Benedict XVI Is the Second-to-Last Pope, Says Irish Prophet Malachy

The prophecies of the Irish saint Malachy, the 12th century bishop of Armagh who predicted all the popes, have thrilled and dismayed readers for centuries. He has stated there will be only one more pope after the current one, and during his reign comes the end of the world.

>> The next one is the anti-pope who enables the anti-christ. No doubt the anti-pope will be popular with the gays, communists, muslims ♠and especially the anti-semites. << How do you read that? Assuming the nonsense that Malachy wrote the apocalyptic portion of the list of popes, and the presumptive notion that Malachy meant to infer that there is no time between the events, the next pope will feed his flock amidst many persecutions. Do you really think a Catholic saint would regard promoting gays, communists, muslims and anti-semites as "feeding his flock amidst many persecutions?"

1. The end-times comments are not germaine to St. Malachy’s prophecies., but are a centuries-later addition.
2. No endorsement from the Catholic church can be inferred from the fact that someone was made a saint, only that he was not a heretic or sinful. Since there is no claim by St. Malachy that the predictions are given him by Christ, etc., he can be wrong without being sinful or heretical.
3. There are whopper presumptions, not in the text of even the corrupted, extended prophecies, which are behind the notions expressed by many interpretations.
4. Even if, on some level, St. Malachy’s statements prove predictive, their predictive usefulness may be exceedingly limited. “The Glory of the Olives” is used as a term by St. Paul for referring to the Jews, in reference to their end-times conversion. Yet the supposed fulfillment of this prophecy with St. Benedict is his tenuous links to an order of priests known informally as Olivetans.

After that pope described by St. Malachy as "The Glory of the Olive," is there not an ellipsis (....) which suggests that Peter the Roman or Peter the Omega is NOT the pope immediately following The Glory of the Olive?

In any event, any predictions whatsoever of St. Malachy may or may not be true but would, at best, be "private revelation" and therefore not required to be believed. Many of us believe in Marian apparitions but we are not required to believe in them. Public revelation was complete with the Apocalypse or Revelations, the last book of Scripture.

St. Thomas Aquinas, remarkable though he was, was wrong on several scores but unquestionably a saint nonetheless. His errors were of a scientific nature (i.e. when life begins) or were as to doctrines not yet mandatory in his lifetime.

St. Malachy's predictions have proven remarkably accurate in many respects but he never predicted when the world would end. The accuracy of his predictions in recent papacies would be reflected in such as: Paul VI (family name Montini) was described as the mountain; John XXIII as the Rose (most prominent feature in his family coat of arms); John Paul I as de Mediatate Lunae (of the half moon) which had long been thought to be a reference to some notable conversion of Muslims but turned out more likely to be related to the extreme brevity of his papacy; John Paul II (Labor Solis, the work of the sun) a reference to the brilliance of his papacy (concededly not perfect but stunning nonetheless).

Since many of St. Malachy's names for popes are not the sort of thing that the cardinals would know in advance, it does not seem likely that the predictions have caused the election of specific popes. John Paul I, John Paul II and Benedict XVI could not have been identified in advance of election by the prophecies as three examples.

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