A 900-year-old book found in the Vatican Secret Archives has an eerie link to Pope Francis health and claims to predict the year of Judgement Day – and some believe it’s very soon
A 900-year-old manuscript discovered in the Vatican’s Secret Archives allegedly predicts the year of Judgement Day – and has an eerie link to Pope Francis’ health battles.
The Day of Reckoning, according to the Bible, is when Jesus is said to return to Earth to decide who will be saved and who will be condemned, with a saint predicting this event will take place in 2027. Saint Malachy is attributed with the 12th-century text, ‘Prophecy of the Popes,’ which includes a series of Latin phrases thought to depict every pope, starting with Celestine II in 1143 and ending with the current Church leader, Pope Francis I.
The book, discovered over 400 years ago, has come back into the spotlight as Pope Francis, aged 88, experienced two bouts of respiratory distress due to a ‘significant’ build-up of mucus in his lungs and bronchial spasms. He has been hospitalised for more than a fortnight.
The book, containing 112 brief and cryptic phrases, was unearthed in 1595 by Arnold Wion, a Benedictine monk who professed to have found Malachy’s writings in the Vatican archives. the book’s final passage reads: “In the final persecution of the Holy Roman Church there will reign Peter the Roman, who will feed his flock amid many tribulations, after which the seven-hilled city will be destroyed and the dreadful Judge will judge the people. The End.”
Some interpret the prophecy as Peter becoming the pope during Francis’ chronic lung disease, while others believe Malachy was implying Francis would be the last. A documentary released in 2024 suggested the latter is more likely due to a passage attributed to Pope Sixtus V from 1585 that reads: “Axle in the midst of a sign.” Pope Sixtus V assumed leadership 442 years after the first leader and with the text suggesting he is the middle of the prophecy, the end of the world would come 442 years later – 2027.
Despite some academics arguing that the text is a forgery from the 16th century, it’s believed that Malachy penned the Prophecy of the Popes in 1139 after having a vision during a trip to Rome. Prior to his canonisation, St Malachy was an Irish archbishop renowned for his religious reforms, notably aligning the Irish church more closely with Roman practices.
The assertion that someone else authored the 112 phrases about each future pope arises from the precise and strikingly accurate descriptions of the popes up until 1590. Post this date, the descriptions become much more ambiguous and open to interpretation. Nonetheless, there are still some accurate phrases applicable to recent times. Over the past few decades, the saint’s prophecies have been taken seriously.
As one account notes: “In 1958, before the Conclave that would elect Pope John XXIII, Cardinal Spellman of New York hired a boat, filled it with sheep and sailed up and down the Tiber River, to show that he was ‘pastor et nautor,’ the motto attributed to the next Pope in the prophecies. ‘ One prophecy identifies the 111th pope as ‘Gloria Olivae,’ translating to ‘the glory of the Olive.”
The Order of Saint Benedict, also known as the Olivetans, has led some historians to speculate that Malachy predicted Pope Benedict would lead the Catholic Church. His papacy spanned from 2005 to 2013.
Some interpret St Malachy’s phrase ‘lilium et rosa,’ translating to ‘lilly and the rose’, as a reference to Pope Urban VIII (1623-1644), given his family’s coat of arms bore lilies and roses. Another intriguing line, ‘De labore Solis,’ meaning ‘of the eclipse of the sun,’ is speculated to refer to Pope John Paul II (Karol Wojtyla), who was born during a solar eclipse and served as pope from 1978 until 2005.
The term ‘peregrinus apostolicus’ is believed by many to refer to Pope VI, who spent much of his life journeying to new nations and was pope from 1963 to 1978. According to the final prophecy surrounding Peter the Roman, the ‘last pope’ will oversee the Church during a period of immense upheaval, culminating in Rome’s destruction and the end of the papacy.
The Sunday Cool Podcast recently discussed the book, with host Josh Hooper noting the escalating number of global crises is reigniting interest in the contentious prophecy. The ongoing war in Ukraine, rising tensions between the United States and China, and the perpetual instability in the Middle East have many fearing that World War 3 could be imminent.
These significant nations have also reportedly started gearing up to reboot their nuclear weapon programmes, stoking fears of a ‘Judgment Day. ‘ And this isn’t the only ancient manuscript that supposedly foretells the apocalypse.
The Book of Revelation, penned towards the close of the first century AD, is interpreted by some as prophesying the demise of mankind – not recounting Biblical events of yesteryears. In fact, there are those who believe that the verses in Revelation depict nuclear blasts, drones, aircraft, and even robots.
