Editor’s Note: The following article will appear in the October 31, 2018 print edition of The Remnant in our “Debating the Relevant Issues” column. Many thanks to Remnant columnist, John Salza, for continuing to carefully consider this most controversial issue which, admittedly, divides not a few good Catholics. The fact that faithful Catholics are left with no alternative but to seriously debate whether or not Francis is still Catholic provides a startling testimony to the disastrous extent of the crisis in the Church, which clearly starts at the top. May God help us all to consider the facts carefully, and then to hold fast to the truth regardless of how difficult to accept that truth may be. These are dangerous times in which even the elect will be deceived if that is possible. Let’s us ask God to protect us all from that diabolical deception.  MJM

With events in the Church pointing more and more to the fulfilment of the Third Secret of Fatima, it is interesting to note that in Archbishop Vigano’s 11-page testimony of August 22 wherein the pope and 32 high-ranking Church officials were implicated in the sexual-abuse of minors, the archbishop cited the crux of the Third Secret, saying:

“The corruption has reached the very top of the Church's hierarchy”

This calls to mind the now famous statement of Cardinal Mario Ciappi, who read the Third Secret and who was personal papal theologian to Popes John XXIII, Paul VI, and John Paul II. In a personal communication to a professor Baumgartner of Salzburg, Ciappi said:    

“In the Third Secret it is foretold, among other things,
that the great apostasy in the Church will begin at the top”