Infiltration

  Cardinal Bea would reveal himself as a Modernist. He openly fought against the imposition of the anti-Modernist oath on clergy at Vatican II. He loved the new “ecumenism” and worked with unbridled determination to appease Jewish rabbis and intellectuals and to remove anything they deemed anti-Semitic from Catholic teaching and liturgy (he would later draft for the Second Vatican Council Nostra aetate — the controversial document on the new ecumenism). Bea also advocated the radical liturgical changes being suggested by Bugnini. In fact, Bea had produced a new “Bea Psalter,” based on the Hebrew psalms, that would effectively destroy Gregorian chant, based on the traditional Latin Psalter derived from the Greek Septuagint.

  As in The Lord of the Rings, J. R. R. Tolkien depicted a dying Théoden, king of Rohan, as under the evil influence of Gríma Wormtongue and Saruman, so the dying Pius XII was truly under the spell of these three false friends: Bugnini, the liturgist; Montini, the secretary; and Bea, the confessor. Ill news is an ill guest. Like King Théoden, his relief would come not by Gandalf but by Gandolfo.

  63 Bernard Doering, The Philosopher and the Provocateur: The Correspondence of Jacques Maritain and Saul Alinsky (Notre Dame: University of Notre Dame Press, 1994), xx.

  64 Saul Alinsky, Rules for Radicals (New York: Vintage Books, 1972), 4.

  65 Doering, The Philosopher and the Provocateur, 110.

  66 Bernard Doering, “Jacques Maritain and His Two Authentic Revolutionaries,” Thomistic Papers (Houston, TX: Center for Thomistic Studies, 1987), 96.

  67 P. David Finks, The Radical Vision of Saul Alinsky (New York: Paulist Press, 1984), 115.

  68 Doering, The Philosopher and the Provocateur, 79.

  69 Finks, The Radical Vision of Saul Alinsky, 115.

  14

  Mysterious Conclave of 1958

  Pope Pius XII died at Castel Gandolfo on 9 October 1958. Earlier that week, he suffered extreme stomach pain, and his doctor tried unsuccessfully to pump his stomach. He was given Last Rites and prepared for death. The night before he died, he looked at the stars and said: “Look, how beautiful, how great is our Lord.” At 3:52 a.m. he smiled, lowered his head, and died. Mother Pascalina recorded that the doctor stated: “The Holy Father did not die because of any specific illness. He was completely exhausted. He was overworked beyond limit. His heart was healthy, his lungs were good. He could have lived another 20 years, had he spared himself.”70

  The papal conclave of 1958 lasted from 25 to 28 October. Fifty-one of the fifty-three living cardinals participated. The two missing cardinals — József Mindszenty and Aloysius Stepinac — had been effectively banned from traveling to Rome by the Communists. Thirty-five votes would attain the two-thirds majority required for electing the pope.

  The conservative cardinals supported Giuseppe Cardinal Siri of Genoa, who was young at the age of fifty-two. Siri also seemed to have been delegated by Pope Pius XII as his preferred successor. The liberal cardinals supported Giacomo Cardinal Lercaro of Bologna at the ideal age of sixty-seven. The compromise candidate was Angelo Cardinal Roncalli, patriarch of Venice, who possessed more than twenty-five years of international diplomatic service in Bulgaria, Turkey, and France. At the old age of seventy-seven, Cardinal Roncalli would be a short-term pope. Most agreed that Cardinal Siri or Cardinal Roncalli would exit the conclave as pope.

  There were no ballots the first day, just discussions. On the second day, Sunday, 26 October 1958, after allegedly four ballots, white smoke billowed out from the chimney of the Sistine Chapel at 6 p.m., signaling the election of a pope. The white smoke continued for a full five minutes. Not only did the smoke signal a papal election, but the bells of Saint Peter’s Basilica rang out to confirm it. Vatican Radio announced: “There can be absolutely no doubt. A pope has been elected.” The Swiss Guard took their posts, and people gathered in the piazza of Saint Peter’s to lay eyes on the new pope and receive his first benediction. The crowd waited for half an hour, and no pope appeared. Vatican Radio announced that a mistake had been made. The crowds dispersed. Non habemus Papam.

  The legend is that Cardinal Siri was, in fact, elected that day and that he accepted the papacy, choosing (or proposing) the name Gregory XVII. Then there was an intervention by the French cardinals or an outside communication that harm would happen to Siri or his family. Other legends state that the Russians threatened “great destruction” if the anti-Communist Siri was elected. Former FBI consultant Paul L. Williams claims to have seen FBI documents asserting that Cardinal Siri was elected, but these documents either no longer exist or are still classified.71 We will never know what happened on the second day of the conclave. The white smoke and bells testify that a pope was elected and that some mistake or misunderstanding occurred. Another version is that the camerlengo Cardinal Masella invalidated the election for some reason.

  On the night of Monday, 27 October, a penumbral lunar eclipse appeared over Rome from 5:13 p.m. until 6:36 p.m. The next day, the cardinals elected Cardinal Roncalli, who appeared on the balcony of Saint Peter’s as Pope John XXIII — the name of an antipope from the days of the Western Schism. In his old age, he was deemed a transitory pope, but he proved to be one of the most revolutionary popes in Catholic history.

  70 Pascalina Lehnert, Ich durfte Ihm Dienen, Erinnerungen an Papst Pius XII (Würzburg: Naumann, 1986), 91.

  71 Paul L. Williams, The Vatican Exposed (New York: Prometheus Books, 2003), 90–92.

  15

  Pope John XXIII Opens the Third Secret

  The three persons of influence over the ill days of Pope Pius XII — Bugnini, Montini, and Bea — rose to prominence under Pope John XXIII. One of the Pope’s first actions as pope in 1958 was to elevate Montini to cardinal.

  On 25 January 1959 — about three months after his election — Pope John XXIII, to the shock of some of the cardinals, announced his intention to call a general council. The secretary of state, Cardinal Tardini, and the newly made Cardinal Montini were enthusiastically supportive. Even more interestingly, the two eminent conservative cardinals Ruffini and Ottaviani supported the idea of a council to reform the Church.

  On 17 August 1959, Pope John XXIII had the Third Secret brought to him where he was summering at Castel Gandalfo. Pope John opened the Third Secret of Fatima, even though Lúcia had instructed that it “be opened and read to the world either at her death or in 1960, whichever came first.”72 This is why Pope Pius XII, who had custody of the sealed envelope, had never opened it or read it.

  Pope John XXIII disobeyed the inscription. He opened it one year early.

  When the sealed envelope arrived, Pope John hesitated and said, “I am waiting to read it with my confessor.” We cannot be certain, but his confessor at this time may have been Monsignor Alfredo Cavagna.73 The Portuguese translator was Monsignor Paulo Jose Tavarez of the Secretariat of State. Cardinal Ottaviani also read the Third Secret, either at this initial reading or later.

  Afterward, John XXIII responded only: “This does not concern my pontificate,” and, contrary to the instruction of Lúcia and the Blessed Virgin Mary said that it would not be published to the world in 1960. The pope, with optimistic hope for fellowship with the world, couldn’t bring himself to endorse the ramblings of “prophets of doom.” Pope John would silence the pessimistic apocalypse of the Fatima message.

  On 8 February 1960, a Vatican press release stated that the Third Secret would not be published in 1960 as expected and ended with this: “Although the Church recognizes the Fatima apparitions, she does not desire to take responsibility for guaranteeing the veracity of the words the three shepherd children said the Virgin Mary had addressed to them.” In other words, Pope John XXIII doubted the words of three children.

  Cardinal Ottaviani related that Pope John XXIII filed away the Third Secret “in one of those archives which are like a very deep, dark well, to the bottom of which papers fall and no one is able to see them anymore.”74 This may be the reason why so many assume that there are two parts or two versions of the Third Se
cret.

  Does the Third Secret Have Two Parts?

  There are three competing theories about the content of the Third Secret. One is that it is the apocalyptic text released by the Vatican in the year 2000. The second theory is that the text of 2000 is the first part, but that another one-page part exists or has existed. Third, there is the belief that the Third Secret was lost or destroyed in 1959 or 1960 by Pope John XXIII and that it will never be known.

  Archbishop Loris Francesco Capovilla, private secretary to Pope John XXIII in 1959, claimed that he was present and saw Pope John XXIII break open the intact seal of the envelope in 1959 and read the Third Secret. Capovilla also stated that he himself read the Third Secret and that it matches the secret released by the Catholic Church in 2000.

  The problem with Capovilla’ s testimony is that Bishop John Venancio previously testified that the Third Secret was on one sheet of paper. Yet the Third Secret released in 2000 is on four sheets of paper. Moreover, we know from Lúcia’s fourth memoir that the Third Secret begins, “In Portugal the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved.” But the version of the Third Secret released in 2000 does not contain this phrase except in a footnote.

  Furthermore, we know that the Third Secret of Fatima has two parts, one about the pope and one that regards the final words of the Second Secret: “In Portugal, the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved.” As explained previously, Pope Pius XII ordered Father Joseph Schweigl to interview Sister Lúcia about the Third Secret in 1952. Father Schweigl said, “I cannot reveal anything of what I learned at Fatima concerning the Third Secret, but I can say that it has two parts: one concerns the pope. The other, logically — although I must say nothing — would have to be the continuation of the words ‘In Portugal, the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved.’ ”75

  This testimony by Father Schweigl gives rise to the belief of a two-part Third Secret: 3a and 3b. This conforms to the First and Second Secrets, since each of them has a complicated revelation followed by the Blessed Virgin Mary directly explaining what she means and desires. The same would be true of the Third Secret. There should be a vision or revelation followed by the Blessed Virgin Mary directly explaining the vision and what she desires.

  The Third Secret document released by the Catholic Church in 2000 is four pages long, and it is about the suffering and murder of the pope. I reproduce here completely and precisely the Third Secret published by Cardinal Ratzinger on behalf of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith on 26 June 2000:

  The third part of the secret revealed at the Cova da Iria-Fátima, on 13 July 1917.

  I write in obedience to you, my God, who command me to do so through his Excellency the Bishop of Leiria and through your Most Holy Mother and mine.

  After the two parts which I have already explained, at the left of Our Lady and a little above, we saw an Angel with a flaming sword in his left hand. Flashing, it gave out flames that looked as though they would set the world on fire, but they died out in contact with the splendor that Our Lady radiated towards him from her right hand. Pointing to the earth with his right hand, the Angel cried out in a loud voice: ‘Penance, Penance, Penance!’ And we saw in an immense light that is God ‘something similar to how people appear in a mirror when they pass in front of it’ a Bishop dressed in White. “We had the impression that it was the Holy Father.”

  Other bishops, priests, men, and women religious were going up a steep mountain, at the top of which there was a big Cross of rough-hewn trunks as of a cork-tree with the bark. Before reaching there, the Holy Father passed through a big city half in ruins; and half trembling with halting step, afflicted with pain and sorrow, he prayed for the souls of the corpses he met on his way. Having reached the top of the mountain, on his knees at the foot of the big Cross he was killed by a group of soldiers who fired bullets and arrows at him, and in the same way there died one after another the other bishops, priests, men, and women religious, and various lay people of different ranks and positions. Beneath the two arms of the Cross there were two Angels, each with a crystal aspersorium in his hand, in which they gathered up the blood of the Martyrs and with it sprinkled the souls that were making their way to God.76

  The vision depicts an angel with fiery sword to the left of Our Lady calling out, “Penance. Penance. Penance.” A “bishop in white” who is presumed to be the pope is then shot down, along with “bishops, priests, men, and women religious, and various lay people.” The vision is very difficult to interpret and lacks the statement “In Portugal, the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved.”

  This is the revelatory part of the Third Secret, or what I call Secret 3a. Yet there must be a second part of the Third Secret, as Schweigl says, in which the Blessed Virgin Mary explains what is meant by this vision. Furthermore, we know from Lúcia that it begins with “In Portugal, the dogma of the Faith will always be preserved.” And to date, the Catholic Church has never released this one-page document of words by the Blessed Virgin Mary, beginning with “In Portugal . . .” This means that there is another section (Secret 3b) of the Third Secret of Fatima that is not yet public.

  To substantiate the existence of a Secret 3b, there is an interview with Cardinal Ratzinger published in the 11 November 1984 edition of Jesus magazine. Cardinal Ratzinger claimed to have read the Third Secret and said that it is about “the importance of the Last Things” and about the “dangers threatening the faith and the life of the Christian and therefore of the world.” Ratzinger further explained that “if it is not made public, at least for the time being, it is in order to prevent religious prophecy from being mistaken for a quest for the sensational.”77 And yet the version of the Third Secret released in 2000 contains nothing about the dangers threatening the faith of the Christian.

  In an interview with Charles Fiore, Malachi Martin provided another account of the reading of the Third Secret. Martin claimed that while serving as secretary to Cardinal Bea, he happened upon this papal reading of the Third Secret in 1959: “I cooled my heels in the corridor outside the Holy Father’s apartments, while my boss, Cardinal Bea, was inside debating with the Holy Father, and with a group of other bishops and priests, and two young Portuguese seminarians, who translated the letter, a single page, written in Portuguese, for all those in the room.”78 Here again we see that the Third Secret is on a “single page” and not four pages, as is the case of the Third Secret documents released in 2000.

  Malachi Martin presents certain details that contradict our known facts about the initial reading by John XXIII. The initial reading happened at Castel Gandolfo. Martin places himself “in the corridor outside the Holy Father’s apartment” back at the Vatican. Martin also refers to two Portuguese seminarians, whereas the official account has one Portuguese priest. Martin also places his exposure to the Third Secret in February 1960: “Early a.m., February 1960 — before I read it, I had to take a vow not to reveal it. It would be a shock, no doubt, some would become very angry.” Either Malachi Martin has invented a sensationalized version to place himself into the events, or he was present at a second reading that included Cardinal Bea and perhaps Cardinal Ottaviani (who seems to have read it later). Martin would not reveal what he claims to have read, but he did reply in this interview:

  I consider Fatima to be the key event in the declining fortune of the Roman Catholic organization for the near future of the Church in the third millennium, the defining event. In Rome there are men among the great with strong wills, all their lives engaged in macro-government, not merely in religion, but in state. They would not touch this with a ten-foot pole. Pope John Paul II is an ardent supporter of a one world government. He wants to bring in his brand of Christianity, of course. To the UN he said, “I am a member of humanity.” This is no longer Pius IX and Pius X, who said, “I am the vicar of Christ.” Completely absent is the Kingship of Christ.

  For reasons I have documented elsewhere, I do not trust Malachi Martin unreservedly, but his testimony does seem to confor
m to the words of those who had close access to Lúcia and to the Third Secret:

  The Secret of Fatima speaks neither of atomic bombs, nor nuclear warheads, nor Pershing missiles, nor SS-20’s. Its content concerns only our faith. To identify the Secret with catastrophic announcements or with a nuclear holocaust is to deform the meaning of the message. The loss of faith of a continent is worse than the annihilation of a nation; and it is true that faith is continually diminishing in Europe.79

  Thus it is quite possible that in this intermediate period which is in question [the time after 1960], the text makes concrete references to the crisis of the Faith of the Church and to the negligence of the pastors themselves.

  — Father Joaquin Alonso, C.M.F., official Fatima archivist80

  It [the Third Secret] has nothing to do with Gorbachev. The Blessed Virgin was alerting us against apostasy in the Church.

  — Cardinal Silvio Oddi81

  In the Third Secret it is foretold, among other things, that the great apostasy in the Church will begin at the top.”

  — Cardinal Mario Luigi Ciappi, O.P.82

  The full Third Secret describes the great apostasy in the Church.

  72 Joaquin Alonso, La Verdad sobre el Secreto de Fatima (Madrid: Centro Mariano, 1976), 46–47.

  73 “Confessor of John XXIII Dies,” New York Times, May 1, 1970, 35.

  74 Alfredo Cardinal Ottaviani, “Allocution on 11 February 1967 at the Antonianum in Rome.” Recorded in the Acta of the Pontifical International Marian Academy.