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Fatima debate: Some say 'third secret' is still secret
cns ^ | May 10, 2010 | John Thavis

Posted on 05/10/2010 4:11:57 PM PDT by NYer

Fatima debate: Some say 'third secret' is still secret


A woman places a candle in an area where pilgrims leave candles and wax figures at the Marian shrine in Fatima, Portugal, in this 2005 file photo. (CNS/Paul Haring)

By John Thavis
Catholic News Service

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Ten years after the Vatican divulged one of the church's best-kept secrets -- the third part of the message of Fatima -- a small band of skeptics and critics are still questioning the official explanation.

More than 100 of them gathered at a hotel not far from the Vatican in early May for a weeklong conference on such topics as "Fatima and the Global Economic Crisis," "The Present Need for the Consecration of Russia" and "Is There a Missing Text of the Third Secret?"

For those in attendance, the answer to that last question is a no-brainer.

"The evidence points to only one conclusion: that something has to be missing," said Christopher A. Ferrara, a U.S. attorney and Catholic commentator who spoke at the conference.

Ferrara pointed to what he described as a series of incongruities and inconsistencies in the Vatican's version. Among people truly familiar with the events at Fatima, he said, only a minority "cling steadfastly to the notion that an ambiguous vision of a bishop dressed in white outside a half-ruined city is all there is to the third secret."

That's the heart of the question for people in the "Fatima Challenge" movement. They argue that the third secret of Fatima was a prophecy so traumatic and dire that several popes decided not to make it known to the faithful, and yet the text published in 2000 contained little more than an allegory about the church's past struggles with 20th-century ideologies.

They say there's good reason to believe the third secret wasn't just about the church battling outside forces, but about Satan working in the church -- at the highest levels. Some have deduced that the secret foresaw the changes of the Second Vatican Council, especially in liturgy and ecumenical dialogue, as part of the "great apostasy" which church leaders refuse to acknowledge.

Most recently, several of these "diehard Fatimists" -- as a Vatican official once described them -- have suggested that the priestly sex abuse crisis in the church is a clear sign of the crisis of faith and pastoral negligence prophesied, they say, by Mary at Fatima.

The conference took place a few days before Pope Benedict XVI's visit to Fatima, and organizers went out of their way to invite the pope and Vatican officials. None showed up. The pope's Vatican aides consider the "Fatimists" a fringe element that is best ignored.

Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone, the Vatican secretary of state, has said one of the reasons the third secret was made public in 2000 was that people were spreading "absurd theses" about catastrophic events or heresy at the top levels of the church.

Cardinal Bertone, who was personally involved in the publication of the third secret, said he was puzzled that some still think the Vatican is hiding something. In 2006, an Italian journalist wrote a book titled "The Fourth Secret of Fatima" that laid out a Vatican conspiracy theory, prompting a new round of publicity.

In 2007, Cardinal Bertone wrote his own book, "The Last Visionary of Fatima," which reiterated the official version of the Fatima messages and secrets and was based, he said, on long conversations with Carmelite Sister Lucia dos Santos, the last of the visionaries to die. In TV appearances, the cardinal strongly denied theories of a Vatican cover-up.

Pope Benedict was also personally involved in publishing the third secret. As Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, the Vatican's top doctrinal official, he presented the text of the secret to the press and wrote a lengthy commentary about it.

That news conference on June 26, 2000, is still memorable for Vatican journalists. The stage was set for disclosure of a text that for decades was thought to be too disturbing to reveal. But instead, Cardinal Ratzinger began by deflating expectations and announcing that there was nothing apocalyptic.

"No great mystery is revealed; nor is the future unveiled," he said. He went on to give a theological framework to the apparitions and messages of Fatima, insisting that in the church's tradition, "prophecy" is not like a "film preview," but more like offering signs that can be useful for Christians.

Cardinal Ratzinger said that was how to understand the third secret's vision of a "bishop in white" who struggles up a hill amid corpses of slain martyrs, and then falls dead after being shot by soldiers. Whether this bishop symbolized Pope John Paul II, who was shot and wounded on May 13, 1981, or a "convergence" of several 20th-century pontiffs who helped the church ward off the dangers, it doesn't mean someone must be killed, the cardinal said.

That explanation still sticks in the craw of "Fatimists," who say it deliberately removes the vision's apocalyptic scenario and lulls the faithful into a false sense of security. The Vatican's version, they say, suggests these problems are behind the church, when in their view the worst is yet to come.

Father Nicholas Gruner, a Canadian priest who founded "The Fatima Crusader" magazine, has long maintained that Russia has yet to be consecrated to Mary in accordance with the instructions of Our Lady of Fatima.

"We haven't had the conversion of Russia by any stretch of the imagination -- not militarily, not morally. It's the largest abortion capital of the world.... There's just no sign of conversion in any sense," Father Gruner said in Rome May 6.

That's another issue the Vatican is tired of dealing with. Church officials say Pope John Paul II in 1984 led the world's bishops in the consecration of Russia and the world. The late Sister Lucia, one of the three Portuguese children who saw Mary in 1917 and the one who received the instructions for the consecration, had said that it was properly performed.

The Fatima messages are not dogma, and the church does not impose belief or any single interpretation. That seems to ensure that the "Fatimists" will continue to broadcast their theories to whoever will listen.



TOPICS: Catholic; Current Events; History
KEYWORDS: catholic; fatima; pope; vatican
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1 posted on 05/10/2010 4:11:58 PM PDT by NYer
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To: netmilsmom; thefrankbaum; markomalley; Tax-chick; GregB; saradippity; Berlin_Freeper; Litany; ...

Ping!


2 posted on 05/10/2010 4:12:24 PM PDT by NYer ("Where Peter is, there is the Church." - St. Ambrose of Milan)
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To: NYer

“The evidence points to only one conclusion: that something has to be missing,”


3 posted on 05/10/2010 4:18:26 PM PDT by STD (islam a spiritual-legal-political Theocratic system of governance which is not to be questioned;)
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To: NYer
I wonder what its like to not have to pay taxes.

Do any of these people have real jobs?

4 posted on 05/10/2010 4:27:06 PM PDT by 2aberro
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To: 2aberro

Lawyers don’t pay taxes?


5 posted on 05/10/2010 4:37:20 PM PDT by nickcarraway
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To: None

The pope is visiting Fatima, so in essence alot of conspiratorial nut job kook stories that wouldnt normally get printed get some print time.
...
...
Alot of these stories gain traction off the fact that Sister Lucia was known as a recluse, primarily of her orders discipline. Yet she wrote at least 2 books, commented in the affirmative on JPII’s consecration of Russia and attempted to meet with these 3rd secret detractors to set the record staight. Fr. Gruner was one of these detractors, yet he was a con man and full of theatrics and denials about the meeting. The story of her meeting with him is a story of a grifter trying to keep his deception going. i.e. He shows 2 hours late, meeting rescheduled, next he shows with 20+ of his best friends for what was supposed to be a private meeting, etc, etc. Fr Gruner in the habitually tardy fashion of the Vatican and the Bishops has since been removed from the priesthood and excommunicated.


6 posted on 05/10/2010 4:44:25 PM PDT by Sporaticus
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To: NYer

Sounds like Opus Dei and the Priory of Sion are still duking it out!


7 posted on 05/10/2010 4:50:09 PM PDT by theDentist (fybo; qwerty ergo typo : i type, therefore i misspelll)
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To: NYer

How could this possibly affect how I’m to live as a Christian for the remainder of my natural life?


8 posted on 05/10/2010 4:50:59 PM PDT by Tax-chick ("Amateurish," agreed Janet Napolitano, the White House amateurishness czar.)
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To: nickcarraway
"Lawyers don't pay taxes?"

??????????

VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- Ten years after the Vatican divulged one of the church's best-kept secrets -- the third part of the message of Fatima -- a small band of skeptics and critics are still questioning the official explanation. More than 100 of them gathered at a hotel not far from the Vatican

Where in there does it mention lawyers?????

9 posted on 05/10/2010 4:53:58 PM PDT by 2aberro
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To: 2aberro

Read it: The first person mentioned, by name, in the story is Christopher A. Ferrara, who is a lawyer in New Jersey. I’m willing to bet that he pays a lot of taxes.


10 posted on 05/10/2010 5:00:45 PM PDT by nickcarraway
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To: nickcarraway
Read it: The first person mentioned, by name, in the story is Christopher A. Ferrara, who is a lawyer in New Jersey. I’m willing to bet that he pays a lot of taxes.

But what the news is about, the CHURCH, does not.........

11 posted on 05/10/2010 5:11:51 PM PDT by 2aberro
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To: NYer

Recent Marian apparitions;

http://www.zeitun-eg.org/stmaridx.htm

http://www.garabandal.us/home.html


12 posted on 05/10/2010 5:12:57 PM PDT by 353FMG (Islam -- America's road to destruction.)
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To: All
On an highly emotional spiritual level there has been a great common-ground meeting place between Rome and Mecca in the town of Fatima in Portugal. To quote a Catholic news organization, "Our Lady of Fatima is really Fatima, daughter of the Prophet Mohammed." On October 23, 1995, Iranian television began running stories that the apparitions in Fatima, Portugal in 1917 were religious phenomena of Muslim origin....

....According to Iranian Television, the woman who appeared to the three shepherd children in 1917 was not the Virgin Mary, mother of Jesus, but Fatima, the daughter of the prophet Mohammed, founder of Islam. Her message was reported to be "I am Fatima, daughter of the Prophet of Islam." This television report has helped launch the growing waves of Muslim pilgrims who have been visiting this Christian site in Portugal in recent years.

Catholics, on the other hand, say that the Blessed Virgin Mary appeared to the three shepherd children. She told them to pray, especially encouraging the prayer of the Rosary. Lucía, the only surviving recipient of the vision, was entrusted with three "secrets," of which the third has never been made public. She recently assured that the third secret was never intended for general proclamation. Pope John Paul II has had a strong devotion to Our Lady of Fatima, especially since the failed assassination attempt of Ali Agca, which occurred precisely on May 13, 1991, the anniversary of the first vision at Fatima (May 13, 1917).
-- From the thread The Papacy and Islam

This brings us to our second point: namely, why the Blessed Mother, in the 20th century should have revealed herself in the significant little village of Fatima, so that to all future generations she would be known as "Our Lady of Fatima." Since nothing ever happens out of Heaven except with a finesse of all details, I believe that the Blessed Virgin chose to be known as "Our Lady of Fatima" as a pledge and a sign of hope to the Moslem people, and as an assurance that they, who show her so much respect, will one day accept her divine Son too.

Evidence to support these views is found in the historical fact that the Moslems occupied Portugal for centuries. At the time when they were finally driven out, the last Moslem chief had a beautiful daughter by the name of Fatima. A Catholic boy fell in love with her, and for him she not only stayed behind when the Moslems left, but even embraced the Faith. The young husband was so much in love with her that he changed the name of the town where he lived to Fatima. Thus, the very place where our Lady appeared in 1917 bears a historical connection to Fatima, the daughter of Mohammed.
-- Archbishop Fulton Sheen, in the book The World's First Love

On the Third Secret, "Fourth Secret(s)", and other visions of Fatima:
Is There Missing Text Of The Third Secret?
'The Fourth Secret of Fatima': Is Pope Benedict's life in danger?
Marian Visionary Warns 2010 Start of Fatima Chastisement (Catholic Caucus ONLY)
Coast-2-Coast AM 10.09.08 Nicholas Gruner -Fatima Secrets-
Fatima: Case Closed
Sister Lucia's Last Moments
Bertone shows original Third Fatima Secret letter on TV
Fatima: The secret's out, despite claims to the contrary
“The Fourth Secret of Fatima”
Two Popes, Two Books -- and Two Major Insights into Famed Third Fatima Secret
The Third Secret of Fatima
Papal Assailant Calls on Vatican to Reveal All Parts of Fatima Secret
Questions ... Regarding The Third Secret of Fatima
Telling Secrets on the Vatican (re: "Third Secret" of Fatima)
Alleged Third Secret Handwriting ... (Fatima, Sister Lucia)
"No More Secrets," Visionary Said in 2001 (Sr. Lucia Confirmed Russia Consecrated to Mary)
On the Lady of Fatima:
Our Lady of Fatima in the Light of History
The Papacy and Islam
Mary And The Moslems(The Virgin Mother Mary & Islam)
Area Catholics to celebrate 90th anniversary of Fatima
New movie about Our Lady of Fatima to be screened in major U.S. cities
Fatima: The new Movie… Deception a-go-go [the Fatima apparitions were really UFO manifestations]
On Catholics joining hands with Muslims:
Malaysia Catholics oppose non-'Allah' Bible
Catholic church in Cologne collects money for a mosque
A Catholic Church (in Venice Italy) Turns Into A Mosque (each Friday)
Muslims seek crisis management plan with Vatican
Pope meets with Muslim scholars, urges better ties
Vatican, Muslims prepare historic meeting with Pope
Muslim-Catholic pact to foster respect
Pope offers 'working meeting' with Muslims
Why Benedict XVI Is So Cautious with the Letter of the 138 Muslims
Muslims and Catholics release mission statement
Muslims, Catholics find common ground
Muslims Get "Prayer Room" at Catholic University
New York Catholics visit mosque, learn about Islam
Catholics Ponder Muslim Coexistence
Pope Invites Muslims to Dialogue, Slams "Holy Wars"(Hooray for the Pope!)
Archbshp Sheen's Prophetic warning of 50 years ago: Mary and the Moslems; The Significance of Fatima
OUR LADY AND ISLAM: HEAVEN’S PEACE PLAN

From the Catechism of the Catholic Church:

841 The Church's relationship with the Muslims. "The plan of salvation also includes those who acknowledge the Creator, in the first place amongst whom are the Muslims; these profess to hold the faith of Abraham, and together with us they adore the one, merciful God, mankind's judge on the last day."

13 posted on 05/10/2010 5:44:19 PM PDT by Alex Murphy (Pretentiousness is so beneath me.)
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To: NYer

Oh brother! Now we are going to see Tom Hanks do a movie called the “The Great Fatima Conspiracy.”


14 posted on 05/10/2010 6:37:46 PM PDT by etradervic (It's the People's Seat ! http://www.toomeyforsenate.com)
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To: Tax-chick

I’m in your camp on this one.


15 posted on 05/10/2010 7:36:50 PM PDT by mockingbyrd (Remember in November.)
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To: Sporaticus
Fr Gruner in the habitually tardy fashion of the Vatican and the Bishops has since been removed from the priesthood and excommunicated.

Please provide a verifiable link for this assertion (and not a threatened or ipso facto "excommunication").

16 posted on 05/10/2010 8:32:59 PM PDT by steve86 (Acerbic by nature, not nurture)
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To: NYer
I believe there have been a great many cover-ups and whitewashings by the Vatican of the true warnings of Our Lady to the shepherd children -- beginning with Pope John XXIII not making the Third Secret public by 1960, as Our Lady had requested -- and including the dismissive commentaries written by Card. Bertone and Card Ratzinger in 2000.

I am not a graphics expert, but I have seen a handwriting specialist's analysis that the Vatican's 2000 "Third Secret" was not written in Sister Lucia's handwriting.

I should qualify that as the Sister Lucia who was one of the three shepherd visionaries -- since there are several reports that the Vatican also created a doppleganger of Sister Lucia to pose for photos with Pope John Paul II and to "verify" the Vatican's "Third Secret."

17 posted on 05/10/2010 9:10:06 PM PDT by Dajjal (Justice Robert Jackson was wrong -- the Constitution IS a suicide pact.)
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To: steve86
Please provide a verifiable link for this assertion (and not a threatened or ipso facto "excommunication"). I'm sorry, do you have me on retainer? If not, I'm not used to cold steely demands. Frankly, if you want to be led by, influenced, or give money to Gruner have at it.
18 posted on 05/11/2010 12:19:41 AM PDT by Sporaticus
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To: Alex Murphy
According to Iranian Television, the woman who appeared to the three shepherd children in 1917 was not the Virgin Mary, mother of Jesus, but Fatima, the daughter of the prophet Mohammed, founder of Islam. Her message was reported to be "I am Fatima, daughter of the Prophet of Islam."

According to Iranian TV, the Jews plan the genocide of humanity.

19 posted on 05/11/2010 6:17:46 AM PDT by Campion
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To: Sporaticus

(You’re a) fraud.


20 posted on 05/11/2010 7:44:02 AM PDT by steve86 (Acerbic by nature, not nurture)
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