Benedict XVI to Resign.

columba wrote:PS.

May I be the first to welcome Mike, George and SF to the sede camp. A world full of sede's and not a schismatic among them.
If a certain prophecy is being interpreted correctly we could be awaiting Peter the Roman.

columba wrote:Just heard the news that Benedict XVI is to resign at the end of the month. The reason given; ill health.

Let the speculation begin.

Here is wisdom. He that hath understanding, let him count the number of the beast. For it is the number of a man: and the number of him is six hundred sixty-six.
- Douay Rheims Bible

Any favourites of our own for the position Columba?

The “Prophecy” of Malachy “the seer”

by Michael Hoffman

Speculation is already at fever-pitch as various hucksters invoke the name of the Irish Saint Malachy, the 12th century bishop of Armagh who, it is alleged, predicted that the next Pope after Benedict will be the last one, who will be named (or nicknamed) "Peter the Roman, who will nourish the sheep in many tribulations; when they are finished, the city of seven hills will be destroyed, and the dreadful judge will judge his people."

As the story goes, the medieval Malachy experienced a strange vision about the future that included the name of every pope, 112 in all from his time forward, who would rule until the end of time. Pope Benedict is the pope supposedly named “Gloria Olivae,” (“Glory of the Olive),” in St. Malachy’s ancient prophecy, and there will be only one more pope after Benedict, “Peter the Roman,” during whose reign comes the end of the world: "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."

There are a couple of rather daunting problems with this “prophecy” attributed to a saintly Irish bishop who may never have uttered them. First and foremost: the Bible says that no man knows the time when the end of all things will come: “But of that day and hour knoweth no man, no, not the angels of heaven, but my Father only.” (Matthew 24:36). An Irish bishop, no matter how saintly, cannot contradict the Word of God when it comes to foreknowledge of the end of the world.

Second, every textual analyst worth his or her salt probes the provenance of a document to assess its authenticity. In this case, the origin is dubious. It is said that, “St. Malachy gave an account of his visions to Pope Innocent II, but the document remained unknown in the Roman Archives until its discovery in 1590..”

This writer has trouble taking the word of the sixteenth century Renaissance Church of Rome in this matter. Hence, from both the point of view of the Word of God, and from the text’s own shadowy provenance, it seems that the putative “St. Malachy prophecy” is a counterfeit intended to manipulate credulous persons by raising the psychic tension and expectation surrounding the next pope, leading to much superstitious mania tending to occlude both our God-given powers of reason, and any genuine revelations God may want to transmit to us which may run contrary to expectations concerning an Irish “seer” and The Last Pope of All Time (cue the organ music).

The "Prophecy of the Popes" is likely a forgery.

http://www.2012hoax.org/malachy

St. Malachy

St. Malachy was the bishop of Armagh in Northern Ireland[1], and is credited with a reformation of the Catholic Church in Ireland. According to some authors, St. Malachy is also the author of a prophecy which has implications for the end of the world, or at least the end of the papacy.

The Prophecy

According to the traditional account, in 1139, Malachy was summoned to Rome by Pope Innocent II. While in Rome, Malachy purportedly experienced a vision of future popes, which he recorded as a sequence of cryptic phrases. This manuscript was then deposited in the Roman Archive, and thereafter forgotten about until its rediscovery in 1590.

Proponents of the Prophecy

Arnold de Wyon

The prophecy was first published in 1595 by Arnold de Wyon, a Benedictine historian, as part of his book Lignum Vitæ[6]. The prophecy is not mentioned in any record prior to its 1595 publication.

John Hogue

Supporters, such as author John Hogue, who wrote a popular book titled The Last Pope about the claims, generally argue that even if the author of the prophecies is uncertain, the predictions are still valid.

The Nostradamus connection

Some authors have suggested that the prophecy was created by Nostradamus and credited to Saint Malachy so the purported seer would not be blamed for the destruction of the papacy.

Criticism of the Prophecy

St. Bernard of Clairvaux

St. Bernard of Clairvaux was a contemporary of Malachy. In 1139, Bernard assisted at the Second Council of the Lateran. About the same time, Bernard was visited at Clairvaux by Malachy, who was Primate of All Ireland, and a very close friendship formed between them. On a second journey to Rome in 1148, Malachy fell ill and later died at Clairvaux, reportedly in the arms of Bernard.

In his biography of Malachy, written shortly after Malachy's death[3], Bernard makes no mention of the prophecy.

Catholic Encyclopedia

The Catholic Encyclopedia also suggests that the prophecy is a late 16th century forgery[2].

Fr. Feijóo

Spanish writer and Benedictine monk father Benito Jerónimo Feijóo (who wrote on subjects such as the "Causes of Spain's Backwardness"[4]) wrote in his Teatro Crítico Universal (1724-1739), in an entry called "Purported prophecies", that the ones by Saint Malachy were a shameful forgery, claiming that they were created ad hoc during the 16th century[1].

As a proof, he offers an accurate fact: that the first time the prophecy is mentioned is on a handwritten account by patriarch Alfonso Chacón (a.k.a Alphonsus Ciacconus, 1540-1599) in 1590 (this account would be later published, in 1595, by the abovementioned historian Arnold de Wyon); in this account, Chacón only comments the prophecies until the papacy of Urban VII (whose papacy only lasted September 1590, and was the current pope at the time Chacón wrote the comment). According to Feijóo, Chacón, who held a great intellectual prestige at the time, was lured to comment the prophecies by someone who wanted to help cardinal Girolamo Simoncelli (1522-1605) reach the papacy. By showing them to be accurate till Urban VII, it was expected people to believe the next ones; that way, Girolamo Simoncelli could be easily elected pope, since the prophecy after Urban VII's one tells about a pope Ex antiquitate urbis (from the antiquity of the city), a fact that seems to fit him, who was cardinal of Orvieto (literally "old city", urbs vetus), or at least better than Gregory XIV, who was elected pope after Urban VII. If it is a forgery, it appears to have been useless, since Simoncelli was not elected pope.

Feijóo's explanation is usually regarded as being the most probable proof of forgery.

Fr. Claude-François Menestrier

Jesuit father Claude-François Menestrier[7] also claimed that the prophecies were forged in order to help the papal candidacy of Girolamo Simoncelli, offering similar reasons to those of Feijóo.

José Luis Calvo

Spanish historian José Luis Calvo points out that the prophecies seem to be very accurate till Urban VII, fitting perfectly even the antipopes, but that afterwards great efforts have to be made in order to make the prophecies fit their pope.

Conclusion

At best, the "Prophecy of the Popes" has a very poor provenance, and it appears likely that it is a 16th century forgery designed to support cardinal Girolamo Simoncelli's bid to become Pope.