A dramatic elevation
of Marian devotion occurred in France during the 1840s and 1850s.
On September 19, 1846, the Virgin
Mary apparently appeared to two shepherd children on the mount of La Salette
in southeastern France. In her messages, Mary criticized the sinful behavior
of the people and predicted further calamities - a major crop failure had
already hit the area in 1846 - unless people repented of their wicked ways.
A shrine was built. And crowds of pilgrims came. This created even more
excitement and religious fervor.
A dozen years later in the small village of Lourdes in southwestern France,
Mary announced to Bernadette: "I am the Immaculate Conception." A grotto
was constructed there and its reputation for miraculous cures soon made
Lourdes a premier center for pilgrims. The Virgin's appearances and messages
confirmed to many that the age of Mary had indeed arrived. Today about 5.5
million visit the shrine annually.
Similar appearances have increased around the world. Apparitions of the
Virgin Mary have been claimed in dozens, if not hundreds, of different locations,
from Lipa City in the Philippines to Bayside, New York, to Medjugorje, Yugoslavia.
Always there are "miracles" and "warnings" to the world of coming judgment,
with the promise that through the rosary and "Our Lady's" intervention peace
can come.
The most famous and well documented miracle of all occurred at Fatima, Portugal,
in October 1917. According to Roman Catholic claims, between May and October
of 1917, the Blessed Virgin Mary appeared six times to three children -
Lucia, Jacinta, and Francisco - in the Portuguese village of Fatima. The
initial appearances attracted little or no attention, but by the time of
the last one up to 50,000 people were present. Many people claimed to see
the sun dance in the sky, but at no time did anyone but the three children
see the person who was appearing.
Consider the events at Fatima and the doctrines they present ... what is
the meaning behind them? When one examines the events at Fatima in detail,
it turns out that they presented or reaffirmed a number of distinctly Roman
Catholic doctrines.
Devotion to the Immaculate
Heart of Mary
The
primary purpose of the apparition was to encourage devotion to the so-called
Immaculate Heart of Mary. In the second appearance, the apparition said,
"Jesus wishes to make use of you to make me known and love. He wants to
establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart." This devotional
practice is related to the cult of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. In the twelfth
century a revolution occurred in the devotional practices of the Roman Catholic
Church; this revolution was inspired by the preaching of Bernard of Clairveaux
and spread widely by Francis of Assisi.
As attention was shifted from our redemption by the Resurrection of the
Lord to a focus on the Passion of the Lord, an erotic element was introduced
in worship and private devotion. The Lord came to be viewed as a companion,
friend, or even husband/lover, as is reflected in the marriage imagery which
was introduced into Western monasticism (in taking their vows, nuns went
through a sort of wedding ceremony, complete with bridal gowns, wedding
rings, etc. with the Lord as the groom). This new devotion stressed the
worshipper's individual union with the Mystic Lover, concentrating on the
pain of the Lord's suffering and trying to arouse emotional feelings by
focusing on His earthly life.
Among the manifestations of this new approach to worship are the Feast of
the Holy Name, special devotions to the Five Wounds of Christ, the Stations
of the Cross, the meditations assigned to the decades of the Rosary, the
Christmas "crib" and devotion to the "Baby Jesus" in general, and the cult
of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. This latter cult focuses on one part of our
Lord's physical body and effectively separates the worship of the human
nature of Christ from His Divine Nature; for this reason it has never found
any acceptance in the Orthodox Church, who teaches her children to worship
the Lord in His Divine-human unity, not in each of the natures separately.
The Rosary
In the sixth appearance the apparition
calls itself the "Lady of the Rosary." One of the methods recommended repeatedly
by the apparition for obtaining world peace is the daily use of the Rosary.
The Rosary is a distinctively Roman Catholic devotion, one which is foreign
to Orthodox piety. The Rosary consists of fifteen "mysteries," or subjects
for meditation, e.g. the Annunciation, the Crucifixion, the Crowning of
Mary as Queen of Heaven, etc.; while reciting the Hail Mary ten times for
each mystery, one is supposed to try to visualize the event commemorated
in that mystery.
As is true of many Western Christian methods of meditation, this approach
actively encourages the use of the imagination, which is a dangerous source
of errors and deception: when we start imagining the events in our Lord's
life, we inevitably clothe them in our terms and present them in a way which
will be congenial to ourselves; in that way we make ourselves the measure
of the events in His life and easily drop those aspects with which we are
not comfortable.
The use of the imagination while reciting the words of the Hail Mary means
that one is not attending to the words of the prayer. Rather than aiding
concentration on the words addressed to God and the saints in prayer, this
method actually encourages distraction and wandering thoughts by concealing
them in the guise of "meditations" on the events of sacred history, as imagined
by the person praying. Thus, the Roman Catholic Rosary is quite different
in use and intent from the Orthodox prayer-rope from which it developed,
whose purpose is to help the person praying to focus more intently on the
words of his prayer and to keep his thoughts from wandering. The Rosary
is obviously an unacceptable devotional practice, and Christians must be
wary of an apparition which teaches and encourages it.
Purgatory
In its appearances, the apparition taught doctrines related to the afterlife
which are not acceptable to Orthodox Christianity. Several times it referred
to Purgatory, the intermediate state of limited suffering between Heaven
and Hell, and said that one person about whom the children asked would be
in Purgatory until the end of the world.
Value of Human Works
The message of these apparitions is all too familiar. That message is salvation
by works. We are told we must make reparations, practice self denial, poverty,
pray the Rosary, and do penance.
The apparition also taught that one's suffering in this life could obtain
salvation for others. In the first appearance, it asked the children if
they would "bear all the suffering [God] wills for you, as an act of reparation
for the sins by which He is offended, and of supplication for the conversion
of sinners." And in the fourth appearance, the apparition told the children,
"Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners. For many souls go
to Hell because there is no one to make sacrifices for them."
The Catholic Church points to the apoycraphal passage in 2 Maccabees 12:46
as justification for prayers for the dead. "It is therefore a holy and wholesome
thought to pray for the dead, that they may be loosed from sins." This passage,
Catholics claim, clearly refers to a way station on the journey to heaven
where some souls are detained until "they are loosed from their sins." It
is "holy and wholesome" to pray for these souls, because doing so can speed
their entry into heaven, but also because the souls whom we have helped
will help us when they get to heaven, and are even able to help us with
their prayers while they are in purgatory.
In this way our Lord's offering for us is denigrated by the idea that our
suffering somehow supplies for others that which is missing in His offering
of Himself. This is a blasphemous delusion, showing Satanic pride in thinking
that we can save others by our prayers and suffering, thereby putting ourselves
in the place of Christ. St. Peter of Damascus expresses the Orthodox understanding
when he says, "We do not dare to entreat on behalf of all, but only for
our own sins." At best, we can entreat God's grace for them to respond with
repentance.
The Bible teaches us that Jesus has already made all the reparations necessary;
that we are reborn when we place our trust in Him and Him alone, and that...
"I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me." [John 14:16]
The Bible warns us repeatedly that we will see strange sights in the heavens,
false prophets, counterfeit miracles, and that "even the very elect might
be deceived." Jesus Christ is the only Savior. The Lord Jesus died for the
sins of man, as the only acceptable sacrifice. According to Marian apparitions,
the Blessed Virgin Mary is the bridge between God and man. This is "another
gospel" of which we are warned in the Scriptures.
From its very beginning, the Christian Church has been opposed by the spirit
of Antichrist, which has tried to distort our understanding of God and His
Son so that we would turn from true worship and fall into Satanic delusion.
His ways have been varied, but all have had the goal of distracting men
from God. The doctrines presented at Fatima have been rejected by the Orthodox
Church as perversions of the Faith leading to idolatry and a carnal attitude
toward the Christian life and toward salvation.
There is little doubt that these are "miracles," but they are performed
by the prince of darkness. The adoration of statues, objects, pictures,
or the like is forbidden in the Scripture and originates with the great
imitator, Satan. Any plea, prayer, or praise addressed to any human being
in order to derive supernatural power is occultism.
The more one believes in these things, the more power he receives from the
Devil. In the end-time, the Bible says the delusion will be so strong that
the masses of people will unconditionally accept the demonic activity as
from God. Thus, the Apostle Paul writes...
"The coming of the lawless one will be in accordance with the work of Satan displayed in all kinds of counterfeit miracles, signs and wonders, and in every sort of evil that deceives those who are perishing. They perish because they refused to love the truth and so be saved. For this reason God sends them a powerful delusion so that they will believe the lie and so that all will be condemned who have not believed the truth but have delighted in wickedness." [2nd Thessalonians 2:9-12]
The Bible warns us to use extreme caution where signs, miracles and the supernatural is concerned, with these words,
"And no wonder, for Satan himself masquerades as an angel
of light." [2 Corinthians 11:14]
"For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after
their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears;
and they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned
unto fables. [II Timothy 4:3-4]
More About Roman Catholicism
The New Catholic Catechism
New Advent Catholic
Supersite
The Fatima Network
