Apokalypso
The End of Time
 
    Come forth from your cloud of unknowing,
Kiss the cheek of the Moon,
The New Jerusalem -- look at Her glowing!
Why tarry all night in this ruin?
                                                        -- Leonard Cohen
    Now that we have crossed the threshold of the 21st Century, the Millennium begins to assume mythic proportions in the collective psyche of mankind.  The world is witnessing a remarkable, evidently spontaneous, spiritual arousal which appears, in turns, feverishly obsessive and blissfully serene.  It is as if, after a number of failed efforts to collectivize itself on a strictly material basis, humankind has begun to rediscover its corporate spiritual identity — the collective Body of Man.

Introduction: "Be Jubilant My Feet!"
     The word "apocalypse" comes from the Greek for "uncovering".  In its truest prophetic sense, the Apocalypse is the transcendent re-emergence of the Body of Man.  It is the realization of the sublime unity of mankind founded upon a common human Interior, which Carl Jung called the Collective Unconscious.
    The history of the 20th Century has amply demonstrated that a culture lacking a coherent vision of its own future is a culture in chaos.  The Christian dogma which captivated  Western minds during the Middle Ages has lost its hold on the popular imagination, which now turns to science and pagan myth for its transcendent imagery.  The ultimate Christian vision of the future — the Apocalypse — is not understood as a future as all, but is perceived as an unthinkable doomsday.  As reflected in its entertainment media, Western culture — which has proliferated into a world culture — anticipates a future of open-ended technological growth, with no discernable goals apart from "more", "faster", and "further".
     Yet, enduring human civilizations of the past  — the Egyptians, the Hebrews, the Greeks, the Mayas —  have invariably preserved an alternate paradigm of Time, a Sacred Time based on cyclical renewals, with their attendant "apocalypses".  Therefore, human history strongly suggests that a belief system recognizing the "End of Time" is an indispensable element of a sustainable social order, a primary attribute of collective mental health.
    What awaits my reader in the pages to follow is a truly visionary drama, in which we will together witness the New Jerusalem of the poets and prophets coalescing as a real model of humanity's future — indeed, the only model which may avert a general conflagration for our species.

Chapter 1: The Fall of the Papacy
    In the first section of this book, our prophetic pilgrimage begins, of necessity, with an exploration of the darker recesses of the history of the Papacy.  Why "of necessity"?  Because, if the manifold apocalyptic visions of the past two millennia share a common thread, it is their nearly unanimous casting of the Roman Pontificate as the central player in the drama of the "end times".  Early on in this journey, we encounter an obscure 12th Century mystic, St. Malachy, who compiled a "list" of future popes, each identified by an uncannily prescient motto.
    St. Malachy's visions furnish us with an entrée into the suspicious circumstances surrounding the death of Pope John Paul I, whose reign was cut short in 1978 only a month after his election.  Our investigation plunges us into a shadowy international underground of Mafia bankers and clandestine masonic cabals, whose tentacles reach deep within the Vatican's walls — deep enough to strike down the Supreme Pontiff himself. The theme of papal assassination next leads us into the murky prognostications of Nostradamus.  His horrifying visions of murder within the Vatican walls are only the prelude to even more appalling consequences to follow:  the outbreak of a great Schism — a veritable civil war within the Church — pitting rival claimants to the papal throne against one another.

Chapter 2: The Secrets of Fatima
    Moving into the second phase of our narrative, our focus will shift to a mystery-shrouded prophecy of our own century.  Ever since the reported apparitions of the Virgin Mary to three shepherd children in rural Portugal in 1917, the contents of the "Third Secret of Fatima" have intrigued Catholics and non-Catholics alike the world over.
    As we proceed to assemble, one by one, the pieces of the jigsaw puzzle which reveal the incredible contents of the Third Secret, we discover that the great Secret of Fatima is, first and foremost, a divine mandate for the "cleansing" of the Holy See.  Coupled with this command come an escalating series of "or else" contingencies, beginning with an agonizing Schism in the Catholic Church and a prolonged vacancy of St. Peter's throne.  Into this calamitous power vacuum will step the very incarnation of human duplicity:  the false Messiah, known to Christian prophecy as Antichrist.  This "Beast" will have his own ecclesiastical accomplice, an Antipope, whom St. Malachy names "The Glory of the Olive Tree".

Chapter 3: Fatima Redux
    Although in the year 2000 the Vatican revealed the vision that accompanied the Third Secret of Fatima, they continue to conceal the actual prophetic words spoken by Our Lady to the shepherd children.  Drawing upon the symbolic elements contained in the vision, we reconstruct the content of the Virgin's message.
    As revealed by our symbolic analysis, the Third Secret deals with the martyrdom of the last Pope, St. Malachy's "Peter the Roman", who, along with his disciples, will be persecuted for his efforts to restore the Church to its Jewish roots.

Chapter 4: The Bones of the Triumvir
    The Third Secret's prophecy of a martyred Pope Peter leads us to examine the bizarre circumstances surrounding the supposed discovery of the tomb of St. Peter beneath the basilica bearing his name in Rome. Interpreting several of Nostradamus' most "cryptic" verses, we uncover yet another case of papal assassination, in this case involving Pius XI, and an elaborate plot to conceal the true identity of the "apostle" buried beneath St. Peter's Basilica.
    As we probe deeper into this mystery, we discover that the unraveling of the myth that St. Peter founded the Church of Rome is destined to proceed hand-in-hand with the unraveling of the Papacy itself.

Chapter 5: Moloch!
    The next section of our treatise picks up where the Third Secret of Fatima leaves off, that is, with the dramatic entry of Antichrist onto the world scene.  Before unveiling the prophetic scenario for the Beast's meteoric rise to the pinnacle of secular and religious power, however, we first seek to clothe him in a real persona —  to put flesh on his bones, so to speak  In this endeavor we are aided by Nostradamus' portrayal of Antichrist as the "reincarnation" of the Roman Caesar Nero, perhaps the vilest human specimen to ever wield the scepter of an empire.
    A host of prophecies point us toward the Millennium as the period of the Beast's ascendency —  an ascendency due, in no small part, to a contemporaneous unraveling of the Papacy.  In the wake of this "shipwreck" of St. Peter's bark, the Beast will assemble his Universal Church, with himself enshrined as its Messiah.

Chapter 6: The Glory of the Olive Tree
    The fourth segment of our story plunges us into the hidden meaning of St. Malachy's prophetic title for the Antipope destined to follow John Paul II — "The Glory of the Olive Tree".  Given the consistent Scriptural usage of the Olive Tree to represent the people of Israel, we cannot avoid the implication that the next Pontiff will be a Jewish convert to Catholicism.  And, astoundingly, we confront the "coincidence" that today, for the first time in the Church's history, a converted Jew has risen to the rank of Cardinal, and is frequently mentioned as a probable successor to the Papal throne!
    Using associational links, we reconstruct the proper order of Nostradamus' stanzas, which he intentionally jumbled to conceal his Papal prophecies from the watchful eye of the Church's Inquisition.  What emerges is a detailed, coherent chronology of the Antipope's fraudulent election to the papal throne — procured by his ally, Antichrist —  and of his short, turbulent reign, marked by savage persecution of the faithful who resist his heresies.  Our prophetic drama reaches its climax in the outbreak of a religious war —  mankind's Final War —  in which the Beast, like Napoleon and Hitler before him, invades Russia:  a "consecrated" Russia, the one European Nation which will not kneel before his Universal Church.

Chapter 7: In Quest of the Grail
    In the final leg of our prophetic voyage, we attempt to anticipate the heresy which is to become the creed of Antichrist and his Universal Church.  As we progress in our Quest, we come to realize that the Grail is not so much a tangible object as a heraldic symbol of a royal bloodline.  Within the name of the Holy Grail itself, "San Greal", we uncover the hidden formula, "Sang Real", meaning "Royal Blood" — the very same phrase by which Nostradamus repeatedly alludes to the pedigree of Antichrist!  Probing more deeply into this mystery, we discover that the royal line identified by Grail heraldry is none other than the House of David, the lineage of the Messiah according to Old Testament prophecy.  And, as we unearth further clues from the Grail romances, they will begin to point us insistently toward the most shocking proposition of all:  that the bloodline of the "Sang Real" is actually that of Jesus of Nazareth and his progeny!
     This last bizarre twist in our tale implies that Jesus did not die on the Cross and did not rise from the dead.  Now the elements of the heresy upon which the Beast's Universal Faith will rest begin to come into sharp focus:  Christ is be "redefined" as a purely human, temporal monarch — the Messianic King of Israel.  This script provides the perfect rationale for Antichrist's reign:  If the Son of Man is not divine, if he does not embody the collective God-Man, then a "superior" individual, such as the Beast, can fit the bill.