WEBVTT - Season 06 Episode 20 Extra: The Secret 0:00:11.400 --> 0:00:16.000 Welcome to Unexplained Extra with me Richard McClane Smith, where 0:00:16.040 --> 0:00:18.599 for the weeks in between episodes we look at stories 0:00:18.600 --> 0:00:21.520 and ideas that, for one reason or other, didn't make 0:00:21.560 --> 0:00:25.600 it into the previous show. In the last episode, Children 0:00:25.600 --> 0:00:29.319 of the Pastures, we traced the remarkable story of three 0:00:29.360 --> 0:00:33.840 young shepherds from the parish of Fatima in southern Portugal, who, 0:00:33.880 --> 0:00:37.919 in nineteen seventeen claimed they were visited six times by 0:00:37.920 --> 0:00:43.120 the Virgin Mary. The children, Lucia dos Santos and her 0:00:43.159 --> 0:00:47.920 cousins Jacinta and Francisco Marto, claimed that during one of 0:00:47.960 --> 0:00:51.880 the Virgin Mary's appearances, she told them a secret about 0:00:51.880 --> 0:00:56.160 the future of human civilization, the knowledge of which they 0:00:56.200 --> 0:01:01.000 insisted was too dangerous for the public to know. With 0:01:01.120 --> 0:01:05.120 the death of Francisco in nineteen nineteen, followed by the 0:01:05.160 --> 0:01:09.360 death of Jacinta in nineteen twenty, Lucier was left as 0:01:09.400 --> 0:01:13.119 the only living member of the enigmatic trio who possessed 0:01:13.160 --> 0:01:18.000 the apparent secret. In nineteen forty one, twenty four years 0:01:18.040 --> 0:01:22.160 after the fact, Lucier revealed they hadn't received one secret, 0:01:22.520 --> 0:01:27.000 but three. The first was a vision of Hell, which 0:01:27.000 --> 0:01:29.920 she described as being like a sea of fire under 0:01:29.920 --> 0:01:34.199 the earth, inside which demons and souls in human form 0:01:34.600 --> 0:01:39.080 floated about without weight or equilibrium, as their bodies blazed 0:01:39.400 --> 0:01:44.520 like transparent burning embers. This appeared to carry some weight, 0:01:44.840 --> 0:01:49.240 owing to the eyewitness accounts of Lucia seemingly being horrified 0:01:49.280 --> 0:01:53.120 by something back in nineteen seventeen during one of her 0:01:53.160 --> 0:01:58.800 alleged conversations with the Virgin Mary. The second apparent secret 0:01:59.120 --> 0:02:02.360 reflected a fear that the rise of Communism in Russia, 0:02:02.680 --> 0:02:07.000 which as an inherently anti theocratic movement, was an existential 0:02:07.040 --> 0:02:10.200 threat to the Church, would lead to an even greater 0:02:10.280 --> 0:02:13.120 war breaking out than the war that was taking place 0:02:13.200 --> 0:02:17.400 at the time. For some, this proved that there was 0:02:17.480 --> 0:02:22.960 something inherently evil or destructive about communism, since that even 0:02:23.080 --> 0:02:27.920 greater war did come to pass. Many others have noted, however, 0:02:28.240 --> 0:02:31.040 that although Lucier claimed this was told to her in 0:02:31.160 --> 0:02:35.919 nineteen seventeen, this wasn't actually revealed until nineteen forty one, 0:02:36.480 --> 0:02:40.320 two years after the Second World War broke out in Europe, 0:02:40.360 --> 0:02:46.080 thus undermining its legitimacy somewhat as a genuine prophecy, all 0:02:46.120 --> 0:02:50.760 of which leads us to the third secret. This one, however, 0:02:51.400 --> 0:02:56.120 Lucia would absolutely not reveal, believing it was simply too 0:02:56.160 --> 0:03:00.360 distressing for the public to hear. As a compromise with 0:03:00.440 --> 0:03:03.880 the Church, she eventually agreed to write it down, but 0:03:04.040 --> 0:03:08.840 only for her superiors. As the story goes, the first 0:03:08.840 --> 0:03:12.920 who read it, Bishop Jose de Silva of Learia, was 0:03:12.960 --> 0:03:16.639 so unsettled by it that he waited thirteen years before 0:03:16.680 --> 0:03:20.440 sharing it with the Vatican. It is also said that 0:03:20.600 --> 0:03:23.760 when the secret was read by Pope Pious the Twelfth, 0:03:24.040 --> 0:03:27.359 the surfing pope at the time, his mouth fell open 0:03:27.720 --> 0:03:33.080 in shock, and so in nineteen sixty the Vatican found 0:03:33.240 --> 0:03:38.120 never to release it. Numerous conspiracy theories emerged in the 0:03:38.120 --> 0:03:41.800 wake of this decision, with many speculating that the secret 0:03:42.040 --> 0:03:45.640 was in fact nothing less than a prophecy detailing the 0:03:45.680 --> 0:03:50.520 imminent collapse of our world, which naturally made people a 0:03:50.560 --> 0:03:55.560 little uncomfortable and in some cases quite desperate to know 0:03:55.680 --> 0:04:06.760 exactly what it said. On May second, nineteen eighty one, 0:04:07.440 --> 0:04:11.160 an aer Lingus Boeing seven three seven was en route 0:04:11.160 --> 0:04:15.720 from Dublin to London, when, five minutes from landing, the 0:04:15.800 --> 0:04:20.719 passenger seatbelt signs flashed on as cabin crew member Deirdree 0:04:20.839 --> 0:04:24.719 Dumphy asked everyone to take their seats. She noticed a 0:04:24.760 --> 0:04:28.160 man in his late fifties and dressed in a business 0:04:28.160 --> 0:04:31.920 suit making a quick dash for the toilet. Assuming he 0:04:31.960 --> 0:04:34.559 was just one of the many professionals on a short 0:04:34.600 --> 0:04:38.960 business trip to London, Deirdre let it pass, so it 0:04:39.040 --> 0:04:42.200 was with some shock when she turned around moments later 0:04:42.600 --> 0:04:45.599 to find him standing in the aisle with his clothes 0:04:45.640 --> 0:04:49.479 completely soaked through and holding a vial of liquid in 0:04:49.560 --> 0:04:54.360 each hand. Before anyone knew what was happening, the man 0:04:54.520 --> 0:04:57.080 made a bee line for the cockpit and told the 0:04:57.120 --> 0:05:00.440 pilots that he was covered in petrol and they didn't 0:05:00.480 --> 0:05:03.600 take the plane immediately to t Iran, he would set 0:05:03.640 --> 0:05:07.200 himself on fire and release the cyanide he was holding 0:05:07.200 --> 0:05:12.080 in his hands. The man, who spoke with an Australian accent, 0:05:12.520 --> 0:05:15.880 claimed he had a new constitution for Iran that he 0:05:15.920 --> 0:05:20.240 wanted to deliver in person. As panic set in among 0:05:20.320 --> 0:05:24.200 the passengers, the pilots agreed to the demand, but only 0:05:24.240 --> 0:05:28.280 if they could first land in France to refuel the plane. 0:05:28.960 --> 0:05:32.520 After landing in Normandy, the plane was met by French 0:05:32.560 --> 0:05:36.720 authorities and prevented from taking off again, forcing the man 0:05:36.800 --> 0:05:41.000 to rethink his plan, at which point he finally came 0:05:41.080 --> 0:05:45.720 clean about why he'd really hijacked the plane. After demanding 0:05:45.760 --> 0:05:48.400 to be put in touch with the editor of Irish 0:05:48.440 --> 0:05:52.560 newspaper The Irish Independent, the man proceeded to give them 0:05:52.600 --> 0:05:57.120 a thirty five hundred word manifesto demanding the release of 0:05:57.160 --> 0:06:02.240 the Third Secret of Fatima. Seconds later, however, he was 0:06:02.279 --> 0:06:05.920 tackled to the ground by French paratroopers who had managed 0:06:05.920 --> 0:06:10.560 to sneak on board while he was distracted. Lawrence Downey 0:06:11.040 --> 0:06:14.320 was originally from Perth in Australia, but had fled the 0:06:14.360 --> 0:06:17.640 country as well as his wife and five children after 0:06:17.680 --> 0:06:22.320 being allegedly involved in some fraudulent dealings, and eventually settled 0:06:22.320 --> 0:06:26.159 in Ireland. Downey had been a Trappist monk in the 0:06:26.240 --> 0:06:29.840 nineteen fifties, but had been expelled for assaulting the head 0:06:29.839 --> 0:06:33.360 of the order, after which he spent some time working 0:06:33.400 --> 0:06:37.000 as a tour guide in Thatchama. It was there that 0:06:37.080 --> 0:06:40.760 he became obsessed with the Children's story and finding out 0:06:40.760 --> 0:06:44.880 the truth about the mysterious third Secret, believing that once 0:06:44.920 --> 0:06:47.880 he knew what it was, it would bring fulfillment to 0:06:47.960 --> 0:06:53.120 him and many other people's lives. Downey, who had turned 0:06:53.120 --> 0:06:56.560 out had only poured water on himself, and whose vials 0:06:56.560 --> 0:07:00.839 of cyanide were also just vials of water, was arrested 0:07:01.080 --> 0:07:05.480 and sentenced to five years in prison. No hostages were 0:07:05.520 --> 0:07:10.040 harmed during the incident, and the Vatican declined his demand 0:07:10.320 --> 0:07:21.440 to release the secret. Eleven days after the air Lingus hijacking, 0:07:21.920 --> 0:07:25.120 Pope John Paul the Second was in Saint Peter's Square 0:07:25.160 --> 0:07:28.160 in Rome, greeting the hundreds of people who'd gathered there 0:07:28.440 --> 0:07:34.240 for his regular Wednesday general audience at five nineteen pm. 0:07:34.320 --> 0:07:38.000 As he sat dressed in all his white splendor, waving 0:07:38.000 --> 0:07:42.480 at the crowd from inside his popemobile, gunshots rang out 0:07:42.520 --> 0:07:45.680 through the square and the Pope collapsed in the back 0:07:45.720 --> 0:07:49.640 of the jeep. He'd been shot four times, with two 0:07:49.680 --> 0:07:53.440 bullets being lodged in his lower intestine, one striking his 0:07:53.560 --> 0:07:59.239 left index finger and another hitting him in the right arm. Miraculously, 0:08:00.040 --> 0:08:03.960 by losing three quarters of his blood, the Pope survived 0:08:04.040 --> 0:08:09.040 the attempt on his life. The lead perpetrator, Memet ali Axa, 0:08:09.480 --> 0:08:13.360 who fired the shots, was arrested soon after, along with 0:08:13.480 --> 0:08:18.520 three accomplices. To this day, it isn't known exactly what 0:08:18.680 --> 0:08:23.200 motivated the group to carry out the act. However, one 0:08:23.240 --> 0:08:26.320 of the reasons that memet ali Axa gave at his 0:08:26.400 --> 0:08:29.800 trial in nineteen eighty five was that it was connected 0:08:30.200 --> 0:08:34.839 to the Third Secret of the Madonna of Fatima. Even 0:08:34.920 --> 0:08:38.520 before this, it hadn't escaped the Pope's attention. That the 0:08:38.559 --> 0:08:42.640 attack took place on May thirteenth, sixty four years to 0:08:42.679 --> 0:08:46.480 the day that the Virgin Mary was apparently first cited 0:08:46.559 --> 0:08:50.800 by the three children. The pope was convinced that his 0:08:50.920 --> 0:08:55.480 earthly life had been saved by the Virgin Mary, and 0:08:55.559 --> 0:08:59.120 so having paid little public interest in the story of 0:08:59.160 --> 0:09:03.360 the prophecies, they suddenly appeared to attain a more significant 0:09:03.400 --> 0:09:07.480 status in the eyes of the church. The following year, 0:09:08.200 --> 0:09:11.680 he visited the sight of the apparent apparitions to lay 0:09:11.679 --> 0:09:15.800 the cornerstone of what would become the Grand Sanctuary of Fatchima, 0:09:16.080 --> 0:09:19.680 dedicated to the alleged visions of the Children, which now 0:09:19.720 --> 0:09:24.480 stands there. The pope remarked then that the coincidence of 0:09:24.640 --> 0:09:29.280 his assassination attempt and the Virgin Mary's appearances occurring on 0:09:29.320 --> 0:09:32.480 the same date was so great that it seemed a 0:09:32.520 --> 0:09:37.360 special invitation for him to visit the sacred location. In 0:09:37.440 --> 0:09:41.200 spite of all that, the Church continued to refuse the 0:09:41.280 --> 0:09:52.280 release of the secret. As the years went by, speculation 0:09:52.400 --> 0:09:57.199 about the mythical Third Secret of Fatima became increasingly alarmist, 0:09:57.960 --> 0:10:01.400 and so seemingly in an effort to calm things down, 0:10:02.040 --> 0:10:06.040 in two thousand, the Church finally agreed to reveal it, 0:10:06.720 --> 0:10:10.800 publishing it on June twenty sixth of that year. The 0:10:10.920 --> 0:10:15.800 secret was largely based around a vision of the Holy Father, who, 0:10:15.960 --> 0:10:19.520 after moving through a ruined city, is gunned down by 0:10:19.600 --> 0:10:24.640 soldiers firing bullets and arrows, alongside a bishop dressed in white, 0:10:25.000 --> 0:10:28.520 as well as other bishops, priests, and women and men 0:10:28.600 --> 0:10:33.959 of faith. For some, the Vatican included the secret had 0:10:34.000 --> 0:10:38.680 clearly prophesied the nineteen eighty one assassination attempt on the Pope, 0:10:38.720 --> 0:10:42.439 who was depicted in it as the bishop dressed in white. 0:10:43.840 --> 0:10:46.880 Some sought to read more into its violent imagery and 0:10:47.000 --> 0:10:52.000 its talk of ruined cities. However, few could quite understand 0:10:52.160 --> 0:10:55.280 what about It was so distressing for people that it 0:10:55.360 --> 0:10:59.600 had to be kept hidden for almost fifty years, leaving many, 0:10:59.800 --> 0:11:03.720 including Lawrence Downey, who had hijacked an entire plane just 0:11:03.840 --> 0:11:09.080 to hear it feeling a little underwhelmed, unless, of course, 0:11:09.679 --> 0:11:13.000 what had been revealed to the public wasn't actually the 0:11:13.000 --> 0:11:17.240 whole secret, or in fact the real secret at all. 0:11:19.559 --> 0:11:24.720 In two thousand and six, Italian journalist Antonio Socci published 0:11:24.720 --> 0:11:28.800 a book entitled The Fourth Secret of Fatima, in which 0:11:28.800 --> 0:11:32.440 he made the stunning and controversial claim that the secret 0:11:32.600 --> 0:11:37.559 published by the Vatican was only part of it. Socci's 0:11:37.600 --> 0:11:41.720 suspicions had been raised when the apparent original secret was 0:11:41.760 --> 0:11:44.320 shown to have been written on four sheets of paper, 0:11:45.040 --> 0:11:48.160 when in fact, previous talk of it from the Church 0:11:48.440 --> 0:11:52.680 and Lucia dos Santos suggested it had only been written 0:11:52.760 --> 0:11:57.280 on one sheet of paper. He also pointed out that 0:11:57.480 --> 0:12:01.000 back in nineteen eighty four, when one cardinal who'd read 0:12:01.040 --> 0:12:04.120 it was asked to comment on it, he said only 0:12:04.360 --> 0:12:08.560 that it involved the importance of the Novissame, also known 0:12:08.800 --> 0:12:14.160 as the four last things of death, judgment, heaven, and Hell, 0:12:15.160 --> 0:12:18.360 something that didn't seem to be explicitly evident in the 0:12:18.400 --> 0:12:23.199 released version. It is also claimed that Lucia dos Santos 0:12:23.280 --> 0:12:27.080 herself once said, on being asked to give some indication 0:12:27.360 --> 0:12:30.160 of what it was about, that it was all there 0:12:30.760 --> 0:12:35.280 written in the Gospels and the Apocalypse that includes the 0:12:35.360 --> 0:12:40.000 Book of Revelation and the depiction of the end of Times. 0:12:47.160 --> 0:12:49.880 If you enjoy Unexplained and would like to help support us, 0:12:49.960 --> 0:12:53.240 you can now do so via Patreon To receive access 0:12:53.240 --> 0:12:56.480 to add three episodes. Just go to patron dot com 0:12:56.600 --> 0:13:00.920 Forward Slash Unexplained Pod to sign up. 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