Newsletter N. 5/26 – “Right is right, even if nobody does it. Wrong is wrong, even if everybody is wrong about it”
Whilst re-reading Father Berti’s account of Maria Valtorta, published in the Rivista di Ascetica e Mistica (No. 3, July–September 1980), an important observation of his caught my eye:
“The visionaries of Lourdes, the visionaries of La Salette, the visionaries of Monte Berico, the visionaries of Fátima and the visionaries of Guadalupe have all been listened to and taken into consideration; so why should we not also listen to Maria Valtorta? Let us listen to her for a moment; listen to her yourselves, hanging on the words of an eyewitness. Maria Valtorta always said that what she wrote was the result of supernatural visions or supernatural dictations. Why dismiss these statements, which Maria Valtorta repeated so often, over and over again? Why dismiss them? Why not even take them into consideration?”
Even after so many years, I cannot help but be astonished to see how Father Berti, an academic and professor of sacramental theology at the Pontifical Marianum Theological Faculty in Rome, seems to overlook the profound differences between the apparitions he cites and the experience conveyed by Maria Valtorta – not only in and of themselves, but also in terms of their significance for both academic and non-academic exegetical circles (and, consequently, the vast range of theological and related interests that were involved). Let me be clear: far be it from me to devalue, even in the slightest, those gifts from Heaven: Fatima and the other events were and are spiritual stimuli (all of them), prophecies of the future (Fatima and Guadalupe) or promised miracles (Lourdes): extremely important gifts, which nevertheless do not touch upon the Gospels and their contents. They presuppose them, but do not delve into the merits of individual or multiple Gospel episodes in order to defend them; they do not seek to confirm or diminish the Gospels: they take them as true, and nothing more.
Maria Valtorta and her writings, on the other hand, are a veritable ‘bombshell’ in the world of rationalist exegesis. The battle — for that is what it is — demands that at least one of the two contenders withdraw. Why is this? Because Valtorta’s work confirms, with its Galilean precision of fact, that rationalist exegesis is polluting and falsifying material, fit only to be thrown in the bin. The evidence is there, available to all; yet, like the Pharisees of old, the deniers of mysticism do not wish to debate, but merely to eliminate. Maria Valtorta must be wrong; otherwise, they — rationalists in general — would have to retract all their false hypotheses, however academically accepted they may be.
But, as Chesterton wrote: “Right is right, even if nobody does it. Wrong is wrong, even if everybody is wrong about it”.
Father Berti was well aware of all this and employed the means he deemed appropriate to support Valtorta’s cause: the notes to the first edition of The Book of Azaria bear witness to this. It was an enormous but futile effort, as it was confined solely to the theological sphere and was therefore always open to debate. It was rather Jean-François Lavère, a French chemical engineer, who fully grasped the significance of the work’s contents. His findings are such that no principle of authority can be set against Maria Valtorta, for contra factum non valet argumentum, yesterday as today. Father Berti did an excellent job, but he failed to realise that the true grounds for the credibility of The Gospel lay elsewhere: elements that were perhaps simpler, but which could not be refuted by the facts. Just as Saint Faustina Kowalska and the devotion to Divine Mercy were vindicated and restored to the people of God by Saint John Paul II, so too must we pray and work to ensure that the truth of Valtorta’s Work finds similar recognition, enabling the holy people of the Church to draw upon it.
— fr. Ernesto Zucchini
[This text was automatically translated by Deepl.com – quotes included]