In January of 2019, YouTube personalities, Taylor Marshall and Tim Gordon, assessed various rumors surrounding Fr. Malachi Martin:
Below is a collection of sources which includes individuals who knew Malachi Martin personally, in order to better comprehend the details of his life, his work, and the many claims circulating about him.
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Controversies
What precisely was his relationship with his landlady, Kakia Livanos?
Origin of relationship
[Narrator] “On the suggestion of Cardinal Cook, he rented a room from the Livanos family in Manhattan. They provided Malachi with a bedroom, a place to write and a chapel.”
Listen at the following linked location from Malachi Martin: God’s Messenger” radio documentary.
[Narrator] “For those of you who don’t know who Kakia Livanos was, she was a wealthy Greek widow of a shipping tycoon in Manhattan. When Malachi Martin first arrived in New York City, it was arranged for him to stay with Kakia and her children…”
Hear the YouTube source segment from the“Hostage to the Devil” Podcast Ep. 3
Robert A. Marro, close friend and former CIA agent explains:
“People like to put all kinds of wink-wink, nudge-nudge salacious connotations attached to that, and they’re very off-base. Had anyone who had ever met Mrs. Livanos — and if you had told them that’s what people would be saying — you’d be laughed out of the room! The woman was a very, very stern force of nature … the best way to describe her would be a brooks-no-interference school principal from the early 1900s. [The kind of] woman, who, when you meet her, if you’re a student, she automatically assumes you’re cheating on something — she just hasn’t found out yet. It took her a while to warm up to me. We’re talking a couple of years to the point where she would put me through to Father Malachi when I called the apartment. She was kind of the gatekeeper, in that respect, to keep the wingnuts away … “There was absolutely nothing romantic between the two of them.”
Hear the YouTube source segment from “Hostage to the Devil” Podcast, Episode 3
[Narrator] Surgeon, psychiatrist, close friend, Dr. Rama Kumaraswami (now deceased) further explains:
“Kakia Livanos was like a mother to him. Took wonderful care of him… Sometimes had to scream at him to stop him from working. She had a real mother’s love for him and did everything she could to make his life comfortable and safe, which was hard to do, because he was perfectly willing to work 24 hours a day helping people… She gave herself the job of being his guardian.
Listen at the following linked location from the video“Malachi Martin God’s Messenger”.
Burial in same grave
Robert A. Marro, close friend, formerly CIA explains:
“I don’t believe that Malachi knew he was going to be buried in the same exact plot of land, but he knew that the Livanos family had made arrangements for him to be buried in consecrated ground at Gates of Heaven cemetery. And there’s a very, very simple reason why Malachi was buried in the same plot: because Mrs. Livanos wanted it that way!”
Hear the YouTube Segment from “Hostage to the Devil” Podcast, Episode 3
Was he a Jesuit priest?
“…and on 6 September 1939, became a novice with the Society of Jesus (the Jesuits). “…and was ordained in August 1954.” [5] — Malachi Martin Wikipedia entry.
Listen at the following linked location from the video: “Malachi Martin: God’s Messenger”
Was he laicized? (no longer a priest)
“In February 1965, Martin requested release from the Jesuit Order. He received a provisional release in May 1965 and a dispensation from his vows of poverty and obedience on 30 June 1965. Even if dispensed from his religious vow of chastity, he remained under the obligation of chastity if still an ordained secular priest.
Martin maintained that he remained a priest, saying that he had received a dispensation from Paul VI to that effect.” — Malachi Martin Wikipedia entry.
Listen to further explanation in the following linked location from the video: “Malachi Martin: God’s Messenger”
Did the Jesuits initiate a campaign of lies against him?
Malachi’s discoveries of corruption in the Church and in his Jesuit order left him with difficult choices.
Listen and Learn more here from the video: “Malachi Martin: God’s Messenger”
Was Malachi Martin truly a Vatican Insider with clout who knew several Popes personally?
Robert A. Marro, close friend, formerly CIA explains:
“There are current Catholic commentators who have absolutely ripped Malachi Martin to
shreds: in one case, in one show having a back and forth conversation about how he was an absolute screwball and wingnut. And I’m thinking to myself, “Well, first off, this is not a show I’d call in and counter your slander with, number one. But number two: if someone was a wingnut or a screwball, would he be able to pick up a phone and obtain for me a one-on-one meeting with Pope John Paul II in the Vatican two and a half weeks later? That’s a rhetorical question, but you know the answer. And I did have the honor of meeting Pope John Paul II, and Malachi arranged the whole thing!”
“And it was early in the morning, about 7:30, and I was walking from one direction and a cleric came walking from the other direction, and it was Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, who would one day be pope. And I reverenced his ring when I greeted him. And I said, “ Uh… hello. I’m here from the United States.” I said I have gotten a personal audience, a short one, with his Holiness tomorrow, arranged through Malachi Martin, the author.
And Cardinal Ratzinger’s face lit up in recognition. ”And how is our Father Malachi doing?” And I said, “he’s doing quite fine.”
“But you know Malachi obviously had very high level connections, because I did get to meet the Pope. I’ve got a photograph of me taken by the Vatican photographer who trails the Pope everywhere he goes, presenting this beautiful pen and ink study of the Virgin to his Holiness.
Hear the YouTube segment from the Hostage to the Devil Podcast, Episode 3
Is it true that Malachi Martin was a Bishop?
Robert A. Marro, close friend, formerly CIA explains:
(paraphrased. See link below for background ) Malachi was made a bishop at the Vatican in the ‘50s, so that he could go behind the Iron Curtain (Prague, Czechoslovakia ) to laicize a wayward priest, which could only be done by a Bishop.
Hear the YouTube segment from the Hostage to the Devil Podcast, Episode 3
Was Malachi Martin really imprisoned behind the Iron Curtain?
Robert A. Marro, close friend, formerly CIA explains:
“…and he was turned in to the Czech secret police by this now laicized priest.
And he actually spent, I believe, what was about a year and a half to two years under very harsh prison circumstances in Czechoslovakia. They knew exactly who they had, by the way, okay, because they found out that he was a Jesuit. Rome at the time was penetrated by the KGB.“He was ultimately released through the direct intercession of either his holiness Pope Pius XII or Pius’ Secretary of State. So, you know he had literally been through the ringer.”
Hear the YouTube segment from the Hostage to the Devil Podcast, Episode 3