Prophecy for Today Summary of the Catholic Tradition Concerning the End of Time Era Edward Connor Book Review

Prophecy for Today
by Edward Connor

Prophecy for Today

A Summary of the Catholic Tradition 

Concerning the End-of-Time Era

Edward Connor, author

Charlotte: TAN Books, 2013

Reprint Edition

Printed in the United States of America

Nihil obstat. Imprimatur.

viii, 134 pages

4.25 x 7 inches

List price: $8.95

Reviewed by Mary Katherine May of QualityMusicandBooks.com. 

Publisher Description (from the publisher: TAN Books)    The best introduction to Catholic prophecy in print. Covers the Great Catholic Monarch who will rule the entire world, the Angelic Pastor (a Holy Pope who will convert the world), the period of peace and prosperity, the Antichrist, etc., all taken from the prophecies of many Saints down through the centuries. It is amazing how they coalesce upon this epoch, which seems to be immediately before us. Brief, comprehensive and enthralling!

My Summary

     Prophecy for Today offers quotes and selections from Roman Catholics throughout the centuries whose eschatological prophecies have been put forth for examination.  Included are prophetic words that have been proven wrong.  The one thing that I find lacking in the book is that at the outset I would like to have had included the Roman Catholic position on the endtimes in relation to the various millennial positions that were active at the time of first publication as well as today.

The Roman Catholic Teaching on What Is Called the Rapture

Quote  

Scripture: 1Thessalonians 4:17 ; Additional Scripture: Matthew 24: 29-31. LINK to Source: The Catholic Company

     The word “rapture” comes from the Latin word meaning “to be caught up” or “taken up”. This refers to the passage in St. Paul’s letter to the Thessalonians 4:17 which states, “then we who are alive, who are left, shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air; and so we shall always be with the Lord.”
      The Catholic understanding of this passage is that those believers who are alive during Christ’s second coming will not experience death, but rather, will be gloriously transformed and join the saints already with Christ. Nowhere in 1 Thessalonians does St. Paul teach a secret coming of Christ. Furthermore, St. Paul states that Christ’s coming will be announced by the cry of an archangel and by a trumpet blast. St. Paul is describing the resurrection of the dead that will take place at Christ’s second coming. It appears, when reading 1 Thessalonians that Christians at the time were worried that those who died before Christ’s second coming would not share in His triumphant return. Paul assures them that when the time comes, they will join the resurrected to meet the Lord and will share in Christ’s triumphant descent from heaven to earth.

Contents

1 Prophecy

2 The Prophecy of St. Malachy

3 The Secrets of LaSalette and Fatima

4 The Earthly Scourge, the Heavenly Scourge and the Three Days Darkness

5 The Great Monarch and the Angelic Pastor

6 Spiritual Aids in Times of Distress

7 The Gospel and the End of the World

8 Signs Before the End of the World

9 The Antichrist in Scripture

10 The Antichrist in Other Sources

11 Extraordinary Disturbances in Nature

12 The Apocalypse

13 The Last Judgment

Appendix A: The Complete Prophecy of Saint Malachy

Appendix B: Apparitions Since Fatima

Appendix C: Can the Devil Raise the Dead?

Bibliography

About TAN Books

TAN Books (from their website): TAN Books was founded in 1967. Since its founding, it has been committed to the preservation and promotion of the spiritual, theological and liturgical traditions of the Roman Catholic Church. TAN Books publishes over 500 titles on Thomistic theology, traditional devotions, Church doctrine, history, lives of the saints, educational resources, and more.

THE PROPHETIC ENSIGN Vol 24 No 3 1964 Arthur E Bloomfield

The Prophetic Ensign, edited and published by Arthur E. Bloomfield
Volume 24, No. 3. July - August - September 1964.

The Prophetic Ensign

Volume 24 Number 3 (July – September 1964)
Arthur E. Bloomfield, editor & publisher

This article prepared by Mary Katherine May of QualityMusicandBooks.com.

 

   Previous to our present time when so much information is now generated and transferred around the world electronically, the best and most inexpensive way to get one’s subject matter out was through mailed media and if local via the telephone.  Postcards, fliers and pamphlets to which one subscribed were sent out to interested parties and read, then passed around to others of like mind who often would then subscribe themselves.

   In 1964, a subscription to The Prophetic Ensign cost one dollar annually, or 25 cents a copy.  Now even in 1964, publisher Arthur Bloomfield could not have been making much of a profit or any at all on his quarter compensation. 

 

   This writing is negative with commentary that includes blatant racism.  Without condoning the author's beliefs, especially when exhibited within a Christian context, such racism was not all that uncommon in the 1960s.  That our country has progressed in respecting the rights of all citizens is due in part to the great efforts put forth during this decade.  

 

Mr. Bloomfield, however misdirected we think his opinions to be, felt a duty, a higher calling, a passion for his serious subject matter.  Though not mentioned as much in this issue and other topics, it is obvious that the author was pressing others to realize how short time was before Christ’s return.  He also shows distress over the issue of false teachers who promoted wrong teaching, and for Christians with little real biblical knowledge. 

The information is dated in relation to Bloomfield’s examples:  Presidents John F. Kennedy and Lyndon B. Johnson, Nikita Krushchev, Vietnam.  According our prophetic editor’s writing in this issue, there is not much positive about, or in the world in 1964. He would not consider himself a voice of doom and gloom, however, but rather a voice of warning which urges that there is little time left to get right with God.  Arthur Bloomfield was definitely not a prophet who brought good tidings.  

1964 is now just shy of being 50 years ago.  Almost a half century has passed since Mr. Bloomfield’s prophetic message went out to readers. 

 

His topics include the following:

The problem alike in liberal ministers and many evangelical churches who teach nothing about Scripture, hold ineffective adult Bible classes, or just plain teach what is not biblically true.

The parable of the ten virgins, focusing on the five virgins with no oil for their lamps.

The lack of teaching of Scripture in relation to current events, or the fulfilling of Bible prophecy.

His forthcoming study written for Bible research groups which will be so difficult but true, and not many will want to complete the course.

Space Travel and Satan: “The modern movement that connects most closely with prophecy is the race to dominate the world.  This connects directly with Satan whose overriding ambition is to the god of this world.  It also connects with Satan’s realm, because it involves the control of the space above the earth.  Who controls the sky controls the earth.”

Bloomfield’s dislike of President Kennedy’s policies and like of President Johnson’s policies.

Vietnam, China, Cyprus and Russia (Soviet Union); Control of the world: “…but the Chinese are not content with that.  They are working on the Africans to unite them in a drive to overcome the white race and make the colored people supreme.”

Building of Israel and Palestine

The Greek Orthodox Church, the Pope, and misconceptions about the Rapture: “The so-called tribulation will not come until after the Rapture…”

THE SIGN Henry Daniel Voss 1971

 

The Sign by Henry Daniel Voss (1971).  The fifth of
five books that Voss calls "FLOODLIGHTS from God--
sent to RESTORE the TRUTH as God gave that TRUTH
in our Saviour and Captain, JESUS CHRIST," and
Five Books of Progressive Revelation of Truth.

The Sign
Henry Daniel Voss
Christ Unlimited, St. Petersburg FL
1971

This article/review contains Notes, Transcribed and Scanned Examples by Mary Katherine May of QualityMusicandBooks.com.

One copy of The Sign is available for purchase at Quality Music and Books webstore.

I do not intend to demean the passionate believe Mr. Voss claimed to be a prophet, but rather attempt to explain his view which stands outside of mainstream Christian theology.

Henry Daniel Voss promoted himself as a prophet of God who carried the same authority as the Old Testament prophets, believing that the words he spoke and wrote were emphatically God’s message to the world in and around1970.  The prophecies were directed by God first to Voss himself, second in particular to those who participated in the pentecostal theology of Divine Healing, and then after to the Christian public at large.  The Sign is Voss’s fifth book of “Five Books of Progressive Revelation of Truth”.  The author’s writing style includes a profuse amount of words and phrases typed in capital letters to lend what I will presume to be emphasis to his text. 

 

I am somewhat uncertain of how to define the theme or premise for writing The Sign because of the author’s compositional style, which was rambling in nature with minimal definitive clarity.  It may be that the only person to whom The Sign was or will be essentially understandable is the Henry Daniel Voss, because there is scant information about Henry Daniel Voss. I could find no documentation on the internet about his ministry training, Christ Unlimited Fellowship or Bible Way Baptist Church, or if there were those who believed his teaching, who they were.

 

The Sign: the substance or premise for the title as best as I can make out  is one of two possibilities.

The Sign, according to Voss, was the one event during Jesus’ earthly life that pointed without a doubt to his divinity.  According to Voss, the miracles Jesus enacted were not completely clear to people because of their temporal nature.  The only clear and true sign of Christ’s divinity was the event of his transfiguration on a mountain, and then after (I am not sure of this) at his ascension to heaven which Voss states was Christ’s divine visible form prior to his ascension.  That is, what was seen at the ascension was how Jesus now appears in Heaven, seated at the right hand of God.

The author explains quite ambiguously and a great many words how this relates to Christians bound to the earthly realm. Here are the two possibilities I believe are possible interpretations of his prophecy.

 

 The first possibility is that Voss believed that a true Christian will manifest himself to the world with clear evidence of his relationship to Christ just as Christ appeared clearly in his supernatural form when transfigured.  People would see and know immediately that the believer contained the same deified nature as Jesus Christ. 

 

The second possibility is that Voss, by his emphatically stated authority as God’s messenger and prophet, believed with 100% conviction that true Christians who had received The Sign were transformed as Jesus had been on the mountain.  That is, that their new divinity would be clear to those who saw them, that they would never die—or never die until reaching old age—which he qualifies with the statement, unless martyred.  In other words, at a minimum, true and real Christians would receive a divine nature exactly as viewed by Peter, James, and John on the mountain when Jesus was transfigured. 

Christians without this event in their lives remain at what Voss calls the Church Stage.  Though he doesn’t understand why, I think he believed that somehow those in the Church Stage would still be saved but with great tribulation and subsequent death with bodily disintegration.

Biographical Information

The information I did find comes from genealogical websites: Henry Daniel Voss was one of three children born to Henry Daniel Voss (immigrant to the U.S.A. born 1852 in Vorden, Hanover, Germany) and Anna Elizabeth Koeber Voss (born 1856 in Quincy, Adams, Illinois to Charles Gottleib Koeber).  Henry Jr.’s siblings were Nettie Louise Voss and Charles Frederick Voss. 

 

Henry Daniel Voss (Jr.) was born in 1886, and married Eugenia (married surname unknown).  They were to have birthed three children.

 

Transcriptions from the Book

I WILL NOT DIE AND RETURN TO DUST (This presentation is inside the front cover.)

I was born 11-15-1886.  Until 12-12-61 I believed Satan’s lie that God has decreed that all men must die and return to dust—and that’s that.  Then God spoke to me—even as he did to Enoch and Elijah that I was in line to be fully accepted for transformation of my physical body to a body like Christ’s glorious body—immortal and incorruptible.  I shall FOLLOW Christ into LIFE—not follow Adam to death.  The amazing Truth dawned on me that Christ died MY death.  Why should I die again?

THEN GOD ORDAINED ME TO PROCLAIM TO YOU THAT GOD COMMANDS YOU TO LIVE TOTALLY (John 12:50)

I have written out in four books listed on inside back cover hereof God’s re-statement from the Bible in understandable language that men must top believing Satan’s lie which is death and begin believing Christ’s Truth which is LIFE—LIFE like Christ had when He was taken up from earth.

 

You have probably been deceived like I was.  Have you believed that you have no choice but to die?  Now it is your choice to LIVE and not die.  Do not turn aside in unbelief.  All I have written is re-statement of Truth as given by Christ—in His person.  His life, His deeds, and His Word.  He said,

"and everyone who lives (on me is implied here) and believes on me shall in no wise die forever.” (John 11:26)

 

I am choosing God’s best.  Will you? 

IS LIFE GETTING YOU DOWN?

Are you saying “Death is the only way out”?  That is Satan’s life.  Christ lived His way out.  He said “FOLLOW ME.”  He did not lay down and die.  Neither must you do that.

These books are God’s secret of the ages—the most amazing books in a thousand years—the New Testament made plain.

The

The Servant of Jesus Christ

Henry Daniel Voss

 

Second Transcription

 

WHY THIS BOOK WAS WRITTEN (this is the preface)

   In this volume the fact is developed from the  Scriptures that God has given men an Absolute Sign which men can reach and know beyond the least doubt that they are being accepted of God to be in His favor forever. There is no realm known to man wherein there plan and goal is as in the realm of Christianity.  Consequently there everything from rank atheism on the one hand to Real Truth on the other.  Fakery has flourished here.  Avarice has exploited every possible idea by which men can make other men believe they have the solution for men’s eternal well being.  Many are so discouraged that bewilderment and confusion is everywhere apparent.

   Yet men have an inborn yearning to live somewhere always and grasp hold of every hope placed before them—generally swallowing hook, line, and sinker of the first one they are acquainted with and then oppose other lines as spurious and of no value.  Their own beliefs they generally call the “faith of our fathers”, or “the old paths”, or “the old time religion”, etc.  And many try one thing then another until they fear that there is no way anyone can be sure of anything concerning their eternal destiny and their relationship to future possibilities and realities.

   In this volume I will show every honest-hearted man of even a child’s intelligence that God has sent Christ to the earth to make certain and secure to every mana destiny which is shown right here on earth in a visible form and with an eternal indestructibility built into it so that nothing is left to chance or uncertainty.  It is built upon a thesis that carries with it a built-in proof of its reality.  As the writer I can say it is the most satisfying Truth ever to come to my attention.  It is not from my mind.  I could not have invented it.  yet is is so simple and in itself so convincing that the most astounding thing about it all is that it hasn’t been discover by every man from the day of Christ even till this 1970.

   Whosoever you are—from those who can merely read at all to those who have reached into the summits of human learning—I know I am giving you God’s Own Word and nothing else to lead and guide you to KNOW that God wants you to know all that He can make known to you of His undying LOVE for your happiness forever.  This is an attempt to given every man a grown up sense of security in God which is like unto the absolute trust of an infant of one or two years of age as he nestles in mother’s arms to be put to sleep for the rest necessary to begin another day on the morrow. 

   As one wrote to me—whom I have never seen—God has revealed to me the most necessary secret of the ages.  What I am telling you in this volume and have written in other books is from God for me and for you.  As you read it let God speak to you.  For my opinion would be of no value whatever.  But what God has spoken will abide forever.  Speaking only God’s Word Himself Jesus said that the earth which looks so durable and also the Heaven will pass away but that His Own Word will not pass away.  Only Christ’s Word and such Word as is in line with His Word has been used in these books.

  I know that I am just passing on His Word as He has given it to me.  read it and you will know I speak nothing but TRUTH.

 

The servant of Jesus Christ,

HENRY DANIEL VOSS





Title Page

 

Copyright Page/Preface

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Inside Back Cover



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