A Church of Human Design? Our Lady of Good Success, Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich, and the Post-Conciliar Crisis

A Church of Human Design?
Our Lady of Good Success, Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich, and the Post-Conciliar Crisis

Introduction
Prophecy has accompanied the Church across her history—not as a substitute for revelation, which ended with the Apostles, but as a reminder of vigilance. In Quito, Ecuador, at the dawn of the seventeenth century, Venerable Mother Mariana de Jesús Torres (1563–1635) received apparitions of the Blessed Virgin under the title Nuestra Señora del Buen Suceso de la Purificación. Ecclesiastical authorities approved devotion to this title, and in 1611 Archbishop Pedro de Oviedo y León solemnly enthroned the miraculous statue still venerated today¹.

Two centuries later, in Dülmen, Germany, the Augustinian nun Blessed Anne Catherine Emmerich (1774–1824) received visions later transcribed by Clemens Brentano². The mediation of these texts is imperfect, and Emmerich herself left no writings. John Paul II, in beatifying her in 2004, recognised her heroic virtue, not the unconditional accuracy of Brentano’s notes³. The Church remains clear: private revelations “do not belong…to the deposit of faith,” but may help the faithful live more faithfully in their time⁴.

Taken together, however, the Quito messages and the Emmerich visions bear striking resonance with the post–Vatican II period. They sketch an image of a Church eclipsed, desacralised, pressured by the world, and yet preserved by a faithful remnant gathered around the enduring altar of sacrifice.

The Eclipse of the Church
Our Lady of Good Success prophesied an “apparent eclipse” of the Church, when the light of faith would be obscured. Emmerich described a “strange, large church” erected “to the latest fashion,” where “nothing came from above.” Both speak of a faith obscured by human construction, a religion reduced to sociological utility.

This imagery finds echo in the turbulence after the Second Vatican Council (1962–65). Though the Council itself was pastoral, its implementation often produced rupture rather than renewal. The Ottaviani Intervention of 1969 judged the Novus Ordo Missae “a striking departure” from Catholic theology as defined at Trent⁵. Vocations plummeted: in France, the number of seminarians fell from 4,536 in 1966 to just 847 in 19966. Sociologist Philip Jenkins described the Western Church after the Council as entering a “demographic free fall”⁷.

The Crisis of the Priesthood
Mother Mariana foresaw priests abandoning the altar, while Emmerich lamented that “few of them were still pious.” The prophetic warning is sobering when read against the twentieth century’s clerical abuse scandals, failures in seminary formation, and widespread dissent from magisterial teaching. Pope Benedict XVI acknowledged in 2005 that “filth” had entered the priesthood⁸.

The statistics bear this out. In the United States, ordinations fell by more than half between 1965 and 2002⁹. In Latin America, where vocations had once flourished, bishops now speak of a “pastoral emergency” as vast regions go without priests. The priesthood, once regarded as a supernatural vocation, is increasingly treated as a social role—a reduction perfectly anticipated in the prophecies.

Attacks on Marriage and the Family
Our Lady of Good Success warned that the sacrament of Matrimony would be profaned, undermining the family. Emmerich foresaw a “concession that could not be granted,” dividing clergy between capitulation and fidelity. Both images converge in today’s crisis of marriage and sexual morality.

From the widespread legalisation of divorce and contraception to civil redefinitions of marriage, the family has been systematically dismantled. Even within the Church, pressure has mounted for concessions on doctrine. The Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith’s Fiducia supplicans (2023) permitted blessings for same-sex couples and couples in irregular unions, insisting that doctrine remained unchanged. Yet bishops’ conferences across Africa openly rejected the declaration, calling it irreconcilable with the truth of Matrimony¹⁰. Here, Emmerich’s warning of an unbearable demand and division among the clergy seems realised.

Loss of Innocence in Children
Quito foretold that children’s innocence would be corrupted. Emmerich described “young teachers” spreading false doctrines. These words now ring with grim clarity. The sexualisation of education, the spread of pornography, and the infiltration of gender ideology into schools—including Catholic ones—confirm the warnings.

The Cass Review in England (2024) found that children had been harmed by activist-led gender policies, concluding that “social transition is not a neutral act”¹¹. At the same time, scandals of clerical abuse have compounded the sense of betrayal. Children, who should be the first recipients of the Church’s protection, have instead borne the heaviest wounds.

Corruption in Religious Life
Our Lady of Good Success predicted laxity and decline in convents and monasteries. Emmerich likewise foresaw priests gambling, drinking, and permitting abominations. The collapse of religious life after Vatican II gives these prophecies historical contour.

By 2016, the Vatican’s Annuarium Statisticum Ecclesiae reported a global loss of over 100,000 women religious since the mid-1990s¹². Many communities abandoned their habits, constitutions, and traditional discipline, while contemplative orders faced pressure to conform to “modern” apostolic models. Instead of being signs of contradiction, too many religious houses became indistinguishable from secular NGOs.

Protestantisation and False Unity
Emmerich foresaw “everything related to Protestantism gaining the upper hand.” Our Lady warned of doctrinal corruption. These prophecies converge in the ecumenical orientation of the post-conciliar Church. While Unitatis Redintegratio (1964) insisted that unity must be “in the unity of the Catholic Church”¹³, subsequent practice often blurred boundaries.

Michael Davies argued that the reformed liturgy imitated Cranmer’s sixteenth-century rites, prioritising assembly over sacrifice¹⁴. Klaus Gamber warned: “Instead of the priest as the representative of Christ, now the ‘people of God’ appear to be the true subject of the liturgy”¹⁵. The 2017 joint commemoration of the Reformation in Lund, Sweden, with Catholic and Lutheran leaders praying together, illustrated the Protestantising trend Emmerich symbolically foresaw.

Oppressed Remnants, the Enduring Altar
Both Mother Mariana and Emmerich foresaw faith surviving in only “a few homes” or “a few places.” Today, traditional communities—restricted under Pope Francis’ Traditionis custodes (2021)—increasingly embody this prophetic remnant. Cardinal Gerhard Müller noted that such restrictions “drive faithful Catholics into the catacombs”¹⁶.

And yet Emmerich’s vision of St Peter’s basilica in ruins left the presbytery and high altar intact. The message is clear: the Sacrifice of the Mass endures. As Dom Prosper Guéranger wrote: “It is here that the divine Victim is perpetually immolated and that the Church draws her life”¹⁷. The altar remains, a sign of hope amid devastation.

Conclusion
The apparitions of Quito and the visions of Dülmen differ in certainty and mediation, but together they map the contours of the post-conciliar crisis with unsettling precision: a man-made “church,” desacralised liturgy, corrupt clergy, profaned marriage, lost innocence, collapsed religious life, Protestantised worship, and oppressed remnants.

Yet both also hold forth hope. Our Lady of Good Success promised divine intervention when all seemed lost. Emmerich saw the altar preserved even amid ruin. God has not abandoned His Church. The path forward is not compromise with modernity but fidelity to Tradition, to the sacraments, and above all to Christ, who is the cornerstone.

Prophecy / Vision	Our Lady of Good Success (Quito, 17th c.)	Bl. Anne Catherine Emmerich (Dülmen, 19th c.)	Post-Vatican II / Contemporary Events
Eclipse of the Church	“An apparent eclipse of the Church” – faith nearly extinguished.	“A strange, large church… nothing came from above.”	Collapse in vocations, desacralised liturgy, rupture in continuity; Ottaviani Intervention (1969) warning of departure from Trent.
Crisis of the Priesthood	Priests would abandon the altar, fall into scandal.	“Few of them were still pious… irreverence and abominations.”	Clerical abuse scandals, collapse in ordinations, priestly identity crisis; Benedict XVI lamenting “filth” in the Church (2005).
Attacks on Marriage	Matrimony profaned; families undermined.	Clergy pressed for “a concession that could not be granted.”	Legalisation of divorce, contraception, same-sex unions; Fiducia supplicans (2023) and African episcopal resistance.
Loss of Innocence in Children	Innocence of children would be corrupted.	“Young teachers” spreading false doctrines.	Gender ideology, sexualised education, clerical abuse; Cass Review (2024) confirming harm from activist-led interventions.
Corruption in Religious Life	Laxity and decline in convents and monasteries.	Priests gambling, drinking, permitting abuses.	Abandonment of habits and rules, mass departures; global loss of 100,000 women religious (1995–2015).
Protestantisation	Doctrinal corruption in the Church.	“Everything related to Protestantism gaining the upper hand.”	Protestantising liturgical reforms; Davies and Gamber critiques; 2017 Reformation commemoration in Lund.
False Unity	Warning against deception in unity.	“Everyone must be admitted… equal rights: Evangelicals, Catholics, sects.”	Abu Dhabi “Human Fraternity” declaration (2019) and post-conciliar ecumenism blurring boundaries.
Faithful Remnant	Faith preserved in “a few places, a few homes.”	Faith oppressed and hidden, yet protected.	Traditional Latin Mass communities curtailed under Traditionis custodes (2021); Cardinal Müller likening them to “catacombs.”
Enduring Altar	The Eucharist would remain the source of renewal.	St Peter’s destroyed, but presbytery and high altar preserved.	Despite institutional crisis, the Holy Sacrifice endures as the heart of the Church; Dom Guéranger on the altar as the Church’s life.

---

Notes

1. Manuel Sousa Pereira, La admirable vida de la Madre Mariana de Jesús Torres (Madrid: 1790).
2. Clemens Brentano, The Life and Revelations of Anne Catherine Emmerich (Munich, 1852; English trans. 1914).
3. Congregation for the Causes of Saints, Decree on the Virtues of Anne Catherine Emmerich (2004).
4. Catechism of the Catholic Church, §67.
5. Alfredo Cardinal Ottaviani and Antonio Cardinal Bacci, A Brief Critical Study of the New Order of Mass (25 September 1969).
6. Guillaume Cuchet, Comment notre monde a cessé d’être chrétien (Paris: Seuil, 2018), pp. 59–62.
7. Philip Jenkins, The Next Christendom: The Coming of Global Christianity (Oxford: OUP, 2002), p. 105.
8. Benedict XVI, Homily at the Mass “Pro Eligendo Romano Pontifice,” 18 April 2005.
9. Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate (CARA), Georgetown University, Frequently Requested Church Statistics (2019).
10. Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, Fiducia supplicans (18 December 2023); Symposium of Episcopal Conferences of Africa and Madagascar (SECAM), Statement of 11 January 2024.
11. Hilary Cass, Independent Review of Gender Identity Services for Children and Young People (UK NHS, 2024).
12. Congregation for Institutes of Consecrated Life and Societies of Apostolic Life, Annuarium Statisticum Ecclesiae (Vatican, 2016).
13. Second Vatican Council, Unitatis Redintegratio (21 November 1964).
14. Michael Davies, Cranmer’s Godly Order: The Destruction of Catholicism through Liturgical Change (London: Augustine, 1976), p. 307.
15. Klaus Gamber, The Reform of the Roman Liturgy (San Juan Capistrano: Roman Catholic Books, 1993), p. 45.
16. Gerhard Cardinal Müller, interview with Die Tagespost, 22 July 2021.
17. Dom Prosper Guéranger, The Holy Mass (London: Burns & Oates, 1874), p. 39.