Question: 10/6/01 - you wrote: Rick Joyner was knighted and he says the Knights of Malta is neither Catholic nor Masons. Is this true? Can you document? He calls them also Knights of St.John (he says its christian)? Please help. I have friends and my brothers pastor is really into him and his ministry (morningstar ministries).

Answer: Rick Joyner apparently has no background of European history as most people don't. Pope John Paul II wears Maltese crosses on his robes very visibly to identify with the Knights of Malta unbeknown to Catholics. Those crosses are on many Catholic ornaments and clothes. Taken from the Catholic Encyclopedia p.557 (published in 1991) Knights of Malta (Hopitallers - [When the Templars, who were the original European Order were persecuted and most rotted in jail and some were burned such as Jaque DeMolay. The American Masonic Youth organization is named after DeMolay which ties Freemasonry into the Templars.

The Hospitallers are Knights who are an offspring of the Templars 33 degree Masons. Pope Paschall II even though he participated in the scourge, protected this group of Knights and placed them on the island of Malta. Some Knights fled to Scotland and the British Isle. If you look at a chart of the hierarchy of the Masonic Order you will find the Knights of Malta in about 29th degree level and the Order of the Red Cross right below them.] )

Here is what the Encyclopedia states: [note in brackets [ ] is added by us] "The sovereign Military Hospitaller Order of St. John of Jerusalem, of Rhodes and of Malta is the most ancient religious [Masonic] order chivalry. The order began in the Jerusalem during the First Crusades [the Templars] in 1070, as a hospice-infirmary for pilgrims from Amalfi. [Masons to this day identify with hospitals such as burn units etc..]

In 1113 the institution was approved by Pope Paschall II. The Knights are a religious order made up of lay brothers and chaplains, whose original purpose was the protection and nursing of pilgrims in the Holy Land. Forced to leave by the Muslim invasion [this is not true - the King of France and the Pope together went against the Templars because they got too rich and powerful]. They were the temporal rulers of Malta until the invasion of 1798 by Napoleon Bonaparte.

Not only a religious order approved by the Holy See, the Knights are also recognized in international law as a sovereign entity. Originally, membership was restricted to the nobility [nobility were all in politics and had to be knighted to become nobility], but a new category of Knights and Dames of Grace and Devotion is open to meritorious persons who are not of the nobility. A National Association of Knights and Dames of Malta exists in the United States. "

Jesus stated: "But he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that they are wrought in God." (John 3:21) "Brethren, if any of you do err from the truth, and one convert him; Let him know, that he which converteth the sinner from the error of his way shall save a soul from death, and shall hide a multitude of sins." (James 5:20)