ST. FRANCIS
OF PAOLA (1416-1507) St. Francis of Paola the 'Wonder Worker'
was born March 27, 1416 at Paola, a small city near the Tyrrhenian
Sea, in Calabria, Italy. His parents, Giacomo and Vienna d'Alessio,
were remarkable for the holiness of their lives. Remaining childless
for some years after their marriage they had recourse to prayer,
especially commending themselves to the intercession of St. Francis
of Assisi. Three children were eventually born to them, eldest of
whom was Francis.
At the age
of fifteen, Saint Francis left his poor home at Paola, to live as a
hermit in a cave on the seacoast. When he was 19, two other men
joined him.
Francis was
especially influenced by his patron saint, Francis of Assisi. In
1436, he and two companions founded the Order of the Minims, which
means the Least. The Minims is a severely ascetic order that does
charitable work and refrains from eating meat, eggs, or dairy
products.
The people
of Paola built a church and monastery for him and his followers,
where he had led his eremitical life some fifteen years later and set
a Rule for his followers emphasizing penance, charity, and humility,
and added to the three monastic vows, one of fasting and abstinence
from meat; he also wrote a rule for tertiaries and nuns.
In 1474,
Pope Sixtus IV officially approved the new order and named it the
Franciscan Minim Friars.
As the order
grew in size, its founder's reputation increased as a holy man, a
defender of the poor and the oppressed, a healer, and a worker of
miracles.
In the year
1464, he was refused passage by a boatman while trying to cross the
Strait of Messina to Sicily. He reportedly laid his cloak on the
water, tied one end to his staff as a sail, and sailed across the
strait with his companions following in the boat.
He also
raised the dead, which included his nephew, and, he also raised his
favourite pet animals from the dead, including a trout that had
already been cooked, and a pet lamb that had already been eaten.
Calling the lamb's name into the furnace where the bones and fleece
had been thrown in by the workmen who had eaten the creature, the
lamb skipped out alive from the oven!
St. Francis
also had the gift of prophecy. He apparently foretold to several
persons, in the years 1447, 1448, and 1449, the taking of
Constantinople by the Turks, which happened on 29 May 1453, under the
command of Mahomet II, when Constantine Palaeologus, the last
Christian emperor, was killed in battle. He also predicted the
capture of Otranto by the Ottoman Turks in 1480, and its subsequent
recovery by the King of Naples to the Count of Arena who was sent by the king to fight the Turks. St. Francis told the Count to remain calm and gave him and those with him blessed candles: In
the battle, all the soldiers who went with the count and who had
received the blessed candle were saved except for one who refused to receive
the blessed candle and died in the combat.
King Louis
XI called for St. Francis when he was dying. Just the thought of
dying made the king terrified. He hoped Francis would cure him.
Instead, the saint gently helped the frightened man to prepare well
to die a holy death. The king had a change of heart. He accepted
God's will and died quietly in the arms of the saint.
St. Francis
himself died on Good Friday, 2 April 1507 at Plessis, France, when he
was ninety-one years old. He spent the last three months of his life
alone preparing to appear before Jesus, since he knew when he was
going to die. He was canonized in 1519, by Pope Leo X, twelve
years after his death. In 1562 Protestant Huguenots broke open his tomb, found
his body incorrupt, and burned it. The bones were salvaged by
Catholics, and distributed as relics to various churches.
St. Francis
of Paola made several of the most detailed prophecies regarding the
Great Catholic Monarch armies and how he will found the last and
greatest military order of the Church in seven letters to to a
certain Simeon de Limena, Count of Montalto, (now called Montalto Uffugo), in the provence of Cosenza, Kingdom of
Naples, who was a very pious Christian, originally from Spain, and a
great benefactor to St. Francis and to his spiritual children.
They were first published in Spanish by Lucas de Montoya and printed in Madrid in 1619 in his book about the foundation of St. Francis' order entitled: "Cronica General de la Orden de los Minimos", and not only Montoya but many learned scholars of the time believed in them. They have
been reprinted may times by several respected authors, and while one
may be tempted to think the letters are forgeries, details of these
prophecies were foretold again by the approved stigmatist and mystic
Marie-Julie Jahenny, which shows they are indeed authentic.
Here are the
letters of St. Francis of Paola:
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First Letter
The original
of the following letter is allegedly preserved as a precious relic by
the respectable family Benedetti in the city of Spoleto:
My most
esteemed Lord, — Through the grace of the Holy Spirit, and through
your merits, but not through my virtue, the spirit of prophecy is
granted to me often to foretell most wonderful events in relation to
the reformation of the Church of the Most High.
From your
Lordship shall be born the great leader of the Holy Militia of the
Holy Spirit which shall overcome the world, and shall possess the
earth so completely that no king or lord shall be able to exist,
except he belongs to the Sacred Host of the Holy Ghost. These devout
men shall wear on their breasts, and much more within their hearts,
the sign of the living God, namely, the cross.
The first
members of this holy Order shall be natives of the city of ... .
where iniquity, vice, and sin abound. But they shall be converted
from evil to good; from rebels against God they shall become most
fervent and most faithful in his divine service. That city shall be
cherished by God and by the great monarch, the elect and the beloved
of the Most High Lord. For the sake of that place all holy souls who
have done penance in it shall pray in the sight of God for that city
and for its inhabitants.
When the
time shall come of the immense and most right justice of the Holy
Spirit, his Divine Majesty wills that such city become converted to
God, and that many of its citizens follow the great Prince of the
Holy Army. The first person that will openly wear the sign of the
living God shall belong to that city, because he will through a
letter be commanded by a holy hermit to have it impressed in his
heart and to wear it externally on his breast.
That man
will begin to meditate on the secrets of God about the long
visitation which the Holy Spirit will make and the dominion that he
will exercise over the world through the Holy Militia. O! happy man,
who shall receive from the Most High the greatest privileges! He
will interpret the hidden secrets of the Holy Ghost, and he shall
often excite the admiration of men by his revealed knowledge of the
internal secrets of their hearts. O, rejoice, my lord, because that
Prince above other princes, and King over other kings will hold you
in the greatest veneration, and, after having been crowned with three
most admirable crowns, will exalt that city, will declare it free and
the seat of the Empire, and it shall become one of the first cities
of the world. I say nothing more. Kissing your hand, together with
the inhabitants of ... . whom I beg, when they shall see this letter,
to receive it as a prophecy,
I remain,
Perpetual
servant,
Friar
Francis di Paola.
From our
house of Paola, 5th February, 1482.
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Second
Letter.
The original
letter is allegedly preserved in the city of Montalto in Calabria:
My excellent
Lord, — You and your consort desire to have children; you shall
have them. Your holy offspring shall be admired upon earth. Among
your descendants there will be one who shall be like the sun amidst
the stars. He shall be a first-born son; in his childhood he will be
like a saint; in his youth, a great sinner; then he will be converted
entirely to God and will do great penance; his sins will be forgiven
him, and he shall become a great saint.
He shall be
a great captain and prince of holy men, who shall be called the holy
Crociferi (I.e the Cruciferi, cross-bearers) of Jesus Christ, with
whom he shall destroy the Mahometan sect and the rest of the
infidels. He shall annihilate all the heresies and tyrannies of the
world. He shall reform the Church of God by means of his followers,
who shall be the best men upon earth in holiness, in arms, in
science, and in every virtue, because such is the will of the Most
High. They shall obtain the dominion of the whole world, both
temporal and spiritual, and they shall support the Church of God
until the end of time. I say no more.
Friar
Francis di Paola.
25th March,
1485.
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Third Letter
My excellent Lord, — O great
treasurer of the Holy Spirit! O new Abraham upon earth! [After
these words St. Francis gives a long and severe reproach to
ecclesiastics for their covetousness, indolence, and want of charity
and zeal for the spiritual welfare of the people; then he says]: Let
the kings and princes in Christendom be ashamed of themselves, who
live without charity. God has granted them means to lead a good life,
and they are bad, having their hands shut up with the accursed lock
of avarice; they are stingy in good works and prodigal in doing evil;
they spend more than what they have in vanities and in useless
things, in order to indulge their passions, oppressing their poor
subjects. O wretched, unhappy men! Do you know what vanity is? Do you
understand that your people are the creatures and subjects of the
Most High God? They are men like you; children of Adam like you; they
have been given to you as subjects, not that you might rob and
maltreat them, but in order that you govern them with that diligence
and care required in the shepherd towards his own sheep. They are
worse by far than ravenous wolves and worse than hungry lions! Be
ashamed of your wicked actions, ye Christians by name, but without
truth; you are worse than the infidels, O ye tyrants of the people of
God! You turn to spiritual principles, much
worse than your secular and worldly principles.
O comrades of Judas Iscariot! To you I
say, evil prelates, greedy for robbery to devour the sheep of Jesus
Christ bought back with His Most Precious Blood: what care do you
have of the holy fold of Christ? Good care, you say; but what? You
have no other care than to devour and eat the goods of Holy Church
without ever remembering the poor of the blessed Jesus Christ. Your
benefits are not enough for you, I call evil deeds for you, not the
abbeys of the monks you have tyrannized, but hospitals, giving them
their income, and the poor are starving to death in the fields and on
the streets. (NOTE: -hospitals: it became a status symbol in towns in
the medieval period to be able to set up a hospital, which were quite
luxurious in Florence for one example, and therefore could be a point
of pride. Obviously St. Francis is upset great funds were possibly
being used wrongfully and spreading the vices of pride and greed, are
not actually go to help those it is meant to help. This could also
be a prophecy of our times, i.e. of great funds going to huge
charitable organisations, that actually do don't what they were set
up to do but get funneled into the pockets of the managers at the
top).
Woe to you because God Almighty
will exalt a very poor man of the blood of the Emperor Constantine,
son of St. Helena, and of the seed of Pepin, (i.e King Pepin of
France) who shall on his breast wear the sign which you have seen at
the beginning of this letter (t) (I.e. a cross). Through the power of
the Most High he shall confound the tyrants, the heretics, and
infidels. He will gather a grand army, and the angels shall fight for
them; they shall kill all God’s enemies. O my Lord that man shall
be one of your posterity, because you come from the blood of Pepin.
Friar
Francis di Paola.
25th of
April, 1486.
(NOTE: Apparently,
this condemnation in the letter to corrupt leaders in the world and
the Church is also a prophecy that this era of lack of charity,
tyranny, coldness and sin will come before the Great King. It is for
this reason the King will be sent to bring renewal.)
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Fourth
Letter
My excellent
Lord and Benefactor, — From the beginning of the world, after the
creation of man, and to the end of human generation, there have been
and there shall be seen wonderful events upon the earth. Four
hundred years shall not pass when his Divine Majesty shall visit the
world with a new religious order much needed, which shall effect
more good among men than all other religious institutions combined.
This religious order shall be the last and the best in the Church; it
shall proceed with arms, with prayer, and with hospitality. Woe to
tyrants, to heretics, and to infidels, to whom no pity shall be
shown, because such is the will of the Most High! An infinite number
of wicked men shall perish through the hands of the Cross-bearers,
the true servants of Jesus Christ. They shall act like good
husbandmen when they extirpate noxious weeds and prickly thistles
from the wheat-field. These holy servants of God shall purify the
earth with the deaths of innumerable wicked men. The head and captain
of these holy servants of God shall be one of your posterity, and he
shall be the great reformer of the Church of God.
Francis di
Paola.
From
Spezzako, 13th of January, 1489.
According
to this prophecy by St. Francis, God would plan to bring the Great
Monarch and his new Military Order of the Cruciferi sometime in the
mid 1800s. Of interest, Our Lord also revealed this to Marie-Julie
Jahenny, and that He had also revealed something similar to St.
Margaret Mary, but, Our Lord revealed to Marie-Julie Jahenny He had
prepared to send the King then (i.e it was the 1800s), but that
France was proving unworthy then to receive him, having rejected the
King of His choice. Therefore the King was REMOVED as the first
chastisement, but he would be 'returned' to his subjects and that the
'Lily' would 'resurrect'. The time for the Great Monarch had
therefore been delayed to a futue date due to sin and the rejection
of His chosen king. See Marie-Julie Jahenny's prophecies, click here.
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Fifth Letter
.
The original
of the following letter is allegedly preserved in the city of
Montalto in Calabria, Kingdom of Naples, and has been copied by John
Baptist Francesco, a public notary:
My Lord and
Brother in Jesus Christ our Lord, — May his Divine Majesty reign in
every place, namely, in heaven, upon earth, and even in hell. How
spiritually blind are those persons who, having no thought about the
things of God, fix their end in earthly objects! Wretched men! by
far worse than the very beasts which are guided by their senses,
because they cannot have reason; but when men abandon the use of
their reason, they become brutalized. Hence they shall ever be in
confusion. Let, therefore, the princes of this world be prepared for
the greatest scourges to fall upon them. But from whom? First from
heretics and infidels, then from the holy and most faithful Cruciferi
elected by the Most High, who, not succeeding in converting heretics
with science, shall have to make a vigorous use of their arms. Many
cities and villages shall be in ruins, with the deaths of an
innumerable quantity of bad and good men. The infidels also will
fight against Christians and heretics, sacking, destroying, and
killing the largest portion of Christians. Lastly, the army, styled
of the Church, namely, the holy Cruciferi, shall move, not against
Christians or Christianity, but against the infidels in pagan
countries, and they shall conquer all those kingdoms with the death
of a very great number of infidels. After this they shall turn their
victorious arms against bad Christians, and shall destroy all the
rebels against Jesus Christ. These holy Cruciferi shall reign and
dominate holily over the world until the end of time. The founder of
these holy men shall, my lord, be one of your posterity. But when
shall this take place? When crosses with the stigmas shall be seen,
and the crucifix shall be carried as the standard. May our blessed
Lord Jesus Christ reign! Gaudeamus omnes; let us all rejoice who are
in the service of the Most High, because the great visitation and
reformation of the world is approaching when there shall be only one
fold and one Shepherd.
F. Francis
di Paola.
26th of
March, 1490.
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Sixth Letter
My excellent
Lord, — The time is coming when his Divine Majesty will visit the
world with a new religious order of holy Cruciferi, who will carry a
crucifix, or the image of our crucified Lord, lifted up upon the
principal standard in view of all. This standard will be admired by
all good Catholics; but at the beginning it will be derided by bad
Christians and by infidels. Their sneers shall, however, be changed
into mourning when they shall witness the wonderful victories
achieved through it against tyrants, heretics, and infidels. Many
wicked men and obstinate rebels against God shall perish; their souls
will be plunged into hell. This punishment shall fall upon all those
transgressors of the Divine commandments who with new and false
doctrines will attempt to corrupt mankind and turn men against the
ministers of God’s worship. The same chastisement is due to all
obstinate sinners, but not to those who sin through weakness, because
these being converted, doing penance, and amending the conduct of
their life, shall find the divine mercy of the Most High full of
kindness towards them.
O holy
Cross-bearers of the Most High Lord, how very pleasing you will be to
the great God, much more than the children of Israel! God will
through your instrumentality work more wonderful prodigies than he
has ever done before with any nation. You shall destroy the sect of
Mahomet, and all infidels of every kind and of every sect. You shall
put an end to all the heresies of the world by extinguishing all
tyrants. You
will remove every cause of complaint by establishing a universal
peace, which shall last until the end of time. You will work the
sanctification of mankind.
O holy men !
People blessed of the Most Holy Trinity ! Your victorious founder
shall triumph over the world, the flesh, and the Devil. Laos Deo et
omnibus Sanctis ejus. May God and all his saints be praised .
Friar
Francis di Paola.
7th of
March, 1495.
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Seventh
Letter.
My excellent
Lord, — Let your soul rejoice! for his Divine Majesty manifests
through you such wonderful signs and great miracles, according to
what I, by God’s will, have often and again written and foretold to
you. One of your posterity shall achieve greater deeds and work
greater wonders than your lordship. That man will be a great sinner
in his youth, but like St. Paul he shall be drawn and converted to
God. He shall be the great founder of a new religious order different
from all the others. He shall divide it into three classes, namely:
- Military knights; 2. Solitary priests; 3. Most pious hospitallers.
This shall
be the last religious order in the Church, and it will do more good
for our holy religion than all other religious institutes. By force
of arms he shall take possession of a great kingdom. He shall
destroy the sect of Mahomet, extirpate all tyrants and heresies. He
shall bring the world to a holy mode of life. There will be one fold
and one Shepherd. He shall reign until the end of time. On the whole
earth there shall be only twelve kings, one emperor, and one pope.
Rich gentlemen shall be very few, but all saints. May Jesus Christ be
praised and blessed; for he has vouchsafed to grant to me, a poor
unworthy sinner, the spirit of prophecy, not in an obscure way as to
his other servants, but has enabled me to write and to speak in a
most clear manner. I know that unbelieving and reprobate persons will
scoff at my letters and will reject them; but they will be received
by those faithful Catholic souls who aspire to the possession of
heaven. These letters shall infuse such sweetness of divine love in
their hearts, that they will be delighted in perusing them often, and
in taking copies of them, because such is the will of the Most High.
In these letters it will be found out who belongs to our blessed Lord
Jesus Christ and who does not, who is a predestinate or a reprobate.
Much better will this be known through the holy sign of the living
God. He shall be a saint of God who will take it, love it, and wear
it.
Nothing more
occurs to me.
Friar
Francis di Paola.
18th August,
1496.
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