The John-Henry Westen Show - Can Europe Return to God？ Fatima and the Rise of the Faithful Remnant

00:00:00.000 The problem with the modern-day popes is that they confuse people.

00:00:04.380 Not only they confuse people, they give permission for people who live in error

00:00:09.220 to tell us, you see, he's applauding me, not you.

00:00:14.660 Hello, my friends. Welcome to the John Henry Weston Show.

00:00:17.520 We've got an interesting show for you today.

00:00:19.700 You know, Our Lady of Fatima's promise to the three children

00:00:23.200 was that the dogma of the faith will always be preserved in Portugal.

00:00:31.000 And that's, of course, there's a lot of controversy around that, because that was supposed to

00:00:34.060 be the start of the third message of Fatima, which we haven't really seen yet.

00:00:38.060 But a lot of people have often wondered, what does that mean?

00:00:41.940 In fact, I know of Catholics who specifically moved to Portugal just for that very reason.

00:00:52.380 And so I wanted to bring to you today someone who lives in Portugal, in fact, lives in Fatima,

00:00:58.340 Portugal, who actually runs his own podcast channel from Portugal. Diogo Brunze is one who

00:01:08.200 does that. He's a Catholic podcaster, and he's a large family man. He does all the right things

00:01:14.000 for the faith. But I wanted to get his perspective on Portugal, what's going on there with the faith.

00:01:19.520 And also to note, to all of you who haven't heard yet, Rome Life Forum this year, LifeSite's

00:01:25.100 signature yearly conference will be held in what many people might call the Second Rome

00:01:30.880 or in Fatima, Portugal. That's coming up in November. All that and much more on this episode.

00:01:35.680 Stay tuned. Diogo, thank you so much for joining us. You're welcome. And thank you so much,

00:01:39.400 everyone listening. I would like to address you as an inspiration, first of all, as a podcaster.

00:01:46.380 It's always good to listen to your own show and learn from you, your guests. Also,

00:01:52.320 So that gives us some strength to keep doing this work.

00:01:55.280 It's a work that we'll never see it paid off in life.

00:01:58.180 So we just hope that we're sending our graces up to heaven.

00:02:01.720 Other than that, thank you so much for being able to speak about Farim as well.

00:02:05.500 Portugal, the system we live in, we need to differentiate between Portugal, the country,

00:02:10.600 the people, and the proxy that has infiltrated most countries worldwide with liberalism and

00:02:15.480 all of those things.

00:02:16.700 But yeah, let's go for it.

00:02:17.960 Absolutely.

00:02:18.720 Let's go for it.

00:02:19.520 And let's begin, as we always do, with the sign of the cross.

00:02:21.260 in the name of the father and of the son and of the holy ghost amen so first of all diogo i mean

00:02:28.760 this is really strange our lady says this thing but let me start with this um we just talked

00:02:38.120 about this just before the show opened and it was 2007 which is a long time ago now but

00:02:43.000 i remember it caused a bit of a crisis in my faith when portugal uh accepted abortion back

00:02:49.840 in 2007, April of 2007. And the reason why is because of this very prophecy from Our Lady of

00:02:57.200 Fatima. First of all, Our Lady of Fatima, you know, is the prophecy, if you will, the Marian

00:03:03.220 prophecy in that it's not only is it acknowledged by the church, but it's the one that had the most

00:03:09.120 stupendous miracle, the miracle of the sun seen by over 70,000 people. She made that prediction

00:03:16.620 that prophecy, the dogma of faith will always be preserved in Portugal. So when Portugal

00:03:22.740 legalized abortion, it really shook me. I was like, what in the world does that mean?

00:03:31.060 I've come to grips with it. I'll tell you how in a second, but I'd love to hear your take on that,

00:03:35.780 especially in light of what's gone on in Portugal with liberalism, both on the abortion side,

00:03:41.860 Well, the definition of democracy is precisely that you're giving people the will to choose between good and evil.

00:03:54.180 And sometimes in referendums like the one that happened in 27, the government promoted this referendum that it had failed before, a couple of years before they had done this.

00:04:06.700 So this is one of the strategies of this new international regime that keeps promoting referendums until they get the answer they want.

00:04:15.520 And so eventually the yes to abortion ended up winning.

00:04:19.760 I think it was something like 51 to 49 percent.

00:04:22.860 So this is 2007.

00:04:25.260 Portugal was already under democracy for 30 years, more or less.

00:04:29.340 Most Catholics were already liberal in their core. 0.82

00:04:31.720 So there was not that much. The church didn't have no strength to just clearly state, no, we should not, first of all, vote in this referendum.

00:04:45.220 And if we do, our position as a country should be this, because we're Catholic.

00:04:49.460 80% of Portuguese still identify as Catholic.

00:04:53.680 There's one problem, though. Most people won't go to church.

00:04:56.900 most people will not even attend Sunday Mass.

00:05:01.620 So we're talking about the majority of the country

00:05:05.000 is Catholic by cultural habits,

00:05:08.200 but they're not Catholic by faith.

00:05:12.280 And this was 27.

00:05:14.020 Today, I think it's even worse.

00:05:16.020 So this even makes the message even a bit more confusing.

00:05:19.420 How is the dogma of the faith being kept here?

00:05:21.100 You need to live here to see it.

00:05:24.140 Fatima is alive and well.

00:05:25.740 When I say this, I'm not addressing the structure of the church.

00:05:29.660 I'm not addressing the bishops, the apparatus.

00:05:32.540 We all know there's a big crisis happening.

00:05:35.400 We all know that this part of this crisis or a big chunk of it is to neglect the message of Our Lady of Fatima.

00:05:44.080 There was no consecration of Russia.

00:05:47.020 There are so many things that could be done to promote the Immaculate Heart devotion that are not being done.

00:05:54.760 But if you are in Fatima, you can tell that there are these small, faithful people, either some priests, lay people like us, families, simple people that are actually keeping this alive.

00:06:12.620 Like anything that our Lord teaches us, it seems like most things are, they root from a simple stem.

00:06:22.800 And in Fatima, if you pay really close attention to how people are devoted to Our Lady, how most people annually, even people who are not Catholics or they don't live a faithful life, in Portugal, they still go to Fatima on the 13th of May.

00:06:40.900 Right now, this is the 5th of May, we have the roads are full of pilgrims.

00:06:46.620 People are coming to see Our Lady.

00:06:48.900 Most of them have no clue why they're doing it.

00:06:51.300 It's part of the conversion process, but they do it.

00:06:54.480 So we need to distinguish between the people who decide and who are in power and promote these referendums and they can pretty much manipulate democracy as they have been doing for the past years.

00:07:06.640 And then we have the real people on the ground, the real feeling and the cultural belonging to a country and identity, which is Portugal.

00:07:17.200 And then, of course, we need to act.

00:07:18.580 But eventually, that's the only way you can see that this Tom of the Freight will be preserved by, and you said this, many people moving to Portugal now.

00:07:29.980 Since COVID, there was a big boom, because we all know why.

00:07:34.820 Things are a bit weird everywhere.

00:07:38.480 But Portugal is still a safe haven for a lot of people.

00:07:41.900 First of all, because we're a traditional Catholic country, or we were.

00:07:45.980 And this means we are kind of, okay, I put this in a way that doesn't feel bad.

00:07:53.120 We are not as effective as other liberal to the core countries in promoting these new agendas.

00:08:00.020 So yes, divorce in here in Portugal, there are no political forces that defend, that want to abolish the divorce laws.

00:08:09.160 Abortion, even the most conservative country, sorry, politician in Portugal already mentioned,

00:08:14.400 And we don't want to change this law.

00:08:16.520 So politias, it's really, really bad in that spectrum.

00:08:22.960 In that kind of proxy that if you notice, it kind of is invading all countries.

00:08:28.720 That's why I call it liberalism.

00:08:29.980 It kind of fits all hats.

00:08:31.640 Everything fits under that hat.

00:08:33.900 But then you have the real people.

00:08:35.500 And this is amazing.

00:08:36.080 You can see a birth of families being brought into Fatima or the region close to Fatima.

00:08:42.860 specifically to the traditional Mass.

00:08:46.040 There are others who don't know the traditional Mass

00:08:48.080 but still they feel attracted to come to Farima.

00:08:51.860 And so I think it's a mystery still to me

00:08:55.920 because I'm here, I can see it.

00:08:58.020 The world is going crazy.

00:08:59.620 But at the same time, there's a small, faithful group of people

00:09:06.660 from all backgrounds, newcomers,

00:09:09.640 people that were already born as Catholics.

00:09:12.620 I was converted much later when I studied theology, so I wasn't a Catholic in 2007.

00:09:19.280 And so you see a lot of lives being changed and touched by Our Lady still.

00:09:25.020 Yes, institutionally as a country, things are not as Our Lady promised us.

00:09:31.840 And I think it's on purpose in a way, because the faith the Church is in, Pope Benedict said this,

00:09:39.180 and i'm going to cite one of the new posts because in that sense i don't think he was correct the

00:09:44.960 church will um definitely default into a small group a smaller group of people will keep the

00:09:52.020 faith and i think the promise of our lady fits into that that was a bit of a wake-up call and

00:09:57.880 that's what i came to in the end was that huh if the dogma of the faith will be preserved in

00:10:03.880 Portugal, and yet the country goes pro-abortion, which means, and the referendum suggests that

00:10:10.260 the majority of the country is not really pro-life, therefore not really Catholic.

00:10:15.740 Oof, what does that mean? It means the answer is actually what our Lord himself said,

00:10:22.320 when I return, will I find faith? In other words, will there be any? I guess there'll be a small

00:10:28.820 remnant in Portugal, and God knows about everywhere else. That's pretty sobering. 1.00

00:10:35.940 But it's beautiful to hear you talk about traditional Catholics in Portugal. Portugal's

00:10:41.860 a small-ish country. The population's not that huge. But you're mentioning in Fatima,

00:10:49.840 there is a group of traditional Catholics as well. You yourself are a traditional Catholic.

00:10:56.100 Yes. Well, I actually don't like the term traditional Catholic. I prefer just Catholic. I understand why we need to say that, because with all the new charismas, all the new novelties of this novel theology that came out of the council, it seems like you can be a Catholic in multiple different ways. Well, you can't. You need to be a Catholic being a Catholic. That's it.

00:11:23.640 Everyone's different.

00:11:25.740 Some people may like strawberry ice cream.

00:11:29.040 Other people, someone make pizza over lasagna, whatever.

00:11:32.940 But the faith is the faith, and you can't change it.

00:11:35.900 And we need to use this term, traditional Catholic,

00:11:38.220 and it sounds like we're very, like Pope Francis used to say,

00:11:41.560 very strict, very rigid.

00:11:43.900 This is just we're trying to define who takes things seriously.

00:11:47.780 I think that's the term basically defines that.

00:11:51.040 Right.

00:11:51.160 What I meant, though, was there's a traditional Latin mass community that's in Fatima.

00:11:57.620 And I think for many people, that'll be interesting because I thought, oh, you know, is it spread even to these countries that are smaller?

00:12:06.980 Everybody knows of France.

00:12:08.940 The U.S. is big into it.

00:12:11.240 But even in Portugal.

00:12:12.360 Yes. So our country has not, if you go back in history, you'll see that we have,

00:12:20.100 Portugal was made out of the Reconquista. So summing things up so it doesn't get boring, 0.62

00:12:27.340 Portugal was created by crusaders. They basically kicked off the Muslim invaders 1.00

00:12:33.860 and they installed the Christian kingdom here. It was approved by the Pope in 1179 DC.

00:12:42.360 And we've kept the borders for 900 years.

00:12:45.560 We're the oldest country in Europe with the same borders since we can recall.

00:12:50.720 And that country was not only created on the Reconquista,

00:12:54.240 but it was also created because our founder, the king that founded Portugal,

00:13:00.380 he was inspired by a vision he had from Christ where he was going into battle.

00:13:04.680 There's a vision called the Battle of Uric, which is very famous.

00:13:08.540 If you come to Fatima, you can find a lot of places that will tell you this story.

00:13:15.860 And Portugal was born with a missionary spirit.

00:13:18.680 Basically, our founder was inspired because our Lord told him, you'll take the cross whenever you go.

00:13:26.980 And we did that. 0.58

00:13:28.060 So for the first 500 years, Portugal did exactly that.

00:13:31.200 We expanded.

00:13:31.900 We went everywhere.

00:13:33.400 We went to India, Brazil, Africa.

00:13:36.060 we always took the faith

00:13:38.180 because we were a Christian

00:13:40.320 kingdom. Then in

00:13:42.280 the 1600s

00:13:44.320 there was already

00:13:46.420 some commotion. Liberalism started

00:13:48.220 to be attained. 0.84

00:13:49.700 After the Protestant Reformation 0.92

00:13:52.240 things became a bit, well 0.99

00:13:54.300 Portugal didn't suffer. We have almost 0.59

00:13:56.200 no Protestantism here so

00:13:57.660 we're a bit more used to discuss

00:14:00.120 with other Catholics and other

00:14:02.100 I don't know

00:14:03.820 other faiths other than Protestantism. 0.81

00:14:08.060 That's one thing. 1.00

00:14:09.420 Our Lady probably kept us without it.

00:14:12.860 And in the 1600s, our kings even stopped using the crown

00:14:17.000 and they reserved it only to Our Lady.

00:14:19.620 So the crown in Portugal stopped being used by kings and queens.

00:14:23.060 It's only used by Our Lady because she became the Padroeira.

00:14:27.700 Probably the name in English should be something like

00:14:31.600 the official saints of the nation.

00:14:33.820 Or official godfather, mother.

00:14:37.700 Patron.

00:14:37.900 Yeah, exactly.

00:14:39.380 Patron.

00:14:40.460 And so what happened is from then onwards, it was always downfall.

00:14:45.760 Don't ask me why we crowned our lady as a patron of the country.

00:14:49.700 And then we started to have Illuminism, pretty much everything most countries had up until the revolt in 1974,

00:14:58.620 1974, where we lost

00:15:00.280 sovereignty and we started

00:15:02.620 depending on the United Nations

00:15:03.980 and basically the monetary system

00:15:06.520 we have nowadays.

00:15:09.000 And everything happened in a way

00:15:10.620 that the country

00:15:12.660 lost its soul,

00:15:14.620 lost its values

00:15:16.860 to the core. The message of

00:15:18.720 Fatima was

00:15:20.200 really well ingrained

00:15:22.660 into the people, but it was

00:15:24.760 seen, and I studied geology, even in

00:15:26.580 in the course, in the university, our professors, they would, PhD, professors in theology, all of those good and fancy names,

00:15:35.900 they would look at Marian devotion as a simple thing, not for us, the lectured one.

00:15:43.140 And this isn't even in Portugal.

00:15:45.800 And so this is the setting where the traditional mass starts to evolve.

00:15:50.660 we don't have

00:15:53.580 a con

00:15:55.080 the XXPS

00:15:57.560 this was everything happened in Switzerland

00:15:59.520 and France and we didn't

00:16:01.400 got that here because we had

00:16:03.380 liberalism coming straight at us

00:16:05.600 in 74 with the revolution

00:16:07.020 and so it was promiscuity

00:16:09.680 contraceptive pills

00:16:11.460 divorce all of that

00:16:12.840 we were completely obliterated and had

00:16:15.520 no counter reform which was

00:16:17.580 what we're doing now we're trying to do now

00:16:20.600 And so traditionalism is becoming a thing now in Farima and in Portugal.

00:16:25.440 These new kids, 20 years old, they don't want the Novoselic.

00:16:30.900 They go there, they find the exact same things that they find in the world.

00:16:36.080 There's a really famous DJ, Portuguese priest.

00:16:39.140 He's a DJ.

00:16:39.860 He goes everywhere.

00:16:40.580 I think he's internationally well-known.

00:16:43.640 These kids can't stand that.

00:16:45.480 And they are confused by that message.

00:16:47.320 Why is the church promoting these kind of things?

00:16:49.700 Why isn't the church allowing us to pray with the traditional mass that was the mass given to the apostles?

00:16:57.660 With particular changes, yes, but definitely they feel that there's something wrong with the Novus Ordo.

00:17:02.900 There's something wrong with this new catechism.

00:17:05.340 There's something wrong with the way the church presents itself to the world, and especially to converts.

00:17:11.800 The church nowadays tries to reach out to so many different people, but they fail to reach out with the Catholic faith.

00:17:18.620 and so the young kids feel that and so traditional mass is booming in portugal i think it's booming

00:17:25.920 everywhere and uh in farima we have uh two or three places where the mass is um being said

00:17:34.660 on a regular basis xxpx uh saint peter as well obviously where the xxps grew so much here that

00:17:43.160 st peter opened straight away it's fine okay i i i i'm an sxps third order member i understand

00:17:50.860 the difference between both but i'm fine with their i just want people to be catholics you

00:17:55.380 know so let's go and then let's join the traditional bandwagon but at the same time

00:18:02.100 the structure in portugal bishops and priests they are very very against it so what what

00:18:12.700 brings you, you're a young man or youngish. You've got, how many kids do you have right now? So you

00:18:16.760 got five kids already. How old are you? I'm 40. I look younger, I think. Okay, you do, but that's

00:18:25.160 great. But you still, I mean, with five kids, my goodness, you're already, a lot of people, I would

00:18:30.980 think by 40 with five kids are going, wow, you've done a lot already. So what brought you to the

00:18:36.800 faith anyway? You mentioned that in 2007, you weren't really Catholic. What were you doing?

00:18:41.100 Well, I was doing other worldly stuff.

00:18:43.320 I was having fun, enjoying life.

00:18:44.900 And that was a part of why I became a Catholic.

00:18:48.060 I was having fun.

00:18:49.200 I was enjoying life.

00:18:50.040 And I was like, why am I not complete?

00:18:53.700 What's happening?

00:18:54.480 What's missing here?

00:18:55.520 My entire education was liberal.

00:18:57.780 You know, like my wife says now, we have no image from Christ or God.

00:19:02.920 We have no idea.

00:19:04.140 We couldn't even rest our eyes in an image, you know.

00:19:07.100 Now we need that.

00:19:07.940 We have images all over.

00:19:08.940 and sometimes we're just sitting there

00:19:10.440 and our eyes can rest in a peaceful image

00:19:13.940 from Christ, Our Lady, any saint.

00:19:17.120 I grew up with that tension

00:19:18.960 from not knowing where I come from

00:19:20.740 and where I'm going after I die.

00:19:23.440 This is where most people grew up nowadays

00:19:26.000 with divorced parents, promiscuity.

00:19:29.260 You don't even identify things as promiscuity

00:19:31.400 because it's just the way things are.

00:19:33.820 There was no TikTok back then, thank God,

00:19:36.120 but there was already a lot of things

00:19:38.200 where you could basically spend your time and your soul with and what happened was i wanted to

00:19:44.420 i went to discover this thing about god was true so i just i went to college and in college i wanted

00:19:51.240 to study theology because i had zero reference about god and i did study theology and by the

00:19:57.820 second year i was already asking for to be baptized but it made sense to me so yeah were you were you

00:20:06.960 raised Catholic at all were you baptized as a child you were not even baptized the only thing

00:20:12.000 that my mom did wow which I'm really thankful and that's probably why I was hooked and I I'm this is

00:20:19.020 I'm thinking about it now was she when I was born I was born like seven months so I was seven months

00:20:24.560 old in the bin and so I was an early baby she took me to Fatima like any Portuguese person 0.97

00:20:30.240 and i think our lady's fishing people here you go there you're mine that's it that's what happens

00:20:38.360 and so i went there and um probably that got me i'm not sure but i was always uh this is a feeling

00:20:47.720 that i on my podcast i there's a my podcast is in portuguese so sorry to everyone who's going there

00:20:53.000 there are a couple interviews to bishop williamson and michael jones that are in english but most

00:20:58.100 are in portuguese i i explained this that i always felt a loving presence that i could never

00:21:04.580 identify i could never express express this while i wasn't catholic but now i know that was god

00:21:11.440 giving me graces like here don't don't just don't die yet here's here's food for your soul and and

00:21:19.520 and try to to go back to the right path and i did well at least i did my best i still i still have

00:21:25.180 many things to correct and to

00:21:26.880 friends

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00:22:06.920 So how do you get to the traditional Latin Mass from a regular kind of baptism?

00:22:13.940 Did you sort of find the traditional Latin Mass right away or what did that look like?

00:22:20.140 So, because I was studying in theology, usually people have this funny joke that you go and study theology at the Catholic faculty here in Portugal and you become not a Catholic.

00:22:31.980 You become everything except a Catholic.

00:22:33.900 But it actually happened the other way around.

00:22:35.760 I was studying theology.

00:22:38.620 They were very liberal and progressive.

00:22:42.080 Van Balthasar, Ranner, all of those Vatican II heroes.

00:22:50.140 and I was being raised in that environment,

00:22:53.860 somehow I managed to find the faith.

00:22:56.200 Because again, modernism and the crisis of the faith,

00:22:59.820 this is like 5%, right?

00:23:01.940 This is what Bishop Feller used to say.

00:23:03.880 Well, if we look at it, this is like 5% of errors.

00:23:06.680 But these 5% are really caustic.

00:23:08.620 They are really a problem. 1.00

00:23:09.540 When you don't know anything, fine.

00:23:11.720 I'll just go through it.

00:23:12.920 So I learned Latin, Greek, all those good things in theology.

00:23:15.860 And I started reading good theology.

00:23:19.480 Still, I was raised a bit more around what in Portugal are seen as conservatives,

00:23:25.600 which are usually Opus Dei and a couple others.

00:23:31.360 But I wasn't sure what I wanted because there's this, after Vatican II,

00:23:36.520 there's this charisma kind of thing that, oh, you can be Catholic in many different ways.

00:23:40.660 And this is so wrong.

00:23:41.700 I think this is the reason why neoconservatives gang up on traditional institutes

00:23:48.140 because they need this multiple charisma kind of thing

00:23:52.900 that you can be Catholic in multiple different ways,

00:23:55.420 even if you play drums at Mass.

00:23:57.980 And so I was also in the charismatic renewal.

00:24:01.180 There's a really good priest in Portugal

00:24:03.240 that's from the charismatic movement

00:24:06.000 and I can't stand the Masses now.

00:24:08.460 Although in doctrine, don't ask me how they do this,

00:24:11.440 but moral doctrine, they're 100% okay,

00:24:15.220 but liturgically, a mess.

00:24:18.140 Anyway, we've got the same thing here.

00:24:21.760 But I would say for those guys, they're at least Catholic.

00:24:27.100 They actually know the faith and teach the faith.

00:24:29.100 And there's such a massive difference between that and everything else we have.

00:24:34.660 That's just stunning.

00:24:35.440 But please.

00:24:36.160 A hundred percent.

00:24:37.440 So that's why I don't, it's a journey.

00:24:41.160 We're kind of discovering the faith again.

00:24:44.200 Not only myself, but everyone.

00:24:47.280 We've been hidden this truth.

00:24:48.740 I ended the geology course with a master's degree in geology, and I didn't know half

00:24:54.200 of what happened to the traditional mass.

00:24:56.440 They don't tell us that the Novo Zordo is 14% of the old mass.

00:25:02.400 They don't tell us that the changes completely suppressed the most relevant parts of the

00:25:07.180 mass.

00:25:07.900 And it's not a liturgical problem.

00:25:10.740 What we're facing today in the church is definitely a doctrinal problem, which is being

00:25:15.220 disguised as a preference

00:25:17.540 when in fact we're dealing

00:25:19.520 with doctrine, that's it

00:25:20.660 and so what happened was

00:25:23.180 I then started to feel there's a

00:25:25.540 problem in the way I'm living my faith

00:25:26.980 I don't feel good anywhere

00:25:28.840 I go to Abraza, fine

00:25:31.380 there are a couple things good

00:25:32.480 then there are a couple things that are weird

00:25:34.800 then I go to the Jajuts

00:25:36.300 most things are weird

00:25:37.920 then I go to, there are so many different things

00:25:41.660 and I was always

00:25:43.060 where's the unity

00:25:44.500 on all of this

00:25:46.240 then I found the traditional faith

00:25:48.840 I went to the XXPX 0.87

00:25:50.280 and it was clear

00:25:52.240 it clicked

00:25:52.920 the sermon on the mass

00:25:57.020 was

00:25:57.700 strict forward

00:25:59.540 priests were actually

00:26:02.440 priests you can feel that they're manly

00:26:04.700 there's some kind of

00:26:05.980 because I grew up with I studied with so many

00:26:08.420 different priests in the

00:26:10.320 theology faculty

00:26:11.180 the new church so to speak

00:26:14.220 not the new church but modernism church or parishes they are infiltrated with some kind

00:26:18.620 of a feminine behavior i can't explain this in english properly but there's something feminine 0.61

00:26:24.640 about it because mostly there's women everywhere you know at the altar they're preparing stuff

00:26:28.720 the crisis of the church i think pushed men out both of the altar where they're helping the priest

00:26:36.100 and also a lot of the parishes because women are in charge of everything you know so i'm not saying

00:26:41.020 that women should be in charge of things don't get me wrong i'm just saying that this is a

00:26:44.980 characteristic that i know identify and i studied with and i spoke to and i know so many priests

00:26:51.240 that were having this behavior they're not bad people but they there's a femininity to it that

00:26:57.900 is not um estovid you know they're they're not manly like uh we need to be as father of

00:27:04.700 when we're living a family and so yeah i there's yeah there's a there's an interesting um comparison

00:27:12.620 you can make it's it's where a church has only altar boys or they allow altar girls i've found

00:27:20.700 anyway in my experience and watching this over parishes over parish life for the last you know

00:27:25.220 40 years it's almost always the same if the parish introduces altar girls they will take over

00:27:34.720 and the number of boys will drop off and eventually be zero we watched that at um we were members of a

00:27:41.740 particularly conservative uh novus ordo parish and it went from i think there was around 50 altar

00:27:50.060 boys serving. And new priest came in totally against tradition. He said he wanted a maximum

00:27:56.480 of five altar servers on the altar at one time, which was different for us because we'd always

00:28:02.580 had 20, 30. But then he went to the school and asked for altar girls. And basically as soon as

00:28:13.140 that started, well, we withdrew our kids from serving because we'd not have that. We wouldn't

00:28:17.460 have that but a lot of families must have done the same or maybe the alter boys just stopped going

00:28:22.620 because they thought oh that's weird and then it was just alter girls for a little while eventually

00:28:28.060 a lot of the families moved away but that tends to happen so that pattern of when it becomes

00:28:33.600 feminized the boys leave the men leave and I guess some of the men take their families with them

00:28:39.040 that's a real pattern that's not just characteristic of your experience that's that's a general pattern

00:28:44.700 Exactly. And so when I saw doctrine was solid, and they weren't preaching stories on the sermon, they were actually talking about doctrine, giving advice and directing people. This was different because most sermons in Portugal were either stories about the gospel, they were told just like the mass, you know, the novels are the mass, it sounds like a story, then Jesus did this, and it's not told in the first person.

00:29:13.320 And so with the XXPS, everything was aligned doctrinally.

00:29:17.820 Liturgically, yes, but on the basics.

00:29:21.780 The XXPS has this charisma where they just want to keep things straight to the basic

00:29:26.900 so that we're not confused on what's actually doctrine and what's aesthetical preferences.

00:29:33.920 So they keep things to the middle, but they do it really well and really with devotion.

00:29:39.700 That was okay.

00:29:40.360 and then people the families what made the most difference was the families a lot of kids

00:29:45.460 people were serious in life more than just at the mass they were living they were living a life or

00:29:53.380 they were living a life where you could see that they were integrally catholics they weren't just

00:29:59.940 dressing up to go to the mass and then bikini shorts and here i go to the beach whatever there

00:30:05.480 is actually preference they start that you can see that people do oh i'm if i want to go to the

00:30:10.260 beach I'm going when there's no crowd there because it's definitely a lovely place to be

00:30:14.720 but nowadays it has been turned into a really bad place to be when there's a bunch of people

00:30:20.620 same thing with tv for example people were avoiding tvs at home or they were consuming less

00:30:27.280 mobile phone time that most parishes I would go the way people would dress the way people would

00:30:32.680 kneel and take communion everything was different so I just I want to be here and the reason I go

00:30:39.600 there it's exactly because i'm as a father i need to take my kids to heaven i know that if i go to

00:30:48.660 novo zordo mass which in principle i think it is a valid mass i cannot control what they will see

00:30:57.040 the communion can be given on the hands i don't want them to understand they will lose the they

00:31:02.420 will not if it's hard to explain to a kid that you have jesus transubstantiated into that bread

00:31:07.760 how can you explain that if people are just taking the communion on the hands

00:31:13.920 and dressing in shorts so it's the entire behavior of the parish so I just stayed

00:31:23.560 that was it it was a simple path to tradition one of the things you raised there is is actually

00:31:29.500 very interesting now you explained that you don't have much of a protestant culture over there but

00:31:33.800 It is true that in America, particularly, we have a different thing happening with Protestants.

00:31:42.080 A lot of the Protestants have what we call community.

00:31:45.360 They're very warm and welcoming.

00:31:47.920 A lot of the evangelical, sort of strict evangelical Protestants, not only are they welcoming,

00:31:53.600 but there is a community aspect that's often missing from most Catholic parishes.

00:31:59.020 Even your traditional Catholic parishes, sometimes they're missing that element of community where you are able to interact with a lot of families who then exemplify a Catholic lifestyle, like you said, at the beach or in what they do in the activities they run.

00:32:19.080 And it is funny because that, what you're describing, is a huge element that often is missing from the Catholic world, if you will.

00:32:32.120 And hearing that it exists in your traditional community in Portugal is really beautiful because that is an element that I think attracts a lot of people.

00:32:40.300 Apart from liturgy altogether, and even apart from doctrine, we need to live in community and raise our families, children, in community so that they can have healthy friendships that direct them to God instead of the other way.

00:32:57.560 Yes, definitely. We have that, but I would say it always needs improvement. A parish is like purgatory. We're all there to kind of expiate our sins. You can never get along with everyone. There's always someone that opens a window and the other wants to close the window. The other wants to stay set. The other is setting up. This will happen everywhere where there are humans.

00:33:22.840 And it perishes now, but I don't think it's just perishes.

00:33:26.520 Life today, because of technology and the way we work and the way we live,

00:33:31.560 is done in a way that it is much harder to balance with other families.

00:33:36.140 So I usually tell this to my wife.

00:33:39.500 Every family now, we're kind of like an island.

00:33:41.940 We're isolated.

00:33:43.720 And we need to create these connections because we all live far away.

00:33:48.460 People who go to tradition, we don't live in the same village.

00:33:51.340 there's people coming from 200 kilometers

00:33:53.740 150, we're all split

00:33:55.880 the old parish

00:33:58.100 way of life where

00:33:59.540 the bell rings

00:34:01.560 we all go to mass, this was heaven

00:34:03.860 this was Christendom, we saw that 1.00

00:34:05.540 and that's the problem with Portugal 1.00

00:34:07.860 not problem, but that's why we must suffer

00:34:09.980 as a country, because we rejected

00:34:12.140 that, so I'm

00:34:13.920 pretty sure the dogma of the faith will be kept

00:34:15.860 but I'm also pretty sure that

00:34:17.660 our God, our Lord

00:34:20.040 prepared us

00:34:20.800 a specific kind of

00:34:23.060 pain in purgatory

00:34:24.720 and even in hell because

00:34:26.140 we've seen Christendom

00:34:29.340 for example countries like the US

00:34:31.040 they are new

00:34:31.720 but we lived Christendom we saw it

00:34:34.940 and we kind of

00:34:37.080 offered that at the altar

00:34:38.880 of vices and luxury

00:34:41.140 so we could have

00:34:42.500 everything that not everyone has now

00:34:45.060 now we have no faith

00:34:47.100 when I

00:34:49.440 say we have I'm saying

00:34:50.640 the overall population and so definitely we we need to be up to the task of being catholics now

00:34:59.040 because not only we know our lord and our duty is to first of all um promote his kingdom and um

00:35:08.120 and and try our best that even one soul converts to our lord through mary mary our lady she she's

00:35:16.200 she's been doing an amazing work here gathering families in one place you can't imagine john

00:35:22.880 and the catholics we get here we get people from buddhist cults um new age cults that they 1.00

00:35:34.440 were completely with the life torn apart with the misery that usually unfolds from those 0.95

00:35:40.460 environment and they all of a sudden they start going to a parish a catholic parish their life

00:35:46.740 they're married their marriage comes back to life they're open to life they start to have kids

00:35:52.620 and i've seen this it's not one or two you know and it's happening here so at the same time that

00:35:57.620 you have the majority of catholics people rejecting christ rejecting christendom you have

00:36:05.180 Catholics that are trying to

00:36:07.120 go on the other direction 1.00

00:36:09.460 which is let's try to go

00:36:11.380 back to a more

00:36:13.120 healthy way of life

00:36:14.720 not only with God but also with the way

00:36:17.380 we live our life, technology

00:36:19.400 the way we work like I was mentioning

00:36:20.980 now trying to close this circle

00:36:23.000 really

00:36:24.140 pulls us apart from

00:36:26.820 other humans, connections, human

00:36:29.180 connections and from ourselves

00:36:31.520 I

00:36:32.820 keep saying this

00:36:35.040 This ecological crisis that everybody mentions, I think the term is correct, ecologic, meaning

00:36:44.020 love for the house, but the house with the problem is not the mother earth, as they call

00:36:49.760 it, it's ourselves.

00:36:52.060 We have an ecological problem that stems from us.

00:36:54.520 We don't know where we come from.

00:36:56.440 We're polluted.

00:36:57.700 We're full of vices.

00:37:00.260 And I'm not sure why the church keeps promoting these environment things.

00:37:04.480 We should be promoting the ecological battle within the heart, not on the Mother Nature, which, of course, we need to treat the environment correctly.

00:37:15.180 But we have so many good things to focus on.

00:37:18.920 And in the end, it's hard for us, you know, lay people to how do we present ourselves to these bishops and to these priests?

00:37:26.220 And this conversation is already completely out of the scope to be addressed with a bishop.

00:37:31.220 They kind of think, oh, this is weird.

00:37:33.120 you guys are talking about the fake families yeah so and that's a that's a difficult thing

00:37:39.820 so really last question for instance it's it's a more difficult one because

00:37:44.020 so i was uh a couple weeks ago i met i met uh i was with a group of guys and and uh met a guy

00:37:52.540 and he wants to come into the church and you know he he's a reader and he's studied a lot

00:38:01.020 and he loves the faith but he said he's he will sign on to the uh the creed and the scriptures

00:38:14.060 but he doesn't know what to make of leo and he says i i i don't i don't i can't

00:38:23.280 i can't get behind that he's there i have to sign on to the pope

00:38:27.780 that's a challenge to answer because what do you do now you're you said you're a theologian i i'd

00:38:37.680 love to hear your take on this because it is i was thrown for a loop what do you what do you

00:38:44.660 respond in in that situation but what does he mean by that have you asked him a little bit

00:38:53.040 I got the impression that what he was talking about was the teachings of the Church don't

00:39:00.800 square with what's being taught now by Pope Leo and Pope Francis before him.

00:39:08.240 But I mean, for instance, the big news here in North America, some of the big news that

00:39:14.580 we get when news from the Church crosses the line of public consciousness, the last

00:39:22.400 one was the death penalty stuff. You know, there's Leo quoting from the Catechism on the death

00:39:29.060 penalty, which is actually opposed to the teaching of the Catholic Church on the death penalty, or

00:39:34.360 has been for 2,000 years until Francis. And there's Pope Leo saying it. And so I could,

00:39:43.440 that's my sense of what the guy was talking about was like, hey, I love the faith. I love the saints.

00:39:48.340 i've read all about it it sounds really good but this whole thing with pope leo and what it's it's

00:39:55.820 now it's not francis anymore but i i can't i can't sign up to that because it it doesn't make any

00:40:02.560 sense and at that point yeah i'm like oh that's an interesting it is it is definitely we have a

00:40:10.240 problem nowadays in a way that um i also have a friend now that you're telling me this there's

00:40:15.740 This good friend I have, he's a friend from before he was a Catholic, and he told me when I was converting,

00:40:21.640 look, if I ask a Muslim about something, or 100 Muslims, 100 people would tell me the exact same thing, approximately.

00:40:31.020 We know that liberalism is already infiltrating the Islamic world as well. 0.97

00:40:35.180 But anyways, he was just stating a point, and you're right. 0.72

00:40:39.260 And in Catholics, it's kind of, everyone says one thing. 0.73

00:40:42.500 And the problem with the modern day popes is that they confuse people and especially not only they confuse people, they give permission for people who live in error to tell us, you see, he's applauding me, not you. 0.79

00:40:59.260 What you're saying is already invalid.

00:41:00.740 And so we're in a position where our father on earth, which is supposedly to be the pope, is kind of being a bad father.

00:41:11.620 And that's it. I made peace with that. I no longer search if popes are technically popes or not, if they are formally, informally committed heresy. What I already rested my mind on is God will fix that. I'm a lay person. This should be for cardinals and bishops to decide. And definitely, if we have material for debate, of course we have. That's why people are having discussions.

00:41:37.500 I can't declare anything because I'm a layperson and the only thing that I say to people is yes

00:41:43.940 you're right we unfortunately for the past 50 years we've had bad fathers in my view they they

00:41:51.520 are popes they were popes but they were just a bad pope that's it now the problem with the pope

00:41:57.060 is that they can only be corrected by another pope or a council and so while that happens

00:42:03.660 it's tough for us to live here.

00:42:06.380 There was a saying that used to say

00:42:07.920 some popes, God sends us

00:42:10.060 for grace and the others

00:42:11.280 God sends them

00:42:14.200 for headache, something like that

00:42:16.060 on those terms.

00:42:17.420 For punishment.

00:42:18.080 Yeah, for punishment.

00:42:20.800 St. John Eudes is famous

00:42:24.040 for that. God shows his greatest

00:42:25.700 indignation when he sends

00:42:28.120 priests who 0.99

00:42:30.080 are more wolves than

00:42:31.380 shepherds and uh yeah anyway and that is happening now so what i tell people look you're not defined

00:42:38.580 by what by what your father does your father can have a and i'm talking about families just like

00:42:43.820 myself i'm not a good father at all times there's i'm weak there's um character flaws that sometimes

00:42:50.140 i speak in a way i shouldn't and sometimes i don't i'm not providing best example for my kids

00:42:54.240 i'm still their father and that's what i have been um guiding my behavior the only thing that

00:43:01.520 i can tell people is look we're we're not in charge of this god is in charge of his church

00:43:07.280 if he's allowing this evil probably it's because we haven't prayed enough probably it's because

00:43:13.020 we're not sacrificing enough how much penance have we done lately are our prayer morning prayer

00:43:19.080 night prayers are they in place are we praying the rosary every day and one of the messages that

00:43:24.260 i keep sending on my podcast because everyone wants to do big things you know everyone wants

00:43:28.340 to fix the faith the church declare citizen declare um pope is not a pope great i really

00:43:36.100 want this to be solved one day but the only thing that our lady asked this wasn't any alert is just

00:43:42.400 pray the rosary every day she told this to three little kids and this is why this simplicity of

00:43:48.160 the faith and getting back to the core of today's message is simply pray the rosary every day. I do

00:43:56.460 think that if all Catholics or most Catholics would pray the rosary correctly every day with

00:44:00.700 their families, the church wouldn't be in this state. And this is something that I'm not sure

00:44:07.140 if people know, but whenever you pray the rosary with your family, you get a, in English, I don't

00:44:13.860 another term in english indulgence a plenary indulgence every time if you have the right

00:44:18.300 dispositions so you go to mass on sunday you confess you pray the rose the entire week with

00:44:23.460 your family and you have a clean slate to jump into heaven whenever you die what can we do

00:44:29.840 other than this not much we can do exactly what you're doing what i'm trying to do which is spread

00:44:35.240 this method, let people know that God is good, let people know that his mother is really

00:44:44.100 holding his arm, because we definitely deserve a punishment if we look at the way the world

00:44:49.600 is going, constant war, the entire monetary system condemning people to slavery via usury

00:44:57.320 interests, regulation, the way the church is being led with false shepherds who live

00:45:05.780 and prefer to live a more political, comfortable life than dying for the gospel, when the gospel

00:45:12.900 is being trashed by countries, nations, everything is.

00:45:19.300 And so I don't think that the only thing we can do is exactly what our mother told us.

00:45:25.200 And she told that to three little shepherds who used to live 10 kilometers from where I live.

00:45:31.240 So if any of you listening here today, come to Fatima.

00:45:34.580 Go and see and stay on those fields where our lady appeared by yourself for a few minutes in silence.

00:45:42.880 God really communicates in a simple way.

00:45:45.620 And he doesn't expect us to do big things.

00:45:48.840 Some of us, yes, they will do big things.

00:45:50.880 But usually God picks the least probable of us.

00:45:55.200 Diogo of Bronze, I thank you so much for joining us

00:45:58.320 thank you for telling us about Fatima

00:45:59.520 I pray that many of you watching

00:46:01.960 will join LifeSite News

00:46:04.100 and Fatima for Rome Life Forum

00:46:05.420 that's in November

00:46:06.140 and make your way to Fatima in your heart

00:46:09.420 even if you're not able to make your way there

00:46:12.040 in person because Our Lady of Fatima

00:46:13.920 will be there for you

00:46:15.340 pray your rosary every day

00:46:18.400 as my friend Taylor Marshall

00:46:19.900 always says if you're not doing that

00:46:21.260 you're not on the team

00:46:21.980 God bless you Diogo

00:46:23.440 and thank you all the best and god bless all of you and we'll see you next time

00:46:31.760 hi i'm liz yore i'm really urging all the audience to continue to follow

00:46:36.960 life site news for all information news about life for a great perspective on

00:46:44.400 all the breaking news in the world thank you for watching and continue to watch and follow life site

00:46:51.680 news.

The John-Henry Westen Show - May 20, 2026

Can Europe Return to God？ Fatima and the Rise of the Faithful Remnant

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