What About Garabandal? Part 2

In my previous post “What About Garabandal? Part 1,” I discussed Ted Flynn’s new book about the Blessed Virgin Mary’s appearances to four young girls at the mountain village of San Sebastian de Garabandal in Spain between 1961 and 1965 and recent Catholic media discussion about the apparitions and Flynn’s book.  In this Part 2, I continue the discussion with greater emphasis on the alleged messages themselves.  

 
Garabandal is a topic that is very challenging to discuss in a short posting such as this one. So my purpose for this post is not to be an exhaustive and authoritative discussion but rather to prompt and encourage you to further study, contemplation, and discernment.

 
Before discussing the Garabandal apparitions, it is important to consider the Catholic Church’s teachings on public and private revelation.   The Catechism of the Catholic Church states:  “God has revealed  himself fully by sending his own Son, in which he has established his covenant forever.  The Son is his Father’s definitive Word; so there will be no further Revelation after him.” See Catechism of the Catholic Church (Ligouri Publications, 1994), Paragraph 73, pg. 24.   

 
The Catholic Church does recognize the legitimacy of some private revelations.  On this subject, the Catechism states:

 
“Throughout the ages, there have been so-called “private” revelations, some of which have been recognized by the authority of the Church.  They do not belong, however, to the deposit of faith.  It is not their role to improve or complete Christ’s definitive Revelation, but to help live more fully by it in a certain period of history.  Guided by the magisterium of the Church, the sensus fidelium knows how to discern and welcome  these revelations whatever constitutes an authentic call of Christ or his saints to the Church.”  See Paragraph 67 of the Catechism of the Catholic Church, p. 23.

 
Thus it is with this guidance that we must approach Garabandal and all other alleged Marian apparitions, especially those not expressly endorsed or approved by the Catholic Church.  

 
So now what about Garabandal?  This supernatural phenomenon is reported to have begun with appearances by St. Michael the Archangel to four young girls ages 11 and 12 beginning on 18 June 1961.  Then on 2 July 1961 these same four girls had their first visit by the Blessed Mary, Mother of Our Savior. Apparitions continued periodically until 13 November 1965.  In total, over 2,000 apparitions of the Blessed Mother are believed to have occurred. 

 
On 19 July 1962 during one of these apparitions, a host miraculously appeared on the tongue of visionary Conchita Gonzalez while she was in ecstasy, an event that was recorded on film.  See https://www.garabandal.it/en/multimedia/video/item/25-the-miracle-of-the-visible-communion  

 
Over the course of these apparitions, Our Blessed Mother is reported to have conveyed a number of messages to the girls for transmission to the world.  These convey a sense of urgency for repentance and dire warnings of the pending consequences of mankind’s sins and rejection of God.   

 
According to the visionaries, the Blessed Mother informed them that the world would experience four supernatural events in succession over a period of time.  First, there would be a Warning.  Each person on Earth would be shown how God views him or her so that each person will be encouraged to amend his or her life and seek God’s forgiveness. This is known as the “Illumination of Conscience.” Second, about a year after the Warning, a Great Miracle will occur near Garabandal which will be able to be photographed and visually recorded. The Blessed Mother will announce the exact date of this Great Miracle to the visionary Conchita Gonzalez eight days before its occurrence. Third, after the Great Miracle, a visible sign will be left there at the site of the Great Miracle.  This sign, too, will be able to be photographed and visually recorded.  Fourth, there will be a Chastisement if humanity fails to heed these repeated calls for repentance and conversion.  According to Conchita, “the punishment is conditioned upon whether or not mankind heeds the messages of the Blessed Virgin Mary” (quoted on page 162 of Ted and Maureen Flynn’s The Thunder of Justice: The Warning, The Miracle, The Chastisement, the Era of Peace.  Sterling VA:  MaxKol, 1993).  

 
To aid you in evaluating the Garabandal apparitions and the messages of Garabandal, I recommend prayer and two podcasts:  Father Chris Alar’s February 2024 podcast with Ted Flynn ( https://divinemercyplus.org/podcast/explaining-faith-fr-chris-alar  ) and  Dr. Mark Miravalle’s June 2023 podcast on Garabandal https://motherofallpeoples.libsyn.com/mary-live-with-dr-mark-miravalle-garabandal-facts-miracle-warning-sign-chastisement  

 
Father Chris Alar is the Provincial Superior of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of Mercy Province of the Marian Fathers of the Immaculate Conception in the United States and Argentina.  

Dr. Mark Miravalle is a professor at Franciscan University in Steubenville, Ohio and an expert on Mariology.  See https://www.markmiravalle.com/  . 

 
To be honest, there are certain aspects of Garabandal that give me concern.  One of my foremost concerns is a prediction of three more popes after Pope St. John XXIII.  Soon after the death of Pope St. John XXIII, Blessed Mary predicted that there would only be three more Popes “then the end of times.”  In a subsequent message, Our Blessed Mother stated that one pope would only serve for a brief period and thus would not be counted in the three more Popes prediction.  See https://www.garabandal.it/en/documentation/going-deeper/1290-the-three-popes-and-the-end-of-times-in-garabandal .  There have been five Popes since Pope St. John XXIII:  St. Paul VI, Blessed John Paul I, St. John Paul II, Benedict XVI and our current pope Francis I.

The messages of Garabandal are important and worth considering.  I have offered several resources for you to consider in this post and its predecessor.  As I am still discerning Garabandal, I am remaining with the Church’s current pronouncement about this phenomenon:  non constat de supernaturalitate (it is not established supernatural).  Read these words carefully.  Garabandal is not established supernatural; that does not mean it has been rejected as not being supernatural.  

 
I conclude this post as I did with my previous post on Garabandal…

 
“Beloved, do not trust every spirit but test the spirits to see whether they belong to God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world.”  1 John 4:1