Bishop Strickland Warns of Apostasy ‘At the Top’ of the Church

His Lordship's latest letter in which he points out that a fish rots from the head. May the Sacred Heart bless His Lordship for his fidelity!

By His Lordship Joseph Strickland, Bishop Emeritus of Tyler, TX

My Dear Brothers and Sisters in Christ,

I am once again compelled to write and to encourage you to seek life more deeply rooted in the Sacred Heart of Jesus Christ. 

By the time this is posted, it will be one year since my first letter was written which was posted on August 22, 2023, the Queenship of Mary. I truly believe that letter was guided by divine providence, and the central point of this letter, a year later, is to urge, even beg, that all of us begin to see the hand of God in all that is unfolding in the Church and in the world.

The letter a year ago looked to the ongoing Synod on Synodality which was approaching in October 2023. It was followed by seven letters amplifying the concerns I raised in that original letter. As many of you know, I have continued to write these letters as prompted by the Holy Spirit. Let me be clear that I am not claiming to have received any special revelation. I have simply been prompted by deep faith and my love for Jesus Christ to open my eyes to what is happening around us.

That call to “open our eyes” is at the heart of the letter you are now reading. I have done my best to urge all who have read these letters to see the corruption and the powerful evil forces that are slowly but surely pushing us toward a devastating calamity. I have no desire to be a “prophet of doom,” but I believe I must speak out and point to the evil that grips our world and the Church. At this point, I have to say – We MUST open our eyes before it is too late! 

Our national political system, the Vatican, and too many influential organizations around the world are engaged in a program that is nothing short of a twenty-first century betrayal of Jesus Christ and His Church. Like the betrayal of Judas Iscariot almost two thousand years ago, this present-day betrayal is emanating even from those at the very heart of the Church and the state. We must open our eyes to these attacks on the mystical body of Christ in order to remain in Christ Who is Truth Incarnate, and to embrace the salvation He won for us on the cross. We must also strive to lead as many other souls as possible to the fullness of truth found only in Our Lord Jesus Christ and safeguarded by His Bride, the Catholic Church. The attempts to explain away this modern-day betrayal of Christ have lost any semblance of credibility. We must acknowledge that one evil hand is moving all of these disparate forces – and that it is no less than the hand of Satan, the prince of darkness.

As I write this, shortly after August 15th, the Solemnity of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary, we are reading reports of the death of Sister Agnes Sasagawa, the visionary of the Church-approved messages of the Blessed Virgin Mary at Akita, Japan in 1973. I emphasize that I am not claiming any special knowledge of her messages, but I do not believe any special revelation is necessary in order to understand the content of these messages. If we simply look at the messages of Akita with eyes of faith, we must conclude that what we see in the world today corresponds with what was foretold in these messages.

The messages of Akita give us a dire warning of what we see unfolding before our eyes. Not only do we see cardinal against cardinal and bishop against bishop, but we see bishops against priests and Pope against cardinals. We see blasphemies against Our Lord and Blessed Mother and attacks on doctrine emanating from Vatican offices with Pope Francis either remaining silent or, by inaction, giving tacit approval.

The messages of Akita remind us also of Our Lady’s messages in Fatima in 1917. In these messages, Our Lady warned that the errors of Russia, which included Freemasonry from which communism had its birth, would spread throughout the world unless and until Russia was consecrated in the manner that she described – in a public ceremony by the Pope, in union with all the bishops of the world, to Her Immaculate Heart. This was never done in complete accordance with Our Lady’s instructions. Furthermore, Our Lady specifically requested that the Third Secret of Fatima was to be revealed in 1960, but it was suppressed instead, and there is much reason to doubt that the full Third Secret has ever been released. 

The future Pope Pius XII, 31 years before the beginning of the Second Vatican Council, spoke these words: “I am worried by the Blessed Virgin’s messages to little Lucia of Fatima. This persistence of Mary about the dangers which menace the Church is a divine warning against the suicide of altering the faith, in her liturgy, her theology and her soul … I hear all around me innovators who wish to dismantle the Sacred Chapel, destroy the universal flame of the Church, reject her ornaments and make her feel remorse for her historical past … A day will come when the civilized world will deny its God, when the Church will doubt as Peter doubted. She will be tempted to believe that man has become God. In our churches, Christians will search in vain for the red lamp where God awaits them. Like Mary Magdalene, weeping before the empty tomb, they will ask, ‘Where have they taken Him?’” 

Indeed, these were prophetic words as, since Vatican II, we have seen an attempt to “update the Faith” by moving the Church away from the Deposit of Faith, which cannot be changed or amended. It is easy to understand why the revealing of the Third Secret of Fatima was to occur in 1960, and why it was suppressed by those who had the intent to change what could not be changed. Cardinal Ratzinger, before becoming Pope Benedict XVI, stated that the Third Secret referred to “dangers threatening the faith,” and he drew a parallel between the message of Fatima and the message of Akita. Cardinal Mario Luigi Ciappi, who had read the Third Secret, stated that the Virgin had said that apostasy would begin from the top. Padre Pio spoke about a “false church” and a “great apostasy” occurring after 1960 in regard to the Third Secret. However, when the purported Third Secret was released in 2000, it said nothing about these things.  

In 2019, Pope Francis, when asked why God “allows” so many religions in the world, answered that “…there are many religions. Some are born from culture, but they always look to heaven; they look to God.” He said that “what God wants is fraternity among us,” and he said “we must not be frightened by difference. God has allowed this.” However, if there was really no difference in the religions of the world, and if what God wanted was just “fraternity among us,” then one might conclude that the Catholic Church is no longer the one true religion, and that it is indeed not the ark of our salvation. However, we know that this is not the truth. Therefore, we must be concerned about the reported words of the Virgin about an apostasy which would begin at the top.  

In conclusion, I must cry out that ignoring the requests and the admonitions of Our Blessed Mother at Fatima and Akita has put the Church and the world in an extremely perilous condition. I do not write these strong words about Fatima and Akita to shake your faith, but instead with the fervent hope that you will awaken to the need for us to repent, confess our sins, and cling fiercely to the two pillars of faith which St. John Bosco saw so clearly and prophetically in a dream in 1862 – the pillars of our Eucharistic Lord, and of His Mother – the Blessed Virgin Mary. I pray that our response to all of the turmoil and evil today may be for us to find a deeper faith and hope in Our Lord. We must never leave Christ’s Bride, but neither can we remain silent as others attempt to change her or make her a caricature of the vessel of salvation she is meant to be. 

None of us have the power to avert catastrophe, but we can and must be spiritually prepared for whatever may come. It is imperative that we ensure that we remain always in a state of grace and that we embrace every act of reparation possible before it is too late. 

Let us take Joshua 24:15 as our inspiration: “as for me and my house, we will serve the Lord.” 

May Almighty God bless you and may our Queen and Mother the Blessed Virgin Mary intercede for you and lead you always to her Son. 

Bishop Joseph E. Strickland 

Bishop Emeritus, Diocese of Tyler