Catholics, too, haven’t been short of digging up old prophecies that seem to apply to modern times, while noting the explosion of mystical phenomena all over the world. Sign of the times, they echo.
In the Catholic world, apocalyptic concerns have raised a lot of questions if not conflict on the events at Fatima, Portugal where the Blessed Mother appeared to three children in 1917. There were revelations from the Blessed Mother there, including one which was revealed (partially?) only during the recent pontificate of John Paul II, about seer Sister Lucia’s vision of a man in white walking amidst the corpses of slain priests and being himself killed before a cross on top of a hill.
Some said the man in white was John Paul II who survived an attempt on his life in May, 1981, but many suspected Sister Lucia did not reveal all that was told her by the Blessed Mother. Even before the man-in-white prophecy was belatedly revealed, there were already published accounts on what supposedly still had to be revealed from the Fatima apparitions. One told of a great punishment that would wipe out much of humankind, so that when nothing of this was later told, suspicions of some sort of whitewash teemed.
Alas, for those with appetite for the more sensational, there is no shortage of warnings from other mystic events that have happened or even continue to happen in modern times: the apparitions in Garabandal in Spain in the 1960’s, the continuing apparitions in Medjugorje starting 1981, the apparitions in Akita in Japan in the 1970’s, and many more.
The Blessed Mother’s messages in Akita, approved by the Church as worthy of belief, should be enough for apocalyptic shock: fire falling from the sky and wiping out a great part of humanity.
And who should miss out on Jesus Christ’s apparitions to St. Faustina Kowalska of Poland? From this apparition was born the Divine Mercy novena and prayers amid another wave of warnings and prophecies. From the apparitions come messages to complete the repertoire of the apocalyptic thrill-seeker.
To Saint Faustina, Jesus said: “You will prepare the world for My final coming. Speak to the world about My mercy… it is a sign for the end times. After it will come the day of justice.”
Also to Saint Faustina, the Blessed Mother also said: “You have to speak to the world about His great mercy and prepare the world for the Second Coming of Him who will come not as a merciful Saviour but as a Just Judge. Oh how terrible is that day! Determined is the day of justice, the day of divine wrath. The angels tremble before it. Speak to souls about this great mercy while it is still the time for granting mercy.”
For those who have become impatient over end-time prophecies, here is what the Lord Jesus had told Saint Faustina: “I am prolonging the time of mercy for the sake of (sinners), but woe to them if they do not recognize this time of My visitation.”
Then, too, read the following words of Jesus to Saint Faustina: “Let all men now approach the throne of My mercy with absolute confidence. Sometime before the last days of the final justice arrive, there will be given to mankind a great sign in the heavens of this sort: all the light of the heavens will be totally extinguished… there will be great darkness over the whole earth. Then a great sign of the cross will appear in the sky. From the openings from where the hands and feet of the Saviour were nailed will come forth great lights which will light up the earth for a period of time. This will happen before the very final days…”
In Garabandal as well as in Medjugorje, the visionaries seemed to have referred to this event that would enable all people, including pagans, to see themselves as God sees them. Then would follow a miracle as another means for converting the remaining unrepentant. And then the chastisement.
Here, some people reread the warnings from Akita. With much concern.
