In July of 1989, Father Messias Coelho, in the presence of three witnesses revealed that Sister Lucy had just received an “instruction” from unidentified Vatican bureaucrats, stating that she and her fellow religious were thenceforward to say that the Consecration of Russia was accomplished by the 1984 consecration of the world ceremony, in which the world's bishops did not take part and no mention of Russia was made.

After this development various persons began repudiating their prior statements that the Consecration of Russia had not been done. These persons had previously clearly maintained, until 1989, that Russia had not yet been consecrated as requested by Our Lady of Fatima because Russia was not specifically named and the world’s bishops did not participate.

Why would Sister Lucy have waited for over five years [From 1984-1989] before declaring that Pope John Paul II had satisfied Our Lady of Fatima’s requests with his act of offering of the world on March 25, 1984?

Fr. Fox has tried to forestall and avoid this formidable objection by claiming that when the Papal Nuncio (Archbishop Portalupi) went to see Sister Lucy after the 1984 consecration and asked if it was the consecration requested by Our Lord, Sister Lucy answered: “Yes.” In brackets, Fr. Fox added, “The Papal Nuncio of Portugal died shortly after the 1984 consecration.” [Fatima Family Messenger, October 1989, p. 9.]

The Abbé de Nantes has proved that this testimony is false and non-existent. Archbishop Portalupi could not have visited Sister Lucy after the 1984 act of offering since he took to his bed after celebrating his last Mass that day at Fatima and died six days later, on March 31. [CRC 225, Eng. ed., January 1990.]

Fr. Fox now attempts to mask this enormous lie by coming out with further lies. “Sister Lucy said, he writes, she had told the Papal Nuncio of Lisbon shortly after the March 25, 1984 consecration that it fulfilled the conditions required by Our Lord.” [The Wanderer, February 22, 1990, p. 10.]

Fr. Fox truly wants to get things right: “To which Papal Nuncio did Sister Lucia confide in 1984 telling him that the collegial consecration was now completed?” he asks Maria do Fetal. And she specified: “As regards the Apostolic Nuncio, Archbishop Sante Portalupi died in Portugal on March 31 … Archbishop Salvatore Asta was appointed next … Archbishop Salvatore Asta asked Sister if the consecration of Russia was made on March 25, 1984. She answered, ‘Yes.’” [Fatima Family Messenger, Jan.-Mar. 1990, p. 11.]

Fr. Fox dares to conclude: “Sister Lucy felt she had done her duty in 1984 by telling the Papal Nuncio.” [The Wanderer, February 22, 1990.]

That is a new untruth. We know, in fact, that at the end of the year 1985, Archbishop Salvatore Asta — appointed Apostolic Nuncio to Portugal on October 17, 1984, still had not met Sister Lucy. [March 12, 1986, personal communication to Frère Michel.]

Nor had he any wish to meet her. He did not want to follow in the footsteps of Archbishop Portalupi, who had gone to the Coimbra Carmel after the act of offering of May 13, 1982, at Dr. Lacerda’s instigation, to hear Sister Lucy state that John Paul II had not satisfied Our Lady’s request.

Archbishop Salvatore Asta did not want Sister Lucy to be able to tell him in front of witnesses that the consecration of Russia was not done as Our Lady wishes.

To lend some credit to Maria do Fetal’s pronouncements, Father Fox is obliged to appeal to an alleged testimony of the Nuncio to Portugal: a non-existent testimony!

For up to the month of June, 1989, all the existing and irrefutable witnesses prove [Cf. CRC 226, Eng. ed.; The Fatima Crusader, Issue 31-32] that after March 25, 1984, Sister Lucy certified that the consecration of Russia had still not been accomplished.

A New Obstacle Arises
A decade later, in the fall of 1962, the opening of the Second Vatican Council created a new obstacle to performing the consecration. To obtain Moscow’s approval for two observers from the Russian Orthodox Church to attend, the Vatican formally agreed not to condemn Soviet Russia or communism in general at the Council. This decision launched the policy of “Ostpolitik,” under which the Vatican was constrained from opposing communism by name, or condemning communist regimes that persecuted Catholics. Instead, the Church was supposed to engage in dialogue and negotiations with these governments. This policy was a radical departure from the Church’s long-standing opposition to atheistic communism and its repressive treatment of Catholics within the Soviet bloc. For most of the next two decades, the issue of the consecration was pushed into the background, and disappeared from the Vatican’s agenda.

A Petition Ignored
In the late 70s, Cardinal Josyf Slipyj launched a public petition seeking the consecration of Russia, as requested by Our Lady of Fatima. In only three years, the petition garnered over three million signatures. This massive appeal from the faithful was delivered to the Vatican in 1980. It was ignored, and no action was taken.

Another Consecration Omits Russia
While still recovering from wounds inflicted in a failed assassination attempt, Pope John Paul II performed another consecration to the Immaculate Heart in June of 1981. However, the official wording referred to the world, without mentioning Russia specifically, and all the world’s bishops were not asked to participate. This consecration thus failed once again to satisfy Our Lady’s request, even though the Pope credited Our Lady of Fatima with saving him from the assassin’s attack.

Sr. Lucia Speaks Again
A year later, in May of 1982, the Vatican newspaper L’Osservatore Romano published an article about Sr. Lucia by Father Umberto Maria Pasquale, a Salesian priest who had known her since 1939. Fr. Pasquale reported that Sr. Lucia told him emphatically that Our Lady had never asked for the consecration of the world, but only of Russia. He also published a photographic reproduction of a handwritten note to him from Sr. Lucia confirming this point.

The Pope Makes an Admission
The day after this article appeared, Pope John Paul II visited Fatima, where he again consecrated the world to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. A few days later, in an article in L’Osservatore Romano, the Pope explained why he had failed to mention Russia specifically, saying he had “tried to do everything possible in the concrete circumstances.” This was widely interpreted to mean that he could not violate the terms of the Vatican’s continuing policy of appeasing Russia.

Our Lady Still “Awaiting Our Consecration”
Two years later, this evasive approach was taken again when the Holy Father once more consecrated the world to the Immaculate Heart of Mary in a ceremony before 250,000 people in Rome in March of 1984. But this time, the Pope made his position clearer. In a departure from his prepared text, he asked Our Lady of Fatima to “enlighten especially the peoples of which You Yourself are awaiting our consecration and confiding.” The Pope thus publicly acknowledged that the consecration requested by Our Lady had still not been performed. These words were included in an official report of the event in L’Osservatore Romano on March 26, 1984. A similar report appeared the next day in the Italian bishops’ newspaper Avvenire, describing the Pope praying in St. Peter’s several hours after the consecration ceremony, asking Our Lady to bless “those peoples for whom You Yourself are awaiting our act of consecration and entrusting.”

A Fatima Scholar Speaks
Also in 1984, Father Messias Coelho, a Fatima scholar of many years, publicly insisted that the requested consecration had still not been done. Five years later, Fr. Coelho was to reveal that Vatican officials had issued instructions to Sr. Lucia and others to contradict this statement, and claim the consecration had actually been done.

A Cardinal Agrees With Sr. Lucia
In September of 1985, in an interview in Sol de Fatima magazine (published by the Blue Army in Spain), Sr. Lucia confirmed that the consecration still had not been done, because the 1984 ceremony did not mention Russia, and the world’s Catholic bishops did not participate. Later in the year, Cardinal Edouard Gagnon acknowledged in another interview that the consecration had still not been done as requested. He later objected to having his remarks published, though he did not deny making them.

Confirmation From a Cousin
For many years, Sr. Lucia’s cousin, Maria do Fetal, publicly quoted Sr. Lucia as saying the consecration had not been done. Maria do Fetal continued to maintain this position until mid-1989, when she suddenly reversed herself, in accordance with the Vatican “instruction” revealed by Fr. Coelho.

More Confirmation from Cardinals
In a brief interview outside her convent while voting in an election in the summer of 1987, Sr. Lucia confirmed to journalist Enrico Romero that the consecration had not been done. Her view was confirmed a few months later by Cardinal Paul Augustin Mayer in an audience with a dozen Catholic leaders, among them the Catholic journalist Victor Kulanday, and again by Cardinal Alfons Stickler a month after that. Cardinal Stickler maintained that the Pope had failed to perform the ceremony as requested because he lacked the necessary support from the world’s bishops. “They do not obey him,” he explained.

Bishops Raise Voices
Since the Vatican had ignored petitions with more than three million signatures of lay persons, Fr. Nicholas Gruner, the “Fatima Priest,” turned to a much smaller but much more influential group. In 1989, he obtained written confirmation from 350 Catholic bishops of their willingness to perform the requested consecration of Russia specifically. In the same year, petitions bearing another million signatures of the faithful calling for the consecration were also delivered to Rome.

Enforcing the Party Line
In the summer of 1989 at the Hotel Solar da Marta in Fatima, Sr. Lucia’s longtime friend Fr. Coelho made a surprising disclosure. He told several witnesses that Sr. Lucia and her fellow religious had received instructions from the Vatican to say that the Fatima request had been satisfied by the consecration performed in 1984. In evident obedience, Sr. Lucia’s cousin Maria do Fetal suddenly repudiated her previous statements, and claimed the consecration had been done. This claim flatly contradicted the Pope’s own comments made in his prayers both during and after the 1984 ceremony.

Maria do Fetal now showed how unreliable she was as a witness when, in obedience to the Party Line, she claimed she “was inventing” when she reported that Sr. Lucia had said the 1984 consecration did not satisfy Our Lady’s request.

An Opportunity Missed
After another decade of inaction, the Vatican prepared once again to perform a consecration. With over 76 Cardinals and 1,400 bishops gathered in Rome for “the Jubilee of Bishops” in October of 2000, a golden opportunity to perform the ceremony as requested presented itself. Some bishops actually believed the long-awaited event would finally take place, but they were doomed to disappointment. When the text of the consecration was released the day before the ceremony, it made no mention of Russia whatsoever but contained only an “entrustment” of various groups of people, including the unemployed and “youth in search of meaning.”

“Ostpolitik” Confirmed
A month later, Inside the Vatican magazine reported that a Cardinal said to be “one of the Pope’s closest advisors” admitted that the Holy Father had been advised not to mention Russia, for fear of offending the Russian Orthodox Church. This provided high-level confirmation that the Vatican’s “Ostpolitik” and “Ecumenism” were indeed preventing the specific consecration of Russia.