the least. That would be contrary to Vatican II!
The Holy Father insists on excluding any « apparent step backwards with regard to all the steps of reconciliation between Christians and Jews taken since the Council – steps which my own work as a theologian had sought from the beginning to take part in and support ».
What are these forward « steps » towards « reconciliation » between Christians and Jews? Joseph Ratzinger gives it to be understood that he was their initiator at the Council.
It is quite simple: these « steps » consist of substituting « reconciliation » between Christian and Jews for the “conversion” of Jews to Christianity.
Number 4 of the “Declaration” on the relations of the Church with non-Christian religions (Nostra ætate) states on what basis this reconciliation will be based: « As the sacred Synod searches into the mystery of the Church, it remembers the bond that spiritually ties the people of the New Covenant to Abraham’s stock », as a door « joins » two rooms of the same house, or as a suspended bridge « joins » two banks of the same river.
But the expression is awkward.
In fact, to be « of Abraham’s stock » is a biological fact without any relationship to a “spiritual” reality, the Abbé de Nantes observes in his Auto-da-fe, which will soon be published in French if God so wills.
As for the « people of the New Testament », they do not strictly speaking constitute a people; the expression is metaphorical insofar as, similar to bonds of blood or « naturalisation » that transform the multitude into an organised civil community, the “bonds” of the Faith and Baptism create a community which, although supranational, is nonetheless organised, visible, hierarchical, analogous to a « people ».
Let us be specific, the Abbé de Nantes writes, in order to cast light on the two hinges on which is hung this door « that spiritually links the people of the New Testament with Abraham’s stock », or the two aerial supports to which a suspension bridge is secured:
1o God reserves Abraham’s religion for his « stock », which is mysterious, but this stock leads to Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, as the two genealogies of St. Luke and St. Matthew reveal (Mt 1:1-17; Lk 3:23-38).
2o The « people », that the Council calls « of the New Testament » has as its “substantial bond”, as its « vinculum substantiale », as Leibniz would say, not circumcision, not the place of birth, or language, nothing other than faith in Jesus Christ, Saviour of the world, who is from « David’s stock » and object of Abraham’s faith.
This is why the unanimous tradition of the Fathers and Doctors of the Church judge the Jews guilty of a criminal infidelity, which in the past was called “perfidy”, towards « Jesus of Nazareth » inasmuch as they show solidarity with their ancestors who refused to recognise in Him the Son of the Most High, the Messiah whom the prophets announced. This tradition must not be accused of anti-Semitism, because until Vatican II exclusively, the Church has unceasingly called Jews to look on Him whom they have pierced and render thanks to Him for handing Himself over to death for them, for the redemption of their sins and death on the Cross. It is in this repentance that the Jews must meet with Christians, thus joining them in the fullness of the New and definitive Covenant.
Comparing the Jews to the Ninevites who did penance at Jonah’s call, St. Ambrose wrote:
« The example of the Ninevites announces punishment [« Forty days more and Nineveh shall be destroyed »] and manifests the remedy [« do penance! »]. Thus, even the Jews must not despair of forgiveness, if they consent to doing penance. » (Homily on St. Luke, ch. 11)
But if the successor of Peter no longer calls them to do it, there is no longer salvation for them. It is a terrifying thing to say.
Here is the remedy.
APPEAL TO THE MAGISTERIUM.
« It is my intention, the Pope writes to the bishops of the whole world, to join the Pontifical Commission “Ecclesia Dei” – the body that has been competent since 1988 for those communities and persons who, coming from the Society of St. Pius X or from similar groups, wish to return to full communion with the Pope – to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. »
Let it be noted that we are not concerned, since we have never broken with « full communion with the Pope ». Even when our Father accused Paul VI and John Paul II of heresy, schism, and scandal, he remained in full communion with their sovereign Magisterium because he was asking them to judge, and therefore to condemn him if he were in the wrong. No Pope has ever condemned the Abbé de Nantes because the Abbé de Nantes is right. Nevertheless, here is something new that interests us
« This will make it clear, Benedict XVI continues, that the problems now to be addressed are essentially doctrinal in nature and concern primarily the acceptance of the Second Vatican Council and the post-conciliar Magisterium of the Popes. »
At long last! Here we are at the centre of the matter. But be careful: the Pope amalgamates here two distinct questions. For « the acceptance of the Second Vatican Council » and of all its novelties, even those taught by Peter’s legitimate successor, is one thing. Faith in the « Magisterium of the Popes » is another, whether ante or postconciliar. The Abbé de Nantes proves his faith in the« Magisterium of the Popes » for forty years now, precisely by appealing to it against the teachings of the Second Vatican Council.
The Holy Father adds that « the collegial bodies with which the Congregation studies questions that arise (especially the ordinary Wednesday meeting of Cardinals and the annual or biennial Plenary Session) ensure the involvement of the Prefects of the different Roman Congregations and representatives from the world’s Bishops in the process of decision-making. »
The Pope seems to reply therein to the protests that the bishops, mainly French and German, raised against the way in which the lifting of the excommunication of the four bishops consecrated by Mgr Lefebvre had been decided without their national Assemblies being consulted.
He adds, for the benefit of the integrists: « The Church’s teaching authority cannot be frozen in the year 1962 – this must be quite clear to the Society. »
Indeed, and this is in fact the integrists’ error, which led some of them to sedevacantism. But the remark also affects Benedict XVI himself, like a boomerang, for it is up to him, Sovereign Pontiff, and not to « collegial organisms », who are no more than his ministers, to take the necessary « decisions », mainly to pronounce an infallible doctrinal judgement to tell us what the Catholic Faith is and is not, and, consequently, who is and who is not, or no longer is, in the unity of the Church, outside of which there is no salvation. The Abbé de Nantes has been demanding this judgement in vain since 6 August 1964, the date at which Pope Paul VI himself « froze » the Magisterium by his encyclical Ecclesiam suam, which transformed his office of preaching the revealed truth into an organ of coexistence and dialogue with the world and all its religions and irreligions.
Pope Benedict XVI does, however, occasionally pronounce very firm condemnations. On 12 February 2009, regarding the Shoah: « There is no doubt that all denial or minimisation of this crime is intolerable and totally unacceptable. » This discourse was addressed to the presidents of the largest American Jewish organisations. But this question does not come within his Magisterium, and the sentence is meant to get the attention of the media, and is not canonical or dogmatic. Has Benedict XVI ever uttered such firm words against any doctrinal error?
For example, against the denial of the death of Jesus on the Cross, such as can be read in the Qur’an?
II. THE REPENTANCE OF PETER,
CONDITION OF THE CONVERSION OF MUSLIMS
Not to my knowledge. Such a condemnation would, moreover, be contrary to number 3 of the declaration Nostra ætate whereby the Second Vatican Council exhorts Christians and Muslims to « forget the past » and its « not a few quarrels and hostilities » in order to “convert” together… to what? to the full truth of Christ who died on the Cross and rose from the dead in order to open Heaven and snatch us from Hell? Not at all! but to « mutual understanding and to preserve as well as to promote together for the benefit of all mankind social justice and moral welfare, as well as peace and freedom ».
The Abbé de Nantes comments: « It is up to you to decide if these great planetary objectives brought an increase in the earthly happiness of men since the closing of the Council. The answer is obviously negative. There was an awakening, a progression of Islam, and torrents of blood. Once again I find astonishing how totally disinterested the greatest Council of all time was, and what is more, at the moment that it addresses the Muslim multitudes, who are strongly religious and believe in God, in retribution, in Heaven, and Hell. Yes! The Council displayed its total disinterest in this § 3… for religion, truth, and the salvation of these multitudes through the grace of God and His Precious Blood shed on the Cross. Would Father Charles de Foucauld have died in vain? Absit! »
In this context, the conversion of a Muslim to Christianity is a heroic undertaking, not only because the convert is the object of reprobation, threats, and violence on the part of his former co-religionists, even in his own family, but because he only encounters lukewarmness and incomprehension when he enters into his new family, the Church.
A book that was published in Italy in 2005 under the title “Christians who have come from Islam” (I Cristiani venuti dall’islam, Piemme, 2005), relates how a « springtime of the faith » bears witness, however, within Islam itself, to a rising up of the Christian sap, despite all the obstacles, preparing the triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary.
IT WAS THE EIGHTH HOUR.
One day in 1997, a young Algerian Muslim turned the knob of his radio in search of an Italian programme capable of helping him in his study of this foreign language. Suddenly he heard: « Ave Maria, piena di grazia, il Signore è con te, tu sei benedetta tra tutte le donne. » The words were articulated slowly and repeated with application, to which numerous voices responded. He was overcome, struck at his heart. « Mary is a person who is very well-known and venerated in the Muslim tradition, but this prayer that was repeated with such conviction spoke to me in a new way… »
It was exactly 8 o’clock. He remembers as St. John remembers his first encounter with Jesus: « It was the tenth hour. » (1:38-39)
At that hour, the Catholic transmitter Radio-Maria broadcasts the Rosary recited by the students of Erba in the province of Come. For the boy, this day, this hour marked a « new birth ». « Ave Maria, il Signore è con te. I heard in these words something familiar, something that concerned me… »
He became a regular listener of Radio-Maria, getting in addition to the Rosary a popular catechism that taught him about Christianity while at the same time allowing him to make great progress in the Italian language. In the evening he recorded the programmes on audio cassettes, and during the day, while he worked at the port of Algiers cleaning ship motors, with the headphones of his Walkman on his ears, he let them sink in.
All the same, he did not abandon his neighbourhood mosque. The imam was of the same age as he; they had gone to school together. He asked him a thousand questions which the latter was unable to answer:
« Is it true that Jesus, whom Christians say is the Son of God and the Lord who gives life, was not crucified? That the Gospels have been falsified? And the Qur’an? Who can guarantee for us the verses of the Qur’an? »
– Ah! What has come over you? Stop asking questions! The Qur’an is a miracle come down from Heaven; no one can make it an object of dispute… If you continue, I will denounce you. »
In Algeria, everyone is “free” since independence. Free to enter into Islam, but not to leave it… He contacted the presenters of Radio-Maria, who had him come to Italy. In a few days, « I began to understand what the presence of Jesus meant today in the Church. Basically, I had the impression of arriving home. »
When he came back to Algiers, he was unable for long to conceal to his family what filled his life. His sister discovered his Bible when doing housework in his bedroom. « Why are you reading the Bible of the Christians? What you are doing is horrible; you are an apostate, a traitor to Islam! » Ahmed, his elder brother, head of the family since the death of their father, threatened him: « You are a renegade. If you continue on this path, I should denounce you, because the person who abandons Islam cannot go unpunished. »
Life became impossible. He left home, and in August 2000 his Italian friends succeeded in bringing him to Italy with a residence permit and found him a house and work in Toscana. It was paradise! He received baptism and chose the name Antonio in memory of the great hermit saint who originated like him from North Africa (3rd- 4th century).
Courageously, in 2003, with his Rosary beads in his hand, he returned to Algeria to visit his old mother and his brothers who remained with her. The discussion was getting heated: « “Are you sure that the path that you have chosen is the good one? How is it possible for you to be happy outside Islam?” For them, my conversion was quite simply something that was inconceivable. » In the end, the eldest brother, Ahmed, “gave up” in the face of Antonio’s serenity.
What is most remarkable for us, however, is the “complete” nature of this conversion; Antonio is very lucid, like the Pope’s neophyte Magdi Allam, whose Open Letter to Benedict XVI we published. He denounces the flaws of our secular society in which « the freedom that remains a mirage in the land of Islam is, in the West, in the land of Christianity, only an alibi for letting everyone do whatever comes into his head. Debauchery, I would say, rather than freedom. Is it a question of freedom, for example, when the body of a woman is exploited as a support for any kind of advertising message? The veil can be seen as a symbol of oppression of women, but without a doubt ostentatious nudity or a provocative way of dressing does not exalt the freedom of women. Where does respect of the person still exist? »
The hypocrisy of our rights of man, of our idolatry of the « free, autonomous, and transcendent human person » cannot be better denounced!
« Muslims observe us, he insists. Christians and the Church have a great responsibility. They must bear witness that one can live a completely Christian life in a society that considers itself secular… in order to reduce God to being no more than a trinket. »
This book is full of accounts that are each more captivating than the next. They only form « the tip of the iceberg », the authors specify, because the movement has reached a scale that must be concealed in order to shield the converts from reprisals.
SARAJEVO, THE CAPTAIN AND THE CARDINAL.
Under this title is related the story of a Bosnian, a Muslim Communist who enlisted for the “holy war” against the army of Slobodan Milosevic, and for devastating Serbian villages, slitting the throats of woman and children.
One night, in a trench, Captain Durakovic heard on the radio the courageous voice of the Cardinal Archbishop of Sarajevo, Vinko Pulic, imploring the end of the slaughter, inviting to forgiveness and national reconciliation « because this is God’s will ».
Then he heard the voice of Mustafa Ceric, who called all Muslims to come together to fight until an Islamic State was established, « because such is Allah’s will ».
Who was to be believed?
When the war was over, he returned to Italy to find his daughter, Ivana, who lived close to Rome with his ex-wife. After a violent quarrel with the latter, a fire broke out, but she succeeded, by giving false evidence, in having him arrested and sentenced on the charge of attempted murder.
He was detained in the Roman prison Regina Cæli, « this was where, behind the bars of a cell, God knocked once again on the door of my life. The remorse that I suffered for the violence of which I was guilty during the war left me no peace of mind. The howls of so many innocent people and the faces of the dead haunted my troubled nights and, from time to time, the sentences of Cardinal Pulic offering forgiveness and inviting to reconciliation came back to my mind. Where, I asked myself, did he get the strength to utter such words? The desire arose in me to read the Gospels in order more closely to know this Jesus whom the Archbishop of Sarajevo had often invoked in his radio conversations. This was when God decided to enlighten the obscurity of my night by the light of Sr. Stella. »
This Croatian nun – bearing a prophetic name! – belonged to the Congregation of Franciscan Teaching Sisters of Christ the King. She was in charge of the prisoners originating from the Balkans. She related:
« Scarcely had I learned that he was of Bosnian origin that I asked him if he knew Cardinal Pulic. He answered yes to me and immediately added: “He is a great man, a true man of God.” Then he asked me to provide him with a Bible in Croatian, but at first, I manifested some hesitation: You are of the Muslim tradition, I told him, why not read the Qur’an? »
« This is interreligious dialogue », you will say, quoting Pope Benedict XVI who affirms in his Letter to the Bishops, « the need for all those who believe in God to join in seeking peace, to attempt to draw closer to one another, and to journey together, even with their differing images of God (!), towards the source of Light. »
Well, no! Don’t you believe it. It is quite the opposite!
« I wanted to put him to the test, Sr. Stella explained. In fact, prisoners sometimes seek to gain the good favour of the on duty nuns or priests of the prison by showing an interest for religion that in reality they do not have. But he, for his part, insisted and every time I entered into the cell that he shared with other Slavs, he started asking me for the Bible again. The day when I arrived with a copy of it in the Croatian language, his face became radiant. He seized it with care as one would for a gem and, from then on, all the time of our encounters was devoted to answering his questions concerning the Gospel, Jesus, the Church. The other prisoners asked for cigarettes, candy, coffee, but he was eager to know more about Christianity.
« He was literally thirsty for God. »
During the summer of 2002, Sr. Stella met Cardinal Pulic and related to him the story of her terrorist war criminal whom his words had touched. The cardinal had tears in his eyes and promised to pray for this “good thief” whom he did not know. The next year, on 2 March 2003, Captain Durakovic was baptised, made his First Communion, and received Confirmation. He chose the names Yvan, in memory of his daughter Ivana, and Vinko in memory of the Archbishop of Sarajevo who had marked his existence forever. A few months later he was released by the court. « But I had already won true freedom by making the acquaintance of Jesus. »
We would have to relate also the story of a particularly fanatical Turkish Muslim who became a Jesuit!
The story of Sara is particularly instructive. She was born in Italy in 1984 of a Tunisian mother married to an Italian who was a half-hearted Catholic. Her mother raised her in the Muslim religion: « For me, to be a Muslim essentially meant observing my mother, listening to her, and having confidence in what she told me.
« I learned how to pray in Arabic from her, I understood that God existed and that that has something to do with our life, that in order to be truly happy we must submit to His will. »
One day at university, she heard her Christian friends reciting the Memorare. She knew that Muslims also venerate the Madonna, but she had never heard anyone turn towards Her with such abandonment and such confidence, with the disposition of placing his entire existence in the hands of a Mother who had given birth to a man, who was Son of God, her friends explained to her, this Jesus who changed the history of the world. Since His coming, it is no longer man who seeks to know the divinity, who builds an image of Him, but it is God who reveals Himself.
THE DENIAL OF PETER.
Notice that this distinction escapes Benedict XVI when he affirms « the need for all those who believe in God to join in seeking peace, to attempt to draw closer to one another, and to journey together, even with their differing images of God (!), towards the source of Light ».
We are told that, matching his actions with his words, he will go on pilgrimage to the Wailing Wall and to the Dome of the Rock on the Esplanade of the Mosques in Jerusalem during his trip to the Holy Land next 8 to 15 May. This resolution is already a denial.
In a speech that was addressed to Muslims in Yaoundé on 19 March, he insisted on « the essential contribution that religion (sic! Any religion?) brings to our understanding of culture and the world as well as to a peaceful coexistence of all the members of the human family. » What “family”, outside of the Church?
« My friends, I believe that today a particularly urgent task for religion (your Muslim religion, ours, and all the others) is to reveal the immense potential of human reason, which is itself a gift from God and which revelation (?) and faith (?) strengthen. »
This is how, in the name of interfaith dialogue and religious freedom, which is its law, « human reason » substitutes itself for « Jesus and crucified Jesus », for Heaven to be won, for Hell to be avoided.
This is « Peter’s denial ».
But Sara now only knows Jesus and no longer fears anything or anyone:
« To look at Jesus on the Cross and to think that His sacrifice has freed us all from suffering, it is truly in this world a sign come from above. It is something that I cannot deny. »
One might say that she is like us, members of the Counter-Reformation, but unwittingly, spontaneously.
« When I attend Mass and I hear Christ’s words – Take and eat, this is My Body, which is offered in sacrifice for you – I understand that He is speaking to me, that it is an invitation to appease my hunger for God. It is an answer offered to my obstinate search for happiness […].
« Ever since, I recite the “Memorare” (the Remember, o most gracious Virgin Mary) and think about my mother each time; I pray the Madonna because she bore witness to the impossible. She sheltered God made man in Her womb and saw Her Son risen from the dead. If that happened, nothing is impossible, not even my mother’s acceptance of my conversion. »
Ah! If our Pastors reasoned in this way, beginning with the Pope, everyone would follow… Like Amina.
She was raised in the most rigorous Muslim practice. She asked herself a thousand questions until the day when she went to Our Lady of Loretto with Anna and other friends on pilgrimage.
« When I entered the Santa Casa of Loretto, I understood that thanks to Mary’s “yes”, the greatest thing that can happen to man was fulfilled: the encounter with God made flesh. It is by considering the “yes” that was uttered before the angel Gabriel that I am able to say my small and at the same time big “yes”. »
Is there a more eloquent demonstration of the error from which Benedict XVI, the successor of Peter, must « turn back » in order to « confirm his brethren »? All the while he gives as the priority of his ministry ecumenism and interfaith dialogue to establish a common front against all the evils of humanity – without worrying about the worst of them, which is to march towards Hell! – not so as to obtain eternal salvation of all men, but to establish peace and harmony here below.
Truly, it was not worth the trouble of proclaiming a “Year of St. Paul”! « For what participation has justice with injustice? What fellowship has light with darkness ? What accord has Christ with Belial?” For what partnership do righteousness and lawlessness have? What agreement has the temple of God with idols? For we are the temple of the living God. » (2 Co 6:14-16)
III. THE LONG-AWAITED MIRACLE OF PETER’S TEARS
No peace is possible between « all men » except in Jesus Christ and through Jesus Christ recognised and received with faith as the only Son of God and unique Saviour, in the bosom of the Roman and Apostolic Catholic Church. For « God so loved the world that He gave His only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him might not perish but might have eternal life. For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through Him. » (Jn 3:16-17)
Thus Heaven only demands that the Pope consecrate Russia to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, and the world will be saved! It will be ninety years next 13 June since Our Lady came to Tuy to ask this in the course of a grandiose theophany with which Sister Lucy was favoured on the night of 13 June 1929:
« Then Our Lady said to me: “The moment has come when God asks the Holy Father to make, in union with all the bishops of the world, the consecration of Russia to My Immaculate Heart, promising to save it by this means. So numerous are the souls that the justice of God condemns for sins committed against Me, that I have come to ask for reparation. Sacrifice yourself for this intention and pray.” »
To this request, Sister Lucy responded by a long life of sacrifice and prayer. But « the Holy Father », Pius XI, to be specific, paid « no heed » to Our Lady’s demand. We received the consequences of his refusal: World War II, which was « worse » than the First, in accordance with the warnings of Our Lady, and Russia spread her errors throughout the world, provoking wars and persecutions against the Church, in particular in her missions and through decolonisation.
Today, one only has to open his newspaper every morning to see the result. In Africa, the Pope saw it with his own eyes. The only thing missing was that he relate this spectacle to the second prophetic vision of Blessed Jacinta:
« On another occasion, Sister Lucy writes after having related Jacinta’s first vision, that of the Holy Father in tears, we went to the “Lapa do Cabeço”. When we arrived there, we prostrated ourselves on the ground to recite the prayers of the Angel.
« Some time later, Jacinta sat up and called me: « Can’t you see all those highways and roads and fields full of dead people [with their blood pouring out Sister Lucy wrote in a letter to one of her confessors; she did not write it in her Memoirs because of the Third Secret, in which the angels gather up the « blood of the martyrs »], and others who are crying with hunger and have nothing to eat? »
That is the situation we are in today! Every day the press shows us a multitude of men, women, children, and old people who « have nothing to eat » due to the devastating impact of the economic crisis on the populations and economies of the poorest countries. Here in the rich countries, we talk of unemployment and purchasing power, we take to the streets, like in London the Saturday before last in order to demand that the G 20 act in favour of employment, justice… and the climate!
But for the poor, what is at stake is being able to « eat » and to drink potable water!
The British Prime Minister Gordon Brown recalled it: for many families, « who are uncertain about the future, economic summits are held around the kitchen table ». The Pope wrote him to say that « the only true and solid basis for coming out of the crisis was [not the family], but “faith in the human person” » (La Croix of 2 April 2009)!
We are waiting for the Holy Father to abjure this “faith” so that the rest of Jacinta’s vision, our invincible hope, may be fulfilled.
« And the Holy Father in a church praying before the Immaculate Heart of Mary? And so many people praying with him? »
Faced with fields that are ravaged by drought or by floods, faced with cities and towns that are devastated by war, we are waiting for the Pope to call the Catholic universe, its bishops, priest, men and women religious, not to a “summit” of religions but to the reparatory devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary! A great miracle will be needed. For, from Angola – Portuguese Angola, which celebrated this year the five-hundredth anniversary of the beginning of its evangelisation – the Pope called Africa, which is ravaged by drought, floods, AIDS, endemic war, famine… He called it to what? To devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary? No, but to march « along the path marked with the principles indispensable to every modern civic democracy: respect and promotion of human rights, transparent governance, an independent judiciary, a free press, a civil service of integrity, a properly functioning network of schools and hospitals, and – most pressing – a determination born from the conversion of hearts to excise corruption once and for all. »
In other words, he recommends something that does not exist in any « modern civil democracy »! In the place of devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, he proffers a chimera! Someone will say that devotion and democracy are not comparable. Indeed! They are contradictory. It is one or the other. Here is proof: the bishops of Colombia appeal to democracy against Uribe, the head of State who recites the Rosary every day to lead victoriously his war against the farc narco-terrorists!
In a communiqué that was published on Sunday, 29 March, the Colombian Conference of Bishops, which “does not get involved in politics”…, asked President Alvaro Uribe not to be a candidate for a third mandate as president in 2010, « for the good of democracy ». The country’s present Constitution only authorises two consecutive mandates, but President Uribe’s supporters want to modify it through a referendum. What could be more “democratic”?! Furthermore, the president of the episcopate, Mgr Ruben Salazar Gomez, calls for an urgent peace dialogue with the guerrillas led by farc (La Croix of 1 April)!
As our Father writes in The 150 points, it is truly « the Church’s sin »!
Then Benedict XVI re-boarded the plane, and everything continued in Africa as before because he did not speak as head of the Catholic Church, but as an « expert in humanity ».
He also said: it is of pressing importance « to address the issue of climate change »; if only he had recommended to pray the Good God who makes it rain, who makes good weather; but no, good weather for everyone must come from « coordinated efforts » of « the international community as a whole »…
In the meanwhile, massive poverty and corruption remain, for the time being, the fruit of the governance exercised by the Popular movement for the Liberation of Angola, the winner of the thirty years of civil war that followed decolonisation…
These were not exactly the results of the previous thirty years, thirty years that were spent under the regime produced by the agreement that President Salazar concluded with the Holy See in 1940, which supported the Catholic missions, their works of education and charity. Is it « climatic change » that annihilated this colonising work, to which the Pope, moreover, made no allusion?
A pall was cast over the Pope’s trip to Africa at Coqueiros Stadium in Luanda by the death of two young girls, fourteen and sixteen years old, crushed to death in the movements of the crowd. It would have been better for these two girls if the Pope had remained in Rome that day… or at least that he had invoked the Immaculate Heart of Mary! They would still be in this world. Where are they now? For this is the true concern about which Benedict XVI did not speak, the only concern that Our Lady of Fatima had when She showed Hell to Lucy, Francisco and Jacinta: « You have seen Hell where the souls of poor sinners go. To save them, God wishes to establish in the world devotion to My Immaculate Heart. If what I am going to say to you is done, many souls will be saved and there will be peace. »