The Prophecy of Bl. Tomasuccio de Foligno

The Storm on the Sea of Galilee, by Rembrandt

It looks like the Maya don't hold a complete monopoly on the prophetic significance of the year 2012. An interesting prophecy connected to the year 2012 was supposedly made by a Franciscian monk named Bl. Tomasuccio de Foligno, who lived between the years 1319-1377. I'm still in the process of attempting to validate this prophecy, but so far there are several factors pointing to its authenticity. The prophecy is cited in a book called Miscellanea Francescana 1, edited by M. Faloci Pulignani, dating to 1886 - long before the prophetic significance of the year 2012 for the Meso-American cultures was discovered after the decipherment of the Mayan glyphs in the mid-20th century. This book in turn appears to base at least some of its information on a facsimile dating to the late 15th century called Legenda de' Beati del Terzo Ordine Sancto Francisco, (ed L. Temperini, Rome: Editrice Franciscanum, 1996), which contains the Legenda of Bl. Tomasuccio de Foligno - as recorded by his companion and disciple Giusto della Rosa. Although I don't have access to this particular book to confirm that the prophecy is actually included there, so would be grateful if anyone else out there can confirm this. Known as The Worthy Shepherd Prophecy, Bl. Tomasuccio's vision is a variation of the Angelic Pope prophecies, which details how a future pontiff will heal the Church of schism following a time of turmoil:

"One from beyond the mountains shall become the Vicar Of God. Religious and clerics shall take part in this change. Outside the true path, there will be only disreputable men; I shrug my shoulders when the Bark of Peter is in danger and there is no one to lend it help... The schismatic shall fall into the scorn of the Italian faithful... By about twelve years shall the millennium have passed when the resplendent mantle of legitimate power shall emerge from the shadows where it was being kept by the schism. And beyond harm from the one who is blocking the door of salvation, for his deceitful schism shall have come to an end. And the mass of the faithful shall attach itself to the worthy Shepherd, who shall extricate each one from error and restore to the Church its beauty. He shall renew it."
(Miscellanea Francescana 1 p173)

Of course the most interesting aspect of this prophecy is the fact that it points to the time of the Second Pentecost to twelve years past the millennium - the year 2012. This would thus correspond with the contention of various commentators on the 2012 phenomenon that the Maya believed that this period would mark a major shift in spiritual thought, rather than being the date of a world-destroying cataclysm.

Given that the above prophecy foretells the emergence of the Worthy Shepherd (who is equated with the Angelic Pope) to restore the Church twelve years after the turn of the millennium, it would thus appear to suggest that a papal election would take place during this year. This leaves us to wonder if this prophecy is the true source of the "assassination plot" furore concerning Cardinal Romeo brought to light by the Vatileaks scandal at the start of the year? In the earlier post concerning this controversy which you can find here, I suggested that Cardinal Romeo may have based his musings that a new pope would be elected sometime in 2012 on a prophetic source of information, rather than being privy to the details of some assassination plot, as was suggested by certain elements within the Italian media. At the time, I pondered if there was a date pointing to the year 2012 in the theoretical "hidden text" of Fatima. Now in retrospect, it seems that if Card. Romeo did base his speculations on a specific prophecy, it would almost certainly be that of Bl. Tomasuccio de Foligno.  

If we look at the exact wording of the prophecy however, it doesn't necessarily imply that a papal election would take place during the course of this year. The only thing it explicitly states is that the Church would be renewed at this date, and that this would mark the beginning of the return of schismatics to the Church at the Second Pentecost, under the leadership of the Worthy Shepherd/Angelic Pope. I suppose the only real way of authenticating this prophecy is by waiting until the end of the year to see if anything takes place.

Of further interest is the fact that the Worthy Shepherd Prophecy also depicts the Church as the Bark of St. Peter being battered by storms during this time period - which is highly reminiscent of St. John Bosco's Dream of the Two Pillars.

 

 

Don Bosco's Dream of the Two Pillars

 

 

These prophecies also allude to Christ's calming of the storm, which in many respects appears to be another example of "enacted prophecy":

On that day, when evening had come, he said to them, “Let us go across to the other side.” And leaving the crowd, they took him with them in the boat, just as he was. And other boats were with him. And a great windstorm arose, and the waves were breaking into the boat, so that the boat was already filling. But he was in the stern, asleep on the cushion. And they woke him and said to him, “Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?” And he awoke and rebuked the wind and said to the sea, “Peace! Be still!” And the wind ceased, and there was a great calm. He said to them, “Why are you so afraid? Have you still no faith?” And they were filled with great fear and said to one another, “Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?”
(Mark 4:35-41)

When the storm batters the ship, filling it with water (symbolising the Great Apostasy), the disciples begin to lose faith, fearing because Jesus appears to have been slumbering and unresponsive. Yet Christ is always present in the Bark of St. Peter, even if at times he seems as if he is asleep.

 "...behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.”
(Matt 28:20)

With a few gentle words, Jesus restores peace and calm to the stormy waters - again recalling Don Bosco's prophetic dream:

At this point, a great convulsion takes place. All the ships that until then had fought against the Pope’s ship are scattered; they flee away, collide and break to pieces one against another. Some sink and try to sink others. Several small ships that had fought gallantly for the Pope race to be the first to bind themselves to those two columns. Many other ships, having retreated through fear of the battle, cautiously watch from far away; the wrecks of the broken ships having been scattered in the whirlpools of the sea, they in their turn sail in good earnest to those two columns, and having reached them, they make themselves fast to the hooks hanging down from them and their they remain safe, together with the principal ship, on which is the Pope. Over the sea their reigns a great calm.


It is interesting that Pope Benedict XVI addressed this theme of the Church as the Bark of St. Peter during his reflections on the Ninth Station in his Way of the Cross address in the year 2005 - where once again he alluded to the visions of St. Hildegard of Bingen, which depicted the Church in clothes sullen with filth before the period of renewal:


What can the third fall of Jesus under the Cross say to us? We have considered the fall of man in general, and the falling of many Christians away from Christ and into a godless secularism. Should we not also think of how much Christ suffers in his own Church? How often is the holy sacrament of his Presence abused, how often must he enter empty and evil hearts! How often do we celebrate only ourselves, without even realizing that he is there! How often is his Word twisted and misused! What little faith is present behind so many theories, so many empty words! How much filth there is in the Church, and even among those who, in the priesthood, ought to belong entirely to him! How much pride, how much self-complacency! What little respect we pay to the Sacrament of Reconciliation, where he waits for us, ready to raise us up whenever we fall! All this is present in his Passion. His betrayal by his disciples, their unworthy reception of his Body and Blood, is certainly the greatest suffering endured by the Redeemer; it pierces his heart. We can only call to him from the depths of our hearts: Kyrie eleison -- Lord, save us (cf. Matthew 8: 25).

PRAYER

Lord, your Church often seems like a boat about to sink, a boat taking in water on every side. In your field we see more weeds than wheat. The soiled garments and face of your Church throw us into confusion. Yet it is we ourselves who have soiled them! It is we who betray you time and time again, after all our lofty words and grand gestures. Have mercy on your Church; within her too, Adam continues to fall. When we fall, we drag you down to earth, and Satan laughs, for he hopes that you will not be able to rise from that fall; he hopes that being dragged down in the fall of your Church, you will remain prostrate and overpowered. But you will rise again. You stood up, you arose and you can also raise us up. Save and sanctify your Church. Save and sanctify us all.

(See full text here)

It should be worth once again comparing the above statement with St. Hildegards' visions below:

In the year of our Lord’s incarnation 1170, I had been lying on my sick-bed for a long time when, fully conscious in body and in mind, I had a vision of a woman of such beauty that the human mind is unable to comprehend. She stretched in height from earth to heaven. Her face shone with exceeding brightness and her gaze was fixed on heaven. She was dressed in a dazzling robe of white silk and draped in a cloak, adorned with stones of great price. On her feet she wore shoes of onyx. But her face was stained with dust, her robe was ripped down the right side, her cloak had lost its sheen of beauty and her shoes had been blackened. And she herself, in a voice loud with sorrow, was calling to the heights of heaven, saying, ‘Hear, heaven, how my face is sullied; mourn, earth, that my robe is torn; tremble, abyss, because my shoes are blackened!’

And she continued: ‘I lay hidden in the heart of the Father until the Son of Man, who was conceived and born in virginity, poured out his blood. With that same blood as his dowry, he made me his betrothed.

For my Bridegroom’s wounds remain fresh and open as long as the wounds of men’s sins continue to gape. And Christ’s wounds remain open because of the sins of priests. They tear my robe, since they are violators of the Law, the Gospel and their own priesthood; they darken my cloak by neglecting, in every way, the precepts which they are meant to uphold; my shoes too are blackened, since priests do not keep to the straight paths of justice, which are hard and rugged, or set good examples to those beneath them. Nevertheless, in some of them I find the splendour of truth.’

And I heard a voice from heaven which said: ‘This image represents the Church. For this reason, O you who see all this and who listen to the word of lament, proclaim it to the priests who are destined to offer guidance and instruction to God’s people and to whom, as to the apostles, it was said: go into all the world and preach the Gospel to the whole creation’ (Mk 16:15)”

 

(Letter to Werner von Kirchheim and his Priestly Community: PL 197, 269ff.).

 

 

 

The image of the woman before the altar in front of the eyes of God that I saw earlier was now also shown to me again so that I could also see her from the navel down. From the navel to the groin she had various scaly spots. In her [genitalia] there appeared a monstrous and totally black head with fiery eyes, ears like the ears of a donkey, nostrils and mouth like those of a lion, gnashing with vast open mouth and sharpening its horrible iron teeth in a horrid manner.

From that head to the knees the image was white and red, bruised as with many a beating. From the knees to the two white transverse zones which crosswise seemed to touch the bottoms of the feet from above, the image appeared to be bloody. Lo, the monstrous head removed itself from its place with so great a crash that the entire image of the woman was shaken in all its members. Something like a a great mass of much dung was joined to the head; then, lifting itself upon a mountain, it attempted to ascend to the height of heaven. A stroke like thunder came suddenly and the head was repelled with such strength that it both fell from the mountain and gave up the ghost. After this a stinking cloud suddenly enveloped the whole mountain. The head was surrounded with such great filth in the cloud that the people standing by were struck with the greatest terror as the cloud stayed upon the mountain somewhat longer. The people standing there beheld it and struck with much fear said to each other: " Woe! Woe! What is this? What does that seem to be? Who will help us, unfortunate as we are? Who will deliver us? We are ignorant of how we have been deceived. Almighty God, have mercy on us. Let us, oh let us return. Let us prepare the covenant of Christ's Gospel, since we have been bitterly deceived." Behold, the feet of the aforementioned female image appeared to be white, giving out a brightness above that of the sun. I heard a voice from heaven saying to me: "Even though all things on earth are tending toward their end, so hardships and calamities is bowed down to its End, nevertheless, the Spouse of my Son, though much weakened in her children, will never be destroyed either by the heralds of the Son of Perdition or by the Destroyer himself, however much she will be attacked by them. At the End of time she will arise more powerful and more secure; she will appear more beautiful and shining so that she may go forth in this way more sweetly and more agreeably to the embraces of her Beloved. The vision which you saw signifies all this in mystic fashion."


(Scivias 3:11; Translated by B McGinn, Visions of the End, pp101-102)