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[Catholic Caucus] Vatican Gives New Guidelines for Implementing Synodality: Now Under Pope Leo XIVWhat will happen now with the arrival of Pope Leo? Sister Nathalie Becquart commented: «The plan approved by Pope Francis and confirmed by Pope Leo includes local, national, and continental assemblies, up to the Ecclesial Assembly in Rome.»The Synod’s General Secretary, chaired by Cardinal Mario Grech, has prepared the new document for the local Churches, in order to «listen to them, support their efforts, and, above all, contribute to encouraging dialogue and the exchange of gifts among the Churches.»Sister Nathalie Becquart, XMCJ, Under-Secretary of the Synod, spoke...

[Catholic / Anglican Caucus] The Jargon-Filled Synodal TrajectoryWhen Pope Leo XIV spoke from the balcony of St. Peter’s Basilica on the day of his election he said: “we want to be a synodal Church.” The significance of this depends, of course, on how Pope Leo understands synodality. The notion of a Church that is One, Holy, Catholic, Apostolic – and now Synodal – isn’t clear to most, because synodality is a largely unknown concept. Its meaning will emerge as Pope Leo guides the “synodal path” with the help of the General Secretariat of the Synod. That secretariat’s latest contribution to...

[Catholic Caucus] The Council of Nicaea and Vatican IIIs there a relationship between the Council of Nicaea, celebrated in the year 325, and the Second Vatican Council, the last of the twenty-one councils recognised as ecumenical, concluded on 8 December 1965?In a letter written on 29 June 1975 to Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre, who was criticising Vatican II, Pope Paul VI stated that “the Second Vatican Council is no less authoritative, indeed in some respects it is even more important, than the Council of Nicaea” (cf. La Doc. Catholique, 58 (1976) p. 34). The statement left many astonished at the time....

[Catholic Caucus] Will Pope Leo XIV Stop Sister Becquart’s Synodal Teams from Hijacking Local Churches?As Undersecretary of the General Secretariat of the Synod of Bishops, Sister Nathalie Becquart now has a mandate to take all the putrid fruits of the Synod and "to implement those fruits with creativity, in the diversity of the context of the local Churches.” She and the Synodal teams are not called to make the local dioceses and eparchies more holy, orthodox, or fervent. Instead (as described below), Sister Becquart wants to compel each local church to experimentally “listen to the Spirit” to determine how to...

[Catholic Caucus] Archbishop Eleganti on Synodality: ‘I Can No Longer Listen To Your Propaganda’For the love of Christ, finally put an end to the excess of synodal documents, intermediate stages, indications for the continuation of the process, announcements of results, final documents that aren’t final, extensions to other cycles, the multiplication of commissions, at the end of an assembly in a canonical no-man’s land. The vast people of God are unaware of your documents. In my experience, almost no believer knows or reads them. Stop spinning on your axis in a process that hasn’t reawakened love for Jesus Christ in...

Vatican II’s Own Words Thoroughly Rebuke the Vatican II RevolutionIf Pope Leo XIV actually applied the words of the Council as set forth below, he could use Vatican II to justify the complete overturn of the Vatican II revolution that has plagued the Church and world for six decades. Here's how that could be accomplished: In his famous “1974 Declaration,” Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre left no doubt about how he viewed the Council at which he had played an important role:“We hold fast, with all our heart and with all our soul, to Catholic Rome, Guardian of the Catholic Faith and...

[Catholic Caucus] Why Ambiguity Was the Most Lethal Weapon of Vatican II’s ArchitectsEvery single ambiguity of Vatican II tended to undermine Catholic teaching in precisely the way against which the pre-Vatican II popes emphatically warned. This is not mere coincidence. Moreover, the presence of so much ambiguity fundamentally undermines the Catholic Church’s role as truth-teller. The Church obviously knew how to speak clearly and unambiguously on all of the matters that have become so contentious after the Council.In his 2024 book Flee From Heresy: A Catholic Guide to Ancient and Modern Errors, Bishop Athanasius Schneider provided the following question and...

New York bishop laments LGBT flag ripped from church while allowing blasphemous ‘pride’ MassBishop Douglas Lucia of Syracuse has permitted a ‘pride’ Mass featuring a ‘transgender’ female Episcopalian as the homilist even as he condemned the tearing down of an LGBT flag at the same church.The bishop of Syracuse, New York, decried the removal of an LGBTQ “pride” flag from a parish in his diocese as “unfortunate.”Over the night of June 6–7, an unidentified Catholic man ripped down a “pride” flag from All Saints Catholic Church in Syracuse, the parish website revealed.During a subsequent, blasphemous “pride” Mass at the church,...

[Catholic Caucus] Traditional Catholicism’s Enemies Routinely Fail These Three Common Sense ChecksAll of this is like a Monty Python skit except that it is only humorous to the enemies of God and His Catholic Church. God has permitted the crisis in the Church to reach this point to which those who persecute Traditional Catholics are unmistakably wrong.Although we pray that the tide will turn with Pope Leo XIV, one of the most astoundingly bizarre realities in the world today is that Traditional Catholics are persecuted by the putative leaders of the Catholic Church. The crime committed by Traditional Catholics is...

[Catholic Caucus] Vatican II’s Dignitatis Humanae and the June Battle of FlagsWere it not for Dignitatis Humanae, there would be no supposed theological justification for this demand that human dignity requires us to refrain from questioning the “transness” of those claiming to practice the Catholic Faith. Thanks in large part to the defenders of Vatican II, though, Fr. Martin and the New Ways Ministry can insist that Catholics ought to celebrate Pride Month in recognition of the human dignity of the Catholic LGBTQ community.As reported by LifeSite, Fr. James Martin recently shared his opinion about why Catholics ought to celebrate...

Anglican Priestess "concelebrates" Catholic Mass? A Case Study in SynodalityIt seems that one of Mackinlay's priests has allowed an Anglican priestess to feign the concelebration of a Catholic Mass during which she also received Holy Communion. The woman, a known lesbian and LGBT-rights advocate, was one of two Anglican women who were dressed in vestments and remained near the altar throughout the Mass. Although the 'Canon' did not speak, she attempted to read the Gospel and helped herself to a chalice containing the Precious Blood.It is fairly common to hear that the definition of Synodality remains a mystery, even years...

LEO XIV: The Upcoming Challenges for the New Pope by Serre Verweijfor Rorate CæliWe have a new Pope elected during a Jubilee year. He instantly faces many crucial tasks and dilemmas. This might seem obvious for any new Pope, but in 2013 Pope Francis primarily had to deal with curial reform, he did not have to deal with countless open questions, and even open wounds, left by his predecessors. Pope Leo XIV will have to deal with foreign policy debacles, a multiyear synod, and national churches that are in open rebellion against the faith.Firstly, Cardinal Grech announced that Pope Francis...

How the Church’s Enemies Have Exploited Mistaken Views of Heresy to Essentially Guarantee Another Heretical Claimant to the PapacyDays away from the conclave to elect Francis’s successor, serious Catholics fear that it would take a miracle for the white smoke to signal the election of a pope who is Catholic. We offer our prayers and sacrifices for the most favorable outcome, but as we study the list of those cardinals most likely to receive serious consideration, it is evident that very few of them would have been recognized as Catholic by Pope Pius XII or any of his predecessors.Some sincere...

[Catholic Caucus] After 12 years of Francis, faithful Catholics must not recognize the election of a hereticIf the cardinals elect a known heretic, who is clearly ineligible to become pope, then they will surely invite God’s wrath as never before in the Church’s history. In his introduction to LifeSite’s recent article about eight cardinals who may succeed Francis, Bishop Joseph Strickland alluded to the role of the Catholic Church in recognizing whether or not the man elected by the conclave is truly the pope: As St. Robert Bellarmine and others have taught, a heretic cannot be the head of the...

A religion of externals is attractive to the unrenewed heart. The pomp and ceremony of the Catholic worship has a seductive, bewitching power, by which many are deceived; and they come to look upon the Roman Church as the very gate of heaven. None but those who have planted their feet firmly upon the foundation of truth, and whose hearts are renewed by the Spirit of God, are proof against her influence. Thousands who have not an experimental knowledge of Christ will be led to accept the forms of godliness without the power. Such a religion is just what the...

Surveying the Most Anti-Catholic Elements of the International Theological Commission’s New Document on the Nicene Creed On April 3, 2025, the International Theological Commission released a document on the Council of Nicea, "Jesus Christ, Son of God, Saviour: 1700th Anniversary of the Ecumenical Council of Nicea (325-2025)". As its preliminary note states, Cardinal Víctor Manuel Fernández and Francis approved the document’s publication in late 2024. Although we learned from Fiducia Supplicans to expect dangerous heresies from any document approved by these two men, the new document goes well beyond even the worst expectations. As we can see from the following...

Trad Godfathers at Vatican II: Lefebvre on the Eve of the CouncilTowards a Better Understanding of the Second Vatican Council: The Importance of studying the Cœtus Internationalis Patrum. Read part I The Coetus: Trad Godfathers at Vatican IIPart II: What Did the Leading Members of Coetus Want Vatican II to Address?The Case of Archbishop Marcel LefebvreWhen the progressives won their first procedural victory at Vatican II on November 21, 1962 (John XXIII withdrew the schema on Revelation that had been prepared before the council), a conservative resistance formed around Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre throughout the rest of that first conciliar session....

US Bishops Denounce Trump’s Immigration PlansThe Catholic Church has clear teachings on immigration, but US bishops stand to lose lots of money from mass deportations.Cardinal Blase Cupich of Chicago opposes Trump plan for deportationsAs President-elect Donald Trump is just days away from returning to the White House, American Catholic leaders are denouncing his immigration agenda. Chicago’s powerful Cardinal Blase Cupich warned in a recent interview that U.S. bishops “are going to have to be prophetic and denounce any abuse of human dignity that may occur” as Trump rolls out his mass deportation program. “We are going to be vigilant and...

How Do We Address the Fact that Francis is Only One Heretical Bishop Among Many?For understandable reasons, there is growing debate about whether Francis is the pope. One common argument that he has either lost the papacy, or never had it, posits that a non-Catholic cannot possibly be the pope, and Francis is not Catholic — as such, Francis cannot possibly be the pope. As interesting as that line of reasoning may be, it raises another question that receives far less attention: how do we address the fact that Francis is only one heretical bishop among many?To begin to answer...

Bishops within the Church of England have raised concerns that certain Christmas carols might be “problematic” because of their explicit references to Jesus as the “true Messiah.” The Birmingham Diocese recently communicated to its clergy the need to reassess the language used in hymns to create an “inclusive” environment during the festive season. The Birmingham Diocese instructed clergy to “use language that won’t add further confusion or tension or take away anything from the good news of the Nativity,” The Mail on Sunday reported, citing the email. The hymns under scrutiny include “Lo, He Comes With Clouds Descending,” a favorite...