Robert Francis Prevost/Leo XIV's Magnificent Sillonism, part three

Robert Francis Prevost/Leo XIV is just another garden-variety Modernist fraud who takes his worldview from disproved shibboleths about Holy Mother Church’s supposedly “checkered” past on such issues of slavery and colonialism and from the contemporary shibboleths about “global climate change,” the “contributions” made by Mohammedan immigrants to Europe, the “rights” of foreign nations to violate the just immigration laws of other nations not only with impunity but with demands for generous cradle to grave social assistance programs funded by the taxpayers of the nations they invade, and of the whole anti-life agenda of the plandemicists.

Robert Francis Prevost/Leo XIV is such an intellectually dishonest fraud that one can conclude with great confidence that what he thinks he knows about Saint Augustine, who was not sanguine about heresy and error as he us and taught that those who defect from the Holy Faith in one matter defect from It in Its entirety, and Pope Leo XIII is based upon contemporary Modernist misrepresentations and deconstructions of their writings.

For example, many fourteen months ago called attention of Pope Leo XIII’s encyclical letter Rerum Novarum, May 15, 1891, to conclude that “Leo XIV” desires to be a “workers’ pope” in the pattern of Gioacchino Vincenzo Raffaele Luigi Pecci, Pope Leo XIII.

This conclusion is overly simplistic as Rerum Novarum, was only one of Pope Leo XIII’s great encyclical letters, and I have yet to find any commentator, whether Catholic or secular, who would dare to claim that “Leo XIV” means to stand by, defend, and propagate Pope Leo XIII’s encyclical letters on the necessity of the Catholic Church being accorded the favor of the civil state in all that pertains to the good of souls (Immortale Dei, November 1, 1885, Tametsi Futura Prospicentibus, November 1, 1900, A Review of His Pontificate, March 19, 1902), the chief duties of Christians as citizens (Sapientiae Christianae, January 10, 1890), his condemnation of Freemasony and the dangers of naturalism (Humanum Genus, April 20, 1884, Custodi di Quella Fede, December 8, 1892), his careful analysis of the dangers of contemporary religious liberty while making the distinctions between the necessity of Holy Mother Church making concessions to the reality in which children find themselves in pluralistic nations without making any concessions to the errors whatsoever to modern errors as a matter of principle, Libertas Praestantissimum, June 20, 1888), his condemnation of the evils of divorce and remarriage while emphasizing the immutable first end of marriage being the begetting and education of children (Arcanum, February 10, 1880), his call for the unconditional return of non-Catholic Christians, especially the Orthodox, to return to the Catholic Church (Praeclara Gratulationis Publicae, June 29, 1894), and his explanation of the monarchical nature of the Catholic Church (Satis Cognitum, June 29, 1896) that is compatible with Jorge Mario Bergoglio’s desire for a “synodal church” that Robert Francis Prevost has said that he continue and fulfill.

This commentary, however, will focus on the currently reigning universal public face of apostasy’s solitary mention in Magnifica Humanitas, May 15, 2026, to the most pressing issue of social justice today, namely, the daily slaughter of innocent preborn human beings by chemical and surgical means, and his misrepresentation of the Catholic Church’s consistent condemnation of chattel slavery by apologizing for Pope Nicolas V’s Dum Diversas without noting anything about Pope Nicholas’s concern for repressing the Mohammedan subjugation of Catholics in Africa that played a significant role in his issuing his Papal Bull.

The following passage contains Prevost/Leo’s solitary reference to abortion in Magnifica Humanitas:

55. Human rights are inviolable, since they are “inherent in the human person and in human dignity.” Consequently, they are universal and inalienable. [68] Precisely because they are grounded in the common dignity of every man and woman, they have practical consequences and legal effects, for “it would be vain to proclaim human rights if, at the same time, everything were not done to ensure the duty of respecting them, respect by all, in all places and for all.” Among these rights, the first is the right to life, from conception to its natural end, without which it is impossible to exercise any other right. When this fundamental right is denied — as in the cases of induced abortion, killing of the innocent and euthanasia — we are faced with choices that the Church considers gravely wrong. (Encyclical Letter Robert Francis Prevost/Leo XIV, Magnifica Humanitas, May 15, 2026.)

That’s it.

Just one gratuitous reference to the daily slaughter of the innocent preborn and no reference at all to contraception or sterilization.

Rather than address this in terms of the binding precepts of the Fifth Commandment and the Natural Law, which many conciliar revolutionaries do not believe exists, Robert Francis Prevost/Leo XIV referred to abortion in terms of “human rights,” not to God’s Commandments that the killing of an innocent human being is prohibited by and offensive to the Most Holy Trinity, a Mortal Sin.

Prevost/Leo XIV devoted an entire paragraph to the “rights” of illegal immigrants within the text of Magnifica Humanitas:

A litmus test for social justice today is the treatment of migrants, refugees and those forced to move due to poverty, violence, climate change and environmental disasters. The way a society treats them reveals whether its sense of justice is driven by fear or by the spirit of fraternity. Pope Francis urged us to see migrants not simply as a problem to be managed, but as a living image of the People of God on the move. They are people with dignity, resources and dreams, who have the right to be treated with respect and to ask to become active members of the societies that welcome them. Social justice in this area entails at least two complementary commitments. On the one hand, this means protecting the rightful hopes of those forced to leave by ensuring safe and legal routes, dignified conditions for receiving them, and genuine pathways to integration. On the other hand, it means promoting the right to remain in one’s homeland in peace and security by addressing the root causes that force people to migrate, including those linked to economic injustices and the climate crisis. When these rights are respected, migration can become an opportunity for encounter and mutual enrichment among peoples. (Encyclical Letter Robert Francis Prevost/Leo XIV, Magnifica Humanitas, May 15, 2026.)

Although this paragraph appears to be somewhat “nuanced” by Prevost/Leo’s promotion of “safe and legal routes” to facilitate migration and that the countries from which people emigrate have an obligation to correct social conditions that cause their citizens to take flight, it is clear that he believes that nations such as the United States of America have an obligation to open their borders to permit an indiscriminate flow of migrants and then to “welcome” them without reservation by “integrating” them into their societies unconditionally as part of “human dignity.”

There was no discussion, of course, of the Natural Law right of nations to protect themselves by the passage and enforcement of just laws to regulate the flow immigrants and to screen those who apply for admission to assure concerns of national defense, public safety, and public health.

Let’s face facts: Robert Francis Prevost/Leo XIV believes in “open borders” and he has made opposition to the deportation of even those illegal immigrants who have committed violent crimes and/or been responsible for fatal car or truck accidents that have killed Americans by the administration of President Donald John Trump.

Exactly like the wretched little insidious demon Jorge Mario Bergoglio before him, Prevost/Leo is wasting no opportunity to meet with completely pro-abortion, pro-sodomite statist politicians to ask them for “advice” about how to oppose President Trump’s efforts to enforce laws that have been duly passed by the Congress of the United States of America concerning the regulation of immigration and, when necessary, to deport foreign nations who have entered the country illegally.

This is what “Pope Leo” did on Whit Friday, May 29, 2026, when he met with several mayors of large cities within the United States of America, the notorious Marxist Mayor of the City of Chicago, Illinois, Brandon Johnson:

Pope Leo XIV on Thursday met in a private audience with radical Chicago Democratic mayor Brandon Johnson, during which they reportedly discussed ICE raids in the city, slavery reparations, and the Iran war, but not key moral issues such as abortion and LGBT ideology, both of which Johnson supports.

While the Vatican has not disclosed what was discussed during the May 28 meeting, Johnson, a far-left Protestant, claimed during a press conference following the audience that the pair discussed President Donald Trump’s immigration policy and other concerns associated with the left. The mayor of Pope Leo’s native city offered no indication that the pontiff had discussed abortion or the LGBT agenda.

The mayor told reporters that Leo’s “position around Trump was more about disagreement with his approach.”

“The Pope wanted to know how ICE impacted our city and whether there were still examples of ICE raids happening in our city,” Johnson said. “I talked about how our rapid response community team came together to support families…. I talked about my executive orders, for which he was very gracious and encouraging, especially those I signed to protect the people of Chicago.”

Johnson’s executive orders also include one about so-called “violence against transgender women,” i.e., gender-confused men.

The mayor has a radically pro-abortion and pro-LGBT record, previously pledging to offer free abortion pills and to prosecute pro-life sidewalk counselors.

He additionally commemorated “National Abortion Provider Appreciation Day” in 2024.

“We commend the bravery and resilience of abortion providers and look forward to continuing to support their efforts to ensure that reproductive rights are upheld and respected,” Johnson said at the time. “Together, we can resist attempts to roll back the progress we have made, ensuring Chicago remains a sanctuary for choice.”

Moreover, the mayor’s team vowed to decrease the use of law enforcement against those who identify as “LGBT,” pledging “[n]o disparity in arrests between [so-called] LGBTQ+ and cisgender heterosexual populations, decreasing interactions with police,” and ending alleged “police harassment and neglect” toward gender-confused and homosexual people.

In the first year of his pontificate, Pope Leo, following his predecessor Pope Francis, has repeatedly denounced the Trump administration’s attempts to curb mass immigration. The 267th pontiff has said that the faithful will be judged for how they “receive the foreigner” and even falsely suggested that supporting the purported “inhuman treatment of immigrants in the United States” under Trump is the same as supporting abortion.

The pope, along with the vast majority of Catholic prelates, while correctly stating that countries have an obligation to treat all migrants with human dignity, has largely failed to mention the issue of the heinous crimes committed by MS-13 gang members and others entering the United States illegally and how they are violating the human dignity of its citizens and other migrants. The Vatican has also ignored the lives saved by the administration’s policies.

Johnson also said that he had discussed the pontiff’s apology for the Church’s purported role in slavery in his first encyclical, Magnifica Humanitas, and the prospect of offering reparations for the practice. He noted, though, that Leo did not take a position on reparations.

“We talked about the conditions that the long legacy of slavery and disinvestment has had on Black Americans and Black people around the world,” the mayor of Chicago said. “I engaged in a conversation with him around reparations and why it is important to work to repair the harm caused by the brutal legacy of slavery.”

Critics of Leo’s encyclical have stressed that the Catholic Church played a key role in ending the institution of slavery. Indeed, Saint Patrick, a former slave himself, is widely considered by historians to be the first person to publicly condemn slavery. In 1537, Pope Paul III, in his encyclical Sublimis Deus, forbade the enslavement of the New World’s indigenous population under penalty of excommunication. Pope Gregory XVI’s 1839 encyclical In Supremo Apostolatus denounced the transatlantic slave trade almost 30 years before it was abolished in the United States.

Johnson, who supports the virtually unrestricted murder of unborn children, also said that he discussed the ongoing war in Iran with the pontiff, telling reporters that “illegal wars” not only lead to a “trail of tears and trauma” but also “harms and brutalize our humanity.” The American pontiff has been very critical of the war, leading to pushback from Trump.

“In the midst of a brutal, horrific, and ignorant tyrant that is currently occupying the White House, it is imperative that we really walk in the true essence of our faith,” Johnson told reporters after the audience. “The impact of his failures on our global economy is quite severe. It is a disgrace to the sensibility of our humanity.”

Interestingly, while Pope Leo takes the time to meet with the non-Catholic, leftist mayor of Chicago, he has not granted an audience to the Priestly Society of Saint Pius X (SSPX), which plans to consecrate four new bishops on July 1.

Father Davide Pagliarani, Superior General of the SSPX, shared in April that Leo has still not responded to their request to meet before the planned consecration date of July 1.

“Before possibly declaring schismatic a society which counts more than a thousand members, and which serves as a point of reference for hundreds of thousands of faithful throughout the world, it might be desirable to know personally those who are to be judged,” he said.

Instead, it has been reported that Leo’s Vatican plans to excommunicate the SSPX following the consecrations. (Pope Leo holds ‘multi-faith prayer’ with far-left Chicago mayor who celebrated ‘Abortion Provider Day’.)

This really nothing new for Robert Francis Prevost/Leo XIV refused to criticize the pro-abortion United States Senator Richard Durbin when the latter had named by the pro-sodomite Blase Cupich for an award to commend his work on behalf of immigrants in September of 2025.

Let me refresh your memories as the meeting with Brandon Johnson did not come of nowhere and was not unique in the fourteen month long antipapal history of Robert Francis Prevost/Leo XIV:

Let me reprise what he said and my own commentary about it before proceeding to note that the currently reigning universal public face of apostasy and betrayal met recently with the radically pro-death, pro-sodomite Jay Robert Pritzker, who is the Governor of the State of Illinois, which is Prevost/Leo’s home state:

On September 30, a journalist from EWTN asked Leo what he thinks about Illinois Sen. Durbin being set to receive an award from Cupich despite his support for abortion.

Leo gave a long-winded answer that appeared to imply he did not have a problem with Durbin receiving the award.

“I think that it is very important to look at the overall work that a senator has done during … 40 years of service in the United States Senate,” he stated. “I understand the difficulty and the tensions but I think, as I myself have spoken to in the past, it is important to look at many issues that are related to what is the teaching of the Church.”

“Someone who says I’m against abortion but says I’m in favor of the death penalty is not really pro-life,” the Pope said. “Someone who says I’m against abortion but I’m in agreement with the inhuman treatment of immigrants in the United States, I don’t know if that’s pro-life.”

“So, they are very complex issues, I don’t know if anyone has all the truth on them, but I would ask first and foremost that there would be greater respect for one another and that we search together both as humans beings, in that case as American citizens or citizens of the state of Illinois, as well as Catholics to say we really need to look closely at all these ethical issues and to find the way forward as Church.”

“The Church teaching on each one of these issues is very clear,” he added. (Pope Leo says support for death penalty is ‘not pro-life,’ defends awarding pro-abortion Durbin.)

Several quick comments.

First, Francis Prevost/Leo XIV contradicted himself by saying: (1) “I don’t know if anyone has all the truth on them [the life issues]; and then by saying (2) “The Church teaching on each one of these issues is clear.”

Well, the Catholic Church is the infallible expositor of the Divine Positive Law, which is part of Divine Revelation, and the infallibly authoritative teacher of all that is contained in the Natural Law, which is knowable by reason and does not depend upon human acceptance for its binding force or validity. She alone has all truth on moral teaching.

Second, as I have noted so many times before, there is absolutely zero moral equivalence between the slaughter of innocent preborn children and the death penalty. Innocent life is always inviolable, and the taking of innocent human life, willful murder, is one of the four sins that cry out to Heaven for vengeance.

To emphasize the gravity of this crime, Pope Pius XI explained the terrible fate that awaits in public life who betray the innocent preborn to the bloody hands of baby butchers:

Those who hold the reins of government should not forget that it is the duty of public authority by appropriate laws and sanctions to defend the lives of the innocent, and this all the more so since those whose lives are endangered and assailed cannot defend themselves. Among whom we must mention in the first place infants hidden in the mother's womb. And if the public magistrates not only do not defend them, but by their laws and ordinances betray them to death at the hands of doctors or of others, let them remember that God is the Judge and Avenger of innocent blood which cried from earth to Heaven. (Pope Pius XI, Casti Connubii, December 31, 1930.)

This statement from the pen of a true and legitimate Successor of Saint Peter is enough in itself to disqualify Richard Durbin from the sacramental life of the Catholic Church, no less from receiving honors that he not only does not deserve but wind up emboldening the wicked in this life, are impediments to an evil doer’s conversion and thus repentance before he comes face-to-face with the Avenger of innocent blood, which has cried out from earth to Heaven.

Robert Francis Prevost/Leo XIV has thus kneecapped what was a growing list of “conservatives” within the conciliar “hierarchy” within the United States of America in a manner worthy of Jorge Mario Bergoglio himself, and those “bishops” would have had left stranded in the cold if Richard Durbin, who is a demagogue to the rotten core of his being, had not declined the award that Blase Cupich wanted to bestow on him because of the controversy Cupich’s invitation engendered.

Third, it is very clear that Robert Francis Prevost/Leo XIV lives in world shaped by leftist ideology and the false narratives that flow therefrom.

The false “pontiff’s” comments about the rough treatment of illegal immigrants, most of whom were brought into the United States of America by Latin American drug cartels whose members have flooded our urban and rural areas with a tidal wave of fentanyl and other illegal drugs that addict American citizens and has brought with it countless violent attacks, many of them fatal, against innocent American citizens.

Robert Francis Prevost/Leo XIV must either be ignorant about or completely uninterested in the victims of illegal immigrants whose plight at the hands of Immigration and Custom Enforcement officers he considers to be the moral equivalent of the daily slaughter of the innocent preborn by chemical and surgical means.

It is therefore an entirely open question whether Robert Francis Prevost/Leo XIV has heard about or even cares to be informed about the violent murders of Laken Riley, Rachel Morin, Jocelyn Nungarary, or scores of others slaughtered by these "heralds of hope." No, the conciliar "popes" and their "bishops" have existed in a delusional world that is detached from reality as they shed crocodile tears for those who been used by drug and human traffickers to violate the just laws of other nations to regulate immigration and thus to prevent the very sorts of violent crimes that men such as Prevost/Leo refuse to admit have been committed. (From A Beaut of An Antipope.)

Now, here is the LifesiteNews report of Robert Francis Prevost/Leo XIV’s meeting with Jay Robert Pritzker, who imposed some of the most draconian, Stasi-like lockdown measures during the plandemic six years ago, in November of 2025:

The stream of liberal clergy and scandalous public figures who are given audiences with Pope Leo XIV seemingly never comes to an end.

Earlier this year dissident Jesuit priest James Martin spent time with the Holy Father. He emerged from that meeting claiming that he believes Leo will ensure that “LGBT Catholics” are welcome in the Church.

So far, his prediction is correct, especially after the sacrilegious LGBT pilgrimage that took place inside St. Peter’s Basilica this summer.

Now comes news that pro-abortion Democratic Governor JB Pritzker of Illinois spoke with Leo for around 40 minutes at the Vatican during a private meeting Wednesday.

In the past, Pritzker has designated Illinois a “sanctuary state” for women seeking abortions, expanded access to chemical abortion pills, and approved policies LGBT activists have long desired. He may sign a bill that would legalize physician-assisted suicide.

According to a Pritzker spokesman, the audience with Leo Wednesday was arranged by — who else? — pro-LGBT Chicago Cardinal Blase Cupich, a man with whom he has had a long and rather chummy relationship.

During COVID-19, for example, Cupich worked closely with Pritzker’s office to coordinate the shutting down of churches in his archdiocese. Cupich has also amplified talking points that echo Pritzker’s own remarks condemning the Trump administration’s immigration policies.

While Pope Leo has no doubt previously met with conservative clergy and laity — U.S. Cardinal Raymond Burke and U.S. Vice President JD Vance, for instance — the purpose of the Pritzker meeting seems to be overtly political.

Last week the U.S. bishops’ conference issued a “special pastoral message” for the first time in 12 years. The last time they released such a message was not to denounce the Biden administration’s mendacious spying on Catholics who attend the Latin Mass, or his backing of mutilation surgeries for gender-confused persons, but President Obama’s contraception mandate.

This week Tuesday outside Castel Gandolfo, Pope Leo expressed support for the USCCB’s message.

“I think we have to look for ways of treating people humanely, treating people with the dignity they have,” he said. “If people are in the United States illegally, there are ways to treat that. There are courts, there’s a system of justice. I think there are a lot of problems in the system.”

So the timing of Pritzker’s audience Wednesday is rather beneficial, politically speaking.

Indeed, the Chicago Tribune has reported that the two spoke about “their shared concerns about the Trump administration’s immigration enforcement practices in Chicago.”

And there you have it.

It would seem that the Vatican these days is willing to meet with any public figure, no matter how much they oppose the Church’s moral and doctrinal teachings. So long as they support Leo’s views on immigration, they are given the green light for a photo-op with the pope. (Pope Leo just met with Illinois' radically pro-abortion, pro-LGBT Gov. JB Pritzker.)

To this, my friends, it is enough to reprise Pope Pius XI’s stern admonition to pro-abortion public officials as contained in Casti Connubii, December 31, 1930:

As can be seen, Robert Francis Prevost/Leo XIV’s Magnifica Humanitas is drawing praise from all the wrong people. Prevost/Leo is so blinded by the ideological bubble within which he lives that he is compelled to give credibility to men such as Brandon Johnson and Jay Robert Pritsker to draw attention to his rabid opposition to anything that President Donald John Trump does ven when the president does things that merely fulfill his constitutional duties to protect the citizens of the United States of America.

Prevost/Leo thus must overlook the rampant street crime in the City of Chicago that Brandon Johnson indemnifies at every turn and is thus as blind to and mute about to the crimes committed by the violent illegal immigrants that are so important to the agenda of the conciliar revolution. Prevost/Leo has thus given complete “papal” cover to the likes Brandon Johnson, Jay Robert Pritzker, Kathleen Hochul, Gavin Newsom as they indignantly posture and preen for the cameras about the “persecution” of illegal immigrants are commit violent crimes, going so far as to refuse to cooperate with the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency when it issues detainers against illegal immigrants who are recidivist career criminals.

Robert Francis Prevost/Leo XIV has so isolated himself in his Modernist/leftist bubble that not even the testimony of an “angel father,” Joe Abraham earlier this year could move him to criticize his beloved Richard Durbin after Mr. Abraham had the courage to denounce Durbin’s silence about the death of his daughter at the hands of an illegal immigrant who had been issued an Illinois driver’s license:

A Senate hearing got tense and quiet after Illinois father Joe Abraham confronted retiring Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., for not acknowledging his daughter, Katie, who was killed by an illegal immigrant drunk driver.

After Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, expressed his condolences to Abraham, the grieving father thanked him and then proceeded to drill into Durbin.

"I appreciate it. I also appreciate Ranking Member Welch and Mr. Padilla for recognizing that. What I don’t understand is why my senator of Illinois, Mr. Durbin, [I] haven’t heard two words from him toward me," he said, pointing in Durbin’s direction.

"It’s kind of amazing," Abraham added.

In the suddenly quiet hearing chamber, Cruz said, "I think it is a fair question to ask." Abraham answered, "Kind of happy he’s calling it quits."

After the tense exchange, Abraham again called out Durbin, writing, "You had the chance to show basic humanity, to acknowledge Katie’s life and death, as other senators in your own party did. Instead, silence. Not a call, not a statement, not even basic human acknowledgment."

Abraham stated that "silence in the face of tragedy isn’t neutrality. It’s indifference."

"You’re retiring, but for many of us, that comes 30 years too late. And whoever you choose to endorse should be rejected just as quickly, because Illinois cannot afford more of the same," he added, writing, "Illinois families deserve better than leaders who look away when the consequences don’t fit their narrative."

He also criticized Durbin for supporting sanctuary policies, saying, "My daughter died in a system shaped by policies you continue to defend."

Abraham’s 20-year-old daughter, Katie Abraham, was killed by an illegal immigrant in a drunk-driving incident while standing at a stoplight in the college town of Urbana, Illinois. The federal government’s immigration crackdown in the Chicago area was launched in Katie’s honor. Dubbed "Operation Midway Blitz," the effort resulted in more than 4,500 illegal immigrant arrests, according to DHS.

In an interview with Fox News Digital, Abraham, a lifelong Illinois resident, described his family as navigating a "dark wilderness" in the wake of Katie’s death.

"We have been in a dark wilderness, wandering, trying to find our new purpose … without Katie, who we thought would be with us the rest of our lives," he said.

"She was a beautiful soul," he added, lamenting, "We thought we'd have our children the rest of our lives."

Addressing other Illinoisans, Abraham warned, "If anything, God forbid, happens to you, your state under this regime will turn its back on you, 100%."

"That's what they've done with us and Katie," he said. (Senate hearing goes quiet after grieving father confronts pro-sanctuary politican.)

Mr. Abraham is suffering through quite a tragedy, of course, and his anguish is very genuine and very well-founded.

However, as needless as his daughter Katie’s death was, it is nevertheless true that everything happens within the Providence of God as justice is pursued without malice and prayers are offered for the conversion of malefactors who commit heinous crimes as well as the conversion of those whose policies made such crimes possible and then shieled malefactors from facing the consequences for their actions.

There is also the case of young Sheridan Gorman, a Loyola University student, who was shot and killed by an illegal immigrant who was released into American society under the policies of former President Joseph Robinette Biden, Jr., and former United States of America Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security Alejandro Mayorkas:

House Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., decried Democratic sanctuary policies, saying they "worked exactly as the Democrats intended," allowing the murder of Chicago college student Sheridan Gorman.

Speaking with reporters at the U.S. Capitol, Johnson lamented that "but for that crazy set of policies, this young lady would still be alive."

[Sheridan] Gorman, an 18-year-old student at Loyola University Chicago, was shot and killed on March 19, allegedly by Venezuelan illegal immigrant Jose Medina-Medina. He had been previously apprehended and released by U.S. Border Patrol under the Biden administration in 2023 and was arrested again for shoplifting shortly after entering the country.

Gorman, an 18-year-old student at Loyola University Chicago, was shot and killed on March 19, allegedly by Venezuelan illegal immigrant Jose Medina-Medina. He had been previously apprehended and released by U.S. Border Patrol under the Biden administration in 2023 and was arrested again for shoplifting shortly after entering the country.

Johnson remarked that "the irony of all this is that the system did not fail Sheridan."

"That worked exactly as the Democrats intended," he said. "You had Democrats in charge of the White House, in charge in the city of Chicago, open borders policy, sanctuary city policies. They coddled the criminal illegal alien, they empowered, they allowed this to happen."

Mass outrage has erupted across the country since Gorman’s killing, with some comparing it to the 2024 killing of Georgia nursing student Laken Riley, which became a watershed case in the presidential election.

Among the critics of Chicago’s Democratic leaders is Gorman’s family, which is pushing back on comments that her death was a "senseless tragedy" and demanding accountability for what they call systemic failures. The Gorman family on Wednesday released a statement criticizing both Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson and Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker, saying that her death "demands accountability."

Johnson said the fact that open border and sanctuary policies worked as intended is "why we're so angry about it."

"He was in the custody of law enforcement twice, and there were two chances to stop Sheridan's killer. But Democrats’ open borders guaranteed his release, and their soft-on-crime sanctuary policies ensured his impunity. And that's why this happened. And Sheridan Gorman should still be with us and her entire life still ahead of her."

"How many more times did this story have to be repeated? Everybody needs to be asking that question," he went on, adding, "Unfortunately, the Democrats’ agenda is going to continue to come at the expense of American citizens, innocent American people. As long as the Democrats insist on shielding dangerous criminals from our laws." (Sheridan Gorman killing worked exactly as Dems 'intended,' says Mike Johnson.)

For all his redundant talk about “human dignity,” Robert Francis Prevost/Leo XIV will never have even the Judeo-Masonic decency to utter the names of Sheridan Gorman, Laken Riley, Rachel Morin and so many others who have been deprived of their lives of the very people that Prevost/Leo wants to keep safe from ICE raids.

Robert Francis Prevost/Leo XIV can meet with Brandon Johnson and express concern about ICE raids in the City of Chicago while being as mute about the killings of innocent Americans by illegal immigrants and while also being morally derelict by not excoriating Johnson’s support of the daily slaughter of innocent preborn children by chemical and surgical means in the manner that he reserves almost exclusively for the enforcement of this country’s just immigration laws.

Meanwhile, the policies of another “sanctuary state” governor, Gavin Michael Newsom of the People’s Republic of California, have resulted in yet another killing of three innocent human beings, including a two week old baby, at the hands of an illegal immigrant upon whom the United States Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency had issued no less than three detainers, each of which were ignored by the pro-abortion, pro-sodomite, pro-open borders statist Gavin Michael Newsom, who remains a Catholic in good standing within the structures of the counterfeit church of conciliarism despite (or may because of) his support for each of the four sins that cry out to Heaven for vengeance:

The illegal immigrant accused of slaughtering a 2-week-old baby, the child's mother and grandmother flashed a grin during a California courtroom appearance Monday as devastated relatives of the victims looked on from the gallery.

Joaquin Escoto, 28, entered Stanislaus County Superior Court shackled at the wrists and ankles, wearing an orange-and-white jail uniform and sitting beside his attorney and a Spanish interpreter. But it was his apparent smirk during the proceedings that stood out as family members were still reeling from what prosecutors allege was a vicious triple murder.

Escoto is charged with three counts of first-degree murder in the deaths of 23-year-old Fabiola Gonzalez-Nunez, her newborn son Mateo Gonzalez and 54-year-old Sylvia Nunez-Villalobos. He also faces special-circumstance allegations for multiple victims, a knife enhancement, child abuse resulting in the death of a child under 8 and child endangerment involving the couple's surviving 3-year-old child.

The hearing lasted only a few minutes, but for relatives of the victims watching from the gallery, the pain remains constant.

Nunez described her niece as a young woman whose future had only just begun.

"He cut her wings," Nunez said. "She had a whole life in front of her. She had a goal. She had dreams."

The family says they still do not know what may have motivated the killings and are searching for answers as they try to make sense of the tragedy.

"They gave him all their love, their respect, and they were there for him," one relative told KTXL. "We just don't understand what was going on in his head."

The deaths have been especially difficult for loved ones because baby Mateo was only 2 weeks old when prosecutors say he was killed alongside his mother and grandmother. (Illegal immigrant accused of triple murder smirks in California court. Also see WAVE OF ALLEGED MIGRANT MURDERS IGNITES FURY ACROSS US AS OFFICIALS WARN OF MORE CARNAGE, CRACKDOWN NEEDED.)

Add the names of Fabiola Gonzalez-Nunez, Mateo Gonzalez and Sylvia Nunez-Villalobos to the long list of innocent people killed by illegal immigrants who will never be named by Robert Francis Prevost/Leo XIV, who like, Jorge Mario Bergoglio, waxes interminably about the “rights” and “dignity” of illegal immigrants.

Robert Francis Prevost/Leo XIV is nothing other than a Modernist/globalist fake, phony, fraud of the thirty-third degree.

Thus, I reiterate Pope Pius XI’s rejoinder to pro-aborts in public life:

Moreover, Robert Francis Prevost/Leo XIV, used the text of Magnifica Humanitas to endorse almost every globalist myth that is promoted by open enemies of the Catholic Fath to arrogate power unto themselves at the cost of suppressing legitimate human liberties, including the right of citizens and scholars from other nations to document the fictious nature of these globalist myths, including the Catholic Church’s clear opposition to slavery despite his contentions to the contrary.

Magnifica Humanitas’s also text discussed slavery in an intellectually dishonest manner and was one of the subjects that was discussed when the of the fake “pope” met with Brandon Johnson last week:

174. The fight against new forms of slavery is a decisive test for the ethical discernment of AI and digital transformation. In continuity with the tradition inaugurated by Leo XIII, the Church renews her firm condemnation of all forms of slavery, trafficking and the commodification of persons. She likewise highlights the urgent need for reflection and action that keep the inalienable dignity of every human being and the common good, as both the focus and goal of society, as well as the guiding criteria for every personal, social and political choice. Without this ethical and humanizing reflection, the growing power of digital systems could lead us toward new atrocities that are no less shameful than those of the past that we now deplore, while we continue to present ourselves as “advanced” and “civilized” societies.

175. Human trafficking must be recognized as a contemporary form of slavery and a grave violation of human dignity. Failing to respond firmly, or tolerating these practices in any way, is in some way to become complicit in today’s sins, which are akin to those of the past when slavery was being concealed and justified. [173]

176. In the development of her doctrine, the Church has gradually come to a deeper awareness of the gravity of these issues. It is true that past events cannot be judged anachronistically, as though the moral criteria that matured over time had always been available. Yet neither can we deny or diminish the delay with which both society and the Church came to denounce the scourge of slavery. In antiquity and the Middle Ages many individuals and even ecclesiastical institutions had slaves. Already in the early modern period, the Apostolic See of Rome, responding to requests from Sovereigns, intervened several times in order to regulate and legitimize forms of subjugation, and, in certain cases, the enslavement of “infidels.” [174] It was only in the nineteenth century that a formal, absolute and universal condemnation of slavery was clearly articulated, notably under Pope Leo XIII. [175] This development offers a clear example of the Church’s growth in understanding the perennial truths of Revelation that she safeguards. Although there was not always consistency in practice — given that slavery was long tolerated before being unequivocally condemned — there has been a continuous affirmation throughout history of the dignity of every human being, created in the image of God, even if it took eighteen centuries for its full incompatibility with slavery to be explicitly recognized. This constitutes a wound in Christian memory, one from which we cannot consider ourselves detached. [176] It is impossible not to feel deep sorrow when contemplating the immense suffering and humiliation endured by so many in stark contrast to their immeasurable dignity as persons infinitely loved by the Lord. For this, in the name of the Church, I sincerely ask for pardon. (Encyclical Letter Robert Francis Prevost/Leo XIV, Magnifica Humanitas, May 15, 2026.)

Extensive Commentary:

From whom does Robert Francis Prevost/Leo XIV seek pardon?

The world?

Holy Mother is inerrant. She is inviolate.

One cannot attribute to Holy Mother Church the sins of her members, something that Pope Pius XII made abundantly clear in Mystici Corporis Christi, June 29, 1943:

And if at times there appears in the Church something that indicates the weakness of our human nature, it should not be attributed to her juridical constitution, but rather to that regrettable inclination to evil found in each individual, which its Divine Founder permits even at times in the most exalted members of His Mystical Body, for the purpose of testing the virtue of the shepherds no less than of the flocks, and that all may increase the merit of their Christian faith. For, as We said above, Christ did not wish to exclude sinners from His Church; hence if some of her members are suffering from spiritual maladies, that is no reason why we should lessen our love for the Church, but rather a reason why we should increase our devotion to her members. Certainly the loving Mother is spotless in the Sacraments, by which she gives birth to and nourishes her children; in the faith which she has always preserved inviolate; in her sacred laws imposed on all; in the evangelical counsels which she recommends; in those heavenly gifts and extraordinary graces through which, with inexhaustible fecundity, [130] she generates hosts of martyrs, virgins and confessors. But it cannot be laid to her charge if some members fall, weak or wounded. In their name she prays to God daily: "Forgive us our trespasses"; and with the brave heart of a mother she applies herself at once to the work of nursing them back to spiritual health. When therefore we call the Body of Jesus Christ "mystical," the very meaning of the word conveys a solemn warning. It is a warning that echoes in these words of St. Leo: "Recognize, O Christian, your dignity, and being made a sharer of the divine nature go not back to your former worthlessness along the way of unseemly conduct. Keep in mind of what Head and of what Body you are a member." [131] (Pope Pius XII, Mystici Corporis, June 29, 1943.)

This truth is unknown to most defecting Catholics as it is the case in many, although not all, instances the lame excuses they give to quit the practice of the Holy Faith and/or to walk into the waiting arms of heretics and infidels are meant to cover the simple fact that they do not want to keep one or more of the binding precepts of the Divine Positive Law and the Natural Law. Among these precepts is the absolutely Sovereignty of God over the sanctity and fecundity of marriage, and it is all too frequently the case these days that Catholics walk away from even the easy-going ways of the counterfeit church of conciliarism because they do want to use contraception freely without any possibility of being reminded that they are jeopardizing the salvation of their immortal souls.

However, did Pope Nicholas V do anything for which his position on Portuguese colonialism and slavey must be apologized.

Historian Paul Kengor, who uncovered the fact that United States Senator Edward Moore Kennedy (D-Massachusetts) pled with Soviet officials to interfere in the 1984 presidential election to prevent the re-election of then President Ronald Wilson Reagan (see Ted Kennedy's Soviet Gambit and How Democrats Try to Use Russia to Defeat My Father), argues that the answer is no as it was Pope Nicholas V’s goal wasto advance the evangelization of the Americas and to secure the salvation of the souls of the indigenous people on these shores as well of the Africans sold into slavery by Jewish slave traders in cooperation with tribal chieftains who wanted to make money by selling their dissidents or rivals to the moneychangers:

It’s easy to forget that the institution of slavery has constituted a social norm in human history. From the grand perspective of time, its supporters and defenders have far outnumbered its critics and condemners.

While one can find intimations of unease with slavery in some Greek and Roman thinkers, there is little question that it was Christianity that introduced the deepest doubts about both the legitimacy of slavery as a practice and the widespread cultural habit of viewing entire categories of people as natural slaves.

This runs against the common narrative that it is only with the various Enlightenments that slavery was subsequently challenged. With some notable exceptions, Enlightenment thinkers were either silent on the topic or decidedly ambiguous. In fact, the institution that most often was the target of many Enlightenment thinkers—the Catholic Church—turns out to have been consistent and early in its condemnation of slavery.

Knowledge of Catholicism’s firm stance against slavery is not widespread, even among Catholics, some of whom hold senior positions in the Church today. I was reminded of this recently when reading Pope Francis’ response to questions submitted by five cardinals in July 2023: specifically, the part in which the pope addressed the broad topic of the magisterium’s interpretation of Scripture and its own previous statements. Referring particularly to Pope Nicholas V’s bull Dum Diversas (1452), Francis describes this as a magisterial document “that tolerated slavery,” and thus a text that “requires interpretation.”

Enter a new and very timely book, The Worst of Indignities: The Catholic Church on Slavery. Its author, Paul Kengor, addresses the topic of Dum Diversas and another of Nicholas V’s bulls, Romanus Pontifex (circa 1454), at the book’s very beginning. Like any good scholar, Kengor analyzes the two texts carefully and consults serious commentators on the topic. This leads him to two conclusions.

The first is that one needs to understand the context of both documents. One is the treatment of captives taken during war at a time in which the customs and rules surrounding this topic, especially as expressed in the law of nations, were then being debated. This was a period in which, Kengor notes, “the notion of ‘just’ enslavement was accepted as a form of punishment for dealing with wartime prisoners in a just war.” Other scholars also observe, Kengor points out, that Nicholas V was addressing a particular situation (Portugal’s expansion into West Africa and subsequent conflict with pagan and Muslim populations). The pope’s comments, one cited scholar states, were “not meant to apply to all times and places.”

Kengor’s second conclusion is that, even putting the worst interpretation upon these two documents (which, Kengor admits, might yet be accurate), we should bear in mind that these statements

were utter exceptions, completely anomalous to other popes, clergy, lay leaders, and Church councils over two millennia—that is, immediately before, immediately after, and ever since. Any modern scholar who seeks to elevate those two statements above and beyond everything else is being grossly unfair. That would not be scholarly.

Much of Kengor’s book subsequently explains the “before,” “after,” and “ever since” of the Catholic Church’s condemnation of slavery and how this teaching emerged very early in the Church’s life. Alongside exploring the history of the teaching, Kengor addresses how Catholic bishops, priests, religious orders, and laypeople treated slaves. In other words, ideas and praxis are given equal attention.

On the level of formal teaching, the Church’s record, Kengor illustrates, is one of consistent opposition to slavery. Very quickly, slavery was understood to be sinful by the Church. The position emerged more or less directly from the Gospels and the writings of Saint Paul. It was also considered universal in its application. (Catholicism and Slavery: Setting the Record Straight.)

Specifically, though, as I have noted in the past, the practice of chattel slavery was condemned by pope after pope in the aftermath of exploration and colonialism in the Americas and Africa that began in the Fifteenth, Sixteenth, and Seventeenth Centuries:

Eugene IV: Sicut Dudum, 1435

On January 13, 1435, Eugene IV issued from Florence the bull Sicut Dudum. Sent to Bishop Ferdinand, located at Rubicon on the island of Lanzarote, this bull condemned the enslavement of the black natives of the newly colonized Canary Islands off the coast of Africa. The Pope stated that after being converted to the faith or promised baptism, many of the inhabitants were taken from their homes and enslaved:

"They have deprived the natives of their property or turned it to their own use, and have subjected some of the inhabitants of said islands to perpetual slavery (subdiderunt perpetuae servituti), sold them to other persons and committed other various illicit and evil deeds against them.... Therefore We ... exhort, through the sprinkling of the Blood of Jesus Christ shed for their sins, one and all, temporal princes, lords, captains, armed men, barons, soldiers, nobles, communities and all others of every kind among the Christian faithful of whatever state, grade or condition, that they themselves desist from the aforementioned deeds, cause those subject to them to desist from them, and restrain them rigorously. And no less do We order and command all and each of the faithful of each sex that, within the space of fifteen days of the publication of these letters in the place where they live, that they restore to their pristine liberty all and each person of either sex who were once residents of said Canary Islands ... who have been made subject to slavery (servituti subicere). These people are to be totally and perpetually free and are to be let go without the exaction or reception of any money."

The date of this Bull, 1435, is very significant. Nearly 60 years before the Europeans were to find the New World, we already had the papal condemnation of slavery as soon as this crime was discovered in one of the first of the Portuguese geographical discoveries.

Eugene IV was clear in his intentions both to condemn the enslavement of the residents of the Canary Islands, and to demand correction of the injustice within 15 days. Those who did not restore the enslaved to their liberty in that time were to incur the sentence of excommunication ipso facto.

With Sicut Dudum, Eugene was clearly intending to condemn the enslavement of the people of the Canaries and, in no uncertain terms, to inform the faithful that what was being condemned was what we would classify as gravely wrong. Thus, the unjust slavery that had begun in the newly found territories was condemned, condemned as soon as it was discovered, and condemned in the strongest of terms.

Paul III: Sublimis Deus, 1537

The pontifical decree known as "The Sublime God" has indeed had an exalted role in the cause of social justice in the New World. Recently, authors such as Gustavo Gutierrez have noted this fact: 'The bull of Pope Paul III, Sublimis Deus (June 2, 1537), is regarded as the most important papal pronouncement on the human condition of the Indians." It is, moreover, addressed to all of the Christian faithful in the world, and not to a particular bishop in one area, thereby not limiting its significance, but universalizing it.

Sublimis Deus was intended to be issued as the central pedagogical work against slavery. Two other bulls would be published to implement the teaching of Sublimis, one to impose penalties on those who fail to abide by the teaching against slavery, and a second to specify the sacramental consequences of the teaching that the Indians are true men.

The first central teaching of this beautiful work is the universality of the call to receive the Faith and salvation:

"And since mankind, according to the witness of Sacred Scripture, was created for eternal life and happiness, and since no one is able to attain this eternal life and happiness except through faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, it is necessary to confess that man is of such a nature and condition that he is capable to receive faith in Christ and that everyone who possesses human nature is apt for receiving such faith . . . Therefore the Truth Himself Who can neither deceive nor be deceived, when He destined the preachers of the faith to the office of preaching, is known to have said: 'Going, make disciples of all nations.' 'All,' he said, without any exception, since all are capable of the discipline of the faith."

The teaching of Sublimis continued:

"Seeing this and envying it, the enemy of the human race, who always opposes all good men so that the race may perish, has thought up a way, unheard of before now, by which he might impede the saving word of God from being preached to the nations. He has stirred up some of his allies who, desiring to satisfy their own avarice, are presuming to assert far and wide that the Indians of the West and the South who have come to our notice in these times be reduced to our service like brute animals, under the pretext that they are lacking the Catholic Faith. And they reduce them to slavery (Et eos in servitutem redigunt), treating them with afflictions they would scarcely use with brute animals."

The common pretext of the allies of "the enemy of the human race," i.e. Satan, for enslaving the Indians was that they lacked the Faith. Some of the Europeans used the reasoning that converting the Indians should be accomplished by any means necessary, thus making the Faith an excuse for war and enslavement. Paul III stated that the practice of this form of servitude was "unheard of before now." This clearly indicates that the practice of enslaving an entire ethnic group of people—the Indians of South America—for no morally justifiable reason was indeed different from anything previously encountered.

The second core teaching of Sublimis Deus which follows from this is the necessity of restoring and maintaining the liberty of the Indians:

"Therefore, We, . . . noting that the Indians themselves indeed are true men and are not only capable of the Christian faith, but, as has been made known to us, promptly hasten to the faith' and wishing to provide suitable remedies for them, by our Apostolic Authority decree and declare by these present letters that the same Indians and all other peoples—even though they are outside the faith—who shall hereafter come to the knowledge of Christians have not been deprived or should not be deprived of their liberty or of their possessions. Rather they are to be able to use and enjoy this liberty and this ownership of property freely and licitly, and are not to be reduced to slavery, and that whatever happens to the contrary is to be considered null and void. These same Indians and other peoples are to be invited to the said faith in Christ by preaching and the example of a good life."

Thus, we see that Eugene IV and Paul III did not hesitate to condemn the forced servitude of Blacks and Indians, and they did so once such practices became known to the Holy See. Their teaching was continued by Gregory XIV in 1591 and by Urban VIII in 1639. Indeed Urban, in his document Commissum Nobis, appealed to the teaching of his predecessors, particularly Paul III. The pontifical teaching was continued by the response of the Holy Office on March 20, 1686, under Innocent XI, and by the encyclical of Benedict XIV, Immensa Pastorum, on December 20, 1741. This work was followed by the efforts of Pius VII at the Congress of Vienna in 1815 to have the victors over Napoleon outlaw slavery.

Gregory XVI: In Supremo, 1839

The 1839 Constitution In Supremo by Gregory XVI continued the antislavery teaching of his predecessors, and was in the same manner not accepted by many of those bishops, priests and laity for whom it was written. As we will see, even today many authors do not have an accurate understanding of this work. First, however, let us consider the content of In Supremo itself.

The introduction of In Supremo tells us that it was written to turn Christians away from the practice of enslaving blacks and other peoples. In it, Gregory first mentioned the efforts of the Apostles and other early Christians to alleviate out of the motive of Christian charity the suffering of those held in servitude, and that they encouraged the practice of emancipating deserving slaves. At the same time, he noted that:

"There were to be found subsequently among the faithful some who, shamefully blinded by the desire of sordid gain, in lonely and distant countries did not hesitate to reduce to slavery (in servitutem redigere) Indians, Blacks and other unfortunate peoples, or else, by instituting or expanding the trade in those who had been made slaves by others, aided the crime of others. Certainly many Roman Pontiffs of glorious memory, Our Predecessors, did not fail, according to the duties of their office, to blame severely this way of acting as dangerous for the spiritual welfare of those who did such things and a shame to the Christian name."

Gregory then cited the various predecessors and their antislavery teachings, even recalling the familiar phrase in servitutem redigere contained in the work of Paul III and his successors. He mentioned the efforts of Clement I, Pius II, Paul III, Benedict XIV, Urban VIII and Pius VII, before concluding this historical summary:

"Indeed these sanctions and this concern of Our Predecessors availed in no small measure, with the help of God, to protect the Indians and the other peoples mentioned from the cruelties of the invaders and from the greed of Christian traders."

However Gregory was well aware that there was still much work to be done:

"The slave trade, although it has been somewhat diminished, is still carried on by numerous Christians. Therefore, desiring to remove such a great shame from all Christian peoples ... and walking in the footsteps of Our Predecessors, We, by apostolic authority, warn and strongly exhort in the Lord faithful Christians of every condition that no one in the future dare to bother unjustly, despoil of their possessions, or reduce to slavery (“in servitutem redigere”) Indians, Blacks or other such peoples. Nor are they to lend aid and favor to those who give themselves up to these practices, or exercise that inhuman traffic by which the Blacks, as if they were not humans but rather mere animals, having been brought into slavery in no matter what way, are, without any distinction and contrary to the rights of justice and humanity, bought, sold and sometimes given over to the hardest labor."

Thus, the historical papal teaching against unjust servitude and the slave trade was upheld, and in 1839 was once again presented to the Christian faithful for their adherence.

In Gregory's time, as with the previous papal efforts, there was obviously widespread non-acceptance on the part of Catholic clergy and laity. Thus, In Supremo also contains a closing prohibition against clerics as well as laity who were attempting to defend slavery or the slave trade:

"We prohibit and strictly forbid any Ecclesiastic or lay person from presuming to defend as permissible this trade in Blacks under no matter what pretext or excuse, or from publishing or teaching in any manner whatsoever, in public or privately, opinions contrary to what We have set forth in these Apostolic Letters."

The primary area of contention with In Supremo lies in determining what was actually being condemned by Gregory. The text of the Papal Constitution itself clearly condemned both the slave trade and slavery, as is apparent from the preceding paragraph citations. Both of the above citations prohibit the slave trade. Likewise, in the first paragraph we read that slavery itself is also condemned: "... no one in the future dare to ... reduce to slavery (“in servitutem redigere”) Indians, Blacks or other such peoples." In the second paragraph, the prohibition of "opinions contrary to what We have set forth in these Apostolic Letters" indicates that no one may hold that slavery itself is somehow not condemned. (As quoted in Father Joel Panzer, The Popes and Slavery. The text of three of these encyclicals is appended below).

As the United States of America is founded on a welter of Calvinist and Judeo-Masonic errors, there was widespread acceptance of chattel slavery among Catholics in the South and a studied ambiguity on the part of the American bishops about the “applicability” of Pope Gregory XVI’s In Supremo, which was described quite correctly by one scholar as Americanized Gallicanism, thereby furthering the Americanist notion that would be expressed by Archbishop John Ireland and James Cardinal Gibbons in the Nineteenth Century and by Monsignor Francis Duffy in the article he ghostwrote for New York Governor Alfred Emanuel Smith in 1927 that the papal condemnations of the separation of Church and State do not apply to the United States of America:

he prevalent attitude of the American hierarchy, with some notable exceptions in both directions, was that many aspects of slavery were evil, but that to change the law would be, practically speaking, a greater evil.

Some put forth strong arguments in favor of the institution of slavery, such as Bishop John England of Charleston, who believed it to be among the accepted practices of the early Church: "The right of the master, the duty of the slave, the lawfulness of continuing the relations, and the benevolence of religion in mitigating the sufferings ... are the results exhibited by our view of the laws and facts during the first four centuries of Christianity."

Answering the charge that Catholics were widely supporting the abolitionist movement—which sadly was far from accurate—England noted that Gregory XVI was condemning only the slave trade and not slavery itself, especially as it existed in the United States.

To prove his opinion, England had In Supremo translated and published in his diocesan newspaper, The United States Catholic Miscellany, and even went so far as to write a series of 18 extensive letters to John Forsyth, the Secretary of State under President Martin Van Buren, to explain how he and most of the other American bishops interpreted In Supremo.

In one of these letters we learn of the events of the 1840 Council of Baltimore, where the bishops read and discussed this apostolic letter:

"Thus, if this document condemned our domestic slavery as an unlawful and consequently immoral practice, the bishops could not have accepted it without being bound to refuse the sacraments to all who were slave holders unless they manumitted their slaves; yet, if you look to the prelates who accepted the document, for the acceptation was immediate and unanimous: you will find, 1st the Archbishop of Baltimore ...2d, the Bishop of Bardstown ... 3d, the Bishop of Charleston: ... 4th, the Bishop of St. Louis ... 5th, the Bishop of Mobile ... 6th, the Bishop of New Orleans ...and 7th, the Bishop of Nashville ... they all regarded the letter as treating of the 'slave-trade,' and not as touching 'domestic slavery.' I believe, sir, we may consider this to be pretty conclusive evidence as to the light in which that document is viewed by the Roman Catholic Church."

Amazingly, it was decided that papal pronouncements against slavery, particularly Gregory XVI's In Supremo, did not apply to the institution as it existed in the United States, thus yielding on this issue a sort of Americanized Gallicanism.

However, it is clear that Gregory wrote In Supremo to condemn precisely what was occurring in the United States, namely the enslavement of blacks:

"We, by apostolic authority, warn and strongly exhort in the Lord faithful Christians of every condition that no one in the future dare to bother unjustly, despoil of their possessions, or reduce to slavery (in servitutem redigere) Indians, Blacks or other such peoples."

England evidently felt justification for this dissent lay in the episcopal (mis)interpretation of In Supremo.

These arguments are not dissimilar to the widespread dissent from the Church's teachings against slavery by bishops, priests and laity that was common from the 17th to 19th centuries. For the Catholics of the United States—as for Catholics everywhere—there was the consistent, historical teaching of the Church, as presented through Eugene IV. Pius II, Paul III, Gregory XIV, Urban VIII, Innocent XI, Benedict XIV, Pius VII and others.

For the early 19th century, in the midst of the volatile decades before the Civil War, Gregory XVI issued In Supremo, with its clear condemnation of both the slave trade and slavery itself.

Since that Constitution mentioned the documents of the previous pontiffs, it is hard to understand how the American hierarchy was not aware of the consistency of the teaching and its nature.

All of these teachings, nonetheless, went unknown to the Catholic faithful of the U.S., perhaps through willful ignorance, or were explained away by many of the American bishops and clergy. Thus, we can look to the practice of dissent from the teachings of the Papal Magisterium as a key reason why slavery was not directly opposed by the Church in the United States. (Father Joel Panzer, The Popes and Slavery.)

It is useful to note that the Americanist bishops of the Nineteenth Century saw the proclamation of papal teaching as a “greater evil” than institutionalized chattel slavery, something that, as noted above, they would do in refusing to admit the universality of the teaching contained Pope Gregory XVI’s Mirari Vos, August 15, 1832, Pope Pius IX’s The Syllabus of Errors and Quanta Cura, December 8, 1864, and Pope Leo XIII’s Diuturnum Illud, June 29, 1881, Humanum Genus (which condemned Freemasonry and the spirit of Freemasonic naturalism despite the contentions of many Americanist Catholics that “Freemasonry in the United States is ‘different’ than in Europe’), April 20, 1884, Immortale Dei, November 1, 1885, Libertas Praestantissimum, June 20, 1888, Longiqua Oceani, January 6, 1895, Testem Benevolentiae Nostrae, January 22, 1899, Tametsi Futura Prospiscentibus, November 1, 1900, and Pope Pius XI’s Quas Primas, December 11, 1925. We can see the tragic results of the Americanism upon the miseducation of generations of Catholics in the United States of America to the point that many of them have fallen into one ideological camp of naturalism or another and have come to belief, at least inchoately, in the illusion of secular salvation and the equally delusional belief that there is some kind of nondenominational, interdenominational, secular, politically ecumenical, constitutional, legal or political solution to social divisions that have their proximate root causes in the Protestant revolution of the Social Reign of Christ the King in the Sixteenth Century and the subsequent rise of the anti-Incarnational, religiously indifferentist, pluralistic and naturalistic Calvinist/Judeo-Masonic civil state of Modernity.

Thus, the divisions that beset the United States of America in the decades before and after the War between the States were but a prelude to contemporary divisions as error divides but only Catholicism can unite men around a common purpose, a common language, a mutual concord of belief that recognizes fallen human nature as the remote cause of all social problems and our own Actual Sins as the contributing factors to worsen the state of our nations. Social order depends upon the right ordering of the souls of men in cooperation with the ineffable graces won for us by Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ by means of the shedding of every single drop of His Most Precious Blood during His Passion and Death on the wood of the Holy Cross on Good Friday and that flow into our hearts and souls through the loving hands of Our Lady, she who is the Mediatrix of All Graces.

Pope Leo XIII put the matter this way in A Review of His Pontificate, March 19, 1902:

Just as Christianity cannot penetrate into the soul without making it better, so it cannot enter into public life without establishing order. With the idea of a God Who governs all, Who is infinitely Wise, Good, and Just, the idea of duty seizes upon the consciences of men. It assuages sorrow, it calms hatred, it engenders heroes. If it has transformed pagan society--and that transformation was a veritable resurrection--for barbarism disappeared in proportion as Christianity extended its sway, so, after the terrible shocks which unbelief has given to the world in our days, it will be able to put that world again on the true road, and bring back to order the States and peoples of modern times. But the return of Christianity will not be efficacious and complete if it does not restore the world to a sincere love of the one Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church. In the Catholic Church Christianity is Incarnate. It identifies Itself with that perfect, spiritual, and, in its own order, sovereign society, which is the Mystical Body of Jesus Christ and which has for Its visible head the Roman Pontiff, successor of the Prince of the Apostles. It is the continuation of the mission of the Savior, the daughter and the heiress of His Redemption. It has preached the Gospel, and has defended it at the price of Its blood, and strong in the Divine assistance and of that immortality which has been promised it, It makes no terms with error but remains faithful to the commands which it has received, to carry the doctrine of Jesus Christ to the uttermost limits of the world and to the end of time, and to protect it in its inviolable integrity. Legitimate dispenser of the teachings of the Gospel it does not reveal itself only as the consoler and Redeemer of souls, but It is still more the internal source of justice and charity, and the propagator as well as the guardian of true liberty, and of that equality which alone is possible here below. In applying the doctrine of its Divine Founder, It maintains a wise equilibrium and marks the true limits between the rights and privileges of society. The equality which it proclaims does not destroy the distinction between the different social classes. It keeps them intact, as nature itself demands, in order to oppose the anarchy of reason emancipated from Faith, and abandoned to its own devices. The liberty which it gives in no wise conflicts with the rights of truth, because those rights are superior to the demands of liberty. Not does it infringe upon the rights of justice, because those rights are superior to the claims of mere numbers or power. Nor does it assail the rights of God because they are superior to the rights of humanity. (Pope Leo XIII, A Review of His Pontificate, March 19, 1902.)

It's Catholicism or the abyss. Behold the abyss.

Ah, but for all of Robert Francis Prevost/Leo XIV’s very legitimate concerns about being enslaved to artificial intelligence and other advanced forms of technology and his “apology” for what he thinks is Holy Mother Church’s “silent complicity” in slavery, neither he nor Brandon Johnson are in the least bit able to recognize the fact that the epidemic of fatherless children, children born out of wedlock, and the fostering of a “culture of victimization” by which white “leftists” have long to control black Americans by making them dependent upon one statist program after another and by “reforming” criminal justice statutes to impose little if any actual penalties upon violent career criminals is but the consequence of Margaret Sanger’s own desire to eradicate and/or control black Americans by means of contraception.

Contraception, which was promoted by Planned Barrenhood’s paid black pastors, destabilized what was becoming an emerging and very stable middle-class black family after World War I even accounting for the injustice of invidious racial discrimination in many parts of the United States of America (de jure in the south and de facto in the north and industrial Midwest)/

Yes, the prevalence of crime in areas with a population of predominantly black Americans is caused, at least in large part, by the breakdown of the stable two-part family that was engineered by racialists and eugenicists such as Margaret Sanger and her equally demonic cohorts. It was the racialist social engineering of Sanger and her cohorts that was designed to break down the stability of the black family and enslave blacks yet again, this time to their supposed “benefactors,” the bureaucrats of the welfare state that was created to become, in essence, the minders of the descendants of chattel slavery. Sanger and her cohorts knew that the creation of a class of citizens dependent upon the civil state for their livelihood would give such people an incentive to keep electing the very people who enact and perpetuate programs designed to enslave them.

A 1992 article from something called Citizen magazine provided great evidence to prove Sanger’s racialist agenda of eugenics and social control of the “undesirables”. Here are some excerpts from that article:

At a March 1925 international birth control gathering in New York City, a speaker warned of the menace posed by the "black" and "yellow" peril. The man was not a Nazi or Klansman; he was Dr. S. Adolphus Knopf, a member of Margaret Sanger's American Birth Control League (ABCL), which along with other groups eventually became known as Planned Parenthood.

Sanger's other colleagues included avowed and sophisticated racists. One, Lothrop Stoddard, was a Harvard graduate and the author of The Rising Tide of Color against White Supremacy. Stoddard was something of a Nazi enthusiast who described the eugenic practices of the Third Reich as "scientific" and "humanitarian." And Dr. Harry Laughlin, another Sanger associate and board member for her group, spoke of purifying America's human "breeding stock" and purging America's "bad strains." These "strains" included the "shiftless, ignorant, and worthless class of antisocial whites of the South."

Not to be outdone by her followers, Margaret Sanger spoke of sterilizing those she designated as "unfit," a plan she said would be the "salvation of American civilization.: And she also spike of those who were "irresponsible and reckless," among whom she included those " whose religious scruples prevent their exercising control over their numbers." She further contended that "there is no doubt in the minds of all thinking people that the procreation of this group should be stopped." That many Americans of African origin constituted a segment of Sanger considered "unfit" cannot be easily refuted.

While Planned Parenthood's current apologists try to place some distance between the eugenics and birth control movements, history definitively says otherwise. The eugenic theme figured prominently in the Birth Control Review, which Sanger founded in 1917. She published such articles as "Some Moral Aspects of Eugenics" (June 1920), "The Eugenic Conscience" (February 1921), "The purpose of Eugenics" (December 1924), "Birth Control and Positive Eugenics" (July 1925), "Birth Control: The True Eugenics" (August 1928), and many others.

These eugenic and racial origins are hardly what most people associate with the modern Planned Parenthood Federation of America (PPFA), which gave its Margaret Sanger award to the late Dr. Martin Luther King in 1966, and whose current president, Faye Wattleton, is black, a former nurse, and attractive.

Though once a social pariah group, routinely castigated by religious and government leaders, the PPFA is now an established, high-profile, well-funded organization with ample organizational and ideological support in high places of American society and government. Its statistics are accepted by major media and public health officials as "gospel"; its full-page ads appear in major newspapers; its spokespeople are called upon to give authoritative analyses of what America's family policies should be and to prescribe official answers that congressmen, state legislator and Supreme Court justiices all accept as "social orthodoxy”. . . .

It was in 1939 that Sanger's larger vision for dealing with the reproductive practices of black Americans emerged. After the January 1939 merger of her Clinical Research Bureau and the ABCL to form the Birth Control Federation of America, Dr. Clarence J. Gamble was selected to become the BCFA regional director for the South. Dr. Gamble, of the soap-manufacturing Procter and Gamble company, was no newcomer to Sanger's organization. He had previously served as director at large to the predecessor ABCL.

Gamble lost no time and drew up a memorandum in November 1939 entitled "Suggestion for Negro Project." Acknowledging that black leaders might regard birth control as an extermination plot, he suggested that black leaders be place in positions where it would appear that they were in charge as it was at an Atlanta conference.

It is evident from the rest of the memo that Gamble conceived the project almost as a traveling road show. A charismatic black minister was to start a revival, with "contributions" to come from other local cooperating ministers. A "colored nurse" would follow, supported by a subsidized "colored doctor." Gamble even suggested that music might be a useful lure to bring the prospects to a meeting.

Sanger answered Gamble on Dec. 10. 1939, agreeing with the assessment. She wrote: "We do not want the word to go out that we want to exterminate the Negro population, and the minister is the man who can straighten that idea out if it ever occurs to any of their more rebellious members." In 1940, money for two "Negro Project" demonstration programs in southern states was donated by advertising magnate Albert D. Lasker and his wife, Mary. (Black Genocide.org | The Truth About Margaret Sanger.)

Sanger knew that frustrating the natural end of what is proper to marriage, the procreation of children, by means of contraception would lead to widespread promiscuity, including adultery by men and women alike. Such promiscuity would result in the destabilization of the stable two-parent family, thus necessitating the intervention of the civil state to provide “assistance” upon which the children of broken families could receive their sustenance as their minders saw to it that they were “educated” about the ways to frustrate the Sovereignty of God over the sanctity and fecundity of that which is proper to be married state and thus become as promiscuous and irresponsible as their father and/or mother had been.

Although Sanger died on September 6 1966, a year after the full-scale launch of then President Lyndon Baines Johnson’s Great Society, which including “Title X” funding for “family planning” programs such as those offered by Planned Parenthood, she had planted the seeds for the complete demolition of the stable two-parent family in black neighborhoods that empowered the statists of the Johnson administration, worthy inheritors and enlargers of the social engineering represented by Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s New Deal” thirty years before, to complete the job of creating a sense of entitlement among those who had been “taught” to depend upon government programs for their every need.

Sanger’s policy racialism and eugenics was such that she embraced the director of Adolf Hitler’s own eugenics program, Ernst Rudin, who was permitted to publish an article in 1939 in her own Birth Control Review:

Ernst Rudin was director of the foremost German eugenics research institute (Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Genealogy, in Munich, Germany). "On June 2, 1933, [German] Reich Interior Minister Wilhelm Frick announced the formation of an Expert Committee on Questions of Population and Racial Policy .... to plan the course of Nazi racial policy. The committee brought together the elite of Nazi racial theory: Alfred Ploetz, ..... Ernst Rudin, director of the Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Genealogy in Munich;...." (4) On July 14, 1933 this committee's recommendations were made law, the sterilization law ("Law for the Prevention of Genetically Diseased Offspring"); the start date for exercising the law was 1 Jan 1934. What was Ernst Rudin's opinion of Adolf Hitler and eugenics ('racial hygiene')?:

Academic William H. Tucker (The Science and Politics of Racial Research, 1994, University of Illinois Press) tells us about Ernst Rudin (p. 121):

In an address to the German Society for Rassenhygiene [Race-hygiene] Ernst Rudin, a professor of psychiatry who was one of the organization's original members and now its head, recalled the early, fruitless days when the racial hygienists had labored in vain to alert the public to special value of the Nordic race as "culture creators" and the danger of "unnatural" attempts to preserve the health of heredity defectives. Now Rassenhygiene [Race-hygiene] was finally receiving the attention it deserved, and Rudin virtually slavered over the man whose efforts produced this change: "The significance of Rassenhygiene did not become evident to all aware Germans until the political activity of Adolf Hitler and only through his work has our 30 year long dream of translating Rassen- hygiene into action finally become a reality." Terming it a "duty of honor" (Ehrenpflicht) for the society to aid in implementing Hitler's program, Rudin proclaimed, "We can hardly express our efforts more plainly or appropriately than in the words of the Fuhrer: 'Whoever is not physically or mentally fit must not pass on his defects to his children. The state must take care that only the fit produce children. Conversely, it must be regarded as reprehensible to withhold healthy children from the state.' (E. Rudin, "Aufgaben and Ziele der Deutschen Gesellschaft fur Rassenhygiene," Archiv Fur Rassen- und Gesellschafts- biologie 28 (1934): 228-29)

Who is author William H. Tucker? He is an associate professor of psychology at Rutgers University, Camden, New Jersey. Tucker is apparently somewhat left of center politically, since he complains about the 'Reagan slash and burn spending cuts.'

How many Germans were 'force sterilized'? Most estimates are in the range of 250,000-500,000. The Germans started twenty-seven years later that the U.S. but within a few years they greatly outpaced them.

Did Ernst Rudin advocate sterilization of Americans?

Three months before the German 'sterilization law' was passed, Rudin's "Eugenic Sterilization: An Urgent Need" article was published in the journal (BCR) Margaret Sanger started and continued to influence until its demise in 1940.

In addressing an American audience Rudin is much more circumspect with his choice of words:

The following essay is concerned only with sterilization as a voluntary practice, that is, when undertaken with the consent of the patient himself or his statutory guardians......

But as the essay wears on, the mask begins to slip:

My experience has led me to the conclusion that systematic and careful propaganda should be undertaken where sterilization is advisable. Such propaganda should, of course, be gradual and should be directed in the first instance at the medical directors in institutions and schools, medical officers of health, and finally at private practitioners.....

Margaret Sanger corresponded with Ernst Rudin and never once renounced his eugenic views. (Margaret Sanger and Sterilization.)

Yes, contraception has imposed created an unparalleled slavery to just among people of all races and nationalities, not just black Americans, in the United States and everywhere else in the so-called “developed” world, but Robert Francis Prevost does not see that this is so nor does he see that separating procreation from marriage is responsible for the destruction of social stability and rise and mainstream acceptance of sodomy that has turned this month of the Sacred Heart of Jesus into “pride month” so that sinners hardened in their perversity can celebrate one of the four sins that cry out to Heaven for vengeance and, of course, along with the sins of us all, wounded the Sacred Heart of Jesus during Our Lord’s Passion and Death on the wood of the Holy Cross on Good Friday. Prevost/Leo does not see that this is so because he is as sanguine about sodomy as was his immediate predecessor, Jorge Mario “Who am I to judge?” Bergoglio.

Pope Pius XI reminded us that the right ordering of souls depends upon the sanctifying offices of Holy Mother Church, and those who believe that those steeped in agitation can do anything other than contribute to the furthering of agitation is sadly mistaken:

And today we again repeat with all the insistency We can command: it is not enough to be a member of the Church of Christ, one needs to be a living member, in spirit and in truth, i.e., living in the state of grace and in the presence of God, either in innocence or in sincere repentance. If the Apostle of the nations, the vase of election, chastised his body and brought it into subjection: lest perhaps, when he had preached to others, he himself should become a castaway (1 Cor. ix. 27), could anybody responsible for the extension of the Kingdom of God claim any other method but personal sanctification? Only thus can we show to the present generation, and to the critics of the Church that "the salt of the earth," the leaven of Christianity has not decayed, but is ready to give the men of today -- prisoners of doubt and error, victims of indifference, tired of their Faith and straying from God -- the spiritual renewal they so much need. A Christianity which keeps a grip on itself, refuses every compromise with the world, takes the commands of God and the Church seriously, preserves its love of God and of men in all its freshness, such a Christianity can be, and will be, a model and a guide to a world which is sick to death and clamors for directions, unless it be condemned to a catastrophe that would baffle the imagination.

20. Every true and lasting reform has ultimately sprung from the sanctity of men who were driven by the love of God and of men. Generous, ready to stand to attention to any call from God, yet confident in themselves because confident in their vocation, they grew to the size of beacons and reformers. On the other hand, any reformatory zeal, which instead of springing from personal purity, flashes out of passion, has produced unrest instead of light, destruction instead of construction, and more than once set up evils worse than those it was out to remedy. No doubt "the Spirit breatheth where he will" (John iii. 8): "of stones He is able to raise men to prepare the way to his designs" (Matt. iii. 9). He chooses the instruments of His will according to His own plans, not those of men. But the Founder of the Church, who breathed her into existence at Pentecost, cannot disown the foundations as He laid them. Whoever is moved by the spirit of God, spontaneously adopts both outwardly and inwardly, the true attitude toward the Church, this sacred fruit from the tree of the cross, this gift from the Spirit of God, bestowed on Pentecost day to an erratic world. (Pope Pius XI, Mit Brennender Sorge, March 17, 1937.)

In other words, order in the world is premised upon order in the souls of men, who need Sanctifying Grace to overcome their sins and to make reparation for them while seeking to pursue the heights of personal sanctification. Catholic sanctity built and maintained Western civilization for nearly a thousand years, not the pursuit of “dreams” and “destinies” according to the dictates of Judeo-Masonic religious indifferentism, truths that matter one little bit to Robert Francis Prevost/Leo XIV, whose Magnifica Humanitas.

Today is the day before the Solemnity of Corpus Christi on which the resumed Mass of Trinity Sunday is celebrated.

Dom Prosper Gueranger, O.S.B., offered the following reflection for Wednesday after Trinity Sunday in anticipation of tomorrow’s great and joyous feast, which contains richly filled history of how the practice of public adoration of the Most Blessed Sacrament of Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ came about to renew the fervor of Catholics in the great gift of Our Lord’s Real Presence as a foretaste of seeing Him without the Eucharistic veil in the glory of the Beatific Vision in Heaven:

We have not, as yet, reached the Feast of the divine Memorial; not until the morrow, shall we have it in all its splendor. But, this evening, at first Vespers, the Church will begin her acclamations to the Eternal Priest; and, although the Sovereign Pontiffs have not ordained that a Vigil, properly so called, shall precede the Feast of Corpus Christi, yet have they granted indulgences (Two hundred days, for the fast, or for any other good work substituted for the same, at the discretion of the Confessor.) to a voluntary fast practiced on this its eve. Let us now resume the history of the Church’s worship of the great mystery. We have already seen how the unity of the Church is based upon the Eucharist. Our Lord Jesus Christ, in that Sacrament, is the cornerstone, upon which rises, in the harmony of its several parts, the temple of living stones, built to the glory of God. (Ephesians 2:21) Jesus is the High Priest, ordained for men, himself being Man, (Hebrews 5:1) that he may present to God the homage of his Brethren, by offering to his and their Father, a Sacrifice in the name of all. And, although this homage of regenerate mankind — this Sacrifice, which is the highest expression of that homage — owes its whole worth to the infinite dignity of him who is the Head of the Church — yet, the Sacrifice is only complete, when there is the union of the Members with the Head. The Head must have the Body. The Church is, as the Apostle tells us, the fullness, the completion, of Him who is filled in all; (Ephesians 1:22-23) the Church perfects the Sacrifice, as an integral portion of the Victim who is offered upon the Altar. What is true of the Church, is true, likewise, of each one of us, who are Members of Christ; and we are really his Members, provided we be united, in the great Action of the Sacrifice, by that intimate union which makes one Body of many Members.

Herein consists the social influence of the Eucharist. The human family had been broken up by sin; it regains its lost unity by the Blood of the Lamb; and the original intention, which God had in creating the world, is fulfilled. After all other beings, there came forth, out of nothing, the creature man; he was to give a voice of praise to the whole of creation; for, his own twofold nature, material and spiritual, made him the compendium of all other creatures. When he was restored by redemption, he regained his position in the glorious choir of beings. The Eucharist, the Thanksgiving, the praise by excellence, is the sweet produce of the human race. The Eucharist, that grand hymn of divine Wisdom sung to the King of ages, ascends from this earth of ours, blending the two harmonies into one: the ineffable harmony of the eternal Canticle, that is, the Word in the Father’s bosom, and the harmony of the new Canticle, which is repeated by the choir of creatures, to the glory of their Creator.

The Ages of Faith lived on this grand truth; they thoroughly understood the priceless worth of the gift bestowed by the Man-God upon his Church. Appreciating the honor thence accruing to our earth, they felt themselves bound to respond to it, in the name of all creatures, by giving to the celebration of the sacred Mystery everything that ritual could impart of grandeur and solemnity. The Liturgy, for the Christians of those times, was exactly what is implied by the word: it was the public function, the social act, by excellence; and, as such, it claimed every sort of external pomp; and the presence of the whole people round the altar was looked upon as a matter of course. As to the lawfulness of what are called private Masses, it would be easy to prove, by most authentic facts of history, that what the Catholic Church teaches regarding them, was her teaching from the very commencement; and yet, practically, and as a general rule, the richness of ceremonial, the enthusiasm of sacred chant, the magnificence of sacred rites, were, for a long period, regarded as inseparable from the offering up of the Holy Sacrifice.

The solemnities of divine service as celebrated in any Catholic Cathedral, on the greatest Feast in the Year, is but a feeble image of the magnificent forms of the ancient Liturgies, such as we described them yesterday. The Church herself, whose desires for what is most perfect never vary, ever evinces a marked predilection for the remnants she has been able to keep up of her ancient forms of worship; but, as far as the generality of her people is concerned, there can be no doubt of the existence of a growing feeling of indifference for the external pomp wherewith the holy Sacrifice is so deservedly accompanied; whatever demonstrations of Christian piety still exist, are directed elsewhere. The cultus of the divine presence in the Eucharist as developed in these our own times, is certainly a blow to the heresy which denies that Presence; it is, too, a joy to every Catholic who loves God; but, care must be taken, lest a movement, which is so profitable to individual souls, and so redounding to the glory of the holy Sacrament, should be turned, by the craft of the enemy, against the Eucharist itself. Now, this might easily be the case, if, in consequence of such devotion being ill-regulated, the very primary object of the eucharistic dogma, which is Sacrifice, were permitted to lose its place, either in the appreciation, or in the practical religion, of the Faithful.

In the admirable connection existing throughout the whole body of Christian revelation, there can be no such thing as one dogma becoming a danger to another. Every new truth, or every truth presented under a new aspect, is a progress in the Church, and an acquisition for her children. But the progress is then only a true one, when, in its application, the new truth, or its new aspect, is not treated with such prominence, as to throw a more important truth into the shade. Surely, no family would ever count that gain of new property to be a boon, which would jeopardize or lessen the rich patrimony which past ages had secured. The principle is a self-evident one; and must be borne in mind, when studying the different phases of the history of any human society, and especially when the History of the Church is in question. If the Holy Spirit, who is ever urging the Church to what is highest, is incessantly adorning her for the eternal nuptials, and is decking her brow with a gradual increase of light, yet is it but too often the case, that the human element of which she partakes through her members, her children, makes its weight tell upon the Bride of Christ. When that happens, she redoubles her maternal solicitude for these her children; they are too delicate to live on the summits, and bear the bracing atmosphere to which their forefathers were accustomed. She herself continues her aspirations after what is most perfect, and approaches gradually nearer to heaven; but, for the sake of her weakly children, she quits the mountain paths she loved to tread in better times, for those paths kept her closer to her divine Spouse; she comes lower down, she is content to lose something of her external charms, she stoops, that she may the better reach the children she has to save. This her condescension is admirable; but it certainly gives no right to the children, who live in these less healthy times, to think themselves better than their forefathers. Is a sick man better than the one who is in health, because the food, which is indispensable for keeping up the little strength he has, is given to him under new forms, and such as will suit his debilitated frame?

Because, in these our days, a certain increase of devotion towards the divine Host, who dwells in our tabernacles, has been observed in some souls, and the external demonstration of this devotion is under a new form, it has been asserted, that “no age ever equaled our own in the cultus of the Most Holy Sacrament!” And because of this holy enthusiasm, our 19th Century, which, with its restless activity, has opened out so many new methods of devotion, has been called, by a certain writer, “the great age of the Eucharist!” Would to God these assertions were correct! for it is quite true, and history is rich in bearing testimony to the fact, “that an age is more or less glorious, according to its devotion towards the adorable Eucharist.” But it is no less true, that if the different Centuries be compared with each other for devotion towards the Sacrament of Love, which, at all times, is the very life of the Church, there can be no doubt but that that ought to be counted as the golden age, in which our Lord’s intentions in instituting the divine mystery were the best understood and carried out, and not that wherein individual devotion was busiest.

Now, leaving aside, for the present, all principles connected with dogma, and which will find their place more appropriately a few days later, we have history to bear witness to this fact, that, so long as the western nations kept up their faith and fervor, the Church, who is the faithful and sure interpreter of her Jesus’ intentions, maintained the discipline observed in the worship practiced towards the Eucharist during the early ages. After her twofold victory over the pagan persecutions and the obstinate dogmatism of the Emperors of Byzantium, the Church, the noble depositarian of the New Testament, was in possession of a freedom greater than she has had at any other period; her children, too, made it their perfection to follow her every wish. Thus free to act as she knew was best, and sure to be obeyed, she kept to the way of eucharistic worship, which her martyrs had followed, and her Doctors had so enthusiastically developed in their writings: that is, she took the energies of the new children she had received by the conversion of barbarian nations, and centered them in the Sacrifice, that is, in the holy fatigues of solemn Mass, and the Canonical Hours, which are but a natural irradiation of the Sacrifice.

Nothing, in those times, was more Catholic, nothing less individual and private, than the eucharistic worship thus based on the social character which pertains to the Sacrifice. It was the uppermost idea even in such of the Faithful as, through sickness or other personal reasons, were obliged to communicate, of the universal Victim, separatedly from the rest of the people. It was the one leading thought, which made them turn their hearts and their adorations towards the gilded dove, or the ivory tower, in which were conserved, under the mysterious integrity of the Sacrament, the precious remnants of the Sacrifice.

Faith in the real presence, a faith quite as animated and deep as any that can be witnessed in our own times, was the soul of the whole Liturgy; it was the basis of the entire system of the Church’s rites and ceremonies, all of which are unmeaning, if you take away the catholic dogma of the Eucharist. This dogma was admitted by all the children of the Church as a principle beyond discussion; it was their dearest treasure; it was a truth, which was both foundation-stone and roofing of the House built amongst men by Eternal Wisdom. To a superficial observer it might seem as though the Faithful of those early ages were less intent upon it than w now are: but is it not always the case, that the rock which supports the edifice, and the timber which roofs it, call for less solicitude when the building is under no risk, either from the indifference of its inmates, or from the attacks of enemies outside?

The Church herself cannot grow decrepit; but it is a law in history, that, even within her fold, and in spite of the vitality she imparts to nations, no society ever maintains itself long at its highest pitch of perfection. Men are like stars in this, that their apogee marks the period of their decline; they only seem to mount on high, that they may speedily descend: and, after the fullest vigor of age, we gradually approach the impotency of the old man. So was it to be with Christendom itself, with that grand confederation which had been established, by the Church, in the strong unity of unfeigned charity, and of faith unalloyed by error. The Crusades were, for a second time, rousing the world to holy enterprise; the preaching of St. Bernard was stirring mankind to zeal for the cause of God. The impulse was so immense, that it seemed as though the event marked the culminating point of Christ’s reign upon earth, and secured perpetuity to the power of the Church. And yet, that was the very period, when old signs of decay returned, and with fresh intensity. The heroic Pontiff, St. Gregory VII, had stemmed the evil for a considerable time; but, at the period we speak of, a relapse set in, and advanced with its work of ravage, till it brought about the great revolt of the 15th Century, and the general apostasy of nations.

The celebrated prophetess of the Middle Ages, St. Hildegard, was then scanning, with her eagle eye, the miseries of her own day, and the still more somber threatenings of the future. She that was used to write the messages of God to Pontiffs and Kings, penned these words in a letter to Werner and his brother priests of Kircheim, — they had written to Hildegard, and solicited her reply: “It was whilst lying for a long time on a bed of sickness, in the year of the Lord’s Incarnation, one thousand one hundred and seventy, that I saw, wakeful both in body and mind, a most beautiful image, having a woman’s appearance: she was all perfect in her suavity, and most dear in the charms of her beauty, which was such, as that the human mind could in no wise comprehend it. Her stature was so great, that it reached from earth even up to heaven. Her face, too, beamed with exceeding brightness, and her eye was fixed on heaven. She was clad in a spotless garment, made of white silk. The mantle which covered her, was adorned with most precious stones, of emerald, sapphire, and likewise of beads and pearls. The shoes on her feet were of onyx. But her face was covered with dust, and her garment was rent on the right side, and her mantle had lost its elegant beauty, and her shoes were dimmed. And she, with a loud and plaintive voice, cried out towards the high heavens: ‘Hearken, heaven, that my face is defiled! And wail, earth, that my garment is rent! And thou, abyss, tremble, because my shoes are dimmed. Foxes have holes, and birds of the air nests; (Matthew 8:20) but I have not helper or comforter, nor staff whereon to lean, and whereby to have support… They that should have adorned me in every way, have, in all these things, abandoned me. For it is they that besmear my face, by dragging the Body and Blood of my Spouse into the great uncleanness of the impurity of their living, and the great filth of their fornications and adulteries; and by buying and selling holy things, defiling them, as a child would be, were he put down in mire before swine… The wounds of Christ my Spouse are contaminated… Princes and a headlong people will rush upon you, O priests! They will cast you forth, and put you to flight, and will take your riches away from you… They will say: Let us cast out from the Church these adulterers, and extortioners, and men that are full of all wickedness! And in doing this, they will have it, that they do a service unto God, because they say, that it is by you that the Church is defiled… By God’s permission, many nations will begin to rage against you in their judgments, and many people will devise vain things concerning you, for they will count as nought your priestly office and your consecration. Kings of the earth will assist these in your overthrow, and they will thirst after the earthly things (you possess); and the princes in whose dominions you live, shall make a convention in this one plan, that they may drive you out of their territories, because you, by your most wicked deeds, have driven away the innocent Lamb from your midst. And I heard a voice from heaven, saying: “This image is the Church!”‘ (Ep. lii)

What a fearful description of the evils brought upon the Church in the 12th Century! What a prophecy of its far-off results! These miseries were in keeping with the way in which the august mystery of the altar was treated. It has always been so. The disorders of the sanctuary necessarily brought about relaxation in the people. They grew wearied of receiving the heavenly food from hands that were, but too often, unworthy ones. The guests at the banquet of divine Wisdom became rare, so rare, indeed, that, in the year 1215, a General Council, the 4th of Lateran, passed the well-known law, which obliges, under the severest penalties, the faithful of both sexes to receive Communion at least once in the year. The evil became so great, that the legislation of Councils and the genius of Innocent III, the last of the great Popes of the Middle Ages, would not have sufficed to arrest it, had not God given to his Church the two saints, Dominic and Francis: they reclaimed the priesthood, and, for a time, brought back the people to the practice of Christian piety. But, the ancient forms of the Liturgy had perished during the interval of the crisis.

The oblation in common, which supposed that all communicated in the divine Victim, had given place to private foundations, and to honoraries or stipendium; in themselves, they were quite lawful, but they had been so considerably increased by the introduction of the mendicant Orders, that a change in the Liturgy was the consequence. Private Masses, for special intentions, were multiplied, in order to satisfy obligations which had been contracted with individual donors; and, by a necessary consequence, the imposing rite of concelebration, maintained in Rome till the 13th Century, entirely disappeared in the Western Church. The Sacrifice of the Mass was no longer brought before the faithful with the majestic ceremonial which, in former times, had secured to it a preponderance over the whole religion and life of the Christian people. The holy Eucharist soon began to be given out of the time of Mass, and for reasons which were not always serious ones. More than one scholastic theologian encouraged the practice. If this scholastic had not true learning on his side, he had his sharp definitions and categorical divisions; and Communion seemed to become, in the minds of some men, a something distinct by itself in the institution of the Eucharist. This was a forerunner of what we so often find practiced in our own times: Communions made isolatedly and furtively on principle, that is, in accordance with an ideal of spirituality, which has a dread of a crowd, and a repugnance to the excitement of the Church’s ceremonies!

The notion, then, of the Sacrifice, which includes the chief motive of the Presence of the Incarnate Word in the Eucharist, was no longer brought before the people with the emphatic pre-eminence of former ages. As a counter result of this, the truth of this Presence of our God, under the eucharistic Species gained an ascendancy over the soul in a more exclusive, and, therefore, in a more impressive and direct way. It was at this period, that, out of a spirit of I holy fear, and from a feeling of respect — a feeling which can never be too great — several ancient usages I began to be discontinued. Usages which were established, in order to express more fully the application of the Sacrifice, were afterwards suppressed, as exposing the sacred Species to involuntary irreverence. It was thus that the custom of giving the chalice to the laity, and communion to infants, fell into desuetude.

An immense ritual change then was brought about. The Church accepted it, although she was aware of its being, in more than one point, a degeneracy as compared with former ages. The time had come, when the grand social forms of the Liturgy, requiring, as they did, the strong union of Christian nations for the basis, would be but unrealities. The jealous mistrust of States against the Church — that is, against the power which was the sole bond of mutual union between the several nations — was ever on the increase, and only waited for an occasion to break out into open hostility. Diplomacy became a system of rupture between one country and another, just as the Church had been the framer and maintainer of their union.

If the evil from within was thus great, still greater were the dangers to which the Faithful were exposed by the onslaughts of heresy. And yet, it is precisely in such a time as this, that is most manifested the superhuman prudence of the Church. In defense of that which is the essential element of her existence here below, in defense that is of Faith, she formed a rampart out of the very ruins caused by the liturgical revolution she had been compelled to accept; she sanctioned with her authority what was worthy of sanction, and thereby controlled the movement. She took advantage of the increase of devotion to the Real Presence, which the movement had excited; she gave a fresh direction to her Liturgy, by substituting a ceaseless expression of the dogma, for the less precise, though not less complete, and far grander, forms of the earlier period. It was a reply to heresy, all the stronger, because of its being more direct. We have already seen how, in consequence of the covert attacks of false doctrine, there was an evident reason felt, in the 13th Century, for instituting a special Feast in honor of the Eucharist, as the Mystery of Faith. That reason became sheer necessity, at the approach, foreseen by God alone, of the bold triumph of the sacramentarian heresy. It was necessary to forestall the attack; and, by so doing, to render the coming assault less hurtful to the Christian world, and less injurious to that Lord, who is present in the Sacrament of his love. The means for efficaciously realizing these two ends was, the development of exterior devotion to the Real Presence; the Church would thus proclaim her unshaken faith in the dogma, and the adorable Sacrament would receive, by the renewed fervor of faithful souls, a compensation for the indifference and insults of others.

Established throughout the world by the authority of the Roman Pontiffs, the Feast of Corpus Christi was, therefore, both in itself and in its developments, as we were observing yesterday, the commencement of a new phase in the Catholic worship of the holy Eucharist. Once the Feast was instituted, there followed Processions, Benedictions, Forty-Hours, Expositions, Watchings in adoration; each of which was an additional affirmation of the Church’s belief in the Peal Presence; the piety of her children was re-enkindled; and to that Lord who, for our sakes, dwells under the sacramental species, there was offered that tribute of homage which is so justly his due.

O Holy Church, our Mother, thou Bride of the Son of God, those times are past when thou couldst produce on this earth, a likeness to the heavenly Jerusalem. Free to follow the inspirations of thy heart as Bride, our ancestors witnessed thy arranging the great Sacrifice with the gorgeous ceremonial, which gave them an insight into the grandeurs of the mystery they saw thus celebrated. That royal magnificence of ritual would be too much for such times as these we live in. The nations of the earth have let themselves be misled: for the glory they once enjoyed, when thou gavest them unity with each other through the unity of the sacred Mysteries, is mow exchanged for the dishonor and misery of alliance with the old enemy. Whilst thou, with nothing to fear, and strong in the consciousness of thy; rights and thy influence for good, wast beautifying, in peace, the garden of thy Spouse; whilst thou wast rejoicing in the sweet fragrance of that garden, and in the fruits of the mystic vine; a strange noise was heard, the noise of the chariots of Aminadab, driven by the hands of thine own children turned traitors. (Song of Solomon 6:11-12) It would have been but a just punishment, hadst thou then left this ungrateful earth, and gone to thy divine Spouse in heaven above. But, loving ‘Sulamitess’, with all this increase of the evils of thine exile, thou gavest ear to the cries of them who willed to be ever thy faithful children; and thou remainedst for us, dear Mother, that we might receive thy teachings, and thence derive light and life.

We know it: instead of the peaceful grandeurs which thou, beautiful Queen, didst once display when thy sovereignty was undisputed; instead of choirs of exultation and triumph resounding in thy courts, we are to see thee, henceforth, as a warrior, and thy hymns are to be the songs of the camp: (Song of Solomon 7:1-2) but, how beautiful are thy steps in the armor of thy pilgrimage, thou daughter of the King! Thou art terrible as an army set in array; but thou art, too, all sweet and comely, when, laying aside the robe of gold and all the richly varied clothing which decked thee standing at the right hand of the King’s throne, thou girdest thyself, like him, with the sword, and piercest the hearts of his enemies with the arrows of thy truth and zeal. (Psalm 44:6)

Turning our thoughts, for a moment, to the Greek Church, how different is the spectacle! She is motionless from the sterility that is in a branch severed from the trunk. She retains, like so many withered leaves, the ancient forms of her liturgy, which has indeed an imposing unity, but it is the unity of schism. The very Heresy, which here, in our own country, celebrates its unmeaning Supper in the Cathedrals built by our forefathers, is it more out of place, than the lifeless Schism of the East, which so scrupulously keeps up the ancient forms, which are its condemnation, and makes a parade of vestments which sit so awkwardly on rebels? What life can the members of such a Church derive from these dead forms of worship?

She alone is Mother, who knows how to meet the wants of her children, for her affection tells her not to give to delicate ones the food that suits the strong. She alone is the Bride of the Lamb, who has the instinctive talent of making, in each period of time, the most of the treasure of her Spouse, the priceless Pearl he has committed to her care; and to this end, she hesitates not to modify, if need be, her dearest practices, her most cherished schemes for good; yea, and changes the delights and grandeurs of her queenly supremacy for the hard work of battling with the enemy of her Lord and her children.

We recognize thee, O Bride of Christ, by this mark, that thou now lispest with us who are weak, thou that, heretofore, didst sing so divinely with the strong; and that thou, who so long enjoyedst the peace and company of thy Spouse, art as ready and as powerful to meet and vanquish his enemies, now that they are filling his world. Thus struggling, thus laboring, and yet misunderstood and blamed by an ever-increasing number of ungrateful children, thou wilt not abandon them, but remainest, that thou mayst carry to the last of the elect the sacred Host, which is to unite him with the great Sacrifice. Affectionate and generous Mother! we will follow thee in thy militant career; through the laborious passes of the steep road which leads thee to thy eternal rest; we will follow thee, because thou bearest with thee the treasure of the world. The bolder the attacks of heresy, and the more insulting the neglect or blasphemies of ungrateful children, the louder shall be the professions of our faith, the humbler our adorations, the warmer and truer the demonstrations of our love towards the sacred Host.

FIRST VESPERS – OF THE FEAST OF CORPUS CHRISTI

We have, at last, reached the great Feast, which, since Monday, has kept our minds attentive. Our earth is preparing to acknowledge, by the homage of a solemn triumph, the presence of Christ, its Priest and King, in the sacred Host. Everywhere are the Faithful busy preparing the triumph, which is to be given to it tomorrow. These preparations are inspired by faith and love; and, whilst they are progressing, the Church is ushering in the great Feast by the celebration of First Vespers. Tuning her harp to the sublime antiphons of the Angelic Doctor, St. Thomas, she proclaims, in a chant which is worthy of the words, that her Jesus is the eternal Priest according to the order of Melchisedech, and that the divine banquet, he has prepared, brings the children of the Church around the table of the Lord, like so many young olive plants.

The limits we have been obliged to observe in this work, would require us to exclude all those portions of the Office for the present Feast, at which the faithful generally do not assist. But as this Office, which was composed by St. Thomas of Aquin, is one of exceptional beauty, we have resolved to give it in its entirety. The magnificence of these hymns, and psalms, and antiphons, and responsories — all of which are teeming with genuine Catholic spirit, will furnish the faithful with the best materials for contemplation, whereby to enlighten their minds and inflame their hearts, during the whole Octave. On each of the days of this week, they will be eager to adore that beautiful King of glory, who is going to hold his court in the midst of his people, with no other veil between himself and them, than the light cloud of the sacramental species. During these happy hours, which love is ingenious enough to steal from one’s ordinary occupations, let the faithful prefer to take, wherewith to give utterance to their sentiments, the formulas which the Church herself uses, when singing to her Spouse, in the sacred banquet of his love: not only will they there find the poetry, doctrine and gracefulness of diction, which the Bride ever has at her command, when she addresses her Beloved Jesus; but they will soon learn, by experience, that, like the divine food itself, those approved and sanctified formulas suit every soul; for these formulas of the Church adapt themselves to the several dispositions and degrees of spiritual advancement, and thus become, to each one of her children, the fittest and warmest expression of every want and desire.

The First Vespers of the Feast of Corpus Christi are exactly the same as the Second, with the single exception of the Magnificat Antiphon. By this Antiphon, O quam suavis, the Church declares to us, her children, how great is the sweetness of our Lord, and that it is manifested to us by the sweetness of the eucharistic Bread; but she also tells us who they are that taste this sweetness, and derive from it the fruits of salvation: they are the souls that are led to the divine banquet by the spiritual hunger of an humble and ardent desire. With such sentiments, let us, with the immaculate Mary, magnify the Lord, who exalteth the humble, and putteth down the mighty, the proud. It is to the humblest of the daughters of Adam, that we are indebted for the Bread of heaven; it was formed, in her chaste womb, by the Holy Ghost, as we shall explain further on; but, let us, thus early, rejoice in the thought, that the Feast of Corpus Christi leads us to Mary, and bids us give her the tribute of our gratitude. (Dom Prosper Gueranger, O.S.B., The Liturgical Year, Wednesday after Trinity Sunday.)

Let us take our recourse on this day before the Solemnity of Solemnity of Corpus Christi to spending time, if at all possible, before Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ in His Real Presence in the Most Blessed Sacrament (or, if one does not live near an area where Our Lord is present, to dispatch one’s Guardian Angel to the nearest tabernacle where Our Lord truly awaits for adorers) to beg Our Lady of the Most Blessed Sacrament to make reparation for our own sins and to pray for the restoration of a true and legitimate Successor of Saint Peter.

The following prayer to Our Lady of the Most Blessed Sacrament is thus very appropriate to pray today in addition, of course, to praying her Most Holy Rosary with renewed fervor and meditative recollection in this month of her Divine Son’s Most Sacred Heart.

O Virgin Mary, our Lady of the Blessed Sacrament, thou glory of the Christian people, joy of the universal Church, salvation of the whole world, pray for us, and awaken in all believers a lively devotion toward the Most Holy Eucharist, that so they maybe made to worthy to partake of the same daily. (The Raccolta: A Manual of Indulgences, Prayers and Devotions Enriched with Indulgences, approved by Pope Pius XII, May 30, 1951, and published in English by Benziger Brothers, New York, 1957. Number 418, p. 320. Pope Saint Pius X, Audience, December 9, 1906; S.C. Ind., January 23, 1907; S.P. Ap. December 12, 1933. An indulgence of 500 days.)

Our Lady of the Most Blessed Sacrament, pray for us.

Saint Joseph, pray for us.

Saints Peter and Paul, pray for us.

Saint John the Baptist, pray for us.

Saint John the Evangelist, pray for us.

Saint Michael the Archangel, pray for us.

Saint Gabriel the Archangel, pray for us.

Saint Raphael the Archangel, pray for us.

Saints Joachim and Anne, pray for us.

Saints Caspar, Melchior, and Balthasar, pray for us.

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Robert Francis Prevost/Leo XIV's Magnificent Sillonism, part three

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