Posted on 10/11/2025 4:54:23 PM PDT by ebb tide
“For what shall it profit a man, if he gain the whole world, and suffer the loss of his soul?” (Mark 8:36)
As Pope Leo XIV was releasing his first apostolic exhortation — Dilexi Te, to all Christians on love for the poor — around midday (Rome time) on October 9th, many Traditional Catholics around the world had already heard the following words from the Epistle for the Mass of St. John Leonardi:
“Therefore, seeing we have this ministration, according as we have obtained mercy, we faint not; But we renounce the hidden things of dishonesty, not walking in craftiness, nor adulterating the word of God; but by manifestation of the truth commending ourselves to every man's conscience, in the sight of God. And if our gospel be also hid, it is hid to them that are lost, in whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of unbelievers, that the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God, should not shine unto them. For we preach not ourselves, but Jesus Christ our Lord; and ourselves your servants through Jesus. For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God, in the face of Christ Jesus.” (II Corinthians 4:1-6)
As St. Paul indicated, it is the mission of the Church to spread the light of Jesus Christ throughout the world. When the Church does this freely and faithfully, the world and mankind are rich even if they are materially impoverished; and when the Church does not fulfill its mission to spread the light of Jesus Christ, the world and mankind are impoverished, even if every man, woman, and child were to have all the material wealth that can be imagined.
As every saint could tell us, Catholics and non-Catholics alike suffer unthinkable spiritual poverty today because for sixty years the Vatican has stifled Catholic truth and promoted the errors that oppose it.
If we want to measure the true wealth of the world and mankind today, we need only consider two realities:
As every saint could tell us, Catholics and non-Catholics alike suffer unthinkable spiritual poverty today because for sixty years the Vatican has stifled Catholic truth and promoted the errors that oppose it. Most Catholics no longer understand this, but we can see the principles articulated very clearly by St. Pius X in his 1905 encyclical on teaching Christian doctrine, Acerbo Nimis:
“How many and how grave are the consequences of ignorance in matters of religion! And on the other hand, how necessary and how beneficial is religious instruction! It is indeed vain to expect a fulfillment of the duties of a Christian by one who does not even know them. We must now consider upon whom rests the obligation to dissipate this most pernicious ignorance and to impart in its stead the knowledge that is wholly indispensable. There can be no doubt, Venerable Brethren, that this most important duty rests upon all who are pastors of souls. On them, by command of Christ, rest the obligations of knowing and of feeding the flocks committed to their care; and to feed implies, first of all, to teach. ‘I will give you pastors according to my own heart,; God promised through Jeremias, ‘and they shall feed you with knowledge and doctrine.’ Hence the Apostle Paul said: ‘Christ did not send me to baptize, but to preach the gospel,’ thereby indicating that the first duty of all those who are entrusted in any way with the government of the Church is to instruct the faithful in the things of God. We do not think it necessary to set forth here the praises of such instruction or to point out how meritorious it is in God's sight. If, assuredly, the alms with which we relieve the needs of the poor are highly praised by the Lord, how much more precious in His eyes, then, will be the zeal and labor expended in teaching and admonishing, by which we provide not for the passing needs of the body but for the eternal profit of the soul! Nothing, surely, is more desirable, nothing more acceptable to Jesus Christ, the Savior of souls, Who testifies of Himself through Isaias: ‘To bring good news to the poor he has sent me.’”
As St. Pius X wrote, almsgiving to relieve the needs of the poor is praised by the Lord, but it is much more precious to teach the Catholic Faith. With this in mind, we can turn to Leo XIV’s exhortation.
As one would expect, the pope focuses primarily on forms of poverty that have little to do with the fact that the Vatican impoverishes the world through its failure to spread the Gospel.
Dilexi Te — Doubling Down on Spiritual Impoverishment
Leo XIV made it clear in paragraph 3 that he has written his apostolic exhortation with Francis’s legacy in mind:
“For this reason, in continuity with the Encyclical Dilexit Nos, Pope Francis was preparing in the last months of his life an Apostolic Exhortation on the Church’s care for the poor, to which he gave the title Dilexi Te, as if Christ speaks those words to each of them, saying: ‘You have but little power,’ yet ‘I have loved you’ ( Rev 3:9). I am happy to make this document my own — adding some reflections — and to issue it at the beginning of my own pontificate, since I share the desire of my beloved predecessor that all Christians come to appreciate the close connection between Christ’s love and his summons to care for the poor. I too consider it essential to insist on this path to holiness, for ’in this call to recognize him in the poor and the suffering, we see revealed the very heart of Christ, his deepest feelings and choices, which every saint seeks to imitate.’”
It is, of course, praiseworthy to tend to the needs of the poor, and much of Leo XIV’s exhortation is full of pious words encouraging Christians to practice corporal works of mercy. As one would expect, the pope focuses primarily on forms of poverty that have little to do with the fact that the Vatican impoverishes the world through its failure to spread the Gospel:
“The condition of the poor is a cry that, throughout human history, constantly challenges our lives, societies, political and economic systems, and, not least, the Church. On the wounded faces of the poor, we see the suffering of the innocent and, therefore, the suffering of Christ himself. At the same time, we should perhaps speak more correctly of the many faces of the poor and of poverty, since it is a multifaceted phenomenon. In fact, there are many forms of poverty: the poverty of those who lack material means of subsistence, the poverty of those who are socially marginalized and lack the means to give voice to their dignity and abilities, moral and spiritual poverty, cultural poverty, the poverty of those who find themselves in a condition of personal or social weakness or fragility, the poverty of those who have no rights, no space, no freedom.” (Paragraph 9)
His reference to “moral and spiritual poverty” is perhaps vague enough to encompass the poverty caused by Rome’s dereliction of duty for the past sixty years, but Dilexi Te instead focuses on the need for Christians to denounce “structural issues” that cause material poverty and injustice throughout the world:
“All the members of the People of God have a duty to make their voices heard, albeit in different ways, in order to point out and denounce such structural issues, even at the cost of appearing foolish or naïve. Unjust structures need to be recognized and eradicated by the force of good, by changing mindsets but also, with the help of science and technology, by developing effective policies for societal change. It must never be forgotten that the Gospel message has to do not only with an individual’s personal relationship with the Lord, but also with something greater: ‘the Kingdom of God (cf. Lk 4:43); it is about loving God who reigns in our world. To the extent that he reigns within us, the life of society will be a setting for universal fraternity, justice, peace and dignity. Both Christian preaching and life, then, are meant to have an impact on society. We are seeking God’s Kingdom.’” (Paragraph 97)
So Leo XIV wants the “People of God” — by which he apparently means all baptized people if we are to take the Synodal Church’s definition — to spread “fraternity, justice, peace and dignity.” With these words, the pope further impoverishes the Church and world because we desperately want Rome to give us the bread of unadulterated Catholicism rather than the stones of a Freemasonic promotion of revolutionary ideals.
So Leo XIV took a random paragraph of the 1984 document to obliquely condemn Traditional Catholics while neglecting the preceding paragraph, which condemns the Francis revolution that he seems committed to perpetuating.
Perhaps worst of all, we find in paragraph 98 an apparent rebuke directed at those “defenders of orthodoxy” who are concerned for “the purity of the faith”:
“Finally, in a document that was not initially well received by everyone, we find a reflection that remains timely today: ‘The defenders of orthodoxy are sometimes accused of passivity, indulgence, or culpable complicity regarding the intolerable situations of injustice and the political regimes which prolong them. Spiritual conversion, the intensity of the love of God and neighbor, zeal for justice and peace, the Gospel meaning of the poor and of poverty, are required of everyone, and especially of pastors and those in positions of responsibility. The concern for the purity of the faith demands giving the answer of effective witness in the service of one’s neighbor, the poor and the oppressed in particular, in an integral theological fashion.’” (Paragraph 98)
Leo XIV took this passage from paragraph 18 of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith’s “Instruction on Certain Aspects of the ‘Theology of Liberation’” (6 August 1984). Interestingly, Paragraph 17 of that 1984 document essentially highlights the defects of Dilexi Te:
“In this full presentation of Christianity, it is proper to emphasize those essential aspects which the ‘theologies of liberation’ especially tend to misunderstand or to eliminate, namely: God and true man; the sovereignty of grace; and the true nature of the means of salvation, especially of the Church and the sacraments. One should also keep in mind the true meaning of ethics in which the distinction between good and evil is not relativized, the real meaning of sin, the necessity for conversion, and the universality of the law of fraternal love. One needs to be on guard against the politicization of existence which, misunderstanding the entire meaning of the Kingdom of God and the transcendence of the person, begins to sacralize politics and betray the religion of the people in favor of the projects of the revolution.”
So Leo XIV took a random paragraph of the 1984 document to obliquely condemn Traditional Catholics while neglecting the preceding paragraph, which condemns the Francis revolution that he seems committed to perpetuating.
None of this comes as a surprise, especially because Leo XIV introduced his exhortation by paying homage to Francis. However, as can see from Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre’s words below, true charity for the poor demands, before all else, that we give them the unadulterated Catholic Faith.
May God grant Leo XIV the grace to open his eyes to the theological poverty that he now perpetuates.
Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre and the Actual Catholic Teaching on Poverty
In his The Mystery of Jesus, Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre described his experience with the way in which the Catholic Faith transforms the lives of those enduring true hardships:
“To really measure all that our Lord brought to our society, perhaps it is necessary to have been in contact with pagan peoples. Of the thirteen years I was in Gabon, seven of them were spent in the bush. I had therefore the opportunity to speak to these pagans in their own language and to teach them the Gospel and thereby enable them to discover our Lord Jesus Christ, and approach Him. It is impossible to imagine the impact made upon these absolutely uncultivated souls, knowing neither how to read nor write, when one spoke to them about our Lord Jesus Christ and about the Cross of our Lord. It is just what St. Paul said: it was what they were waiting for.” (p. 38)
The Catholic Faith is not just one good thing among many, it is the most important thing. Archbishop Lefebvre explained why this is the case:
“This might at first glance seem surprising; and yet, it is not at all. Rather, it is very natural. Our Lord is their God, their Creator, and it is impossible for there not to be an affinity between the One who created and redeemed them, and themselves, between their Creator and their souls and, consequently, the simple fact of speaking of our Lord to these souls captivated them. (p. 39)
As we know, however, there are many who have tried to subordinate the teaching of the Faith to the work that Leo XIV focuses on in Dilexi Te. Archbishop Lefebvre saw this decades ago:
“There are also those who affirm, and this occurs frequently, that in the missions, the missionaries should not preach religion to the infidels until they have given them a minimal standard of living. Of what use it is, they argue, to preach the Gospel to people who live in a completely deficient social, and even physical, environment. But this reasoning is absurd and, let us add, truly almost diabolical, because it means depriving these people and these children of what is most precious and beautiful for them, and which they are quite capable of receiving. Ultimately, it means depriving them of the very thing they are most capable of adapting themselves to, even more rapidly and more easily, perhaps, than can those persons who are well endowed and live comfortably.” (pp. 39-40)
If we want to talk about sin as it relates to how Christians treat the poor, nothing could be more sinful than for the Catholic Church’s nominal shepherds to withhold and distort the unadulterated Catholic Faith. Archbishop Lefebvre emphasized this by pointing to Our Lady’s Magnificat:
“In her admirable Magnificat, the Blessed Virgin Mary says: ‘He hath filled the hungry with good things and the rich He had sent empty away.’ So, they would like to make these poor people who are ready and able to receive the truth of our Lord rich according to the world’s standard, and deprive them of what brings true happiness; for it is not from riches that a truly happy life springs.” (p. 40)
Souls today hunger for the bread of the immutable Catholic Faith and all they receive from Rome are revolutionary stones, typically thrown in their faces. Leo XIV’s Dilexi Te says many pleasant things but ultimately does little more than make those stones look more appetizing. All of it highlights what Archbishop Lefebvre expressed so clearly:
“These few reflections are brought forth to refute the false principles according to which one would refrain from giving our Lord Jesus Christ to those who seek Him, need Him, and are waiting for Him. It is not charitable to say that first of all it is necessary to give these poor peoples a more humane standard of living, after which one will preach to them the Gospel. True charity consists in giving them straight away what is essential, that is the foundation of their joy, their happiness, and their interior transformation. . . . It is by preaching our Lord Jesus Christ that injustices will disappear. . . . It is not by class struggle that justice can be re-established, but by preaching the reign of our Lord Jesus Christ.” (pp. 40-41)
Our greatest service to the Church, world, and even Leo XIV is to insist on these truths that Archbishop Lefebvre defended. Yes, Catholics must always strive to practice corporal works of mercy, but the spiritual works of mercy are immensely more necessary today and the greatest obstacle to them happens to be the fact that Leo XIV and his Vatican are apparently fixated on continuing the Vatican II revolution. May God grant Leo XIV the grace to open his eyes to the theological poverty that he now perpetuates. Immaculate Heart of Mary, pray for us!
The clash between President Donald Trump and Pope Leo XIV has reached new proportions with the publication of Dilexi Te, which firmly places the Vatican behind two issues that the current occupant of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue has been fighting against for the last decade.
Ping
Can he now write an encyclical on the poor in spirit?
He would have to include himself and all the leftist pretenders frankee filled the Vatican with.
A home run, ebby!
Bashing Popes - check! Both vig and the excommunicated sspxer - check! Both the remains and LifePsycho from the Cartoon Network - check! Leo = Francis - check! How did they miss your “homos”? You better go lay down and rest, ebby - I think your spent.
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