It is a very good time to recall that in the Seventies of the last century Japan was the scene of the best authenticated Marian apparition since Fatima, and which has been deemed worthy of belief by the Vatican. The message of Our Lady of Akita is a stern one, and a call for repentance and a turning to God.
In this world, as well as in the next, our only sure reliance is in God.
I must say, I’m disappointed with CNA. “Purported visions?” From a Catholic source owned by EWTN? It would have been simple to change that opening sentence to say “…whose visions…found worthy of belief by the Holy See under the title of Our Lady of Akita…”. Have they started hiring their social media writers from PMSNBC? Sigh.
[…] 1980, I Bought Into This C%@# Lock, Stock and Barrel – Fr. Allan J. McDonald at Southern. . .Our Lady of Akita – Donald R. McClarey, J.D., at The American CatholicConfession Is Not Enough, 12 Unknown […]
“Fire will fall from heaven” –> nuclear war?
The first trumpet in Revelation 8:3?
Attached are notes from my study of Revelation 8 for evening prayer last night. I had no idea Donald would post about Our Lady of Akita today.
Frank: Agree. “‘Purported’ visions?” Purported (def.), Merriam-Webster: “ to have the often specious appearance of being, intending, or claiming (something implied or inferred).”
No, Sr. Agnes HAD visions: what other people dismiss of her experience is reflective of their own doubtfulness. And at least some of her revelations have been remarkably accurate (“bishop vs. bishop,” etc).
Sister Agnes lived away from her order. There are documented stories that those who asked to meet her were told by various Cardinals and Bishops she was senile. When a particular visitor managed to have a meeting with Sister Anges and was shocked to see her alert, aware and normal they told her what is being said about her and she was offended. Lots of dark forces in the Church have worked against her and the Apparitions at Akita. Perhaps because some of the messages from Our Lady warn about the evil within the Church.
She was cured of deafness in 1982 just as Our Lady promised her. Pope Benedict in 1988 when he was part of the Sacred Congregation in Rome declared the apparitions at Akita to be authentic Divine revelations. She passed away on Our Lady’s Feast Day.
There was a fair bit of confusion on this matter a few years back, so it’s worth noting that the Vatican only approved the bishop’s declaration that there was nothing in the messages contrary to the teaching of the Church.
Rome (more particularly, the then-head of the CDF, the future Benedict XVI) specifically refused to rule on the supernatural character of the apparitions.
LV – I’m not sure that’s the case. Akita has Ecclesiastical approval. Perhaps the issue here is that the administration on how the Vatican communicates approved Marian apparitions needs to be addressed by the Vatican. It’s poor. And clearly politics is at play because of how maligned the good Sister Agnes has been made to be, by those within the Vatican with ill intentions, laying the r power card. Our Lady’s messages at Akita are Divine Revelations.
As most commenters here know, the original ordinary for Akita, Bp. John Shojiro Ito of Niigata diocese. authorized the veneration of the apparition in a pastoral letter to the diocese in 1984. He had met with Sr. Agnes some number of times and had witnessed the inexplicable tears of the statue and other related mystical phenomena.
However, according to Radio Veritas Asia (report, May 20th, 2024), “In 1990, Peter Shirayagani, the Archbishop of Tokyo and of the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of Japan, stated in an Italian monthly magazine that he no longer took the events of Akita seriously.”
But that should be no surprise to anyone. Many bishops and archbishops today evidently do not take the appearances of Our Lady at Lourdes and at Fatima “seriously” either any longer.
And those same pastors seem quite terminally unable to understand anything about things that have gone wrong today in the Catholic Church.
@ Ezabelle: Well said: “ Lots of dark forces in the Church have worked against [Sr. Agnes] and the Apparitions at Akita. Perhaps because some of the messages from Our Lady warn about the evil within the Church.”
It is a persistent mystery. Why is that many clergy, some influential in the Catholic Church, became adamantly and even bitterly,
opposed to the Marian apparitions of the last 200 years. Theologian Fr. Edouard Dhanis, SJ (d.1978), who taught at the Gregorian for many years, vigorously contested the interpretations and subsequent visions of Sr. Lucia of Fatima and became very personal in his criticisms. Secretary of State Agostino Cardinal Casaroli (d. 1998) for much of his tenure was strongly opposed to the Marian apparitions at Fatima and went to considerable lengths to restrict Marian inspired priests who asked to lead “Fatima crusades”. Then there are many rank-and-file priests who seem embarrassed by the stories of the apparitions and especially their warnings.
1 cannot explain it.
Steve – I can explain it. They are committing sins themselves and leading double lives which are contrary to their vocations. So when something like Akita come along which shines light on their deceptive ways they will destroy it and everything connected to it. It’s very easy to state a lie. It’s harder to disapprove it.
As footnote to what Ezabelle has said:
3rd Message, Our Lady at Akita to Sr. Agnes, Oct. 13th, 1973: “The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops. The priests who venerate me will be scorned and opposed by their confreres…churches and altars sacked; the Church will be full of those who accept compromises and the demon will press many priests and consecrated souls to leave the service of the Lord.”
And comes to mind another highly placed prelate of the Church who has scoffed at the Marian apparitions and revelations without care to distinguish among them at all:
“I prefer the Madonna as mother, our mother, and not a woman who’s the head of a telegraphic office, who sends a message every day at a certain time,” P. Francis told reporters in 2017 (AP News, May 17,2024, “ Vatican moves to adapt to hoaxes, Internet and overhauls its process for evaluating visions of Mary,” Nicole Winfield)