National Catholic Register portal reports on a travelogue by British journalist Elliot Hartley, who visited Malta to explore the island’s 2,000-year Catholic heritage tied to St. Paul’s shipwreck. The article celebrates Malta’s churches, relics, and traditions while noting the country’s rapid secularization, legalization of same-sex marriage in 2017, and EU membership since 2004. What presents itself as a pious pilgrimage account is, upon closer examination, a symptom of the very modernist rot it fails to diagnose — a Catholic culture reduced to folklore, architecture, and gastronomy while the faith that built it is hollowed out from within.
The Shipwreck of Faith Precedes the Shipwreck of Nations
The article opens with a telling juxtaposition: the author notes he “didn’t arrive in a storm” to Malta, unlike St. Paul, but immediately frames the apostle’s shipwreck as a tourist attraction — a “must-visit for tourists interested in how Christianity spread throughout Europe.” This is the conciliar mentality in miniature: the supernatural drama of God’s providence in casting Paul upon pagan shores to convert a nation is reduced to a travel itinerary. The Acts of the Apostles recounts how God Himself directed the shipwreck to fulfill His salvific purposes; the article sees only heritage tourism.
St. Paul’s shipwreck was not an accident but a divine intervention. As the Apostle himself declared: “And now I exhort you to be of good cheer. For there shall be no loss of any man’s life among you, but only of the ship. For there stood by me this night an angel of God, whose I am, and whom I serve, saying: Fear not, Paul; thou must be brought before Caesar; and behold, God hath given thee all them that sail with thee” (Acts 27:22-25). The angel of God promised Paul the lives of all aboard — a miracle of divine providence. The Maltese pagans recognized this: “And when Paul had gathered a bundle of sticks and laid them on the fire, a viper came out of the heat and fastened on his hand. And when the barbarians saw the beast hanging from his hand, they said among themselves: No doubt this man is a murderer, whom, though he hath escaped the sea, suffereth not to live. And he shook off the beast into the fire and felt no harm” (Acts 28:3-5). Paul’s immunity from the serpent was a sign of divine favor, and he went on to heal Publius’s father and many others — the very miracles the article mentions but never once attributes to the power of God operating through His apostle. The miracles are presented as local color, not as evidence of the true faith.
Relics Without Reverence: The Cult of the Museum
The article describes St. Paul’s Shipwreck Church in Valletta, where “light seeps in through a dome at the center and filters onto marble walls.” Canon David Cilia shows the author “a relic of St. Paul’s wrist bone and one of the four marble pillars from the table on which the apostle was beheaded.” The relic came from Rome as a gift from Pope Pius VII in 1818. Yet the article treats this with the same tone one might use to describe a museum exhibit. There is no mention of the theology of relics — that the bodies of saints are temples of the Holy Ghost, that God honors the instruments of His glory, that the Church has always venerated relics as a consequence of the doctrine of the Communion of Saints.
The Council of Trent, in its 25th session, taught: “The holy bodies of holy martyrs and of others now living with Christ — which bodies were the living members of Christ and the temple of the Holy Ghost — which are by Him to be raised unto eternal life and to be glorified — are to be venerated by the faithful, through which many benefits are bestowed by God on men.” The article’s author stands before the wrist bone of the Apostle to the Gentiles and feels nothing worth reporting. This is the fruit of the conciliar revolution: the sacramentals of the Church are reduced to curiosities, and the faithful are taught to admire architecture instead of adore God.
Similarly, the Grotto of St. Paul in Rabat — where the apostle lived for three months, prayed, preached, and converted the Maltese — is presented as a site visited by “three popes”: John Paul II, Benedict XVI, and Francis. The article notes that “each parish in Malta provides enough candles to keep the lantern lit up for one year… This has been going on since 1960.” But what does this devotion mean when the very “popes” who visited are the architects of the destruction of the faith they claim to represent? John Paul II, who knelt in this grotto, also kissed the Koran, prayed with animists at Assisi, and advanced the very modernist apostasy that has emptied churches across Europe. Benedict XVI, who visited in 2010, had already reigned as the “pope” who declared that the Church had no authority to evangelize Jews. Francis, who came in 2022, is the same antipope who has systematically dismantled Catholic moral teaching on marriage, the sacraments, and the existence of God. Their visits to Malta are not acts of piety but acts of propaganda — photo opportunities for the conciliar sect.
The Ta’ Pinu Sanctuary: A False Apparition in Plain Sight
The article devotes considerable space to the Ta’ Pinu Sanctuary in Gozo, where “in 1883 it’s believed a woman heard the voice of Our Lady at a far smaller chapel that then occupied the site.” The walls are “plastered with picture frames of children, baby clothes and prayers, attesting to those souls who believe they’ve experienced miracles.” The last three antipopes have visited.
Let us be clear: the Ta’ Pinu apparition has never been approved by the true Church. It was investigated and approved by the conciliar structures that emerged from Vatican II — structures that have approved virtually every dubious Marian claim put before them, from Medjugorje to Kibeho. The “voice of Our Lady” heard by a woman in 1883 bears all the hallmarks of private revelation exploited for institutional purposes. The walls covered in baby clothes and photographs are indistinguishable from pagan votive offerings — the same practice condemned by the Church when found in non-Catholic cultures. The article makes no attempt to evaluate the theological credibility of the apparition, nor does it mention the criteria the Church has historically applied to discern true from false revelations: the visionary’s humility, the conformity of the message to Catholic doctrine, the absence of doctrinal error, and the spiritual fruits.
Instead, the article presents the sanctuary as a quaint local tradition, no different from the rabbit stew and pastizzi described elsewhere. This is the conciliar method: reduce everything to culture, and culture to tourism.
The Rotunda of Mosta: A True Miracle in a False Church
The article recounts the remarkable story of the Rotunda of Mosta, where on April 9, 1942, during the most intense bombing campaign in history, three bombs fell on the church during Mass — two failed to detonate, and the third, the largest, pierced the dome and rolled across the floor without exploding. Two hundred people were inside. Historian Pauline Cassar recounts: “Many believe this is due to miraculous intervention.”
This is indeed a remarkable event, and one may legitimately see in it the hand of God protecting His people. But the article fails to draw the necessary conclusion: if God protected the faithful in 1942, why has He allowed the faith to be stolen from them since 1958? The same church that was miraculously preserved from German bombs has been spiritually destroyed by the conciliar revolution. The “Mass” celebrated there today is the Novus Ordo Missae — the Protestantized liturgy of Annibale Bugnini, a rite that the Catholic theologian Fr. Anthony Cekada and others have demonstrated is gravely deficient in its expression of the propitiatory sacrifice of Calvary. The dome that survived a bomb now shelters a liturgy that denies what the sacrifice of the Mass is. Quid enim prodest homini, si mundum universum lucretur, animae vero suae detrimentum patiatur? (For what doth it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and suffer the loss of his own soul? — Matthew 16:26).
Malta’s Apostasy: Divorce, Same-Sex Marriage, and the EU
The article acknowledges that “Malta has undergone rapid social change in recent years. Divorce was only introduced in 2011, and same-sex marriage became legal in 2017, with the country now ranking among the most progressive in the world for LGBTQ rights.” The author adds, with evident satisfaction, that “abortion remains illegal in most cases, a reminder that even in a rapidly modernizing society, the influence of Catholicism is still embedded in the country’s politics and culture.”
This is the language of the conciliar compromise: celebrate the remnants of Catholic influence while accepting the revolution. Divorce is a mortal sin that destroys families and condemns souls. Same-sex marriage is an abomination before God — a counterfeit of the sacrament of matrimony that the Church has always taught is reserved for one man and one woman for the procreation of children and the mutual sanctification of the spouses. The Catechism of the Council of Trent teaches that matrimony is “a sacrament, by which the bond of conjugal union is consecrated and confirmed.” The legalization of same-sex “marriage” in Malta is not a neutral political development; it is a formal cooperation with evil, a public sin of the Maltese state that cries out to Heaven for vengeance.
And yet the article treats this as a footnote — a sign that “Catholicism is still embedded” — rather than as the apostasy it manifestly is. The Maltese state, by legalizing divorce and same-sex marriage, has formally rejected the social reign of Christ the King. Pope Pius XI, in Quas Primas, taught: “His reign, namely, extends not only to Catholic nations or to those who, by receiving baptism according to law, belong to the Church, even though their erroneous opinions have led them astray or discord has separated them from love, but His reign encompasses also all non-Christians, so that most truly the entire human race is subject to the authority of Jesus Christ.” And further: “The state is happy not by one means, and man by another; for the state is nothing else than a harmonious association of men.” Malta’s laws are not merely “progressive” — they are rebellion against the King of Kings.
The article also celebrates Malta’s EU membership since 2004, noting that the island has “benefited from financial support for the preservation of architecture.” The European Union is a Masonic project — a supranational structure designed to erode the sovereignty of Catholic nations and impose a secularist, relativist order. Its founding documents make no mention of Christ, the Church, or the natural law. Its institutions have consistently promoted abortion, gender ideology, and the dissolution of Catholic education. That Malta has joined this structure and benefited from its financial support is not a sign of Catholic vitality but of Catholic capitulation.
The Knights of Malta: From Crusaders to NGO
The article briefly recounts the history of the Knights of St. John, who “oversaw a huge building spree between 1530 and 1798” and “fought off the Ottomans over four months during what became known as the Great Siege.” This is indeed glorious history — the Knights who defended Christendom against the infidel, who built the churches and hospitals that still stand, who made Malta a fortress of the faith.
But the article does not mention that the modern “Knights of Malta” — the Sovereign Military Order of Malta — is a thoroughly modernist institution, fully integrated into the conciliar structures, engaged in humanitarian work indistinguishable from that of any secular NGO. The Order that once fought the Ottomans now distributes condoms in Africa and promotes the agenda of the United Nations. The article shows a photograph of “The Knights of Malta process through the streets in Malta” — but these are not the Knights of the Great Siege. These are the Knights of the New Order, processing not for the glory of God but for the glory of the conciliar sect.
St. Pius X, in Lamentabili Sane Exitu, condemned the modernist proposition that “the organic structure of the Church is subject to change, and the Christian community, like the human community, is subject to continuous evolution” (proposition 53). The Knights of Malta are a living example of this condemned principle: an institution that once existed to fight for Christ the King now exists to serve the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals.
The Younger Generation: Secularization as the Fruit of Conciliarism
The article notes, almost in passing, that “the younger generation are becoming more secular, with many wanting to travel and work in other EU countries.” This is presented as a natural sociological phenomenon — the inevitable result of modernization. But it is nothing of the sort. It is the direct and predictable fruit of the conciliar revolution.
Before Vatican II, Malta was Catholic. The faith was taught, the sacraments were received, the churches were full. Then came the Council, and with it the destruction of catechesis, the Protestantization of the liturgy, the introduction of false ecumenism, the abandonment of the social reign of Christ the King, and the systematic dismantling of every institution that had sustained the faith. The younger generation did not abandon the faith — they were never given it. They were given the Novus Ordo, the Catechism of the Catholic Church (1992) with its ambiguities and errors, and a “Church” that no longer believes in itself. Is it any wonder they left?
Pius IX, in the Syllabus of Errors, condemned the proposition that “in the present day it is no longer expedient that the Catholic religion should be held as the only religion of the State, to the exclusion of all other forms of worship” (proposition 77). Malta’s secularization is the fulfillment of this condemned error — the logical consequence of a “Church” that no longer demands the public recognition of Christ the King.
Easter in Malta: Spectacle Without Substance
The article describes Malta’s Easter celebrations: “Each Easter Sunday, cannons are fired, church bells ring out, and flowers decorate altars. Men sprint with life-size statues depicting the Risen Christ down narrow streets, while crowds run alongside cheering them on.”
This is external piety without internal faith — the religion of the conciliar age. The statues are carried, but the people who carry them have been taught by their “bishops” that the Resurrection is not a historical fact but a “purely supernatural order” that “is not proven, cannot be proven” — as the modernists condemned by St. Pius X in Lamentabili (proposition 36) taught. The cannons fire, but the faith they once proclaimed has been replaced by the religion of man, the cult of progress, the worship of the EU and its values.
The article’s author, Elliot Hartley, is described as a journalist who has worked for EWTN News, the BBC, and The Catholic Herald. EWTN is a conciliar institution that, while preserving some elements of Catholic culture, operates entirely within the framework of the post-conciliar sect. The Catholic Herald is a publication that has consistently supported the conciliar revolution. That Hartley writes for these outlets is itself an indication of the problem: the Catholic press has become an instrument of the very apostasy it should be denouncing.
Conclusion: Malta Deserves Better Than This
Malta deserves better than a travel article that treats its Catholic heritage as a tourist attraction. Malta deserves the truth: that the faith of St. Paul, the faith of the Knights, the faith that survived the Great Siege and the bombs of 1942, has been betrayed by the very men who claimed to be its custodians. The “popes” who visited Malta — John Paul II, Benedict XVI, Francis — did not come to strengthen the faith. They came to advance the conciliar revolution, to present the face of a “Church” that no longer believes in the necessity of conversion, the reality of hell, or the exclusive salvific mission of Christ and His Church.
The Maltese people — those who remain faithful — deserve to know that the true Church endures, not in the structures occupying the Vatican, but in the faithful who profess the integral Catholic faith, who offer the true Mass of all time, and who reject the modernist apostasy in all its forms. They deserve to know that Christ the King reigns, and that no EU directive, no same-sex “marriage” law, no conciliar “reform” can change that eternal reality.
Ad maiorem Dei gloriam — but not the God of the conciliars. The God of St. Paul, the God of the Martyrs, the God who cast an apostle upon the shores of Malta to convert a nation. That God still reigns. And He will not be mocked.
Source:
In the Footsteps of St. Paul: Discovering Malta’s 2,000 Years of Unbroken Catholic Tradition (ncregister.com)
Date: 29.04.2026