** Note that Fr. Elias has posted a detailed explanation in the comment section. It turns out that he did not say the things that multiple websites have alleged. **
[I have rewritted the original article. The new version is below.]
Some websites and social media accounts are promoting a false claim about the messages of the Blessed Virgin Mary to Sister Agnes Sasagawa at Akita, Japan. The false claim is that the messages given at Akita in 1973 omitted two sentences about the future of the Church. This claim has been attributed to Fr. Elias Mary, incorrectly. Fr. Elias comments below that he did not make the claim being attributed to him. I believe him.
As late as 2019, Sister Agnes gave an update to her messages, which again contains nothing like the claim that two sentences were omitted from the messages of Akita. Fr. Elias confirms that no such material was omitted. Her spiritual director, Teiji Yasuda, wrote a book on the messages. He also wrote a book of homilies, which is the source of the claim about a last Pope who is “an antichrist pope”.
Here are the real messages from Mary at Akita, Japan, from an archive of the EWTN website. These messages do NOT contain the false claim, which expresses a particular heresy about the Church in the End Times.
Now here is that false claim:
“Fr. Yasuda, the spiritual director of Sister Sasagawa instructed her not to write this: ‘Judas and the last pope are to sell Jesus to the enemy. Therefore the era of Antichrist Pope will soon come.’ He did not wish her to receive attacks, so he told her not to write that part of the message.”
The source of the above quote is this page at TraditionInAction.org (TIA), which noted that this claim is “based so far only upon the word of Fr. Elias Mary”. But Fr. Elias has offered this blog a length correction to the claims attributed to him. See the comments section below.
Now I will explain why this claim is heretical. But be advised that I am not accusing Fr. Elias of heresy.
The claim again is:
“Judas and the last pope are to sell Jesus to the enemy.
Therefore the era of Antichrist Pope will soon come.”
As my readers know well, it is the ancient constant teaching of the Church that Peter and his successors have the charism of truth and never-failing faith. See the documentation of this teaching here. This has been the teaching of the Saints, Fathers, Doctors, Popes, and Councils of the Church since the earliest days. The teaching is based on the words of Jesus in Luke 22:32: “But I have prayed for you, so that your faith may not fail, and so that you, once converted, may confirm your brothers.” The very same teaching was explicitly clearly taught by the First Vatican Council, thereby infallibly confirming the teaching of the ordinary universal magisterium.
Another dogma of the Catholic Faith is the indefectibility of the Church. The Church is the body of Christ, with Christ as Her eternal head and the Holy Spirit as Her soul. Then “Christ and His Vicar constitute one only Head” of the one Church [Pius XII, Mystical Body of Christ, 40].
Therefore, the Church can never go astray or lead astray. And neither can any Roman Pontiff fail gravely in faith, nor err gravely in doctrine or discipline. Some errors can occur in non-infallible decisions of the Roman Pontiff on doctrine or discipline, but never to a grave extent. So it is utterly impossible for the Antichrist to become the Pope, or for a Pope to become the Antichrist, or the false prophet associated with the Antichrist. It is also impossible for the Pope to “sell Jesus to the enemy”, as the claim asserts.
The Antichrist never wants to become the Roman Pontiff of the Catholic Church. Rather, the Antichrist denies Jesus, thereby denying Christianity, and at the same time, the Antichrist wishes to be worshiped as if he were God. The Antichrist never claims to be Pope. Instead, the Antichrist sets up his own false religion, in which he is worshiped. This false religion of the Antichrist opposes, openly and vehemently, all the teachings of Catholic Christianity. No one in that future time would mistake the Antichrist for the Roman Pontiff of the Catholic Church.
[2 Thessalonians 2]
{2:1} But we ask you, brothers, concerning the advent of our Lord Jesus Christ and of our gathering to him,
{2:2} that you not be readily disturbed or terrified in your minds, by any spirit, or word, or epistle, supposedly sent from us, claiming that the day of the Lord is close by.
{2:3} Let no one deceive you in any way. For this cannot be, unless the apostasy will have arrived first, and the man of sin will have been revealed, the son of perdition,
{2:4} who is an adversary to, and who is lifted up above, all that is called God or that is worshipped, so much so that he sits in the temple of God, presenting himself as if he were God.
Saint Paul and Sacred Scripture warn us about false spirits, words, or letters — which certainly would include false claims about private revelations — that might claim the time of the Antichrist and the Return of Jesus immediately afterward are near. Do not let anyone deceive you! For the arrival of the Antichrist will be of a man who is an adversary to true religion, an adversary to Christianity and Catholicism, and he will claim to be God.
This does not describe a Pope, but instead someone rejecting the Catholic Faith entirely, in favor of some new religion which worships the Antichrist. So the claim in the alleged addition to the messages of Akita is false and contrary to Scripture.
The First Letter of John says this about the Antichrist:
{2:22} Who is a liar, other than he who denies that Jesus is the Christ? This one is the Antichrist, who denies the Father and the Son.
Again, this cannot be a description of a Roman Pontiff, as every Roman Pontiff, and even the antipopes of history, have never denied that Jesus is the Christ, nor denied the Father and the Son. The worst Popes of Church history, the so-called “bad popes”, have never behaved this way. A Pope can be sinful, personally, but the charism of truth and never-failing faith given by Christ to Peter and his successors, just as promised in Luke 22:32, does not allow such a severe failure of faith, nor of teaching and preaching.
Therefore, the Blessed Virgin Mary never gave such a false and heretical message to Sister Agnes. The correct attribution of the claim is a homily by Sister Angnes’ spiritual director, Fr. Yasuda. But his meaning is subject to various possible interpretations. I do not agree with the claim by Fr. Yasuda that there will ever be an “antichrist pope”. A valid Pope cannot be the Antichrist. And while an antipope can be very sinful, the description of the Antichrist in Scripture does not match the idea that he will be an antipope or false clamant to the papacy, as the Antichrist claims to be God.
Similarly, there has been another false claim, this time about the third secret of Fatima. This third part of the messages given by the Virgin Mary at Fatima was revealed by the Vatican in the year 2000, under Pope Saint John Paul II, with Cardinal Ratzinger (later Pope Benedict XVI) as the Prefect of the CDF. Then Sister Lucy of Fatima confirmed that this was the third part of the messages (the so-called third secret).
The claim that the “real” third secret is something else has been used by certain persons to undermine the confidence of the faithful in the Church, the Roman Pontiffs, and the body of Bishops and to promote a false and heretical version of the End Times. In such heresies, the Church supposedly goes astray from the true Faith, with the claims varying regarding the specifics. They wish to make the faithful distrust the Roman Pontiffs, the body of Bishops, or the institutional Church. Often, such heresies on the End Times portray the Church as becoming corrupt and as following the Antichrist, so that the faithful can no longer trust Popes, Bishops, dioceses or parishes. They claim that the “real” faithful will then be a scattered remnant, who apparently are guided by claimed messages, new claims of private revelations, and their promoters.
When did Christ or Scripture or the Church ever teach such a thing? NEVER. And it is contrary to the dogmas of the indefectibility of the Church and the charism of truth and never-failing faith of the Roman Pontiff. This indefectibility assures the faithful that the Church will never lose Her essential characteristics, including that She is guided by the successors of Peter and that She will always be one, holy, catholic, and apostolic. IF the Pope and/or the body of Bishops were to go astray, following the Antichrist, leaving only scattered small groups of a remnant faithful, then the Church would have lost her essential nature of being one, holy, catholic, and apostolic — which is impossible as it is contrary to dogma and contrary to the promises of Jesus in the Gospels.
[Revelation]
[Revelation 12]
{12:1} And a great sign appeared in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, and the moon was under her feet, and on her head was a crown of twelve stars.
{12:2} And being with child, she cried out while giving birth, and she was suffering in order to give birth.
{12:3} And another sign was seen in heaven. And behold, a great red dragon, having seven heads and ten horns, and on his heads were seven diadems.
{12:4} And his tail drew down a third part of the stars of heaven and cast them to the earth. And the dragon stood before the woman, who was about to give birth, so that, when she had brought forth, he might devour her son.
During the worst time the Church will every see, the reign of the Antichrist and his kingdom, “a third part of the stars of heaven” are cast down to the earth. My interpretation is that these stars represent the Bishops as the successors of the Twelve Apostles. Note the crown of 12 stars in verse 12:1 and the expression that only a third of the stars, the Bishops of that future time, will be led astray by the Antichrist and his kingdom. The rest of the Bishops, and certainly the last Roman Pontiff, remain faithful.
Ronald L Conte Jr
the reproach of Christ 
Ave Maria! Thank you, Ron, for making those corrections and clarifications. I also contacted the TIA people as well. Ave Maria! Father Elias
Thank you, Ron, for revising and correcting your article.
God bless you,
Robert
Thanks to Fr. Elias and Dr. Fastiggi. Article has been corrected.
April 5, 2024
Ave Maria!
Dear Mr. Conte, First I want to preface my response that your comments about my talk on the internet proves the old saying, “The message is received according to the mode of the receiver.” I think you need to have some serious work done on your receiver as you have mixed things up very badly.
First of all you accept the purported message of Sister Agnes in 2019 as being legit rather whole cloth, but without examining well what I said you immediately discounted it even though I cite Father Yasuda as the source. Father Yasuda never instructed Sister to not write about the anti-Christ Pope in her messages that she received from Our Lady in 1973. That has nothing to do with the 1973 messages. And I never said that either. The anti-Christ pope comment was from a homily that Father Yasuda gave that was transcribed and published in 2003. This book is not to be confused with the book that Father Yasuda wrote about the messages of Akita and translated into English by the 101 Foundation. This book: ( Seibo-Maria-Zoh no Namida: Tehpu no Bunshuh (Kana no Mizukame), Yasuda Shinpu no Ohanashi [Holy Mother’s Statue and its Tears: An Anthology of Tape-Recorded Preachment (The Cain’s Water Jar), Father Yasuda’s Narratives], coedited by Akemi Igarashi and Sachiko Kotake, published by Tajimi Convent, Gifu, Japan, on April 1, 2003, pp. 78-79. ) has never been translated from the Japanese into English. It is a compilation of homilies that he gave prior to 2003 when the book was published. I never said that Father Yasuda told Sister nor did he say he told her not to write about the Anti-Christ Pope in her messages. You are confusing two different things. What I prefaced the talk with is that I and Mr. Dionisi were both interested in wanting to know if Sister Agnes was ever told by Our Lady in her message to Sister in October 13, 1973 what was meant by the “sign left by my Son…”. When I met with Sister in April of 2023, I did not get a chance to ask her if she could provide any more details. Since then, in October 2023, Mr. Dionisi and his Japanese translator stumbled across this book of Father Yasuda’s homilies in which Fr Yasuda stated that Sister would not have been able to provide any further details about what the “sign ” was, because Our Lady never told her. Father Yasuda then surmises that the sign could be a combination of both the Cross and Holy Communion. That was what he said Sister Agnes would not have known. He never told her not to write anything in her messages! This is what Dave Dionisi and his translator stated regarding his initial reading of the book of Father Yasuda’s homilies: “…Fr. Yasuda knew before his death two other important facts. The first is that Sister Agnes was never told the meaning of the sign left by her Son. Sister Agnes also was never told the specifics about a future antipope. … Fr. Yasuda was sent by God to explain the meaning of the sign to Sister Agnes and the world. He also explained the depth of Catholic Church infiltration including Satan would capture the seat of Peter. Fr. Yasuda finished writing this information about the antipope on August 15, 2001. The information was published in a very hard to find, if not impossible to find 2003 book. We have this book, Nihon-no-Kiseki: Seibo-Maria-no-Namida, Akita-no-Messeji [Japan’s Miracle: Tears of A Holy Mother Mary’s Statue―Messages in Akita. Fr. Yasuda died at the age of 97 with the odor of sanctity on November 22, 2013.”
It is well known that Bishop Ito appointed Father Yasuda to be the “official” theologian and interpreter of the messages in case Sister Agnes had any questions or did not understand something she was told or received. For example, Sister was thinking in her mind about the significance of the 101 weepings of Our Lady and what they meant. Her guardian angel told her, Genesis 3:15 and the symbolism of the first “1” was Eve, the “0” -The Eternity of God, and the final “1” The New Eve, The Blessed Virgin Mary, who undid the damage caused by the first Eve. Sister did not know what Genesis 3:15 was and consulted Father Yasuda for further enlightenment. He wrote extensively about the messages of Akita and their significance. The comment about the Pope was from the book as I mentioned previously regarding his homilies.
Here is the excerpt:
The below text in brown is excerpted from Seibo-Maria-Zoh no Namida: Tehpu no Bunshuh (Kana no Mizukame), Yasuda Shinpu no Ohanashi [Holy Mother’s Statue and its Tears: An Anthology of Tape-Recorded Preachment (The Cain’s Water Jar), Father Yasuda’s Narratives], coedited by Akemi Igarashi and Sachiko Kotake, published by Tajimi Convent, Gifu, Japan, on April 1, 2003, pp. 77-79.
Fr. Yasuda wrote: The first pope and the last pope are to sell Jesus to the enemy. Therefore, the Era of Antichrist Pope will soon come.
So, no matter how much we worry, we cannot prevent this, and there is nothing we can do about it. Therefore, we must properly defend our faith.
Thus, there are what is called Communion and what is called Holy Mary.
And, the third message given at Yuzawadai in Akita says that various disasters occur such as fires falling from heaven and “at this time, the weapons left to us are the Rosary and the Sign left by Holy Son.”
If you ask Sister Sasakawa about “the Sign left by Holy Son,” she has nothing to know it. Perhaps she might say it is Communion.
By “the sign” if Holy Mary meant Communion, why didn’t she say so plainly? In the message, however, Holy Mary says it is “the Sign left by Holy Son” not ”Communion.” Then arises the question what kind of sign it is, and we are so puzzled that we wonder whether it is the sign of the Cross, the Communion, or some other signs. So much it seems to be ambiguous.
Even if you ask Sister Sasakawa about it, you could not know it. But you should know that it is not Sister Sasakawa’s intention. In other words, the message given by Holy Mary is indeed God’s teaching.
“The sign left by Holy Son” is the sign of the combination of Communion and Cross. Since the Communion was created by the Cross, I would say that the Cross by itself is nothing.
Nowadays, however, we tend to separate the Communion from the Cross. So we tend to look up only to the Cross.
However, the Communion is attached to the Cross, which is suffering. The greatest suffering of Jesus was the suffering of death. Therefore, the communion is not valid unless we swallow the cross at the same time we receive the communion.
However, when Sister Sasakawa says that Communion is the sign, everyone takes the Communion as the sign but without the Cross, and people tend to think that they should just receive the Communion alone, or that they should respect it by itsef or something like it.
So much so that “the Sign left by Holy Son” is the relationship between the Cross and the Communion that cannot be separated from each other. That is why it is called as “the Sign left by Holy Son.”
For reference, see Father Yasuda’s other publications:
Gendai no Kiseki: Akita no Seibo-Maria—Seibo-zoh no Namida to Messehji [Contemporary Miracle: Holy Mother Mary in Akita—The Tears of the Statue of Holy Mother Mary and Her Message], published by the Eucharist Service, Akita, Japan, in May, 1986.
Kiseki to Namida—Zoku･Akita no Seibo Maria [The Miracle and the Tears: A Series of the Holy Mother Mary in Akita], published by Shuhyuhsha, Tajimi, Gifu, Japan, in April, 1993.
Nihon no kiseki: Seibo-zoh no Namida; Akita no Messehji [A Miracle in Japan: The Tears of the Statue of Holy Mother Mary, The Message in Akita], pulished by Endelle, Tokyo, Japan, in December, 2000.
The comment by Father Yasuda at the beginning of this quote is based on the fact that for some reason Father Yasuda believed that Judas wanted to be the first Pope. I have never read or heard of any Father or Doctor of the Church making such a claim. That is why, according to the translator, he is referring to Judas as the “first Pope” and not Peter. Peter never sold Our Lord. I supplied this to the original interview as a link for those who wanted to read it. You could have reached out to me and discussed this in person. I think you owe me an apology for misrepresenting my words and completely mixing apples and oranges.
I never said that a legitimately elected pope could be or become a heretic. It is my understanding that St. Robert Bellarmine said that it could be possible, but that neither he nor the Church has ever witnessed such a thing. If it did happen, he said that the person holding the office would cease being the Pope. I do not think that the Holy Spirit would ever let a legitimate successor of St. Peter become a formal heretic. There are those who are seriously casting doubts about whether the current occupant of the See of Peter is legitimately elected and I think that there is much merit to their arguments. Our Holy Father St. Francis even predicted that there would come a time when a man who was not canonically elected would occupy the throne of St. Peter and do much harm to the Church. Has it happened already in the past? There have been anti-Popes in the past. Are you saying that because we live in the 21st Century it could never happen again? I would like to see a serious debate about the merits of both sides like they would have done in the Middle Ages. They were not afraid of tackling the “difficult or troubling” issues like we are today. It seems that the approach of our day is to bury our heads in the sand or to cancel the opposition when we have topics we do not want to discuss. Is our Faith that weak?
Ave Maria! Father Elias Mary Mills, FI
Dear Ron,
Happy Easter. I know Fr. Elias Mary, FI. I sent him a link to your article. Perhaps he will reply. He was also on a podcast about Akita with Dr. Mark Miravalle:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qtWJtEZyCG0
Blessings for the upcoming Divine Mercy Sunday,
Robert