Posted on 07/29/2025 3:06:08 PM PDT by ebb tide
In his July 27th Angelus address, Pope Leo XIV spoke of our need to avoid cruelty to others if we want to be able call God our “Father”:
“When we recite the Our Father, in addition to celebrating the grace of being children of God, we also express our commitment to responding to this gift by loving one another as brothers and sisters in Christ. Reflecting on this, one of the Fathers of the Church wrote: ‘We must remember . . . and know that when we call God ‘our Father’ we ought to behave as children of God’ (Saint Cyprian of Carthage, De Dom. orat., 11), and another adds: ‘You cannot call the God of all kindness your Father if you preserve a cruel and inhuman heart; for in this case you no longer have in you the mark of the heavenly Father’s kindness’ (Saint John Chrysostom, De orat. Dom., 3). We cannot pray to God as ‘Father’ and then be harsh and insensitive towards others.”
As grateful as we may be to Leo XIV for this pious exhortation, we are left to wonder what the new pontiff intends to do to address one of the most wicked cruelties in the world today: the Vatican’s continued attacks on the unadulterated Catholic Faith and its persecution of those souls who want nothing more than to practice our religion as faithfully as possible. Borrowing the words of St. John Chrysostom from the Angelus, can Leo XIV call God his Father if he maintains his silence about these unfathomably evil cruelties?
The sad story of declining Mass attendance after Vatican II is familiar to many who have studied the crisis in the Church. The changes that Rome has promoted in furtherance of the Vatican II revolution have robbed Catholics of the Faith, which has led predictably to the emptying of pews.
To put the matter in perspective, we can consider the first questions and responses in the Baptism ceremony:
“Priest: N, what do you ask of the Church of God? Response: Faith. Priest: What does Faith offer you? Response: Eternal life.”
The Faith is what souls have wanted from the Catholic Church ever since Our Lord established it. However, in his 1977 sermon for priestly ordinations at Ecône, Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre asserted that since around the time of the Second Vatican Council the Vatican has been turning souls away from the Faith:
“What was the first word the priest said to us when we were infants and could not speak for ourselves, and to which our godparents replied? ‘What do you ask of the Church of God?’ That was the question the priest put to our godparents: What do you ask of the Church of God? We ask for faith. That was what our godparents answered. And now we too ask from the Church, or from those who say they are of the Church, those occupying important posts in the Church, those responsible for that faith — we ask them: ‘Preserve the Faith for us, give us the Faith. That Catholic Faith is what we want. We want no other.’ ‘Why do you ask for Faith?’ the priest said to our godparents. ‘We want Faith because Faith brings us to Eternal Life.’ Why are we here below unless to gain Eternal Life? We have no other purpose here below except to gain Eternal Life; life on earth is a fleeting life, an ephemeral life-a few days, few years, a few decades. We have to choose if we want Eternal Life-Yes or No. We want Eternal Life, and for that we want the Catholic Faith. But we are compelled to state that for fifteen or twenty years those with the highest authority in the Church, the Holy See and the Vatican, have been turning away, turning us away from the Catholic Faith and have become the friends of our enemies.”
Was Archbishop Lefebvre accurate in his assessment that the Vatican has been turning souls away from the Faith?
As one indication among many, we can consider the 2025 National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) study recently cited by Rorate Caeli:
“Using an event-study design, we find that rates of religious-service attendance in predominantly Catholic countries started to decrease relative to those of all other countries and to those of other Christian countries precisely in the aftermath of Vatican II. This result holds for adult and child religious-service attendance and also holds when using the share of a country’s catholic adherents as a continuous measure of a country’s exposure. Overall, the Catholic relative attendance rate fell by four percentage points per decade between 1965 and 2015. This pattern is consistent with religion modeled as a club good (Iannaccone [1992]) and with the view that Vatican II shattered the perception of an immovable, truthholding Church (Greeley [2004], MacCulloch [2010]). More generally, these results might explain why many religious authorities are reluctant to modernize their doctrine or reduce barriers to religious participation.”
This sad story of declining Mass attendance after Vatican II is familiar to many who have studied the crisis in the Church and certainly comports with Archbishop Lefebvre’s assessment. The changes that Rome has promoted in furtherance of the Vatican II revolution have robbed Catholics of the Faith, which has led predictably to the emptying of pews.
Another tragic development is the reality that so many truths of the Catholic Faith are no longer accepted by many of those who identify as Catholic.
Another tragic development which aligns with Archbishop Lefebvre’s assertion is the reality that so many truths of the Catholic Faith are no longer accepted by many of those who identify as Catholic. Consider, for example, that many bishops, priests, and laity appear to reject one or more of the following infallible (De fide.) truths, among others, from Dr. Ludwig Ott’s Fundamentals of Catholic Dogma:
Most of these truths are at least implicitly contradicted by the tenets of false ecumenism and religious liberty, which have thrived since the Council. Far from trying to rectify the erroneous beliefs prevalent among so many nominal Catholics, Rome has continuously exacerbated these evils by turning a blind eye to heresy while persecuting those Traditional Catholics who adhere to what the Church has always taught. Archbishop Lefebvre’s assessment from 1977 thus appears entirely correct: “those with the highest authority in the Church, the Holy See and the Vatican, have been turning away, turning us away from the Catholic Faith and have become the friends of our enemies.”
For decades, Traditional Catholics have asked the Church for the unadulterated Faith. In response, the Vatican has effectively made itself like the evil father described by Our Lord in the Sermon on the Mount.
For the sake of argument, though, let us just assume that the Vatican II revolution was correct in advancing false ecumenism and religious liberty. As we know, the progressives in Rome have used false ecumenism and religious liberty to praise, defend, and even advance all Christian denominations — Baptists, Episcopalians, Lutherans, and Methodists all have a place of honor in the ecumenical assemblies sponsored by the Vatican. How is it, then, that the only Christians dishonored and persecuted by the Vatican are those Traditional Catholics who make great sacrifices to adhere to what the Church has always taught? The phrase “diabolical disorientation” seems like an entirely accurate answer.
For decades, Traditional Catholics have asked the Church for the unadulterated Faith. In response, the Vatican has effectively made itself like the evil father described by Our Lord in the Sermon on the Mount:
“Or what man is there among you, of whom if his son shall ask bread, will he reach him a stone? Or if he shall ask him a fish, will he reach him a serpent?” (Matthew 7:9-10)
Leo XIV has inherited this Vatican regime that cruelly offers stones to those who ask for bread, and hurls serpents at those who ask for fish. We did not expect him to reverse the Vatican II revolution overnight, but three months is long enough to at the very least speak out against the rampant heresies prevalent among his bishops and assure Traditional Catholics that they will no longer be persecuted by Rome. Every passing day of Leo XIV’s silence adds to the cruelty of the Vatican II revolution, such that he risks incurring the judgment of his own Angelus message: “We cannot pray to God as ‘Father’ and then be harsh and insensitive towards others.” We pray that he will heed his own words while he has time. Immaculate Heart of Mary, pray for us!
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Ping
If he’s not able to at least condemn the “masses” showcased in this video, then that’s a problem.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xnaafu7EVdY
I would THINK that it would cover everything.
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