My House Shall Be Called The House Of Prayer, But You Have Made It A Den Of Thieves

The Wrath of God Cometh Against The Grifters

This Wolf is recalling here two very famous men, Fr Malachi Martin and Fr Nicholas Gruner.  The point here is not to review the very many controversies surrounding each of these men but merely to ponder the fact that both of them died rather suddenly and apparently without either sufficient time for reflection over their past lives or the Last Rites of Holy Mother Church.  Throughout history a sudden and unprovided death has been seen by Holy Men as a sign of God's Wrath and Reprobation.  While we certainly hope this is not true in either case, reason exists to fear.  
Let us begin with Fr Malachi Martin.  While numerous lurid accounts exist of Fr Malachi Martin having had affairs with various women, and E Michael Jones has accused him of being a "Double Agent" for Jewish interests during Vatican II and especially as regards the composition of Nostrae Aetate, one need only consult the public record to make a very dire case against this poor soul.  

Fr Martin, on October 1st 1973, published a most hideous book called "Jesus Now" and had an attendant interview with William F Buckley Jr on "Firing Line" on December 7th, 1973, which is still on YouTube.  One can listen to Fr Martin spout the most liberal psychobabble for the better part of an hour.  As for "Jesus Now", this review should suffice: "Jesus, Martin declares, is disappearing from the minds of men.  And it is just as well that he is.  For the Jesus that we are losing is the Jesus that we have created- that is, the 'Jesus figures' of history and of religious emotion, the Jesus of the 'reasonable man' and of the social liberationists.  What we will be left with- indeed, all that will remain- is the true Jesus, the Jesus-Self, as Fr Martin calls him.  The Jesus-Self is the immutable, ageless Jesus, the stumbling-block of the Jews and the folly of the Gentiles, who lives within each man and from whom there is no escape- the Jesus-Self which every man inexorably is.  Martin's exasperation at man's historic insistence upon creating and recreating Jesus according to his whims, his indignation at the utilization of Jesus as a tool and a weapon by the various 'schools,' and his assertion of the Jesus 'who did not come in order to depart, and need not come again because he never went away. Jesus past. Jesus future. Jesus now' - all this has a rhetorical power which carries the reader along and almost compels his assent, even while wondering whether the author, like the cultures and institutions he damns, is not perhaps creating his own Jesus, yet another Jesus in his own likeness and according to his own needs. If so, the Jesus-Self could not have found a prophet more stimulating and more articulate than Malachi Martin."  Hope all that vintage 1970's psychobabble did not give the reader a headache.

Shortly after the death of Pope Paul VI, Fr Martin would appear again on "Firing Line" this time to give "... us a breathless and detail-filled account of why Pope Paul VI had sought to appease the Communists ['because he was persuaded that he couldn't stop the advent of Communist parties ... (either in Europe or in Latin America) and hence his idea was, "Let's survive by making friends"']..." Just a few months before, in January of that year, Fr Martin would release the book, "The Final Conclave", about a hypothetical election of a pope wherein was dramatized Vatican "insider politics".  In the words of one review: "This book may easily be read as an alternative church history depicting the years after Vatican II, whereby the author speculates in the final pages what might have happened if the Cardinals had followed their latent idealistic instincts instead of their stronger political ones.  Could the outcome given in the novel really have happened?  Yes.  Did it?  No.  Will it ever?  To this last question, the words of Hemingway seem especially appropriate: ‘Isn't it pretty to think so?’  Highly recommended for fans of this type of literature."

Now the ironic and perhaps sadistic side of this Wolf is speculating that what Fr Martin had been doing in the 1970's was looking for that target readership that would latch onto his penchant for applying his vivid imagination and his knowledge of Catholic Church affairs to producing tantalizing speculation and absorbing narrative. The liberalism had apparently not burgeoned as he hoped, and "Jesus Now" had essentially flopped.  "The Final Conclave" obviously targeted the more mainline Catholic audience of the 1970's, but just not was quite the deal breaker.  Then, as the 1980's were waning, he found the proper formula with the release of “The Jesuits”.  To quote the Editorial Review: "In ‘The Jesuits’, Malachi Martin reveals for the first time the harrowing behind-the-scenes story of the 'new' worldwide Society of Jesus. The leaders and the dupes; the blood and the pathos; the politics, the betrayals and the humiliations; the unheard-of alliances and compromises. The Jesuits tells a true story of today that is already changing the face of all our tomorrows."  This success was quickly followed in 1991 by “Keys To This Blood”, the expanded title of which tells the story: "Pope John Paul II Versus Russia and the West for Control of the New World Order."  In the light of subsequent revelations that the "Soviet Bloc" was in actuality financed by the same people that run the United States Federal reserve and the stupendous revelations concerning Marcial Maciel and the "Legionaries of Christ", Keys To This Blood was disingenuous, to put it mildly.

But before those revelations, Fr Martin, capitalizing on his newfound fame, expanded his market into the turbulent waters of Traditional Catholicism with the publication of “Windswept House” in 1996.  For the first time, Fr Martin lets his "Traditionalism" go mainstream, along with hints of truly diabolical happenings in the Vatican after 1960. (At this stage in the game, this Wolf will speculate that what was probably occurring in the Vatican long before 1960 makes the scenes in Windswept House mild by comparison.  Be that as it may, Fr Martin was instantly the darling of the gossips and wagging tongues in Traditional Chapels all across the spectrum and from coast to coast.)

And it was on Coast to Coast, with Art Bell, that Malachi Martin would spin the most sensational tales revolving around the "Third Secret of Fatima" which he claimed to have read, but had sworn not to reveal.  Nevertheless, he could give titillating glimpses of an Antipope who would rule a "counterfeit church"- as though what followed Vatican II was not a false church with a false mission- the Grand Freemasonic Coming Out Party- mixing the obvious with the speculative and tossing in a good mix of "Our Lady of Akita" for good measure.  He would also hint at frightening chastisements similar to "The Three Days Of Darkness" in which, as Cardinal Ratzinger had alluded, "millions would perish from one moment to the next".   The first interview was in October 1996 and the last in July 1998.

One year later, in July 1999, Fr Malachi Martin allegedly fell and suffered a severe head injury, which triggered bleeding in the brain.  Apparently traumatized, he was sequestered by his "housekeeper", one Mrs Kakia Livanos, until he died some four days later.  One can speculate that, having suffered a stroke some months earlier, various sources colluded in his demise lest certain bits of information get out.  One cover story is that he met his demise by way of certain proponents of Medjugorje, because he was opposed to the "apparitions" in former Yugoslavia.  Be that as it may, his death remains sudden, mysterious, and tragic.  Was his distortions of Our Lady of Fatima the last straw with Divine Justice?

We now turn to the story of Fr Nicholas Gruner, the famous "Fatima Priest" who led the "World Apostolate of Fatima".  Many diverse opinions concerning his priestly status, his relationship with Rome, his exact status as regards the "New Sacraments" and the "New Mass" abound, and will not be explored here.  Nor will this Wolf delve into the rumors he extorted monies from the Dimond Brothers, or other gossipy tidbits regarding himself or his organizations, "The Servants of Jesus and Mary" or "The World Apostolate of Fatima".  Suffice to say that Fr Gruner hid his "Traditionalism" under cover, so to say, and largely appealed to the "Conservative Novus Ordo" crowd.

Fr Gruner catapulted onto the world stage when he opposed various Fatima apostolates who suddenly reversed their opinions about 1988 that the collegial consecration of Russia requested by Our Lady of Fatima at the apparition to St Sr Lucia at Tuy Spain on June 13th, 1929 had not been completed.  Led by a Fr Matthew Fox from the Fatima Family Apostolate, a coalition of Fatima apostolates, including the Blue Army, all now opined that the 1984 Consecration performed by Pope John Paul II fulfilled Our Lady's requests.  (Of course, this was ludicrous, as Pope John Paul II did not specifically mention Russia, nor did he consecrate anything formally to the Immaculate Heart, wondering if such an act was even theologically possible, and, of course, most of the bishops of the world paid little or no attention to this act, nor did he order them to perform the act along with him.)  Their position was buttressed by the subsequent "collapse" of Russia and Communism, and the "Cold War".  Fr Gruner alone would continue to promote the truth that the Collegial Consecration requested by Our Lady had yet to be performed, and millions latched onto and supported his apostolate, including this Wolf.

Throughout the 1990's, Fr Gruner's magazine, The Fatima Crusader, wove a tapestry of sensational mass media and church  headlines underscored by the dire prophecies of Fatima, causing millions to wonder how imminent the chastisements were.  And, of course, the proverbial cards and letters, with millions of dollars in donations, kept pouring in.  This Wolf is not alleging these funds were mismanaged or misappropriated.  He is just stating the obvious; the message of Fatima, properly contextualized, was immensely profitable.

After the epochal events of September 2001, however, this Wolf was becoming disenfranchised with the Fatima Crusader.  He had already become somewhat incredulous with the publication of the book Fatima Priest, an account of Fr Gruner's confrontations with Carlos Evaristo and an alleged imposter to St Sr Lucia (an imposter of the imposter, as it were).  The "author" of the book, Francis Alban, was obviously fictional, and the glorification of Fr Gruner left a bad taste in this Wolf's mouth.  Nevertheless, he persevered for a few years until it became obvious that Fr Gruner was not willing to delve into what really happened that fateful September day, preferring instead the cover story that the Towers were demolished by Terrorists who wanted to initiate a jihad against the West, and the United States in particular.  (The "Patriotic Orgy" that followed in the wake of 9-1-1 and especially that poster "He will Bless His People With Peace" utterly sickened this Wolf, but we digress...)  This WOlf was subsequently told that "conspiracy theories" would detract from the message of Fatima, as it would disenfranchise the "sheeple".

This Wolf's hopes were bolstered when Fr Gruner's sidekick Fr Paul Kramer, in his second edition of the Devil's Final Battle in 2010, finally in an addendum lambasted the official narrative of 9-1-1, and also discussed other false flags many and sundry.  But meanwhile, Fr Gruner was apparently hesitant to delve into whether the "Sr Lucia" post 1957 was actually an imposter, as more and more evidence was accumulating that that was indeed the case.  But the last straw with Divine Providence might have been in 2014 when Fr Gruner was scheduled to make an appearance with St Michael's World Apostolate to commemorate the "apparitions" of Our Lady at Bayside, New York.  (Some years before, this Wolf had personally complained to Fr Gruner of conflating Our Lady of Fatima with the "apparitions" at Akita Japan, as if Our Lady of Fatima needed an "update".)

Then, on April 29th, 2015, John Vennari penned this notice: "It is my sad duty to announce the sudden death of Father Nicholas Gruner.  He died suddenly late today of a heart attack while working at his Fatima Center office.  At the moment, I do not know more than this.  Please re-visit our page for updates."  Not exactly the way this Wolf would expect a devout Apostle of the Immaculate Heart to die, and not the way anybody with any sense would want to die.  Now, does this mean Fr Gruner commenced a voyage with the damned?  Of course not, and we can have good hope for the repose of his soul, all the ecclesiastical censures notwithstanding.  But it is disturbing nonetheless.

The point here is that God does not look kindly upon those who would distort the message of Fatima, or use it to pad coffers.  Our Lady of Fatima is not a brand name, nor should the message of Fatima be a source to garner clicks, views, likes, shares, and subscribes.  Us Apostles of Fatima should take the job with utmost seriousness, and stay immersed in the spirit of prayer.

And this is why this Wolf does not conflate Fatima with any other apparitions except Lourdes and La Salette- and La Salette only from the foundation of what we can know for certain, that Our Lady told Meleanie these are "The Times of Times and the End of Ends" and that "Rome Would Lose the Faith and Become The Seat of the Antichrist".  (Questions, anybody?)

A long held axiom of the Church Fathers is that "Judgment will begin in the House of God".

A Word to the Wise is Sufficient.

Our lady of Fatima, pray for us.  You are our only hope!