Fatima Prophecy in 1454 AD

I am not so sure about this because the evidence is inconclusive but there are important facts here and the combination of three different documents makes it at least credible.  True or false, I believe it deserves reflection by my readers for the other facts in this story, the possibility that it is true, and the fact that it does no apparent harm to faith or Fatima.

These three documents all relate to the happenings at and near the death of Sister Filipina on October 16, 1454, in the Monastery of Saint Mary Magdalene of the Dominican nuns of Alba, south of Turin, Italy.

Sister Filipina was dying.  The whole religious community had gathered around the bed of the Dominican and accompanied her with the prayers for the dying. Blessed Margaret of Savoy, founder and abbess, and Father Bellini, confessor of the religious, were also present. All were witnesses to the extraordinary facts that occurred and they signed and sealed a document that surfaced recently addressed “to those who will read these pages in the years to come.” In 2000, the Dominican nuns of Alba published the documents related to the extraordinary fact.

There are three documents from the convent of Alba, and these provide the substance of this article. 

This first is a four-page unnumbered manuscript note, dated October 7, 1640, which was added to a book written by Father Jacinto Bartesio in 1640 and containing the essential body of the revelation of Sister Filipina.

The second is an insertion to the notebook with the inscription, “1624—Book in which are recorded the Masses, Miracles and ex-votos are offered every day to Blessed Margaret of Savoy in Alba.” The insertion is dated 1655, begins on page 52 of the notebook and it is written “with a clear and slender calligraphy” by a religious who signs “Sister C.R. M.”

The third is some notes written by Sister Lucia Mantello in 1855. She lived in the convent briefly and became a Salesian religious afterwards. She did not know of the two previous documents, where all three were “rediscovered casually on August 19, 1999 and published in 2000.

The History of Sister Filipina

Sister Filipina was of a princely line. Her father, Philip II of Savoy, Prince of Acaia, was born in 1344, and had to defend his rights to the paternal fief by force. He was disinherited by his stepmother, betrayed and targeted for death. On December 20, 1368, he was chained and hurled into the icy waters of Lake Avigliana near Saint Michele delle Chiuse Abbey between Piedmont and Savoy.

On the same year, his only daughter, Umberta Felipa, was born in the castle of Sarre. She never knew her father, and when she learned of his terrible fate, became a nun in order to obtain for him the grace of eternal salvation. She took the name of Filipina dei Storgi.

Prince Philip was wearing a medal around his neck at the hour of the execution. The medal belonged to his ancestor, Blessed Umberto II (1080–1103), sovereign count of Savoy and hero in the defense of the papacy against the unjust claims of Emperor Frederick Barbarrossa.

The assassins fled when Philip’s body disappeared in the water. Yet, unbelievable as it may appear, the prince did not die. He miraculously returned to the surface without being seen by anyone, a favor he attributed to Blessed Umberto’s medal.

He set out for exile, leading a penitent’s life from then on. Using a pseudonym, he went on pilgrimages to the sanctuaries of France, Switzerland and Spain, and finally Fatima in Portugal.

Why Did Prince Philip Go To Fatima in the 14^th Century?

Queen Mafalda was married to Dom Alfonso Henriques (1128–1185), founder of the Kingdom of Portugal. She was a daughter of Amadeus III of Savoy, count of the Holy Roman German Empire, who died in the Second Crusade, and a sister of Blessed Umberto, to whom the prince owed his life.

The region of Fatima and the nearby lands were taken forcefully from the Moors by King Alfonso Henriques. Afterwards the king saw to the colonization and control of the conquered area against the continuous Moorish incursions. To achieve that end, Dom Alfonso, with the participation of Doña Mafalda, granted great extensions of those lands to two select religious orders. He also assigned castles to noble Portuguese, paladins of the Re-conquest.

One favored religious order was Citeaux (Cistercians), whose “co-founder” was Saint Bernard of Clairvaux, the great Marian apostle of the Middle Ages, and cousin to the king. The Cistercians erected the celebrated Santa Maria de Alcobaça Abbey, birthplace of Portuguese culture, less than 25 miles west of Fatima.

The other religious order was that of the Templars, a military order of chivalry to defend the Holy Land, also created under Saint Bernard’s influence. After their suppression, hotly disputed to this day, the Templars were expelled from the rest of Europe and took refuge in Portugal. Their headquarters was located in Tomar, approximately 19 miles east of Fatima. In 1318, during the reign of Dom Diniz, they became the headquarters for the Order of Christ. The cross of the Templars-Order of Christ was on the sails of the ships of Pedro Alvares Cabral, discoverer of Brazil. That cross was the insignia that fluttered in the first years of Brazil’s history on the standards and banners of that new land, called Land of the Holy Cross.

Fatima is located at the crossing of the routes connecting the castles of Leiria, Tomar, Santarem, Ourem and Porto de Mos, which was traveled by kings, nobles and Knights Templar.  In 1385 AD Blessed Nuno Alvares Pereira was passing through Fatima,  his horse “knelt, and seeing that, Dom Nuno said, ‘Here a great miracle will take place.’” 

In the outskirts of Fatima was a small monastery erected by Cistercians from Alcobaça, and all that remains of that monastery are its foundations that serve as the foundation for the present parish church of Fatima built in the 18th century and originally called Our Lady of the Rosary. (Recently proof of this was found in the side walls.)

Most likely Queen Mafalda (Matilda in English) of Savoy, sister of Blessed Umberto and first Queen of Portugal, in honor of Most Holy Virgin, built the small abbey chapel that later became the Church of the Children of Fatima, in the place called at the time, the ‘Rock of Fatima’.  This is what Philip went to visit, and the documents speak of.

The fact is that Prince Philip returned to the land of his birth after years of absence. He presented himself first to his uncle, the bishop of Tarantasia, Eduardo of Savoy (U1395). Afterwards he began to search for his daughter, who was hiding under a pseudonym.

The years passed, and neither the wrinkles marking his face, nor his beggar’s clothing betrayed to strangers that he was Philip, the youthful and feared warlord he once was.

Among the homes he visited in his fruitless search was that of his niece, Blessed Margaret of Savoy-Acaia.  The last time he was with her, in December 1418, he revealed his true identity, and told her of the miracle at the hour of his execution, and all about his later life. Finally, he entrusted to her his most precious relic—Blessed Umberto’s medal—asking her to give it to his daughter in case she ever appeared.

According to one of the documents, “Once he had made this last revelation, he breathed his last the next night in the church of Saint Francis, on the sepulcher of his brother Louis of Savoy, even as he yearned to return to the tomb of Blessed Umberto in Altacomba.”  

Blessed Margaret kept the medal. Like her father, Prince Philip’s daughter had disappeared a long time before. In fact, she had joined, “along with her mother, the monastery of Saint Catherine of Alba, taking the name, Sister Filipina, for her father whom she believed to be dead.”

Years later, Blessed Margaret went to Alba, where she founded the Monastery of Saint Mary Magdalene. Some time later, Sister Filipina requested to be transferred to the new monastery, having an authorization from Pope Nicholas V, dated January 16, 1448. However, it was not until her death that she confessed to Blessed Margaret that she was her cousin. It was at that moment that Sister Filipina learned through Blessed Margaret of the virtuous death of her father, for whose salvation she had offered her religious life, as well as of his passage through Fatima. Then, enraptured with admiration, she received the miraculous medal.

Sister Filipina spent her whole life not knowing that her sacrifice had been accepted. At her death the admirable meaning of her life was presented to her like a lightening flash. Furthermore Heaven rewarded her with a vision of the future triumph of Our Lady over “a certain monster from the Orient . . . which would be slain by Our Lady of the Holy Rosary of Fatima if all men had invoked her with great penitence.”

The 1454 AD Revelation of Fatima

On October 16, 1454, according to one of the documents,

“It happened that during the agony of her death [Sister Filipina] had a magnificent vision or revelation, during which, in the presence of Father Bellini, the Abbess Foundress and all the nuns, she spoke of hidden things aloud . . . . Enraptured by a celestial joy from on high, she greeted by name and aloud the heavenly inhabitants³ who came to meet her, namely the Most Holy Lady of the Rosary, Saint Catherine of Siena, Blessed Umberto, and Abbot William of Savoy. She spoke of future events both favorable and harmful for the House of Savoy, until an undefined time; she spoke of terrible wars; of the exile of Umberto II of Savoy in Portugal; of a certain monster from the East, the scourge of mankind, but which would be slain by Our Lady of the Holy Rosary of Fatima if all men would invoke her with great penitence. After that, she expired in the arms of her cousin, Blessed Margaret of Savoy.”    

Indeed, in 1454, 463 years before the apparitions at Cova da Iria, heaven revealed the chastisement of a sinful world by a “monster from the East, the scourge of mankind,” an image that seems to embody the “errors of Russia” against which Our Lady warned men in 1917.

Furthermore, Our Lady indicated a sign of the times in which the “scourge” would take place—on the occasion of the exile of King Umberto II of Italy. That took place in 1946, one year after the end of World War II, and five years after Sister Lucy made public the content of the message revealed at Fatima!

Already in the 15th century, the revelation also emphasized the condition set by Our Lady in 1917: a “great penance” for the world to free itself from the “scourge of mankind coming from the East.”

In 1454, as in 1917, heaven announced the final triumph of the Most Holy Virgin. One of the documents now published states that the “monster from the East, the scourge of mankind . . . would be slain by Our Lady of the Holy Rosary of Fatima.” In another document, one reads the same assertion: “Satan will wage a terrible war, but he will lose, because the Most Holy Virgin Mother of God and of the Most Holy Rosary of Fatima, ‘more terrible than an army in battle array,’ will defeat him forever.”

History of Documents

The story does not end there. As aforementioned, in 1454 all those present signed and sealed the documents narrating Sister Filipina’s portentous vision to be kept for posterity.

In 1638, 184 years later, Father Jacinto Baresio, O.P., published a history of the noble family of Savoy at the request of the Duchess of Mantua, Margaret of Savoy-Gonzaga, then regent of Portugal. When he wrote it, Father Baresio analyzed Sister Filipina’s chronicle and figured that the episode of Prince Philip’s execution could stain the reputation of the dynasty. So he simply burned it!

However, as soon as he left, the abbess and the older nuns in the monastery, who had read the original, recreated from memory the document’s text, and each one signed the text as a proof of authenticity on October 7, 1640.

In 1655, a nun who signed only her initials, left another written document, confirming everything said in the previous one, in the terms that follow:

The written memoirs say that in Portugal there is a church in a little town called Fatima, built by an ancestor of our holy founder Margaret of Savoy, Mafalda, Queen of Portugal and daughter of Amadeus II of Savoy, and that a statue of the Most Holy Virgin will speak about very grave future events, for Satan will wage a terrible war. But he will lose because the Most Holy Virgin Mother of God and of the Most Holy Rosary of Fatima, “more terrible than an army in battle array,” will defeat him forever.

Nonetheless, these other manuscripts were also forgotten, because of the religious persecutions that closed the Dominican convent in Alba twice.

Time passed, and in 1855 or 1885, the then Abbess Benedetta Deogratias Ghibellini, “received a revelation by a holy soul of the content of that lost chronicle and confided it verbally to her successor, with the obligation of transmitting it, always in secret and not publicly, until each event had been verified.”

On May 22, 1923, Mother Prioress Stefana Mattei communicated the secret to Sister Lucia Mantello, who briefly stayed with the Dominicans before joining the Salesians. She did not have the ancient documents in her possession. She merely transcribed this revelation, transmitted by each abbess to her successor, which referred to the chronicles that had been lost.

Errors of Russia

In my opinion the errors of Russia are still with us.  They are in the constitution of the European Union.  From 1914 till 1984 this “monster from the East, the scourge of mankind" spread its errors all over the world.  From 1984 on it has been loosing the war to the great warrior, Our Lady of Fatima, starting from the statue at the parish Church that smiled at Lucia at her first communion.  The war has a long way to go because communists do not give up without a fight and they are now working to take over Western Europe.  Our Lady is at the head of Her army in this fight.  Are you behind Her fighting as one of Her children?  In the end She will win with or without you.  However, the smaller Her army the harder the victory will be.  It is up to you.

Richard Salbato

 

Catholic Encyclopedia:

Blessed Margaret of Savoy

Marchioness of Montferrat, born at Pignerol in 1382; died at Alba, 23 November, 1464. She was the only daughter of Louis of Savoy, Prince of Achaia, and of Bonne, daughter of Amadeus VI, Count of Savoy, and was given in marriage in 1403 to Theodore, Marquis of Montferrat, a descendant of the Greek emperors, the Palæologi, and widower of Jeanne, daughter of the duke of Bar and of Lorraine. Her piety, already great, increased after she had heard the preaching of St. Vincent Ferrer, who spent several months in Montferrat. Therefore, when she was left a widow in 1418, she decided to abandon the world. Leaving the direction of the affairs of the marquisate to Jean-Jacques, the son of her husband by his first marriage, she retired to Alba where she joined the Third Order of St. Dominic. A little later, Philip Maria, duke of Milan, asked her hand in marriage and begged the pope to relieve her of her vow. But Margaret opposed a formal refusal to this request and thoroughly resolved to give herself entirely to God: with several young women of rank, she founded a monastery and placed it under the rule of the order of St. Dominic. Redoubling her mortifications she made rapid progress in the way of perfection and died in a saintly manner. On 13 December, 1464, her remains were placed in a simple tomb; in 1481 they were transferred to a different and much more beautiful sepulchre built in her monastery at the expense of William, Marquis of Montferrat.

 Philip II (1438-1497)

Philip II, surnamed the Landless was the Duke of Savoy for the brief reign from 1496 to 1497, one year. 

He was the granduncle of the previous duke Charles II, and the youngest surviving son of Duke Luis of Savoy and Anne of Cyprus. He however was not the heir general of the previous duke, there being several females before him in the line of succession. To ensure male inheritance to the Savoy line, his eldest son Philibert was married to his cousin, the only sister of the deceased young Duke. However, the plan did not succeed: the girl died at age 12. (Philip had already died in the meantime.) The children of the daughters of Philip's eldest brother Duke Amedeo IX of Savoy were next in line, and were entitled to the inheritance of the line of heirs-general, including Cyprus and Jerusalem. Despite of the fact that Cyprus and Jerusalem did not bar succession in female line, Philip however took those claims and used those titles as well. His male successors in Savoy also continued to do so, thus giving their ducal title a higher, royal titulary.

He spent most of his life as a junior member of the ducal family. His original paanage was the district of Bresse, close to the French and Burgundian border, but it was lost and therefore Philip received his sobriquet "the Landless".

He married two women:

1.     Margaret of Bourbon (1438-1483) and had 3 children from this marriage Louise (1476-1531), married Charles of Valois-Orléans, Count of Angoulême, had children including: Francis I of France whose daughter Margaret of Valois married to Emanuele Filiberto of Savoy. 2. Girolamo (1478) 3. Philibert II (Filiberto II) (1480-1504)

 

2. Claudine or Claudina de Brosse of Brittany (1450-1513) and had 6 children from this marriage:  Carlo III (1486-1553) who succeeded his half-brother as Duke of Savoy, Louis (1488-1502), Philip (1490-1533), duke of Nemours , Assolone (1494), Giovanni Amedeo (1495), Philiberta (1498-1524), married Julian II di Medici (1479-1516), duke of Nemours

He had also other 8 illegitimate children by 2 mistresses known as Libera Portoneri and Bona di Romagnano. One of those children was Rene de Savoie, known as the Grand Bastard of Savoy.

House of Savoy

The House of Savoy was a dynasty of nobles who traditionally had their domain in Savoy, a region between Piedmont, Italy, Frnace and French-speaking Switzerland. They once had claims on the modern canton of Vaud in Switzerland, but their access to it was cut by Geneva during the Reformation, after which it was conquered by Bern.

They became Kings of Sardinia and later of Italy.

Their Kingdom ended with the referendum by which Italians chose the republic as the form of state. Under the Constitution of the Italian Republic, male descendants of the House of Savoy were forbidden from entering Italy. This provision was removed in 2002.

The house descended from Humbert I, Count of Sabaudia (or "Maurienne"), Italian Umberto I "Biancamano", 1003-1047 or 1048, and includes the Counts of Savoy, the Dukes of Savoy, the Kings of Sardinia, and the Kings of Italy. Piedmont was later joined with Sabaudia, and the name evolved into "Savoy" (Italian "Savoia").