Dunno about the Vatican part, but he's definitely a fraud.
He's been saying the world's gonna end since the 1970s. It hasn't yet and it's not likely to for the next several billion years.
Ecumenism
Much of his life was spent as a fierce proponent of the fundamentalist Biblical doctrine of Biblical separation. This teaching is that we, as a church, are to be removed from those individuals who promote doctrinal error. In late 1970's Van Impe made a shift towards the inclusiveness of Ecumenism and Evangelism. His break with the fundamental church came in 1984 with the publication of Heart Disease in Christ’s Body. In it, he disapproves of the lack of love and unity among so many of today's Christians. The remedy for this was for the relaxing of the fundamentalist definition of what is a Christian. He called for the acceptance as a "true Christian" of anyone who believed in the inspiration and inerrancy of Scripture, the Deity of Christ, the Virgin Birth, the Substitutionary atonement, and the physical resurrection of Christ along with His personal, bodily return to earth. In addition to this Jack sought to redefine the very concept of Biblical separation itself. In his new formula, anyone who disagrees with these conditions that he defined as a "true Christian" was himself in doctrinal error and thus subject to isolation.
Now a Roman Catholic?
In 1993 Van Impe, who formerly warned that the Roman Catholic church is a false, apostate church, now made a complete reversal by accepting the Pope and traditional Roman Catholicism as being part of the body of Christ. He not only claimed that the Pope was a genuine Christian but also considered him to be a true prophet and defender of the faith. In a recent broadcast Van Impe explained his conversion to the Roman Catholic Church, comparing it to the conversion of the Apostle Paul. He stated that he was once a fundamentalist who rejected Roman Catholicism, but now has evidently been converted.
"I have read the entire new catechism, 2800 points. And I know what they believe and we misrepresent them so often. I was one of those bigots who used to do it. And the Spirit spoke to me."
Trust Mary Instead of Christ
In an article for the October-December 1995 issue of Foundation Magazine Van Impe offered praise to Pope John Paul II and praise for the Pope's plan for unity among all "Christians" and the establishment of a "world church." John Paul II, whom evangelicals like Van Impe have praised, trusted Mary instead of Christ for his eternal destiny. In a February 1980 addendum to his Last Will and Testament of March 6, 1979, John Paul II entrusted "that decisive moment [of death] to the Mother of Christ and of the Church [and] of my hope. In life and in death, Totus Tuus [totally yours] through the Immaculate." Embroidered inside all of his robes was the phrase, Totus tuus sum Maria, "Mary I am all yours." His Apostolic Letter of Oct. 16, 2002, ended with these words:
O Blessed Rosary of Mary, sweet chain which unites us to God, bond of love which unites us to the angels, tower of salvation against the assaults of Hell, safe port in our universal shipwreck, we will never abandon you. You will be our comfort in the hour of death: yours our final kiss as life ebbs away. And the last word from our lips will be your sweet name, O Queen of the Rosary of Pompei, O dearest Mother, O Refuge of Sinners, O Sovereign Consoler of the Afflicted.
Instead of obeying Jude's command to "earnestly contend for the faith once delivered to the saints," Van Impe, has never raised a voice against heretical denials of the true faith.
http://www.biblicist.org/bible/vanimpe.shtml
