Great Catholic Monarch

The Great Catholic Monarch, also referred to as the Great Monarch, is a concept that has or had a certain place in unofficial Roman Catholic eschatology, mainly as a French monarchist variant of the medieval theme of the Last Roman Emperor. It predicts that in the last times, a last monarch would appear on earth to reestablish the kingdom of France/Holy Roman Empire and assume his function as biblical katechon who stalls the coming of the antichrist.
The notion of last Roman Emperor is related to it, as is the notion of the Angelic Pope.
Basic descriptions
The Great Catholic Monarch also has a counter-revolutionary or restorationist character. He is said to be a future king of a re-united Holy Roman Empire, who will restore the European Catholic royalty in the West, destroy the power of heretics and atheistic rebels, and successfully convert many Muslims and Jews to the Roman Catholic faith.
The Great Monarch was very popular in popular folklore until the 18th century Enlightenment. He reappeared in 19th century prophecy when French legitimists believed that the count of Chambord, Henry V of France would be the new king.
Foundations
Biblical
The biblical foundations for the concept of the Great Monarch are claimed to be found in the Old Testament and in the New Testament. References in the Old Testament can be found in Isaiah, Jeremiah, Daniel and Zechariah. It is also found in Revelation 20:4. Catholic teaching refers to the 25th chapter of Matthew's Gospel in which Christ says that no one knows the hour or the day, except the Father in Heaven. The Church furthermore teaches that Christ indicated the approximation of these events in the New Testament, when he spoke of signs which would indicate that the end of days was near. Some of these signs include natural disasters, civil problems, and other catastrophes. Of the precise time, however, it will come like a thief in the night, .
Apostolic
Before the return of Christ, a number of conditions have to be fulfilled. They include:
* The spreading of the "one true Catholic faith" among all corners of the planet and among all people.
* Recognition of Jesus-Christ as the Messiah and Son of God by all Israel.
* The Great Apostasy that will shake the faith of many believers. This is a religious deception offering men an apparent solution to their problems at the price of apostasy from the Catholic faith. This will be prepared gradually. The supreme form of this religious deception will be that of the Antichrist, a pseudo-messianism by which man glorifies himself in place of God and of his Messiah come in the flesh.
The Catechism of the Catholic Church, proclaimed by Pope John Paul II on 15 August 1997 in the Apostolic letter Laetamur magnopere, speaks only of Christ as the king who is to be manifested in "the last days". It speaks of this manifestation as associated by his recognition by "all Israel" and preceded by the Church's ultimate trial, "a religious deception offering men an apparent solution to their problems at the price of apostasy from the truth. The supreme religious deception is that of the Antichrist, a pseudo-messianism by which man glorifies himself in place of God and of his Messiah come in the flesh". It makes no mention whatever of the coming of any Great Catholic Monarch, whether French or German or of any continent whatever.
Prophetic
He will appear at the end of the sixth age of the world, according to Saint Augustine of Hippo's Six Ages of the World. We actually live in the sixth age of the world according to Saint Augustine.
Saint Remigius, bishop of Reims and apostle of the Franks, baptised Clovis I, king of the Franks on 24 December 496. This baptism, leading to the conversion of the entire Frankish people to Nicene Christianity, was a momentous success for the Catholic Church and a seminal event in European history. He had had a vision and prophesied that in the distant future, the last monarch who descended from the line of the kings of France, would be revealed and reestablish the Holy Roman Empire at the end of time. This prophecy was related through Hincmar, archbishop of Reims, and Rabanus Maurus Magnentius O.S.B., archbishop of Mainz.
Similar prophecies were made by Saint Caesarius of Arles, archbishop of Arles, by monks from the Carthusian monastery of Prémol, Chartreuse Notre-Dame de Prémol at Vaulnaveys-le-Haut, France, by Saint Catald of Taranto, archbishop of Taranto, Italy, and by Saint Angelus of Jerusalem. The prophecy of Saint Caesarius was commented upon by John of Vatiguerro and published in the Mirabilis Liber (1524), and by French priest Jean-Marie Trichaud (1853). The prophecy of the Carthusian monks of Prémol was discovered between 1795 and 1850 and the prophecy of Saint Catald was discovered in 1492.
Bartholomew Holzhauser, a German priest and visionary and writer of prophecies, details his coming further and states he will appear in the fifth age of the church in his book Interpretatio Apocalypsis usque ad cap. XV, v. 5. It discusses the seven ages of the Church:
* the status seminativus or the first age of the Church, from Christ and the Apostles to Pope Linus and Emperor Nero,
* the status irrigativus or the second age of the Church, the days of persecution,
* the status illuminativus or the third age of the Church, from Pope Sylvester to Leo III,
* the status pacificus or the fourth age of the Church from Leo III to Leo X,
* the status afflictionis et purgativus or the fifth age of the Church, from Leo X to a strong ruler or grand monarch and a holy pope,
* the status consolationis of the sixth age of the Church, from that holy pope to the birth of Antichrist,
* the status desolationis are the seventh and last age of the Church, from the Antichrist to the end of the world.
According to Holzhauser, we actually live in the fifth age of the Church and are experiencing the transition to the sixth age. Holzhauser further explains his function in these events in his book Visiones, which contains the ten visions of Holzhauser:
* de septem animalibus
* de una monarchia et duabus sedibus
* de s. Michaele archangelo et sedibus
* de ecclesia sponsa Dei
* de propria persona Jesu
* de egressione Danubii
* de verme grandi
* de conversione Germaniæ
* exprobratio vitiorum, exprobratio impœnitentiæ, quomodo revertatur
* de duabus personis
Also , bishop of Puy, Blessed Hildegard of Bingen O.S.B. and Jérome Bottin O.S.B. made similar prophecies.
Modern day prophecies about the Great Monarch were made by Marie Julie Jahenny, mystic and stigmatist of La Fraudais, France, and by Mélanie Calvat and Maximin Giraud, visionaries at La Salette, France.
Profane
All references made by Nostradamus in his writings to the Great Monarch were based on these public sources.
Context
This is a part of theology and philosophy concerned with the final events in the history of the world, or the ultimate destiny of humanity, commonly referred to as the end of the world.
While in mysticism the phrase metaphorically refers to the end of ordinary reality and reunion with the Divine, in the Roman Catholic Church it is taught as an actual future event prophesied in sacred texts or prophecies or apocalyptic literature.
More broadly, it encompasses related concepts such as the Antichrist, the return of Jesus, the end times, end of days and the end of the world, the resurrection of the dead, the Last Judgment, the renewal of creation, heaven and hell, the establishment of the kingdom of God, and the consummation of all of God's purposes, the fulfillment of Messianic prophecy and the beginning of the Messianic Age.
The term eschatology is often used in a more popular and narrower sense when comparing various interpretations of the Book of Revelation and other prophetic parts of the Bible, such as the Book of Daniel and various sayings of Jesus in the Gospels, such as the Olivet discourse and the Judgment of the Nations, concerning the timing of what many Christians believe to be the imminent second coming of Christ.
In Roman Catholic dogmatic, mystical or folk traditions there are, in addition to doctrines and prophecies of the Bible, also traditional teachings, or writings of people granted gifts of prophecy or a special visitation by messengers from heaven, such as angels, saints, or Christ. The concept of the Great King features here prominently.
Equivalent notions
The notions of great monarch and angelic pope are equivalent to the French grand monarch and saint pape and the German Weltkaiser and Engelpapst.
The Great Monarch is conceptually similarly to the Mahdi of Islam in that:
* Both are conquerors/rulers that unite various peoples.
* Both live during the rise of antichrist but do not themselves defeat antichrist.
* Both convert many people to their respective religions.
* Both prepare the way for the second coming of Jesus Christ.
* Some of their source belief is exta-scriptural, although the GCM is scriptural (Daniel's "He-Goat" and "king of the greeks").
Differences are the GCM defeats the Moslems who have invaded and occupy Europe in the future.
Bibliography
* S.N., Mirabilis Liber, 1522
* Madrolle, Antoine, Le grand prophète et le grand roi ..., Carnier Frères, Paris, 1851
* S.N., Le roi des lys: Etude prophétique sur le grand monarque, Victor Palmé, Paris, 1871
* Moult, Th.-J., Le Monarque fort, son avènement, événements qui doivent le précéder, prophéties de Barthélemy Holtzhauser (1646), Joseph-Thomas Moult (1268), Pierre Turel (1542), M. Lenormand (1843), Alençon, 1873
* Marquis de la Franquerie de la Tour, André Lesage, La mission divine de la France, ..., Paris, 1926
* Baethgen, Friedrich, Der Engelpapst: Vortrag gehalten am 15. Januar 1933 in öffentlicher Sitzung der Königsberger Gelehrten Gesellschaft, M. Niemeyer, Halle (Saale), 1933 OCLC 9819016
* Reeves, Marjorie, The Influence of Prophecy in the Later Middle Ages: A Study in Joachimism, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1969 ISBN ...
* Cohn, Norman, The Pursuit of the Millennium: Revolutionary Millenarians and Mystical Anarchists of the Middle Ages, Oxford University Press, ..., 1970 ISBN 978-0-19-500456-4
* Muraise, Eric, Histoire et légende du grand monarque, Albin Michel, Paris, 1975 ISBN 2-253-02052-4
* Marquis de la Franquerie de la Tour, André Lesage, Le Saint Pape et le grand monarque d'après les prophéties, Editions de Chiré, Chiré-en-Montreuil, 1980 ISBN ...
* Morin, Michel & Perrot, Chris, Le retour du Lys, Editions du Trécarré, Saint-Laurent, 1985 ISBN ...
* Poulin, Maurice, Le grand monarque messager du verseau, Louise Courtea, Montréal, 1985 ISBN ...
* Bertin, Francis, La révolution et la parousie du grand monarque, in Politica Hermetica, 3 (1989) ISSN ...
* Garat, Anne-Marie, Le monarque égaré, Flammarion, ..., 1989 ISBN 978-2-08-066395-5
* Birch, Desmond A., Trial, Tribulation & Triumph: Before, During, and After Antichrist, Queenship Publishing Company, ..., 1997 ISBN 978-1-882972-73-9
* McGinn, Bernard, Visions of the End: Apocalyptic Traditions in the Middle Ages, Columbia University Press, ..., 1998 ISBN 978-0-231-11257-4
* Möhring, Hannes, Der Weltkaiser der Endzeit, Jan Thorbecke Verlag, Stuttgart, 1999 ISBN 978-3-7995-4254-8
* Morin, Michel, Le grand monarque selon les prophéties, Louise Courteau, Saint-Zénon, 1999 ISBN 978-2-89239-184-8
* Airiau, Paul, Le grand monarque dans le catholicisme français (XIXe-XXe siècles), in Politica Hermetica, 20 (2000) ISSN ...
* Otto, Helen Tzima, The Great Monarch and WWIII in Orthodox, Roman Catholic, and Scriptural Prophecies, The Verenikia Press, Rock Hill, 2000 ISBN 1-891663-01-1
* Gautier, ..., Le grand monarque et l'antéchrist: Le secret de Rennes-le-Château, Godefroy de Bouillon, ..., 2001 ISBN 978-2-84191-125-7
* "We Are Warned: The Prophecies of Marie-Julie Jahenny" (December 1, 2011). PDF E-Book:

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