Peter the Roman, Pope Francis?

St. Malachy, Archbishop of Armagh

Full name: Máel Máedóc Ua Morgair

Born: 1094, Armagh, United Kingdom

Died: 02 Nov, 1148, Clairvaux Abbey, France

The resignation of Pope Benedict XVI in March 2013 fueled significant debates and discussions online about the next pope being the "Petrus Romanus" or Peter the Roman foretold in the posthumously "discovered" prophecies of St. Malachy (1094 - 1148). We wouldn't bother with this notion considering that the papal prophecies of the Irish saint widely held among historical and theological experts as a forgery for very obvious reasons: (1) Neither St Malachy himself nor his contemporaries ever mentioned any prophetical writing of his, and (2) the prophecies were "discovered" 447 years after his death with correct prophecies prior to the date of discovery, but with wrong prophecies after the date of discovery. Sure, there were a few hits among them, but when you have just 5-6 good predictions out of 112, that's more a statistical provenance than anything. 

Whoever the forger was, he certainly made some research on the past popes between the time of St. Malachy's death and the "discovery" date to make a good enough post-dated prophecy, but since he was no clairvoyant, simply had to concoct prophetic guesswork on the future popes henceforth.  It helped that he wrote in the same cryptic manner as how Nostradamus framed his predictions, so as to keep believers guessing.  But no matter with what angle you look into his prophecies, they all point to the same conclusion as forgery.  Never mind the fact that they are not even recognized by the Church at all.  

The St.Malachy prophecy on Peter The Roman

Here is the exact passage on the controversial prophecy of the Irish saint in both its original Latin  as it appeared in the Latin publication of the Lignum Vitae in 1595 and its modern English transcription:

Final part of the St. Malachy papal
 prophecies in Lignum Vitæ (1595), p. 311.
with the red box indicating the
final pope, Petrus Romanus

In persecutione extrema S.R.E. sedebit Petrus Romanus, qui pascet oues in multis tribulationibus: quibus transactis ciuitas septicollis diruetur, & Iudex tremêdus iudicabit populum suum. Finis.

“In the final persecution of the Holy Roman Church will sit Peter the Roman, who will pasture his sheep through many tribulations, at the end of which, the city of seven hills will be destroyed, and the formidable judge will judge his people. The end”

Anyone expecting more to that prophecy will surely be dismayed.  It seems that the forger, after listing 111 popes from the death of St. Malachi hurriedly ended his prophecies by truncating the relevant "city of seven mountains" passage from Book of Revelation alluding to the reign of a pope prior to the destruction of the Catholic Church during the reign of the Antichrist.  

But this 112th pope that figured last on his papal prophecies was described as a good pope who would shepherd his flock through the tribulations foretold in Revelations. He certainly did not fit the description of the bad pope or the false pope who would sit on the throne of Peter blaspheming the Church in connivance with the political reign of the AntiChrist. 

So How is Pope Francis the "Petrus Romanus?"

St. Malachy's papal prophecies predicted the final 112 popes (including 11 Anti-Popes who were never recognized by the Vatican) starting with Pope Celestine II elected in 1143 but without stating their names. It refers to them using titular sobriquets or short epithets, or motto, to describe each pope leading to the last pope presumably before the Apocalypse. St Malachy named the last pope as Petrus Romanus or Peter the Roman, hinting at some sort of closure where the first Pope was Peter the Galilean.  

The 77-year old Pontiff is the former Argentine Archbishop Jorge Mario Bergolio who assumed the name Pope Francis in honor of St. Francis of Assisi. He became the first Jesuit and the first from Latin America to become the Vicar of Christ on earth.  So how does Pope Francis fulfill St. Malachy's Prophecy. Here's what Dr. David R. Reagan says from Does Pope Francis fulfill the Malachy prophecy of the last pope? and we quote:

The argument goes like this: He named himself after Saint Francis of Assisi, but Saint Francis' real birth name was Giovanni di Pietro di Bernardone, and Pietro is the Italian version of Peter.

This is the kind of nonsensical interpretations that have historically been applied to the Malachy "prophecies." Thus, if a Malachy clue for a Pope is "Rose," the believers will search day and night to find some connection to a rose, even if it ends it to be the fact that the new Pope's great grandmother loved roses!

But it does not end there.  You still have to account for Pope Francis being a Roman.  Because while St. Francis had  "Peter" in his birth name, he was not a Roman, but was born in the town of Assisi in the province of Perugia nestled in the Italian region called Umbria, and is 180 km from Rome. No luck there.  

Believers of the St. Malachy papal prophecies need to identify the new Pope with something even remotely associated with Rome to be a Roman. Breaking down his birth name to establish a connection to either Peter or Rome has become a word game challenge to these believers in their attempt to make Pope Francis the Petrus Romanus of their beloved St. Malachy. 

Peter literally means “the rock” and was the name Jesus gave to one of His apostles  Simon the Fisherman, whom He personally appointed as the first pope, the "rock" on which He built His Church. On the other hand, the name "Jorge Mario Bergoglio" is a Latin American or Spanish name that literally means “farmer man” Bergoglio.  Nothing rocky or Roman there. But what about his surname "Bergoglio?" 

Pope Francis’s last name is “Bergoglio.” Berg (German) means mountain or rock. Oglio is a river in Italy (Rome). Berg-Oglio translates as Rock-Rome or “Petrus Romanus” 

Pope Francis (Jorge Mario Bergoglio),
266th Pontiff  of the Catholic Church

Now I understand what Dr. Reagan meant by the word "nonsensical."  While the  pope’s last name when broken down can be translated from “Berg” meaning mountain in German,  a little geography will show that Oglio is a tributary flowing left of the Po River in Lombardy which sits on the northern region of Italy.  Unfortunately, the Po River does not connect to Rome.  It ends at a point around 550 km north of Rome.

Now if you want to use the Spanish meaning of the word "Oglio," it is an old form of the word "Olio" which means a hodgepodge, a mixture or a potpourri that can apply to a collection of things, art pieces, music or even several ingredients in a dish. Again, nothing rocky or Roman there. 

Then there's the research finding, verifiable in wikipedia, that the new Pope's parents were of Italian roots.  His father was an Italian immigrant, Mario José Bergoglio, who was a railway worker born in Portacomaro in the Province of Asti in Italy's Piedmont region, while his mother was Regina María Sívori, born in Buenos Aires to an immigrant family from the Piemotese-Genoese region in Northern Italy.  Now, the only problem is that being Italian does not equate to being a Roman. That's like saying being an American is also being a New Yorker.  What if I was born in LA? and worked there?  Would that make me a New Yorker too?  But to believers of St. Malachy's prophecy, that's as good as it gets.  

So now you have a Pope whose surname means a mountain straddling a river that does not even pass through Rome and whose parents have Italian but not Roman roots.  Either that or his idol from whom he assumed the name Francis had a birth name with "Peter" in it, but was not a Roman.  Even if you combined all these, the resulting explanation as to how the new Pope is the Petrus Romanus is as hilariously strained as saying his favorite cat is named Petrus and had a laundry women named Romana, hence, he must be Petrus Romanus.  We just couldn't help but laugh. 

The Great Letdown

Lovers of sensational prophecies with a hint of gossip mongering  will surely be disappointed that nothing in Pope Francis can put him in direct association with Peter The Roman - the only way for St. Malachy's prophecy to be considered fulfilled.  Attempting to do so, which Malachy's supporters have ardently pursued to its absurdest ends, only establishes indirect and forced associations that strain and stretch credulity to make them contemptuously laughable to say the least.  

Were the Cardinals during the conclave that elected Jorge Mario Bergoglio to the Papacy familiar with or even aware about the St. Malachy papal prophecies?  You have to be so naive to even think they weren't.   Perhaps the better question is:  Did they allow their knowledge of the prophecies to influence their choice?  Not if you believe that the Holy Spirit was at work behind their choice.   

Now don't you just love conspiracy theorists?  They claim that because the electors knew about the prophecy, they made sure the new Pope would not fit Petrus Romanus.  But even if they wanted to elect a Roman cardinal with a name of Peter, they wouldn’t have found any from the Cardinals attending the March 2013 Conclave.  While there was a Peter Kodwo Appiah Turkson who bears the name of the prophesized Pope, he was from Ghana, not Rome. There were no Pietros among them either.  The closest would be two Pierres: Nasrallah Pierre Sfeir of Antioch and Jean-Pierre Ricard from Marsaille, France.  Then you had one Pedro: Pedro Rubiano Sáenz from Cartago, Colombia. And while there were many Italians, there were no Roman-born cardinals in the running to be Benedict's successor.  You can check that out here for the list of Cardinals who attended the Conclave and were in the running to be Pontiff.

We won't argue with conspiracy theorists, except to say that the conclave that elected Jorge Mario Bergoglio to the papacy was the handiwork of the Holy Spirit who had nothing to do with the Malachy prophecies in the first place. Through His guidance, the ascendancy of Pope Francis sent a clear message around the world affirming and confirming that the St. Malachy prophesy is nothing more than a contrivance and a forgery. 

Supplemental Reading

Is Pope Francis the Final Roman Pontiff?
The Prophecies of St. Malachy: Are they genuine?
Does Pope Francis fulfill the Malachy prophecy of the last pope?