In the twelfth month, which is the month of Adar, on its thirteenth day ... on the day that the enemies of the Jews were expected to prevail over them, it was turned about: the Jews prevailed over their adversaries. - Esther 9:1
And they gained relief on the fourteenth, making it a day of feasting and gladness. - Esther 9:17
[Mordecai instructed them] to observe them as days of feasting and gladness, and sending delicacies to one another, and gifts to the poor. - Esther 9:22
Purim is one of the most joyous and fun holidays on the Jewish calendar. It commemorates a time when the Jewish people living in Persia were saved from extermination.
The Book of Esther
The story of Purim is told in the Biblical book of Esther. The heroes of the story are Esther, a beautiful young Jewish woman living in Persia, and her cousin Mordecai, who raised her as if she were his daughter. Esther was taken to the house of Ahasuerus, King of Persia, to become part of his harem. King Ahasuerus loved Esther more than his other women and made Esther queen, but the king did not know that Esther was a Jew, because Mordecai told her not to reveal her identity.
The villain of the story is Haman, an arrogant, egotistical advisor to the king. Haman hated Mordecai because Mordecai refused to bow down to Haman, so Haman plotted to destroy the Jewish people. In a speech that is all too familiar to Jews, Haman told the king, "There is a certain people scattered abroad and dispersed among the peoples in all the provinces of your realm. Their laws are different from those of every other people's, and they do not observe the king's laws; therefore it is not befitting the king to tolerate them." Esther 3:8. The king gave the fate of the Jewish people to Haman, to do as he pleased to them. Haman planned to exterminate all of the Jews.
Mordecai persuaded Esther to speak to the king on behalf of the Jewish people. This was a dangerous thing for Esther to do, because anyone who came into the king's presence without being summoned could be put to death, and she had not been summoned. Esther fasted for three days to prepare herself, then went into the king. He welcomed her. Later, she told him of Haman's plot against her people. The Jewish people were saved, and Haman and his ten sons were hanged on the gallows that had been prepared for Mordecai.
The book of Esther is unusual in that it is the only book of the Bible that does not contain the name of G-d. In fact, it includes virtually no reference to G-d. Mordecai makes a vague reference to the fact that the Jews will be saved by someone else, if not by Esther, but that is the closest the book comes to mentioning G-d. Thus, one important message that can be gained from the story is that G-d often works in ways that are not apparent, in ways that appear to be chance, coincidence or ordinary good luck.
Modern Echoes of Purim
The Pesach (Passover) seder reminds us that in every generation, there are those who rise up to destroy us, but G-d saves us from their hand. In the time of the Book of Esther, Haman was the one who tried to destroy us. In modern times, there have been two significant figures who have threatened the Jewish people, and there are echoes of Purim in their stories.
Many have noted the echoes of Purim in the Nuremberg war crime trials. In the Book of Esther, Haman's ten sons were hanged (Esther 9:13); in 1946, ten of Hitler's top associates were put to death by hanging for their war crimes (including the crime of murdering 6 million Jews). An 11th associate of Hitler, Hermann Göring, committed suicide the night before the execution, a parallel to the suicide of Haman's daughter recorded in the Talmud (Megillah 16a). There are rumors that Göring was a transvestite, making that an even more accurate parallel. One of the men seems to have been aware of the parallel: on the way to the gallows, Julius Streicher shouted "Purim Fest 1946!" See: The Execution of Nazi War Criminals. It is also interesting that, in the traditional text of the Megillah (Book of Esther), in the list of the names of Haman's sons, the letters Tav in the first name, Shin in the seventh name and Zayin in the tenth name are written in smaller letters than the rest. The numerical value of Tav-Shin-Zayin is 707, and these ten men were hanged in the Jewish year 5707 (the thousands digit is routinely skipped when writing Jewish years; there are no numerals for thousands in Hebrew numbering). They were not hanged on Purim, though -- they were hanged on Hoshanah Rabbah.
Another echo of Purim is found in the Soviet Union a few years later. In early 1953, Stalin was planning to deport most of the Jews in the Soviet Union to Siberia, but just before his plans came to fruition, he suffered a stroke and died a few days later. He suffered that stroke on the night of March 1, 1953: the night after Purim (note: Jewish days end at sunset; you will see March 1 on the calendar as Purim). The plan to deport Jews was not carried out.
A story is told in Chabad (Lubavitcher Chasidic Judaism) of that 1953 Purim: the Lubavitcher Rebbe led a Purim gathering and was asked to give a blessing for the Jews of the Soviet Union, who were known to be in great danger. The Rebbe instead told a cryptic story about a man who was voting in the Soviet Union and heard people cheering for the candidate, "Hoorah! Hoorah!" The man did not want to cheer, but was afraid to not cheer, so he said "hoorah," but in his heart, he meant it in Hebrew: hu ra, which means, "he is evil"! The crowd at the Rebbe's 1953 gathering began chanting "hu ra!" regarding Stalin, and that night, Stalin suffered the stroke that lead to his death a few days later.
Purim Customs and Observances
Purim is celebrated on the 14th day of Adar, which is usually in March. The 13th of Adar is the day that Haman chose for the extermination of the Jews, and the day that the Jews battled their enemies for their lives. On the day afterwards, the 14th, they celebrated their survival. In cities that were walled in the time of Joshua, Purim is celebrated on the 15th of the month, because the book of Esther says that in Shushan (a walled city), deliverance from the massacre was not complete until the next day. The 15th is referred to as Shushan Purim.
In leap years, when there are two months of Adar, Purim is celebrated in the second month of Adar, so it is always one month before Passover. The 14th day of the first Adar in a leap year is celebrated as a minor holiday called Purim Katan, which means "little Purim." There are no specific observances for Purim Katan; however, a person should celebrate the holiday and should not mourn or fast. Some communities also observe a "Purim Katan" on the anniversary of any day when their community was saved from a catastrophe, destruction, evil or oppression.
The word "Purim" means "lots" and refers to the lottery that Haman used to choose the date for the massacre.
The Purim holiday is preceded by a minor fast, the Fast of Esther, which commemorates Esther's three days of fasting in preparation for her meeting with the king.
A traditional grager. Click to hear it The primary commandment related to Purim is to hear the reading of the book of Esther. The book of Esther is commonly known as the Megillah, which means scroll. Although there are five books of Jewish scripture that are properly referred to as megillahs (Esther, Ruth, Ecclesiastes, Song of Songs, and Lamentations), this is the one people usually mean when they speak of The Megillah. It is customary to boo, hiss, stamp feet and rattle gragers (noisemakers) whenever the name of Haman is mentioned in the service. The purpose of this custom is to "blot out the name of Haman."
We are also commanded to eat, drink and be merry. According to the Talmud, a person is required to drink until he cannot tell the difference between "cursed be Haman" and "blessed be Mordecai," though opinions differ as to exactly how drunk that is. A person certainly should not become so drunk that he might violate other commandments or get seriously ill. In addition, recovering alcoholics or others who might suffer serious harm from alcohol are exempt from this obligation.
In addition, we are commanded to send out gifts of food or drink, and to make gifts to charity. The sending of gifts of food and drink is referred to as shalach manos (lit. sending out portions). Among Ashkenazic Jews, a common treat at this time of year is hamentaschen (lit. Haman's pockets). These triangular fruit-filled cookies are supposed to represent Haman's three-cornered hat. My recipe is included below.
It is customary to hold carnival-like celebrations on Purim, to perform plays and parodies, and to hold beauty contests. I have heard that the usual prohibitions against cross-dressing are lifted during this holiday, but I am not certain about that. Americans sometimes refer to Purim as the Jewish Mardi Gras.
Purim is not subject to the sabbath-like restrictions on work that some other holidays are; however, some sources indicate that we should not go about our ordinary business on Purim out of respect for the holiday.
Recipe for Hamentaschen
•2/3 cup butter or margarine
•1/2 cup sugar
•1 egg
•1/4 cup orange juice (the smooth kind, not the pulpy)
•1 cup white flour
•1 cup wheat flour (DO NOT substitute white flour! The wheat flour is necessary to achieve the right texture!)
•2 tsp. baking powder
•1 tsp. cinnamon
•Various preserves, fruit butters and/or pie fillings.
Blend butter and sugar thoroughly. Add the egg and blend thoroughly. Add OJ and blend thoroughly. Add flour, 1/2 cup at a time, alternating white and wheat, blending thoroughly between each. Add the baking powder and cinnamon with the last half cup of flour. Refrigerate batter overnight or at least a few hours. Roll as thin as you can without getting holes in the batter (roll it between two sheets of wax paper lightly dusted with flour for best results). Cut out 3 or 4 inch circles.
Put a dollop of filling in the middle of each circle. Fold up the sides to make a triangle, folding the last corner under the starting point, so that each side has corner that folds over and a corner that folds under (see picture at right). Folding in this "pinwheel" style will reduce the likelihood that the last side will fall open while cooking, spilling out the filling. It also tends to make a better triangle shape.
Bake at 350 degrees for about 15-20 minutes, until golden brown but before the filling boils over!
Traditional fillings are poppy seed and prune, but apricot is my favorite. Apple butter, pineapple preserves, and cherry pie filling all work quite well. I usually use Pathmark grocery store brand fruit preserves, and of course the traditional Simon Fischer brand prune lekvar. I have also made some with Nutella (chocolate-hazelnut spread); I find it a bit dry that way, but some people like it.
The number of cookies this recipe makes depends on the size of your cutting tool and the thickness you roll. I use a 4-1/4 inch cutting tool and roll to a medium thickness, and I get 20-24 cookies out of this recipe.
Wheat-Free, Gluten-Free Variation
If you are on a wheat-free diet for wheat allergies or a gluten-free diet for celiac-sprue, substitute 2 cups of buckwheat flour and 1/2 cup of milled flax seed for the white and wheat flour. Reduce the baking powder to 1 tsp. The resulting hamentaschen will have an unusual pumpernickel color, but they taste great!
Make sure the buckwheat flour you use is wheat-free/gluten-free! Sometimes buckwheat flour is mixed with white or wheat flour. The Hodgson Mill buckwheat and flax linked above are gluten-free and have reliable kosher certification.
List of Dates
Purim will occur on the following days of the secular calendar:
•Jewish Year 5772: sunset March 7, 2012 - nightfall March 8, 2012
•Jewish Year 5773: sunset February 23, 2013 - nightfall February 24, 2013
•Jewish Year 5774: sunset March 15, 2014 - nightfall March 16, 2014
•Jewish Year 5775: sunset March 4, 2015 - nightfall March 5, 2015
•Jewish Year 5776: sunset March 23, 2016 - nightfall March 24, 2016
For additional holiday dates, see Links to Jewish Calendars.
“We would be mistaken to think that Fatima’s prophetic message is complete.”
It is a very healthy sign for the Church and the world in general that Church leaders, stung by the often badly-managed paedophilia crisis, have now begun to admit of an underlying sinfulness. In the spirit of great men and women of the Old Testament, like Jeremiah (3:5; 14:20), and Daniel (9:5), and Queen Esther (14:6), they are saying: “We have sinned … we acknowledge, O Lord, our wickedness, the iniquities of our fathers ... we beg forgiveness”. The earlier tendency to close ranks and to try to ignore the deep-seated problems has ever so slowly given way to a spirit of repentance and expressions of sorrow for the victims. Many of the latter have, not surprisingly, received this belated turnaround with scepticism. And the distrust sown has even provided the secular authorities with an excuse to intervene in Church affairs, as in the case of the recent raids by Belgian state police on Church property.
How did this disastrous state of affairs ever come into being? Simply because, as in the case of the Jews of Jeremiah’s time, the genuine prophetic warnings were ignored; our own going back at least as far as Fatima in 1917, when Our Lady of the Rosary had warned (echoing her Son’s “Unless you repent you will all likewise perish”), that “If” humankind refused to respond to the signs of the times, then unimaginable devastations would follow, physical and spiritual. The horrors of two World Wars and the concentration camps were not even to be the end of it. A tidal wave of error was next to be unleashed from Communist Russia. Sister Lucia spoke of this in 1946.
Chronologically, the World Wars and the spread of error have corresponded closely with Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich’s prediction that the Devil would be let loose about 50-60 years before 2000 AD, with some lesser demonic unleashings to occur even earlier than that, in approximately her own time (i.e., 1774 – 1824).
This period included the terrible French Revolution.
Some sixty years after Catherine’s ‘own time’, Pope Leo XIII experienced a most terrifying demonic visitation that seemed to play out, on a cosmic scale, God’s formerly permitting of Satan to buffet an individual, the righteous Job.
Or, even more notably, to the “hour [of] the power of darkness” when Jesus Christ was handed over to his enemies (Luke 22:53). We refer to:
The Vision Of Pope Leo XIII
October 13, 1884
Exactly 33 years to the day prior to the great Miracle of the Sun in Fatima, that is, on October 13, 1884, Pope Leo XIII had a remarkable vision. When the aged Pontiff had finished celebrating Mass in his private Vatican Chapel, attended by a few Cardinals and members of the Vatican staff, he suddenly stopped at the foot of the altar. He stood there for about 10 minutes, as if in a trance, his face ashen white. Then, going immediately from the Chapel to his office, he composed the prayer to St. Michael, with instructions that it be said after all Low Masses everywhere. When asked what had happened, he explained that, as he was about to leave the foot of the altar, he suddenly heard voices – two voices, one kind and gentle, the other guttural and harsh. They seemed to come from near the tabernacle. As he listened, he heard the following conversation [http://www.stjosephschurch.net/leoxiii.htm]:
The guttural voice, the voice of Satan in his pride, boasted to Our Lord:
“I can destroy your Church.”
The gentle voice of Our Lord:
“You can? Then go ahead and do so.”
Satan:
“To do so, I need more time and more power.”
Our Lord:
“How much time? How much power?”
Satan:
“75 to 100 years, and a greater power over those
who will give themselves over to my service.”
Our Lord:
“You have the time, you will have the power.
Do with them what you will.”
Incredible! God, who assuredly does not tempt us to sin, allowing Satan the freedom to exercise real power against his Church, just as He had permitted in the case of the trials of Job, and, later, of Jesus Christ. To bring forth a greater good. In the first case, the perfecting of Job. In the second, the salvation of the entire human race. And, now, in our day, the purification of the Church – the Bride following her Crucified Spouse by imitating his Passion, Death and Resurrection.
Surely nothing better explains this chaotic age in which we have found ourselves than the combined testimonies of Blessed Catherine, Pope Leo, and Lucia in this regard. All Hell breaking loose!
And we are not to blame God for this. We have only ourselves to blame, and our forefathers. And now our Church leaders are starting to say it. But all Catholics need to say it, in the words of Daniel (9:5): “We have sinned, and have dealt perversely, and have done wickedly, and have rebelled, even turning aside from thy precepts and from thine ordinances”. Catholics first, to lead the way, so that other Christians, but also Jews, and Moslems, and Hindus, and indeed the whole world, will follow suit. ‘For it is not sacrifice alone that pleases God, but a humbled contrite heart’.
But now we shall also have to pay the cost, and most surely we are already paying it. And Fatima may give a hint of further horrors yet to come; Fatima supplemented perhaps by some of those frightening post-1920’s Marian apparitions. Here of course we speak only of those apparitions that have been solidly approved by the Church. So, perhaps it was wishful thinking that the contents of the Third Fatima Secret were initially interpreted as being all completely done and dusted by the end of the C20th. As if the C21st century has suddenly set humankind in the right direction. {Our AD centuries have been, we suspect, artificially calculated anyway, as the BC ones most definitely have}. Thankfully Pope Benedict XVI en route to Fatima for the celebrations of the 13th of May, 2010, offered a more realistic interpretation of the Third Secret. Colleen Hammond gives this account of it (on May 19, 2010):
Pope: “Fatima’s prophetic message is NOT complete”
On board a jet bound for Fatima on May 11, 2010, Pope Benedict XVI answered a question regarding the Third Secret that put him at odds with the ‘official’ Vatican interpretation of the Secret propounded in 2000. The year 2000 Commentary claims that … the prophecy of the Third Secret is completely fulfilled by the 1981 assassination attempt against Pope John Paul II.
For a multitude of reasons … this interpretation was denounced as insufficient by tens of thousands of Catholics the world over. During Pope Benedict’s latest trip to Fatima, however, the Pope did not speak of the Fatima prophecies as already fulfilled, but linked the Third Secret with the present pedophilia scandals in the Church, and indicated the prophecy of the Secret includes future events. ….
[End of quote]
And the Pope associated his Fatima message with the old Babylonian Captivity, the era of Jeremiah, Daniel and Esther mentioned above. (From the Vatican’s website):
Esplanade of the Shrine of Our Lady of Fátima
Thursday, 13 May 2010
Dear Pilgrims,
“Their descendants shall be renowned among the nations […], they are a people whom the Lord has blessed” (Is 61:9). So the first reading of this Eucharist began, and its words are wonderfully fulfilled in this assembly devoutly gathered at the feet of Our Lady of Fatima. Dearly beloved brothers and sisters, I too have come as a pilgrim to Fatima, to this “home” from which Mary chose to speak to us in modern times. I have come to Fatima to rejoice in Mary’s presence and maternal protection. I have come to Fatima, because today the pilgrim Church, willed by her Son as the instrument of evangelization and the sacrament of salvation, converges upon this place. I have come to Fatima to pray, in union with Mary and so many pilgrims, for our human family, afflicted as it is by various ills and sufferings. Finally, I have come to Fatima with the same sentiments as those of Blessed Francisco and Jacinta, and the Servant of God Lúcia, in order to entrust to Our Lady the intimate confession that “I love” Jesus, that the Church and priests “love” him and desire to keep their gaze fixed upon him as this Year for Priests comes to its end, and in order to entrust to Mary’s maternal protection priests, consecrated men and women, missionaries and all those who by their good works make the House of God a place of welcome and charitable outreach.
These are the “people whom the Lord has blessed”. The people whom the Lord has blessed are you, the beloved Diocese of Leiria-Fatima, with your pastor, Bishop Antonio Marto. …. In God I embrace all [Portugal’s] sons and daughters, particularly the afflicted or outcast, with the desire of bringing them that great hope which burns in my own heart, and which here, in Fatima, can be palpably felt. May our great hope sink roots in the lives of each of you, dear pilgrims, and of all those who join us through the communications media.
Yes! The Lord, our great hope, is with us. In his merciful love, he offers a future to his people: a future of communion with himself. After experiencing the mercy and consolation of God who did not forsake them along their wearisome return from the Babylonian Exile, the people of God cried out: “I greatly rejoice in the Lord, my whole being exults in my God” (Is 61:10)”. [*]
*Here the Pope quotes the so-called ‘Trito-Isaiah’ (who is not the original Isaiah) in connection with the Babylonian Exile, which occurred more than a century after Isaiah himself. We have argued in our “Towards a Full Restoration of the Prophet Jonah” (http://bookofjonah.blog.com) for the traditional view that the prophet Isaiah wrote the whole Book of Isaiah, which must therefore substantially pre-date the Babylonian Exile.
The resplendent daughter of this people is the Virgin Mary of Nazareth who, clothed with grace and sweetly marvelling at God’s presence in her womb, made this joy and hope her own in the canticle of the Magnificat: “My spirit rejoices in God my Saviour”. She did not view herself as a fortunate individual in the midst of a barren people, but prophecied for them the sweet joys of a wondrous maternity of God, for “his mercy is for those who fear him from generation to generation” (Lk 1:47, 50).
[End of quote]
The Pope then later goes on to make the all-important statement relevant to the Third Fatima Secret:
We would be mistaken to think that Fatima’s prophetic mission is complete. Here there takes on new life the plan of God which asks humanity from the beginning: “Where is your brother Abel […] Your brother’s blood is crying out to me from the ground!” (Gen 4:9). Mankind has succeeded in unleashing a cycle of death and terror, but failed in bringing it to an end…
In sacred Scripture we often find that God seeks righteous men and women in order to save the city of man and he does the same here, in Fatima, when Our Lady asks: “Do you want to offer yourselves to God, to endure all the sufferings which he will send you, in an act of reparation for the sins by which he is offended and of supplication for the conversion of sinners?” (Memoirs of Sister Lúcia, I, 162).
[End of quote]
The Holy Father’s Fatima Homily is filled with a realistic hope, based on the promised Triumph of the Immaculate Heart of Mary “in the end”. And we, too, can share in that same hope based on that same promise. We must ever resist a tendency found amongst some Christians to focus upon all the ills of the world, seeing a conspiracy around every corner; or, like St. Peter, taking one’s eyes off Christ to focus on the terrifying, storm-tossed waves. Nevertheless, we must also be realistic. We well know of the great ancient enmity, that there is most definitely a diabolical conspiracy in process even in our own very era. And so we have our work cut out.
Co-founder of the AMAIC, Frits Albers (RIP), who had studied for the priesthood at Nijmegen (Holland), used to tell of the Teilhardian modernism in supposed Catholic places like Louvain University back as early as the 1940’s.
By the 1970’s, things had of course become far worse still. On June 29, 1972, His Holiness Pope Paul VI stunned the world with the alleged (some have disputed this) words: “From some fissure the smoke of satan entered into the temple of God. ...”.
The testimony of Fr. Gabriele Amorth as given in the last MATRIX may serve to bring us up to date about the present horrific state of affairs even in the Vatican: the consequences of that satanic infiltration included power struggles at the Vatican as well as “cardinals who do not believe in Jesus, and bishops who are linked to the Demon”. It is always difficult to confirm or verify, from a distance, the full accuracy of such reports. But sometimes insiders will let the cat out of the bag, as did Communist, Bella Dodd, whom Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen converted in 1952. And as has Lt. General Ion Mihai Pacepa, the highest-ranking intelligence officer ever to have defected from the former Soviet bloc, who has told of his involvement in a plot to discredit Pope Pius XII (See: http://article.nationalreview.com/303351/moscows-assault-on-the-vatican/ion-mihai-pacepa
On occasion readers can send us some very startling reports, certain of which tend, quite unrealistically, to attribute all presumed conspiracies to the Jews. There was something of a light-hearted moment in the 2005 documentary Protocols of Zion, which documents the rise of anti-Semitism in the US after the 9/11 attacks. Here was commentator Marc Levin walking up and down the streets asking random people about Jews and anti-Semitism. He then comes upon a group of feisty young street protestors, black Americans, one of whom argues with him about how, as he thinks, all the Jews have taken over New York. Levin asks him what he means, and the guy responds, “Even the mayor of New York [at the time, Giuliani] is Jewish!”
Levin tells the young pontificator that he’s wrong. “Oh really?” he says, “Jew-liani? Jew-liani? That doesn’t sound Jewish to you?” Everyone laughed.
Far less humorous, and much closer to home (Australia), is this one just received:
Australian Adept Unveiled World Satanic Control
by Henry Makow Ph.D.
January 3, 2010
In an explosive deathbed confession, a former head of the satanist “Alpha Lodge” in Sydney, Australia, revealed the pervasive worldwide power of organized Satanism, which is synonymous with the Illuminati.
“Things are not as they seem – and they have not been for a long, long time,” he wrote, describing a wholesale betrayal of society by its ostensible leaders.
“Petor Narsagonan” aka “Frater 616” died March 25, 2004. Recently, his executor, an “Aloysius Fozdyke” (their satanic names) sent the 15 pp. document by email to Arthur Cristian, webmaster of “loveforlife.com.au”.
“I have felt it necessary to edit very little of this work,” “Fozdyke” wrote to Cristian, “although legal considerations have ensured that some names and details were excised. It was his intention to have this published in the popular media.”
What follows is a synopsis of this shocking document focusing on Satanic power and influence. Satanic influence is “now so pervasive as not to be readily noticed,” Frater says. Satanists are laced throughout Australian society, and the pattern is replicated everywhere. They include politicians, doctors, high ranking police officers, lawyers, decorated military men, media personalities, fashion models and social workers. The most talented have lifestyles maintained by crime under a veneer of respectable professionalism and knowledge. Marginal types (prostitutes, drug dealers) are important to Satanism but are merely tools.
Frater explains he got involved in a satanic group in university in 1971. “I fell through a crack in reality... I escaped the mundane through one of western society’s fault lines”. “A mentor” in the Satanic network set him up in the travel business and for years Frater live a life of unimaginable wealth, occultism and debauchery. He studied the black arts: divination, dark meditation, sacrifice, sexual vampirism, voodoo dolls and sex magic. Each day ended with a “Black Mass orgy of unforgettable and unspeakable delight.” ….
Excerpt from a Poem by Sydney poet, Patrick Moylan
The woman of agony from the flaming furies
Came winging up from the underworld depths
To start quarrels and wars
Upon the Earth for unfortunate man.
Her only pursuit to revel in strife
With her mind a whirling vortex
Of a thousand odd tricks
To deceive and cajole the naivety of man
And exploit opportunity
To cause any argument
Of one with another
Anything she hopes
That will lead to blood-shed
Destruction and famine
Suffering and death
Madness among men
Being her greatest objective.
Locked into her hair
Nestle two coiled snakes
Poised rearing to strike
At her given command
By the slightest pretext
From her horrific snarled mouth
Like that of a mad savage dog
With out-turned bared lips
From the underworld depths
Hell-bent she rises in fury
To drag men down to the deep buried pit
Wonder you must in the events of man
How far she has advanced
In her planned Goal of Death ....
Now she glides across slowly
...To stir the strife cauldron
As she wings on her way
Wonder just where
She is perched right this minute
Perhaps scanning the horizon
For more likely prey
Innocently unsuspecting her invisible presence
Never resting but planning unceasing
To satisfy her desire for bloodshed and death
Our blessed Lady years ago requested
During a time of violence and war
At a place called Fatima
For your Rosary of Prayer
To block the Hellspirit
And stop her marauding and sowing of strife
To regain world peace
In the Great World War
Yet since that distant time
Some well thinking religious people
Outright refrain
To speak about Fatima
And our Lady's requests
As part of their chores
Of church canon laws
But please God let's hope
Just the same
They'll not be blown up ....
For it was in 1984 that there occurred the long-awaited and long-neglected collegial consecration of Russia - but now also including the entire world (since ‘Russia’s errors’ had now gone out worldwide) - to the Immaculate Heart of Mary.
So we find a sharp contrast between the Marian-inspired hope of Pope Benedict XVI (and those who follow him) and the prevailing despair of our times. It is like a drama story that is filled with many dark twists and turns, but with the author knowing that ultimately it will finish on a happy note. The basis of Benedict XVI’s hope has the same foundation as it had for the three Fatima seers: Jesus Christ.
Moreover, that Light deep within the shepherd children, which comes from the future of God, is the same Light which was manifested in the fullness of time and came for us all: the Son of God made man. He has the power to inflame the coldest and saddest of hearts, as we see in the case of the disciples on the way to Emmaus (cf. Lk 24:32). Henceforth our hope has a real foundation, it is based on an event which belongs to history and at the same time transcends history: Jesus of Nazareth. The enthusiasm roused by his wisdom and his saving power among the people of that time was such that a woman in the midst of the crowd – as we heard in the Gospel – cried out: “Blessed is the womb that bore you, and the breasts that nursed you!”. And Jesus said: “Blessed rather are those who hear the word of God and obey it!” (Lk 11:27-28). But who finds time to hear God’s word and to let themselves be attracted by his love? Who keeps watch, in the night of doubt and uncertainty, with a heart vigilant in prayer? Who awaits the dawn of the new day, fanning the flame of faith? Faith in God opens before us the horizon of a sure hope, one which does not disappoint; it indicates a solid foundation on which to base one’s life without fear; it demands a faith-filled surrender into the hands of the Love which sustains the world.
[End of quote]
We must allow hope to evaporate the paralysing fear of our times. In fact, though it might not seem so, the turning point might already have been reached. According to the conversation overheard by Leo XIII, Satan was granted “75 to 100 years”. That was in 1884. And to what date do 100 years bring us from there? To 1984, and that was a most significant date in relation to the Fatima prophecies (and possibly the year intended in St. Don Bosco’s Dream). For it was in 1984 that there occurred the long-awaited and long-neglected collegial consecration of Russia - but now also including the entire world (since ‘Russia’s errors’ had by now gone out worldwide) - to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. On the 25th of March 1984, in the square of St. Peter’s Basilica, the great Marian Pope, John Paul II, achieved the consecration in union with a moral majority of the world’s bishops. And this, after several unsuccessful attempts by the modern popes. Sr. Lucia, the sole remaining Fatima seer, ultimately accepted that this was the act of consecration that Our Lady of the Rosary had requested at Fatima.It was a consecration that Heaven had asked for, and expected, back in the 1920’s. But Satan had managed to thwart and delay it, owing to the lack of will on the part of most Catholics. Perhaps it took the near violent death and then miraculous ‘resurrection’ of this great Marian pontiff to achieve what had for so long remained unfulfilled.
In our Fatima book, The Five First Saturdays (1994), a decade later, we took up in great detail the attractive theme introduced by Blue Army writers that the Fatima series echoed the drama of the Book of Esther, both having a beginning and a concluding on the 13th day of a month. In the case of Fatima, the initial series of apparitions occurred between May 13 and October 13 of 1917, culminating in the great solar miracle, ‘so that all would believe’.We likened the wicked edict of Haman, the enemy of the Jews in the Book of Esther - who had planned to destroy the entire Jewish race, the church of that time - to Satan’s pitch for souls, especially in the modern era. The terrifying Fatima apparition of Hell was Satan’s calling card. Mordecai’s countermanding edict echoed of course the Divine work of salvation, and Our Lady of Fatima’s key role (like Queen Esther’s) in it, with a special culmination in 1984. Error had gone out universally (Haman’s edict), but now (in 1984) God had applied the brakes to it (cf. Mordecai’s edict). Haman was exposed and executed, but his minions were still active and the final victory would therefore be delayed.
In contemporary terms, the cap had been placed securely over Satan’s destructive oil leak, shutting down its flow, but the sludge and pollution remain everywhere.
Is it too much to say that, along parallel lines with the Book of Esther, the 1984 consecration was God’s countermanding Edict against the former unleashing of error? And that, with it, the Devil’s 100 years of being let off the leash were brought to an end. A final crushing of his already crushed head? And that it remains to mop up the mess, along with Satan’s still very active minions? Error to be reined in by Truth?
People of good will on earth must co-operate to cap the far-reaching error spill; Truth, the antidote to error, needing to be held up everywhere, in everything, at every level. As said, we have our work cut out. And it may be that, as in the drama of Esther, it will all come down to a last throw of the dice and to a last minute rescue, with much “bloodshed … suffering and death” (as in Patrick’s poem above) at the end. For, as Mordecai had dreamed (Esther 10:10-11): “For this purpose [God] made two lots, one for the people of God and one for all the nations, and these two lots came to the hour and moment and day of decision before God and among all the nations”.
Our ‘ray of hope’ at the end of all this ‘gloominess’ is the sure fulfilment of that other great Fatima promise: an era of peace and the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart. The Pope had well in mind this happy future for humankind when he said at Fatima, may “the seven years which separate us from the centenary of the apparitions hasten the fulfillment of the prophecy of the triumph of the Immaculate Heart, to the glory of the Blessed Trinity.” In the meantime, as he goes on to tell us:
... we must cultivate an interior watchfulness of the heart which, for most of the time, we do not possess on account of the powerful pressure exerted by outside realities and the images and concerns which fill our soul (cf. Theological Commentary on The Message of Fatima, 2000). Yes! God can come to us, and show himself to the eyes of our heart. An example and encouragement is to be found in the shepherd children, who offered their whole lives to God and shared them fully with others for love of God. Our Lady helped them to open their hearts to universal love. .... Only with this fraternal and generous love will we succeed in building the civilization of love and peace.
[End of quote]
We greatly look forward with Pope Benedict XVI to Fatima in the year of 2017:
In seven years you will return here to celebrate the centenary of the first visit made by the Lady “come from heaven”, the Teacher who introduced the little seers to a deep knowledge of the Love of the Blessed Trinity and led them to savour God himself as the most beautiful reality of human existence. This experience of grace made them fall in love with God in Jesus, so much so that Jacinta could cry out: “How much I delight in telling Jesus that I love him! When I tell him this often, I feel as if I have a fire in my breast, yet it does not burn me”. And Francisco could say: “What I liked most of all was seeing Our Lord in that light which Our Mother put into our hearts. I love God so much!” (Memoirs of Sister Lúcia, I, 42 and 126).
