Father Hess: Didn’t I quote Chesterton?

Interviewer: Yes, very shrewd. Very shrewd. Or use Chesterton to make us believe that it was okay.

Father Hess: No, you had to drink wine before. Yes.

Father Hess: Published.

Interviewer: Published? They say.

Father Hess: They say, John.

Interviewer: Do you believe what they have to say, Father?

Father Hess: Let me give you a very complicated answer. No. I don’t. I raise my glass of wine, which is the substance that Christ chose to become himself, which is the substance that he drank and that God, before He created the world, chose as the best drink ever, and the very liquid to become His own son. Let me raise this glass to Our Lady, who is now ridiculed by the Vatican.

This is not a prepared conference in the sense that I do not have notes. My dear friends who are going to watch this video are advised to order as soon as possible, best yesterday, the copies of The Fatima Crusader, especially The Fatima Crusader issue number 64, Summer 2000. It will fill them in on both the so-called published secret and His Eminence Cardinal Ratzinger’s beautiful interpretation. I do not have the text memorized, neither of the so-called published secret, nor of the comment by Ratzinger, but you will find my own articles in issues 63 and 65 on the subject. What I’m going to say here is in addition to these articles in The Fatima Crusader without which I couldn’t possibly answer your questions because it was my source of information, as the Vatican published this document and it was translated into several languages. As far as I’m aware of it, it seems that the English translation has been done as precisely as usual. So everything I know, I know out of the English translation of the Vatican publication, except a few single rather important words in the Portuguese text supposedly written down by Sister Lucia.

And what has been done here is a continuation of a plot to silence Our Lady, nothing else.

And it’s very easily understood why it hasn’t been done because Sister Lucia also accounts in her own writings, in times when there was no computer software to imitate handwriting, she said that Our Lady had asked that Fatima be fulfilled by consecrating Russia. Mind you, she did not say the Soviet Union. She said it at a time when the Soviet Union was in full bloom. But she said Russia. She wanted Russia consecrated to the Immaculate Heart. And when Sister Lucia asked, „How?‟ She said, „The pope has to do it together with the bishops.‟ And Sister Lucia explains herself when she was asked on how she had understood the conditions, she said the pope together on the same day, at the same time. She said, but at the same time I gather would be the same day because of the time differences in the whole world. You can’t expect the bishop of Anchorage to do it at 1:00 in the morning when the pope does it at 10:00 in Saint Peter’s. What Sister Lucia said: the consecration has to be done by the pope and at the same time by each bishop in his own cathedral.

I’m not going to waste your time by giving all the proof that that has not been done. We know that that hasn’t been done. The pope, as a matter of fact, so far has not even mentioned Russia. He said he consecrates the world to the Immaculate Heart and all those countries that you want consecrated. That’s not what Our Lady said. She didn’t say, „Consecrate the world and all the countries that I want consecrated.‟ I mean, can you order out of a catalog in this country by saying, „I want, I want, I want, I really want your products and I want all the products that I really desire. Please ship them to me‟? The company is not going to react, except they will think probably that you are not exactly in your right mind, to put it mildly. Our Lady said, „Russia.‟ If Our Lady said Russia, it will be Russia or bust. Our Lady is not some average day person not to be taken seriously in her wishes. Our Lady doesn’t choose the word Russia because she really meant the world and the countries that she wanted. This was an explicit request. It’s like filling out an order form. I want this item number so-and-so, description so-and-so, single price, total price. She said, „Russia.‟ It hasn’t been done.

Of course, in the recent publication, Archbishop Bertone, who is the secretary of the so-called Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, said that the consecration had been done and he quotes a letter supposedly written by Sister Lucia that wasn’t even signed. Maybe they didn’t have the software back then to imitate Sister Lucia’s signature. Guesswork, guesswork. The Fatima Crusader has proven sufficiently that this letter cannot be authentic and there’s no need to repeat this.

First of all, we have to consider the text of the actual vision published. Then we have to consider the comments made by Archbishop Bertone in the introduction to his publication, and then we have to consider the comment by Cardinal Ratzinger.

And why in the Vatican’s publications supposedly Sister Lucia decided on when it should be published, which I don’t believe for a minute. Sister Lucia is not the kind of sister that would decide on her own when a secret has to be published. I’m sure she asked Our Lady, and Our Lady said, „It should be published in 1960 because then it will be better understood.‟ That’s another reason. Why would Sister Lucia… I’m referring to the part of the published document that is a supposed account of Archbishop Bertone’s talk to Sister Lucia in which supposedly Sister Lucia says, „Oh, it was just my feeling, my intuition that told me that it shouldn’t be published before 1960.‟ I don’t believe that because Sister Lucia never decided anything on her own. She’s a Carmelite nun, and the Carmelite tradition is you do not decide anything except to go to heaven and serve our Lord. Why would the angel of the Old Testament in the Book of Genesis, the one who chased Adam and Eve from paradise, who turned Adam and Eve’s life into a life of penance, be a secret in a time when penance is the only way to save your soul? That’s one thing.

In the entire history of salvation, the word corpses, cadáveres, cadavers has never been used for the dead. Only in the Old Testament, I think it’s Prophet Jeremiah or Ezekiel, but I don’t remember right now, will you find the word cadáveres, cadaveri in Latin. And it’s only used for apostates and lost souls, saying their souls are lost, therefore what’s left is not a temple of a former temple of the Holy Spirit as we would say in the New Testament or in the Old Testament say the body that God gave to this man, but it’s a cadaver, like animals. That’s the term you use it for. In the entire tradition of antiquity, you use the word cadaveri for animals. In the history of salvation, you do not use it for a dead human body. In the creed it says the resurrection of the dead, „Credimus in resurrectionem mortuorum.‟ It doesn’t say, „In resurrectionem cadaverum.‟ It doesn’t say, „We believe in the resurrection of the cadavers.‟ We don’t believe in the resurrection of the corpses. We believe in the resurrection of the dead. When I apply a mass to some dead, I do not apply the mass to his cadaver, to his corpse. I apply the mass for the dead. The requiem is officially called the mass for the dead or defunct. Defuncti in Latin means the ones who have been buried, the bodies that have been buried, not the corpses that have been buried. You find a corpse with the obituary hall, with the police, you know? That’s what you call a corpse that has to be examined for a crime and whatever. The history of salvation doesn’t know the term except for apostates and lost souls.

Why would a Carmelite nun that has read many pious books, as Cardinal Ratzinger calls them, claiming that she might have seen pictures of that vision in pious books… Sister Lucia, how does she spend her time in a monastery? It’s a long time ago that she was young enough to clean the floors. She probably spends her time not just in prayer, but also in religious reading. She’s probably one of the few people in the whole world who has read the entire Holy Scripture several times. Why would she use the term cadáveres? In a vision, mind you. So you couldn’t say, „That’s what Our Lady said.‟ No. She is choosing the term, according to the Vatican publication, for something that she saw. So she’s giving a description of that vision. She does not quote Our Lady having used the term cadáveres. She is making up that term. Of course, it’s a futile attempt to speculate on Sister Lucia’s IQ. But you can rest assured that somebody who has spent his entire life on the study of holy Scripture and so-called devotional books, pious books, religious books, is one who might, after several decades in the monastery (which in 1945, she was several decades in the monastery), you might assume or presume that she would know religious language. And exactly as in English, in Portuguese, you do not use the word cadáveres for the dead. You do not say, „Tomorrow I will say una misa por los cadáveres.‟ You will say, „Tomorrow I will say a mass for the dead,‟ not for the corpses. To me, this in itself is conclusive proof.

Sister Lucia has proven to be very precise in her accounts. When she was asked, with years in between, several times about what Our Lady said in 1917 and after that, she’s usually very precise. Why would she, of course she’s an old woman now, but why would she now use a word like cadáveres? And the so-called published text was not written now. That was laid down in writing many, many, many years ago when she was anything but old. Why would she back then have used the word cadáveres? To me, this is conclusive proof.

Let’s think, when we talk about precision, the requests of Our Lady for the five Saturdays of reparation. Again, she’s very precise. As a matter of fact, I considered the message of Fatima one of the most precise ever. „Why,‟ I’m asking, „is the Third Secret vague?‟ Why? She talks about a man, a bishop dressed in white. Do you know that the Abbot of Brixen in South Tyrol is dressed in white and he’s a bishop? Ask any missionary bishop in Africa or local diocesan bishop in Africa. He’s a bishop and he’s dressed in white. Why would Our Lady say, „A bishop dressed in white‟? Now, the cynical account, this will right now interfere with Father Hess and say, „Of course, because he’s not the pope, but he dresses in white, and he might be a bishop.‟ I don’t think that the Third Secret of Fatima would be an exception to the exceptional precision in the first and second secret.

A third, and again, to me, conclusive proof for the publication being a hoax is the fact that the publication, the published text makes no logical connection, let alone a direct reference to the unexplained line, „In Portugal, the dogma of the faith will be preserved, comma, et cetera.‟ Sister Lucia said that Our Lady’s own words were, „In Portugal, the dogma of the faith is going to be preserved, et cetera.‟ The „et cetera‟ is of course Sister Lucia’s addition indicating that there was more. „In Portugal, the dogma of the faith will be preserved,‟ comma, and more words from Our Lady following.

And it’s quite interesting to see that both Archbishop Bertone and Cardinal Ratzinger, not to forget Cardinal Sodano, the Secretary of State, hasten to affirm, confirm that the Third Secret must be essentially dealing with the poor present pope’s fate in 1981. I’m asking myself, I happen to be one who is pretty well aware of the history of the 19th century, especially in the United States of America. And we have lived in this country here through the Civil War. We have seen in the United States of America Lincoln’s assassination in 1865. And, of course, the Americans in this century have witnessed the assassination of President Kennedy in 1963. Why would an attempt on the pope’s life be better understood after 1960? How come the people in the 19th century wouldn’t understand that?

Also, the supposed vision that supposedly Sister Lucia put in writing speaks about the pope being killed. John Paul II wasn’t killed. He came close to it, but he wasn’t killed. And there are many other very, very strange circumstances about that attack of May 13th, 1981, that I cannot go into here because it doesn’t deal with Fatima for the very simple reason that I believe, firmly believe, that the assassination attempt on the pope’s life has nothing to do with the Third Secret. It’s the reason why I do not go into the details that are rather strange about what happened in 1981.

To me, it is conclusive proof that Cardinal Ratzinger said in 1984 that the Third Secret deals with the end of times and is a religious prophecy, and that now he says it’s all events of the past and we are mainly dealing with the prophecy showing that John Paul II, the sweet Christ on earth, as he quotes some religious quotation about the pope, that this Third Secret basically deals with hardly anything else but the attempt on the pope’s life. To me this is conclusive proof, and I cannot see why, if Cardinal Ratzinger was in error about the actual Third Secret in 1984, he would be right now. Mind you, I didn’t use the word „lie,‟ not yet.

First of all, the method of theology. Usually a science has its own methods. You use the brush and the shovel and the lens and microscopes and analyzing gadgets in archeology. You use instruments, the scalpel and pincers and whatever in medicine. A science has its own instruments. Saint Thomas Aquinas proved all through his life in all of his publications that the instrument that we use in theology is twofold. Theology is not just dealing with things that have been made up by the human mind. Theology is dealing with revelation. The basis of what we discuss is coming from revelation. That’s one thing. And the method that is used is what Saint Thomas Aquinas calls the sensus communis. In an analogous way, not in an identical, but in an analogous way, Gilbert Keith Chesterton and the English language called that common sense. And my dear friend, Chesterton, who was never tired to define this wonderful substance, wine… Chesterton said in his book on Saint Thomas Aquinas that the method of Saint Thomas Aquinas was common sense. „And common sense,‟ he says, „is the sense of the probable.‟

Whenever we are faced with revelation that is not instantly clear and understandable, and there are such things (in revelation you will even find apparent contradictions; it is sufficient to remember the different versions that we find in Matthew, Mark, Luke and John about the actual words that our Lord used at The Last Supper for consecrating bread and wine), we will find apparent contradictions, but we will not, that is a dogma of the church, find actual real contradictions in Holy Scripture. We are faced sometimes with quotations in Holy Scripture that we do not understand. There are several ways to understand them. Now, in that case, tradition will help and the sense of the probable. If an interpretation is highly improbable, it will never become a sententia probabilis, which is one of the theological categories for theological statements and judgments. Sententia probabilis means nothing else but a probably right judgment. So we say, „Well, when our Lord said that, what he really meant was…‟ If theologians, popes in their private pronunciations, and doctors of the church for a certain amount of time found that this is the most probable, the most feasible interpretation of this otherwise enigmatic pronouncement, then we talk about a sententia probabilis. So the method of theology is not a microscope or the scalpel. The method of theology is reason and common sense.

Now, common sense is something that every sane and healthy human being has received with his intelligence. It’s in proportion to his own intelligence. It’s also in vertical proportion to his education, because usually the more specialized your education is, the less you will maintain your common sense. That’s why we have the so-called specialists who know more and more and more about less and less and less until they know everything about nothing, which is the definition of a specialist. Now, he has lost his common sense. He will be able to rattle on on one single detailed topic for hours and hours. And when you ask him, „How does a simple alarm clock work?‟ He will say, „Oops, excuse me. A what?‟ Theology doesn’t know that problem, not if it is dealt with properly. In theology, we do have the unchangeable truth contained in the sacred scripture, tradition, and infallible magisterium, but we also have, whenever it’s not infallibly decided, the sense for the probable. The sense for the probable has a very high authority in the church. It’s not something to be taken lightly.

Now, apply your common sense to the following reasoning and you will understand why the Vatican publication cannot possibly be authentic. God only knows the future. Saint Thomas Aquinas says very clearly that even the saints in heaven and even the angels do not know the future. They are what he calls… They are not absolutely in eternity. They are in what he calls the aevum. I have no English translation for that. It’s something between eternity and time and space. The angels obviously, being spiritual creatures, cannot have time and space. Impossible. However, they are not that much within eternity as God is, that they would know the future. Nobody knows the future except God.

Now when God decides to communicate the future to somebody, which is called the gift of prophecy—mind you, Cardinal Ratzinger says in his commentary on the so-called Third Secret, that prophecy is not about revealing the future, but explaining the past and the present. That’s a very interesting definition, but certainly in direct contradiction to what the Church fathers and the teachers of the church, the doctors of the church, said about prophecy. We also know, just consider what Saint John of the Cross said about the gratis datae, the special given graces to somebody. Prophecy is the highest of all of those graces. Why would it be the highest of all of those graces if it only interpreted the past and the present? Well, that’s nonsense. Prophecy essentially deals with the future. God does not often reveal the future to people. Even Our Lady, the queen of heaven, the mediatrix of our graces, does not know when the last judgment will take place. I don’t think she knows, according to what we know, according to what we can conclude from Holy Scripture, she doesn’t know because Christ said, „Only the Father in Heaven knows when it will take place.‟

Now, please explain to me, why would our Lord, God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit tell Our Lady, inform Our Lady in 1917 about the end of the First World War, about the beginning of the Second World War under Pope Pius XI, about the chastisement for which Russia is going to be the instrument? And then, if the publication of the Vatican is authentic, our Lord would have revealed to Our Lady the attempt on the Pope’s life, which, mind you, I consider a grave sin. I consider it to be very tragic. But is it something that our Lord would reveal in a vision that does not correspond to any of the details, neither of the wording nor the contents of the other secrets of Fatima? I do not believe that. And with all my respect to His Eminence, the Cardinal, who happens to be a well-educated theologian, and he has proven that, but is it really probable that God reveals something to Our Lady that deals with a future Pope? I said, I am still wondering about the details of this so-called assassination attempt. I have my own reasons to believe that it wasn’t an assassination attempt. Again, this is something which I cannot possibly get into here, because there are too many details, too many ifs and buts and maybes. But would God reveal to Our Lady that a future Pope is going to be attacked and then not be killed? Would God do that if the Third Secret is supposed to be the most important one of all? And then it isn’t.

When a theologian, when a cardinal like Cardinal Ratzinger says it’s over, that’s it, this is what you get, and it’s over and done with. And he says in another context, uh, that prophecy is, uh, interpreting the past and the present and not dealing with the future. Then I say, what if he had said that the entire Church has to look for the Antichrist? Would that not be interpreting the future? It’s a contradiction in itself. It doesn’t make sense. It’s not probable. And therefore, by applying common sense, I believe this is a hoax.

Possible that a priest, through some illegal channels, had access to the actual secret? Now, the actual secret is kept, as far as we know, of course, the actual secret is kept in the personal safe that the pope got in his apartment. Now, after 15 years in the Vatican, I know that some people can get into everything they want to get into. And the American intelligence communities, be it the CIA, the DIA, the NSA (NSA is No Such Agency), they are very capable agencies. Now, I’m not saying they did that, and I don’t believe they did it, but, of course, they would be able to get into a papal apartment if they wanted to. That’s not a bunch of amateurs. So somebody might have had a way to get into the papal safe, which is made of wood, by the way, and read that secret. Write it down or memorize it, and now threaten the Vatican that he would publish it if the Vatican didn’t do this and this and this. They also could say, this would be something that Father Gruner would have a smile about, „Dear Holy Father, either you consecrate Russia right now or we’re gonna publish that secret anyway.‟ That’s another way.

Whatever it is, end of guesswork here, whatever it is, the Vatican must have a very serious reason for publishing a document that cannot hold. No way. Pretending that this will be the third secret.

And did you notice something else? Now, John, you know the mass media better than I do. You know the newspapers. How come the newspapers were in an uproar about the beatification of Pope Pius IX, but the newspapers didn’t say anything about the published secret of Fatima? I mean, they just mentioned it. There was no objection. They didn’t say, „Hey, wait a second. Another one of those Vatican lies.‟ No. You couldn’t read about that. The newspapers said, „Yesterday, Cardinal Secretary of State has announced…‟ et cetera, blah, blah. „Secret was revealed.‟ That’s it. The world press that has never failed to be incredibly efficient in ridiculing, slandering the sacred, now there’s nothing. Maybe they had a hint. Maybe somebody told them, „Hey, listen, ignore that whole thing.‟ Why would they do that? Why wouldn’t they say, „Here’s another one of those typically inquisition-like medieval lies coming from the Vatican?‟ Soldiers shooting the pope. Why? Maybe because what was published is entirely politically correct? Maybe. That’s guesswork again. It’s no guesswork that the fact that there was no enemy reaction, as we call that, means something. The fact that there was no enemy reaction means a lot.

It also means a lot that this publication takes place at a time when maybe part of that secret will come true. The pope is very old. It’s not up to me to decide when John Paul II is going to die, but I don’t think it’s going to be in 10 years. Maybe some people have an educated guess on who is going to be the next Pope. Maybe some people know a lot more about these things than I do, and consider the possibility that the next pope might not be a pope at all. Saint Francis of Assisi predicted a long state of vacancy. He did that, that’s a fact. And whatever it means, it’s a fact, it’s a printed fact. Saint Francis of Assisi predicted that there will be an extended time of vacancy when the church will be in great disaster and when wrong, false doctrines will be preached by that man who was not canonically elected. And I’m not saying this is John Paul II, because I do not have any proof in this direction, but at the same time, I’m not saying that this is not possible. I’m not saying that divine providence will interfere with this and will not make it happen. I cannot tell divine providence what divine providence knows before the world was started. But what I’m saying is that with all the knowledge that I might have after 15 years in the Vatican, there are millions of things that I do not know. Apart from my memory not being what some of my friends might think, there are many things that, obviously if you’re not at the core of things, at the heart of things, you cannot know. There is a lot of possibilities that would explain such a ridiculous publication.

To us here, the thing that is interesting is that we are faced with a ridiculous publication. In my article in The Fatima Crusader, which is in print, and as everything that is in print, is literally quotable and cannot be excused or explained with the moment of action like we have it now. Obviously, I’m not reading anything when I answer your questions, and I have not had much time to prepare this. But when I print things, I usually try to be on the safe side. And that’s the reason why in my article in The Fatima Crusader I’m not as adamant on the whole publication being a hoax as I am now. My firm conviction is that basically not one word of the whole publication is true.

Theologically speaking, it doesn’t matter if we’re dealing with the introduction by Archbishop Bertone. It doesn’t matter if we’re talking about the introduction to the publication by Cardinal Sodano or the commentary by Cardinal Ratzinger. The whole thing is at least pretty close to heresy and blasphemy. I’ll quote that with examples, because I have to justify my judgment right now. I generally speaking, do not consider anything in this whole publication to be true.

Now first of all, you know better than I, I’m not very well versed with this modern gadget, which I call a beeping pile of plastic. Most people call it a computer. I’m not very familiar with computers. My computer’s from 1986, and I’m happy with it. It’s a 286. But I know that the software nowadays will cost you less than $100 and you will be able to print original handwriting. All we have seen is photocopies of the so-called handwriting by Sister Lucia. Some graphologists have said that can’t be her handwriting anyway, but I don’t even need that kind of proof, because software wouldn’t make that mistake anyway. So, that might even be a proof for the authenticity of the whole thing, because my own handwriting has changed over the years, so Sister Lucia’s handwriting might have changed. But we know that politicians send beautiful electoral campaign letters written in their own handwriting from „Dear Mr. So-and-so,‟ signed by, and the whole thing is a fabrication of computer software that came out 15 years ago already. Wasn’t affordable back then, but it came out 15 years ago. That I know. I’ve talked to experts about that. I’m not the expert. The fact that we see a photocopy of a handwriting doesn’t mean it’s Sister Lucia’s handwriting.

If, and I remember well, it was in 1991, if they admittedly were capable of presenting an old lady in a badly put-on habit as Sister Lucia in 1991, then they might as well invent the whole so-called conversation between Sister Lucia and Archbishop Bertone. How would I know that an archbishop, a secretary of the congregation who makes a statement that this whole publication of the Third Secret has ended that period of, you know, I quoted it, „tragic human lust for power and evil,‟ such an idiotic statement, then why would I believe that his conversation with Sister Lucia is authentically reported? Why? How do I know… We’re all human beings. We are capable of sins. How do I know that he’s not capable of lying? I have absolutely no guarantee for that. On the contrary, a ridiculous publication like the one we’re facing is rather indicating a lie.

But think of the fact what Cardinal Ratzinger said in 1984, and what he’s saying now. That’s absolutely contradictory. At the same time, Cardinal Ratzinger, in one of his books, I wish I remember the title, but in one of his books he literally says that the council document [Gaudium et Spes] is nothing but an anti-syllabus. So the Cardinal Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith obviously is not very shocked that Vatican II is an anti-document to Pope Pius IX’s syllabus. Why would I presume that such a man is always saying the truth? Now, Cardinal Ratzinger cannot sue me for having called him a liar. I didn’t call him a liar. I just say, why would I presume that he is not? What guarantee do I have that he is not? Do I have any proof whatsoever that this publication is not entirely a fabrication? No, but I do have proofs that at least parts of it are fabricated. So I have to conclude that we are dealing not only with a hoax, but we are dealing with a strategically intended hoax.

A hoax is not something… See, these people, they are not just some old bishops, cardinals, prelates, monsignori, who have nothing else to do all day long but to come up with ridiculous fabrications. You cannot deny their common sense that easily. Why would they waste time? A document like this is something you do not write in one afternoon. Why would they waste their time with a ridiculous publication like that if it wasn’t for a definite purpose? I said it before and I say it again, I do not know why that publication was done now. I do not know what is the strategic purpose of this strategic diversion, of this deception, of this perception management, but I know it is perception management. It is deception, diversion. And I say it again, it has to be and it cannot be anything else. It has to be the diversion from what I believe to be the actual secret of Fatima, announcing Vatican II, the apostasy, the heresies after Vatican II, and in Vatican II.

I said blasphemy and heresy. Cardinal Ratzinger says that prophecy does not predict the future. He says that a prophet who predicts the future would only satisfy the curiosity of the mind. And Ratzinger this way does not reproduce faithfully and authentically as he should do as the Prefect of Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, what is church teaching, number one. Number two, with his almost equation of the Immaculate Heart and „the blessed are the pure of heart, for they shall see God,‟ he is uttering blasphemy. Our Lady’s heart is not immaculate because she was pure in her heart and saw God. Of course she saw God. God was her son for many years. But she has the Immaculate Heart because she was immaculately conceived as the only one ever. After Adam and Eve, there was one new Adam and a new Eve, as they are called. Our Lady was conceived without original sin, and so was our Lord. The Immaculate Heart is only one, and it’s Our Lady’s. And in Vatican II, which is something that I’ve dealt with elsewhere, in Vatican II we are facing similar and other heresies. Therefore, I cannot see any other sins in that quoted publication, but to hide the disastrous effects and disastrous contents of a council that I do not believe for one minute was a council, and that I do not believe for one minute was magisterium of the church. In the entire history of the church, never has it happened that a council was convoked by a pope with the a priori exclusion of definition of truth and condemnation of errors. John XXIII said exactly that. And at the same time, I refuse to believe that something can be ordinary magisterium, which is what the documents of Vatican II claim to be, that would not have received the permission for print.

Again, I’ll say, I’m rather inclined not to believe that this priest really had that message. However, whatever he put in print, and you can read this in The Fatima Crusader, whatever he put in print that supposedly would have been the third secret, the actual message of Fatima, makes a lot more sense than anything that Cardinal Ratzinger said or published. Because the third secret must be something, Cardinal Ratzinger said that in 1984, it must be something that is entirely coherent with the messages of Our Lady in La Salette and other approved messages. There is one common theme to La Salette, 16th century Quito in Peru, or is it Ecuador? Ecuador, I’m sorry. Then you had Our Lady of Good Success in 1635 or something like that, approved Marian visions. They all talk about that chastisement to come. They all talk about the errors that are going to be spread in the Church. They all talk about the crisis of the faith. And in 1984, Cardinal Ratzinger said, „The third secret is entirely coherent with these Marian apparitions.‟ But now he says it’s in the past, and only dealing with the assassination attempt, which I’m still wondering about if it was an assassination attempt. I don’t know. So many inconsistencies about the whole thing, but it’s not up to me to go into a criminal investigation here.

Let me conclude this with a rather sarcastic line, which is not out of character with Father Hess, I think. Probably with the so-called publication of the third secret, which was mainly in Cardinal Ratzinger’s hands, we are faced with something that you can find on the trademark of old musical records. The company was called „His Master’s Voice.‟

Father Hess: I mentioned that in my article that will be published in The Fatima Crusader. Now, that was several questions, I’m sorry. The first thing is, why is there no reaction from the priests? Well, that’s just the same question as, why is Vatican II that easily accepted by most of the priests and the bishops? Needless to say, I do not know the percentage of priests that will correspond to the groups that I have to classify as an answer. Human beings are individuals. The more one is a human being, the more one is an individual, because of course, the soul of a human being is entirely individual. While the body has certain similarities, which is why we talk about the species. We usually have one nose, two eyes, one mouth, and two hands with five fingers each. So we have similarities. But each single human soul is a complete individual, just like Saint Thomas Aquinas defines the angels as absolutely individual. As a matter of fact, Saint Thomas Aquinas says that each angel is his own species. That’s something to elaborate on another occasion. But you just look up the term species and individual.

So it is not easy to generalize. Today, we are living in a time when fantasy is substituted by video images, TV, whatever, and movies. In the old days when people still had fantasy and imagination, they were very careful about generalizing groups. However, for the sake of argument, allow me to generalize the clergy into several groups.

There are those who will do nothing but what the superiors tell them to do. The Catholic Church, when my patron saint, Gregory the Great, was pope, did not believe in anything like slave obedience. Matter of fact, I can quote my favorite Church father, Gregory the Great, my favorite pope, 590-604, saying that, „Priests should not always be obedient because they will assume the vices of their superiors too.‟ Now, that’s the wisdom of a saint. However, we are faced with priests who grew up in a certain organization. You know that to obey very often is more comfortable than uncomfortable. And sometimes an eccentric individual like me is not the person for whom obedience is the most evident and obvious thing in the world. But many people find comfort in obedience because they blame everything on the superior and just do what he wants. That’s one category.

There’s another category who have genuinely been brainwashed, especially young priests. And this is why I must warn people, and I do this from the pulpit all the time, do not judge them. If you see they’re heretics, avoid them, but do not judge them. You do not know why they are heretics. Many of them never saw the Catholic Church. They never experienced the faith. They have never seen it. And traditionalists are not all saints. So sometimes when they meet a traditionalist, one is enough for them. They turn back to the conciliar church, which is more comfortable.

Then there’s a group of priests who are just plain stupid. They scratch their head and say, „Well, the cardinal prefect of Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith publishes it. I wouldn’t know any better.‟ They’re just stupid. They don’t understand what the whole thing is about. They couldn’t care less anyway.

Then you have the group of priests who are not believing it for one minute, but aren’t gonna risk their salary, apartment, position, retirement, and Medicare, Medicaid, and all these Clintonian securities, quote-unquote, today. These people just go for security. „I gotta survive.‟ Few people know better than I that we have to survive. But some people are willing to sacrifice the truth for their own physical, comfortable survival. I’m not saying now this is true for all priests. I’m also not categorizing by numbers. Just saying there are several explanations.

And now, there’s one thing which has very little to do with any kind of dishonesty, which I have personally experienced, and I’m going to name the name. And may he see that video and think of it. I was the secretary, not a secretary officially by the Vatican, but a personal secretary to His Eminence Cardinal Alfons Maria Stickler. He was the librarian, the cardinal librarian of the Vatican, and he was the cardinal archivist of the Vatican. Because the prefect of each is really the number two, and usually a simple priest. So, I’m quite honored to say that Cardinal Stickler and I are friends since 1975. That’s a quarter century of friendship. And my personal appreciation of all the things that I’ve learned from him would fill another one of your digital video cassettes. Cardinal Stickler is one of the most intelligent priests and cardinals and bishops that I’ve ever met. He, even more than intelligent, is incredibly erudite. He was a librarian and a teacher all of his life. He knows a lot. He probably belongs to the 10% of the most erudite Catholics in the world. Now, get this. Cardinal Stickler is a Salesian, means Don Bosco. He belongs to the priests of Don Bosco.

In 1991, when I left Rome, there was an issue which I do not want to quote here, on which Cardinal Stickler and I disagreed. Now, being old friends, I don’t have to say, „Yes, your eminence. Yes, your eminence. Yes, your eminence.‟ We’re old friends. We’re not talking in familiar terms. I don’t say, „Hi, Al.‟ But I don’t have to call him „Eminence. Yes, Eminence. Yes, Eminence,‟ all the time. We talk in familiar terms. And we disagreed. And Cardinal Stickler looked at me and said something that you have to think about in a negative way. Cardinal Stickler said, „My dear friend, you will have to learn to let others do the thinking for you.‟ You can’t believe how shocked I was. Here, I’m talking to somebody who has studied the Doctors of the Church better than I ever will, one who has an erudition that’s incredible, and who tells me that I have to let others, other people do the thinking for me. Now mind you, the issue we had a controversy about was he held the position of Vatican II and Paul VI, and I held the position of tradition. I was so surprised by this statement that, usually not being too much of a problem in finding an answer for things, I was speechless. Cardinal Stickler is one of few people probably who managed to see me speechless. I just stood there and gave him a look. Three months later, we met again, and I said, „By the way, do you remember when, in December, you told me that I really should start to let other people do the thinking for me?‟ „Yeah, yeah,‟ he said. I said, „When you said that, I was so completely taken by surprise that I didn’t find the real answer, and I’m going to give it to you. See, I do let others do my thinking. You let 40 years of church history think for you; I, 1900 years.‟ His reaction was, „Uh.‟ Nothing else.

And that will explain a lot if an educated, personally very holy priest, archbishop, cardinal, retired, who could basically strategically speaking, allow himself to do anything because he has nothing to lose. He can’t become pope. He cannot advance anymore. He couldn’t possibly have a personal, dishonest or honest motive not to do this, and he could do anything he wanted basically, tells me to let others do the thinking for me. That will explain. The cardinal prefect of the Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith has commented on this authentic real secret of Fatima. That’s it. Period. Roma locuta, causa finita. The papal infallibility has been defined in 1870. It has never been described well so far. It has only been overrated. And I think that answers one of your questions.

Father Hess: After 15 years in the Vatican, I know that the Vatican is a government, obviously and rightly so. But still, it is a government. In 1900, the Germans were shouting and screaming, „Heil Kaiser Wilhelm.‟ In 1933 following, they shouted and screamed, „Heil Hitler.‟ In Italy, they shouted, „Viva Mussolini, the Duce.‟ In Russia, they were praising Stalin. We have had periods in this country when presidents were not really praised, but we’ve also had periods when presidents were praised. And it’s in the essence of bureaucracy, and career-making, and being an official in a government that you will have people who are sort of willing to perform all kinds of things just to advance in their career. There are several vulgar terms for them, which I do not want to quote, but these people are certainly willing to do a lot just to advance. Don’t ever think that this has never happened in the Vatican. Flattery will get you anywhere. It’s an old saying. That’s not something that came up recently.

You may rest assured that you will not get anyone’s true opinion on Bill Clinton in Washington as long as Bill Clinton is president and is the master of the fate of all the bureaucracy in Washington. It doesn’t matter if the next president’s name will be Gore or Bush. It doesn’t matter. Whoever will make it will have automatically the majority of officials in Washington officially on his side. Either they will claim, „I voted for you anyway,‟ or they will say, „What a terrible mistake I didn’t vote for you. I wish I had known better.‟ Whatever. It’s in the human character. And you can rest assured that in the Vatican you will find the same thing. Sometimes even a much higher level. We’re talking about people who genuinely believe that whoever is Pope is to be revered, not only as the Vicar of Christ, not only as the Bishop of Rome, not only as the Archbishop of Latium, the Primate of Italy, the Patriarch of the West, but will also be revered as a person, which is a terrible mistake when we consider that Pope Alexander VI already was pope when he still had children, and nobody revered him. Back then they were a little bit more honest about that and they didn’t pretend that Alexander VI… He said, „I’m a miserable person.‟

But it goes with the essence of bureaucracy and the circumstances of government that you will find people who will try idolatry. And to consider 1981 as an event important enough to be the third secret is certainly one of the many forms of idolatry. I’m not accusing Cardinal Ratzinger of this. No. Certainly not. Because sources told me, this is… I cannot confirm this, that on more than one issue, Cardinal Ratzinger was not in agreement with the pope and offered his retirement, offered his relief. But the pope kept him. So, I do not for one moment even intend to say or think that Cardinal Ratzinger did that out of a motive of idolatry. I don’t think so. However, it’s an ingrained habit. „His master’s voice,‟ I called him. There is today in the Church, and it’s not come up recently, I’m sorry, but something that dates back to the early 19th century, at least, if not further back. I could quote here Saint Ignatius of Loyola and Saint Alphonsus of Liguori, whose concepts of obedience are somewhat… I’m not taking it lightly to call a doctor of the church wrong in any point. But at the same time, when I compare the church father, Saint Pope Gregory the Great’s concept of obedience with the concept of obedience that Saint Alphonsus of Liguori had, then I will have to say that one of the two was wrong. And I believe that Saint Alphonsus was wrong. Not basically on obedience, but on the extent of his obedience, on the extension of obedience, on the limit of obedience. Saint Thomas Aquinas was very clear that if you find the prelate wrong, you have to correct him. If he doesn’t accept it, you have to recur to a higher authority. And it’s in the gospel, mind you. Fraternal correction is something that you will find in Saint Paul. So, obedience in the church is something bound by tradition. Obedience is not just dependent on the superior.

But what can you do with the ingrained habits of an established bureaucracy that we have to consider, generally speaking, an efficient bureaucracy? You cannot expect them just to put up resistance. Also, unfortunately, they couldn’t care less either.