Allegations
persist that the Vatican is continuing to cover up the truth about
the ‘third secret’ said to have been disclosed by the Virgin Mary
exclusively to three Portuguese children on 13th July 1917.
Ongoing
reports of papal obfuscation and lies did not deter big numbers of
pilgrims gathering at the Shrine of Fatima near Leiria for the 99th
anniversary of the secret visions. The pilgrims have come from many
countries, including such places as China, Indonesia and Costa Rica,
as well as Italy, Ireland, the UK and the US.
Recently,
however, Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI felt moved to issue a formal
denial of any wrong-doing over the third secret controversy.
The
generally accepted belief is that apparitions of the Virgin Mary,
popularly know as Our Lady of Fatima, were witnessed on the 13th of
each month between May and October 1917.
The
Vatican has described the apparitions as “undoubtedly the most
prophetic of modern times”.
The
main visionary, 10-year-old LĂșcia Santos, became a cloistered
nun and in 1941 wrote accounts of the secrets. The first two
emphasised the horrors of hell, the threat of more world war, and the
danger to humanity of Russia replacing Christianity with communist
totalitarianism.
Sister
LĂșcia delayed writing about the third secret until ordered to
do so by her local bishop. Her one-page letter dated January 1944 was
kept by the bishop of Leiria in a sealed envelope until it was
conveyed to the Vatican in 1957 for safe keeping in the Secret
Archives of the Holy Office.
Critics
claim that successive popes “suppressed” the information until
the year 2000 when John Paul II deemed that its publication was
appropriate. His secretary of state, Cardinal Angelo Sodano, declared
that the third secret was the Virgin Mary’s prophesy of the
attempted assassination of John Paul on 13th
May 1981.
The
announcement was received by many Catholics with incredulity. An
“interpretation” by another of John Paul’s top officials,
Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, only added to the international outcry.
Traditionalist Catholics denounced it as part of the “heresy”
that had infiltrated the papacy since the modernising Second Vatican
Council in the 1960s.
Many
Catholics have long believed that the third secret predicted a
satanic takeover of the Catholic faith and that each pope since the
Second Vatican Council has been the Antichrist.
Ratzinger
succeeded John Paul as Benedict XVI but resigned, the first pope to
do so in almost 600 years, in the midst of scandals over alleged
corruption within the Vatican and widespread sex abuse perpetrated by
priests.
The
third secret cover-up allegations resurfaced as this year’s
celebrations were getting underway at Fatima in mid-May.
A
former German priest and professor of theology, Ingo Dollinger, was
quoted as saying that his long-time friend Cardinal Ratzinger had
confided that what the Vatican had published about the third secret
was not complete.
According
to Dollinger, Ratzinger told him that the published part of the third
secret was authentic, but that the unpublished part referred to “a
bad council and a bad Mass that was to come in the near future.”
Dollinger
had said much the same thing about Ratzinger before. He was quoted
nine years ago as saying his conversation with Ratzinger had been
“burning in his mind.”
This
all tallies with apocalyptic “crisis of faith” warnings that have
been rife among traditionalist Catholics for decades.
As
pope emeritus in the shadow of the present Pope Francis, Benedict has
remained largely silent on all matters, but he obviously felt he must
speak out about the latest Dollinger allegation.
A
statement from the press office of the Holy See read: “Several
articles have appeared recently, including declarations attributed to
Professor Ingo Dollinger according to which Cardinal Ratzinger, after
the publication of the third secret of Fatima (which took place in
June 2000), had confided to him that the publication was not
complete.
“In
this regard, Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI declares ‘never to have
spoken with Professor Dollinger about Fatima’, clearly affirming
that the remarks attributed to Professor Dollinger on the matter ‘are
pure inventions, absolutely untrue’, and he confirms decisively
that ‘the publication of the third secret of Fatima is complete’.”
The
only thing that is really clear about this issue is that someone is
not telling the truth.
Of
course, exposing the truth can get people into trouble. A Vatican
court last week convicted a priest and a public relations executive
for their involvement in leaking secret documents to two journalists.
The priest has been jailed.
The
leaked documents allowed journalists to expose the workings of a
Vatican commission set up in 2013 to advise Pope Francis on reforming
the deeply flawed Roman Curia, the Vatican’s civil service that
Francis once called “the leprosy of the papacy.”
Unfortunately,
the leaks did not shed any further light on the third secret of
Fatima.