By Modesto P. Sa-onoy
There are voices among the Catholic faithful that seemed to be lost for lack of clear guidance in the confusions within the Church today. Many succumbed to the mandate of the government and church leaders to close the churches, reduce attendance and accept the Mass online as a real substitute for the Holy Eucharist.
They accepted these “new normal” because their pastors have acceded to these restrictions. Except for one bishop who said that the Mass online is not real and cannot substitute for the personal attendance at Mass – the others had remained silent. Perhaps there are but their voices had not been heard.
The result is that although churches had opened and spaces are available even with social distancing, the Mass on Sundays had few attendance. Baptism and marriage in the church are hardly heard when these can be ministered within the government protocol although with little or no fanfare. The party celebration is more important than the sacrament.
Last August 15, LifeSiteNews released a lengthy article by Fr. Frank Unterhalt, a German diocesan priest and speaker of a group of priests called Communio veritatis. This piece deals with the current crisis in the Church and linking this crisis to the message of Our Lady of Fatima.
The article quotes Cardinal Ciappi, a theologian of the Papal House (1955-1989), who stated in 1995: “In the Third Secret it is predicted, among other things, that the great apostasy in the Church will begin at the top.”
Citing several sources, Fr. Unterhalt summed up different aspects to help us see that the Church has been infiltrated for quite some time now by anti-Catholic forces. He quoted the former Communist Bella Dodd who admitted to having helped infiltrate the Church in the U.S. with 1,100 communist priests.
Fr. Unterhalt also quoted George Weigel who, after studying the communist archives, described in 2011 “how the communist governments and secret services infiltrated the Vatican and used diplomatic relations with the Holy See to promote their interests and to strengthen their efforts to penetrate the highest levels of the Catholic Church’s leadership, an approach that many high-ranking dignitaries in the Vatican apparently did not see.”
I cited this claim some years back and the assertion of Cardinal Zen of Hong Kong that the Catholics in China were betrayed by top Vatican diplomats who relented and gave the Chinese government powers over the Church in China, including matters pertaining only to the church like the appointment of bishops.
Pope Benedict XVI announced in 2010 that the Third Secret of Fatima is about the fact that “the greatest persecution of the Church comes not from her enemies without, but arises from sin within the Church.”
There is an ongoing debate whether Rome has even fully published all the words of Sister Lucia of Fatima relating to the Third Secret despite the official publication of this secret in Rome in June 2000. The claim of Cardinal Ciappi about apostasy at the top of the Church is not contained in the officially published Third Secret.
On the other hand, LifeSiteNews quoted, Cardinal Silvio Oddi, the secretary of Archbishop Angelo Giuseppe Roncalli – later Pope John XXIII – who said in Paris in 1990: “I would not be surprised if the Third Secret alluded to dark times for the Church: grave confusions and troubling apostasies within Catholicism itself … If we consider the grave crisis we have lived through since the [Second Vatican] Council, the signs that this prophecy has been fulfilled do not seem to be lacking.”
Fr. Unterhalt reminds us that both the Book of Revelation and the Catechism of the Catholic Church speak about the loss of Faith at the end of times and of the final trials of the Church. He quoted the catechism as saying: “Before Christ’s second coming, the Church must pass through a final trial that will shake the faith of many believers. The persecution that accompanies her pilgrimage on earth will unveil the ‘mystery of iniquity’ in the form of a religious deception offering men an apparent solution to their problems at the price of apostasy from the truth.”
Fr. Unterhalt encouraged us to remain close to Our Lady, our hope, quoting her: My Immaculate Heart will be your refuge and the way which leads you to God!
