An unprecedented event shook the True Church of Christ on April 22, 2016, when Pope Gregory XVIII apostatized. While one of the Popes – Saint Celestine V – had renounced the Papacy in 1292, he did not renounce his faith, as Gregory XVIII, the apostate, unfortunately did.

Predictably, many assumed that this event marked the beginning of the end of the Palmarian Church; however, the opposite has occurred. The Church has re-emerged, as She has always done in the darkest moments of Her history, with renewed strength and spiritual splendor. There is new vitality in the spiritual state as well as the material state of the Palmarian Church, which is the soundest proof of Her incorruptible veracity. Still, it is also interesting to consider how the apostasy of the previous pope has not affected, in the least, the integrity of the True Church; rather, it has confirmed it.

In the first place, if the Palmarian Church was, as their enemies declare, a group of evildoers and deceivers, why would its top leader renounce the Faith? Does it make sense to imagine Al Capone renouncing the Mafia? Honestly, it is difficult to conceive.

On the other hand, in his farewell letter he claimed to have lost his faith, and at the same time he did not want to convince anyone…What kind of person, at the head of a Church that he supposedly considers as false, would not at least try to “lift the blindfold from the eyes” of those who up to the previous day, gave him the honor that a Pope deserves? Is that called “respect for the beliefs of others” or refined perversity and selfishness?

In fact, it is something more simple and brutal: the ex- pope knows intimately that the Palmarian Church is the True Church of Christ and Mary, but the amount of his infidelities made his religious life so hard and heavy to carry on, that, without being able to bear it anymore, he simply left, unable even to sort his thoughts to offer a consistent excuse or explanation. All this reveals the deplorable state of the confusion of his conscience.

For a long time, the ex- pope was a formidable religious. For years he generously worked for the Church. Even so, he apostatized. This should not be surprising, since there are similar cases in history. Henry VIII was a pious man during his youth and also during the first years of his reign, where he firmly defended the Catholic cause against Lutheranism. Then, slowly overcome by a lustful life, he separated from the True Church and regrettably condemned himself. The reprobate Pope Paul IV was also an admirable young man, who even experienced high mystical Charismas, such as the stigmatization and also, temporarily and at different times, the Mystical Espousal of the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary. But then his infidelities reached the point of ordering the assassination of his predecessor Pope Saint Marcelo II. In this way Pope Paul IV also condemned himself eternally.

Henry VIII, Paul IV, Gregory XVIII…are three similar examples that, like so many others, should catch our attention and make us see that only with prayer and penance, the frequent use of the Holy Sacraments and the exercise of the virtues, we can persevere in the Faith until the end.

One last word: Henry VIII and Paul IV damned themselves for eternity, but the ex-pope Gregory XVIII is still alive in this world. It should be remembered that Jesus and Mary were lovingly willing to forgive, until the last moment, the traitor Judas Iscariot. What happiness would there be in Heaven if the ex- pope repented!