By Father Mieczysław Piotrowski TChr,
Love One Another! 8/2007 → Catholic Church
John Paul II reminds us that the warning and urgent call to conversion
contained in Our Lady’s message at Fatima is “not limited
to one time. The call must be taken up by every generation in accordance
with the ‘signs of the times.’ We must return to it
constantly, respond to it ever anew.”
John
Paul II reminds us that the warning and urgent call to conversion
contained in Our Lady’s message at Fatima is “not limited
to one time. The call must be taken up by every generation in accordance
with the ‘signs of the times.’ We must return to it
constantly, respond to it ever anew.”
Given the situation of the world today, the Fatima message has
lost none of its sense of urgency. In her three-part secret, Our
Blessed Mother reminds us that God, and only God, will satisfy our
thirst for happiness. God created us for Himself. He desires that
we share perfect happiness with Him. For our part, we must do everything
in our power to join ourselves with Him by embarking on the hard
and narrow path of faith. Our Lady’s message of July 13, 1917
is quite simply the message of the Gospels.
1. The first part contains a terrifying vision of hell. Here
Our Blessed Mother recalls the truth of the Gospel that in rejecting
God, we actually choose hell. Eternal damnation is an objective
reality to which we are inevitably drawn when we live as though
God did not exist, allow ourselves to be guided by the logic of
selfishness, reject absolute moral norms, and treat evil as good
and good as evil. Eternal damnation is the worst evil that can
befall us. Of our own free will we can bring ourselves to such
a state of hardness of heart that we end up hating God and freely
choosing hell at the moment of death…
2. The second part of the secret reveals the most effective means
of avoiding hell. It consists in deep faith, which we can best
acquire through devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. Our
Lady knew better than anyone else the pain associated with the
dark night of faith. She believed heroically. In situations that
were humanly hopeless, she believed with “a hope against
hope”. She is, therefore, our best teacher and guide along
the path that takes us to the foot of the Cross. By placing ourselves
at the complete disposal of Mary, we learn to believe and trust
in God at all times. This trust expresses itself in a) turning
from sin; b) daily prayer, including the rosary and the reading
of Scripture; c) monthly sacramental confession and frequent reception
of Jesus in the Eucharist.
3. The third part of the secret deals with the historical consequences
of the modern crisis of faith and morals and the potential results
of rejecting the Fatima message. Since the call to penance and
conversion contained in the message has gone largely unheeded,
we have actually witnessed the fulfillment of a large part of
the Fatima prophecies. In her letter to the Holy Father, dated
May 12, 1982, Sister Lucia, the witness of the Fatima revelations,
observes: “Even though we have not yet seen the entire fulfillment
of the final part of this prophecy, we can see that we are moving
toward it with rapid strides. It will come if we do not turn from
the path of sin, hate, vengeance, injustice, abuse of human rights,
immorality, violence, etc. I do not say that it is God who punishes
us in this way; on the contrary, it is we who visit this punishment
upon ourselves. God warns us patiently and recalls us to the path
of righteousness, all the while respecting the freedom of choice
He has given us. That is why it is we who bear responsibility.”
The published text of the Fatima secret reads like a prophetic
vision. Pope Benedict XVI (then Cardinal Ratzinger) explains in
his accompanying commentary: “The angel with the flaming sword
on the Blessed Mother’s left recalls similar images in the
Book of Revelation. This represents the threat of judgement that
looms over the world. Today the prospect of the world being consumed
by a sea of fire no longer seems farfetched fantasy: man himself,
by his inventions, has forged the flaming sword….The place
of action is described in three symbols: a steep mountain, a great
city reduced to rubble, and a large, rough-hewn cross.” A
‘bishop dressed in white’ along with other bishops,
priests, men and women religious make their way toward the cross.
Before reaching it, the Holy Father passes through a great, half-ruined
city. Trembling, walking haltingly, afflicted with pain and sorrow,
he prays for the souls of the corpses he meets on the way. On reaching
the hilltop, he kneels down at the foot of the great cross and is
killed by a group of soldiers who fire on him with bullets and arrows.
One after another, bishops, priests, monks, nuns, and laypeople
of various ranks and positions are also killed (The Third Secret).
Pope Benedict XVI goes on to observe: “in the Via Crucis
of an entire century, the figure of the Pope has a special goal
to play. In his arduous ascent up the mountain we can clearly see
a convergence of different Popes. From Pius X to [John Paul II],
all shared in the sufferings of the century and strove to go forward,
through all the anguish, up the path that leads to the Cross. In
the vision, the Pope is killed along with the martyrs. When, after
the assassination attempt of May 13, 1981, the Holy Father had the
text of the third part of the ‘secret’ brought to him,
was it not inevitable that he should see his own fate in it? He
had been very close to death, and he himself explained his survival
in the following words: ‘…it was a mother’s hand
that guided the bullet’s path, and in his throes the Pope
halted at the threshold of death’ (John Paul II, Meditation
from the Policlinico Gemelli to the Italian Bishops, May 13, 1994).
Yet the fact that ‘a mother’s hand’ deflected
the fateful bullet shows again that there is no immutable destiny,
that faith and prayer are forces that can influence history, and
that ultimately prayer is more powerful than bullets, and faith
more powerful than armies.”
Given the 90 years that have elapsed since the Fatima revelations,
we can safely state that the vision described in the third part
of the secret represents the tumultuous events of the twentieth
century. The great crisis of faith characterizing that tormented
century led to the seizure of political power by militant atheists
of every political stripe – Communist, Fascist, and Masonic.
This atheism brought about the most heinous crimes of genocide in
history, the moral disintegration of nations, the decline of culture,
and horrific enslavement resulting from the trampling of individual
human rights. More Christians died in that century as a result of
hatred of their faith than in all the preceding centuries since
the birth of Christ. We have only to recall the extraordinarily
bloody persecutions of the Catholic Church in Mexico (1926-1930)
conducted by a militantly atheistic government of Masons. Thousands
of priests and laypeople were murdered for the sole reason that
they lived their faith. A similar situation took place in Spain
(1936-1939) where the atheistic authorities, both Communist and
Fascist, murdered tens of thousands of believers, including thirteen
bishops, 4184 priests, 2648 religious brothers and sisters. Both
Communism and Nazism viewed the Catholic Church as their number-one
enemy, which had to be eradicated. The ultimate goal of both the
Communists and the Nazis was the annihilation of Christianity. Hence
the ruthless and bestial murder of the clergy and ordinary believers
in the Soviet Gulags and Nazi concentration camps.
The third Fatima secret is therefore mainly concerned with the
state of our faith. Its loss is the worst tragedy that man and entire
nations can experience. It is a far greater threat than nuclear
war and any other catastrophe. It is also a clear warning against
all forms of atheism. Rejection of God and His laws, be it through
the atheism of Communism, or Fascism, or Satanism, or that propagated
by the New Age, or the practical atheism underlying the most widespread
mindset of living life as if God did not exist – all this
represents the gravest threat to mankind. We see the present crisis
of faith in the western world in its contempt for human life, the
mass slaughter of the unborn, euthanasia, sexual depravity, contraception,
rampant divorce, drug addiction, and so on. The repudiation of the
Christian system of values always leads to murderous totalitarian
power and ultimately – to hell on earth and self-extinction.
That is what makes all those who promote abortion, euthanasia, pornography,
and moral relativism so dangerous to the world.
As John Paul II observes in his encyclical Veritatis Splendor:
“Today, when many countries have seen the fall of ideologies
which bound politics to a totalitarian conception of the world –
Marxism being the foremost of these – there is no less grave
a danger that the fundamental rights of the human person will be
denied and that the religious yearnings which arise in the heart
of every human being will be absorbed once again into politics.
This is the risk of an alliance between democracy and ethical relativism,
which would remove any sure moral reference point from political
and social life and, on a deeper level, make the acknowledgment
of truth impossible. Indeed, if there is no ultimate truth to guide
and direct political activity, then ideas and convictions can easily
be manipulated for reasons of power. As history demonstrates, a
democracy without values easily turns into open or thinly disguised
totalitarianism” (101). The third secret is therefore an especially
urgent warning to the world at this juncture of history.
The second part of the Fatima secret mentions certain nations disappearing
altogether. This has an ominous ring, summoning us to conversion.
Neglect of prayer, ignoring the sacraments, living as if God did
not exist, practical materialism, moral decline — all these
lead to open rebellion against God and the moral and biological
degeneration of entire peoples. Many today refuse to listen to the
voice of their conscience, their common sense, and what Christ tells
us in the Gospels and through His Church. The modern democracies
have allowed themselves to be deceived by the mass media, which
promote atheism, moral degeneration, and the culture of death.
It is becoming increasingly clear that our democracies (old and
new) are succumbing to ideological manipulation. In presidential
and parliamentary elections, citizens are blithely voting in practical
atheists who favor legalized abortion, pornography, same-sex unions,
etc. They do so in flagrant disregard of the teachings of Jesus
and His Church. When people reject the moral absolutes of the Ten
Commandments, and embrace ethical relativism, they bring on the
most appalling practical consequences. Criminal acts and radical
abuses of freedom follow as a matter of course.
Will we heed
the warning contained in the third Fatima secret — that atheism
in all its forms is the gravest threat to us all? Recent history
teaches us that Christians in Germany did not listen to the Fatima
message. Blinded by the alluring promises of Hitler and his party,
they quite legally and democratically handed power over to him.
We cannot forget that those who voted for him bear a moral responsibility
for that choice and its terrible consequences.
Yet we must not think that the fulfillment of the Fatima prophecy
is immutable. The future has not been decided. Everything depends
on our attitude, our free choice. If we heed the call for conversion,
then the prophesied disasters will not take place. If we do not
heed it, we will certainly suffer the consequences of our sinful
choices. God’s justice works itself out in His allowing man
to taste the fruit his own sins. The prophetic vision of the third
Fatima secret warns and reminds us that the future of humanity depends
on the free choice of men and women, on their declaring themselves
for or against God. This sober warning with its call to penance
and conversion is meant to mobilize our will and strength to take
the only logical step — the way of faith, penance and constant
prayer. It is the only way of avoiding hatred, wars, bloodshed,
and the moral and biological disintegration of our nations. Only
in this way can we protect others and ourselves from eternal damnation.
The Holy Father tells us that the most important component of the
Fatima message is the call “to pray, pray, and pray again”
(Fatima, May 13, 1982). Thus, John Paul II reminds us that people
and nations that pray, are reconciled with God, and thus, enjoying
the greatest treasure, have no cause to fear for the future.
The Fatima call to conversion is aimed at you and me. It is a call
to strike out on the path of faith toward perfect happiness. Our
personal consent and decision to follow Christ is all that is needed.
“And the Lord gave me to know” writes St. Faustina,
“that the secret depends on me, on my free and fully informed
consent, that God waits for my word — my consent. And I replied:
if You abide in me, then whatever You desire, I shall surrender
to Your will.”
Father Mieczysław Piotrowski TChr
The article was published with the permission from "Love One Another!"
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