SHOCKING! Pope Francis did NOT "consecrate" "the world" to the "Immaculate Heart of Mary" after all!

Following his "installation" last spring, many Catholics hoped that Pope Francis -- rumoured to be a devotee of the Blessed Virgin -- would finally obey Our Lady's Fatima request and consecrate Russia by name to Her Immaculate Heart.

Father Nicholas Gruner and other "Fatimists" insist that Sister Lucia, the seer of Fatima, was told that the Consecration must be done solemnly and publicly, in union with all the world's bishops. So far, no pope, from Pius XI through Benedict XVI, has been willing to go that far, although Pius XII and John Paul consecrated "the world" on several occasions.

Around the time of Walt's birthday, the Vatican announced that on October 13th Pope Francis would again consecrate "the world", in the presence of the original statue of Our Lady of Fatima, which would be brought to Rome from Portugal for the occasion. Believers in the Fatima prophecies began to hope that he might even mention "Russia" by name. Father Gruner went to Rome to press his campaign for this more specific act of consecration.

On October 14th Walt reported -- as did all the Catholic media -- that the Pope had consecrated the world as he said he would. And in my October 23rd update, I pointed out that nothing happened. There was no Miracle of the Sun, no sudden outbreak of peace in the Middle East, not even a resolution of the impasses in the United States Congress. Why not? Because, I said, what Francis (and his predecessors) did was not what Our Lady wants.

Little did I know -- I didn't go to Rome for the Big Event -- that Pope Francis didn't even go as far as his predecessors towards obeying Heaven's command. I have seen only today the October 15th report in Catholic Family News which gives the full Italian text (and an English translation) of the Pope's prayer in St. Peter's Square on the 13th.

Follow the link and read it carefully. You will find no mention of the specific words "consecrate" or "world" or "Immaculate Heart". None. What the Pope said he was doing was an "act of entrustment", not an act of "consecration".

Does it matter? Isn't it just a semantic quibble? Isn't an "entrustment" as good as a "consecration"? Well, seems to me a public prayer -- which is what Our Lady asked for -- is a combination of actions and words. We can't know what's in the mind of the person praying. Francis may have had some kind of "mental reservation" -- thinking something other than what he said -- but his spoken words were all the public could hear.

So, as far as we mere mortals know, no "consecration" of any kind was done on October 13th. Our Lady of Fatima is still waiting.