Whether or not we are surprised with these results, we have to realize that this type of thinking was completely anathema to all of the pre-Vatican II saints. Consider, for instance, the words of St. Edmund Campion in his letter to “the Right Honourable, the Lords of Her Majesty's Privy Council”:
“Be it known that we have made a league — all the Jesuits in the world, whose succession and multitude must overreach the practices of England — cheerfully to carry the cross you shall lay upon us, and never to despair your recovery, while we have a man left to enjoy your Tyburn, or to be racked with torments, or consumed with your prisons. The expense is reckoned, the enterprise is begun; it is of God, it cannot be withstood.”
He and many of his fellow Jesuit priests spent the last years of their lives trying to save souls in England, knowing that Queen Elizabeth’s anti-Catholic regime would brutally torture and kill them when they were eventually caught. Why would he have done this if the Anglican religion was just fine? Indeed, if Francis’s version of Catholicism is right, how can we avoid the conclusion that the efforts of St. Edmund Campion were misguided at best and very likely wicked? After all, if all religions — Christian or otherwise — can lead to eternal life, the saint was quite unnecessarily putting his life, and the lives of others, in jeopardy, as well as tempting his eventual captors to sin. As absurd as it sounds, this follows logically from Francis’s ecumenical vision of Catholicism.
Of course St. Edmund Campion was not the only saint to have believed that Catholicism was the only path to salvation — all of the pre-Vatican II saints knew that every other religion was displeasing to God. The Church has always taught this, and Blessed Pope Pius IX’s Syllabus of Errors specifically condemned the following propositions, which closely resemble the ecumenical principles promoted by Vatican II and embraced by Francis today:
15. Every man is free to embrace and profess that religion which, guided by the light of reason, he shall consider true. — Allocution “Maxima quidem,” June 9, 1862; Damnatio “Multiplices inter,” June 10, 1851.
16. Man may, in the observance of any religion whatever, find the way of eternal salvation, and arrive at eternal salvation. — Encyclical “Qui pluribus,” Nov. 9, 1846.
17. Good hope at least is to be entertained of the eternal salvation of all those who are not at all in the true Church of Christ. — Encyclical “Quanto conficiamur,” Aug. 10, 1863, etc.
18. Protestantism is nothing more than another form of the same true Christian religion, in which form it is given to please God equally as in the Catholic Church. — Encyclical “Noscitis,” Dec. 8, 1849.
Pius IX condemned these propositions because they clearly contradict perennial Church teaching. But the apologists for the Spirit of Vatican II have told us that Church teaching has changed.
Pius IX condemned these propositions because they clearly contradict perennial Church teaching. But the apologists for the Spirit of Vatican II have told us that Church teaching has changed. Have any of these progressive wizards explained to us the timing of when the pre-Vatican II saints received their update on this major element of the Catholic Religion? Was it immediately upon entering heaven or did they have to wait for the Vatican II innovators to start teaching their novelties? Does heaven rejoice to welcome a new class of saints every time our oracles of Vatican II promulgate their new breakthroughs in ecumenical science?
In his One Hundred Years of Modernism, Fr. Dominique Bourmaud described the malicious process by which the progressive architects of Vatican II brought so many Catholics to the tragically absurd state of belief indicated by the Pew survey:
“The ecumenists responsible for the making of Vatican II — and for its undoing — had to distort words and realities before the open, pluralist Church could be accepted. Only with abundance of ambiguities and behind-the-scenes maneuvering did they succeed in passing off to the Council Fathers the identity of contraries: the Church of Jesus Christ is only the Catholic Church and is not only the Catholic Church; truth in matters of religion is the Catholic Faith alone and it is not the Catholic Faith alone; the grace of Jesus Christ is received exclusively through the Catholic Church and it is not received exclusively through her. Or else, if they did not identify contraries, they relativized them, portraying one Church to be as good as another, one faith as true as another. These two means, contradiction and relativism, lead to absolute skepticism: nothing is true since everything and its contrary is true. So it is that the Council was only able to implement the incoherent charter of ecumenism by sacrificing the principles of reason and faith.”
Although many Council Fathers went along with the changes without fully grasping their anti-Catholic nature, those who pushed the false ecumenism agenda knew they were attacking immutable Catholic teaching. As a result, Catholics were left with the impossible task of believing both what the Church has always taught and what it has always rejected. Thus, in the Spirit of Vatican II religion, “nothing is true since everything and its contrary is true.” One simply cannot reconcile the Faith of the pre-Vatican II saints (i.e., Catholicism) with the beliefs of today’s nominal Catholics, including Francis.
As is commonly the case, we can look to Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre to bring us back to Catholic reality when we are faced with the contradictions of the Spirit of Vatican II. In his They Have Uncrowned Him, Archbishop Lefebvre responded to the Council’s novelties like a man who gave his life to fight for the true Faith:
“The Council took pleasure in exalting the salvific values, or the values — period — of other religions. Speaking of the non-Catholic Christian religions, Vatican II teaches that ‘Although we believe them to be victims of deficiencies, they are not in any way devoid of meaning and of value in the mystery of salvation.’ This is heresy! The only means of salvation is the Catholic Church. . . . One can be saved in Protestantism, but not by Protestantism! In heaven there are no Protestants, there are only Catholics!”
Francis and his collaborators would, of course, say that Archbishop Lefebvre was far too rigid and unkind in saying that there are only Catholics in heaven. But why would anyone bother being Catholic if Francis is right and Archbishop Lefebvre wrong?
Souls are hungry for the truth and know that Francis’s ecumenism is a silly and unsatisfying lie.
As a rebuttal to any suggestion that the true Catholic perspective is unkind, we can look to a story from Archbishop Lefebvre’s Against the Heresies:
“Some young Protestants invited me one day to Lausanne to give them a conference; they wanted to hear me speak about Econe. I told them: ‘I am speaking to you as a Catholic bishop, and I think that is why you invited me. Do not be surprised then if I tell you exactly what I think of Protestantism.’ I made it clear that for us there is only one true religion, and the Econe represents this conviction, for one cannot be saved outside the Catholic Church. That is why we are traditionalists; that does not mean we despise the others, but the Protestant religion is for us an error.”
How do we suppose this group of Protestants responded to Archbishop Lefebvre’s clear defense of the Catholic Faith? If we imagine that the false ecumenism of Vatican II and Francis are correct, we might suspect that he was rebuked for his rigidity. Instead, they congratulated the archbishop for actually telling the truth about Catholicism:
“Well, in the days following, these young Protestants wrote me to congratulate me. They told me that was what they had wanted to hear; they knew that a Catholic is a Catholic and that he cannot admit that Protestantism is the true religion. So they were not surprised.”
Today we know with absolute certainty that this new ecumenism has brought the world to a state of almost complete spiritual and intellectual darkness.
Souls are hungry for the truth and know that Francis’s ecumenism is a silly and unsatisfying lie. Unfortunately it is a lie that has been told for so long by so-called Catholics that sensible people are often surprised to find real Catholics who speak the truth. For this reason, those of us with the actual Faith have an even greater obligation to speak clearly and honestly about Catholicism. As the archbishop wrote, we must do this to save souls:
“All this is serious, and we Catholics have to constantly face such situations. Let us be of service to these souls, let us always think of their salvation. If I do not speak correctly, if I do not transmit the truth, there will perhaps be souls who shall not be saved, whereas they might have been. Certainly, the good God can act directly, without intermediary in order to convert the whole world. Nevertheless, He wanted to use priests and missionaries. He counts on us; it is we who must be the occasion of conversion of these souls.”
In the years immediately following Vatican II, perhaps Catholics could be excused somewhat for hiding their Catholic light under a bushel out of a misplaced sense of obedience to the new ecumenism; but today we know with absolute certainty that this new ecumenism has brought the world to a state of almost complete spiritual and intellectual darkness. For those with eyes to see, it is apparent that Francis employs the false ecumenism of Vatican II as it was always intended: to develop a one world religion that will be at the service of Satan and his New World Order. This means that now, more than ever, we must obey the direction of Our Lord: “So let your light shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in heaven” (Matthew 5:16).
What will our legacy be? Has this ecumenical spirit emasculated our Faith as well?
The putrid fruits represented by the Pew survey have their roots in Vatican II, were nurtured by Pope John Paul II’s Prayer Meeting at Assisi, and are enshrined in the Abrahamic Family House, where they can rot freely. That is the legacy of the architects of Vatican II.
What will our legacy be? Has this ecumenical spirit emasculated our Faith as well? Do we accept the preposterous contradictions inherent in the Spirit of Vatican II? If so, why bother being Catholic?
If we wish to be truly Catholic, God will give us the grace to do all we can to fight for the Faith. We are not constrained by our duty of state in this regard — every Catholic has the blessed opportunity to fight for the Faith at this crucial moment, even if it is simply through prayer, good works, and steadfast adherence to the Catholic Faith. We simply need to believe and practice the real Catholicism, of which St. Maximilian Kolbe wrote to inspire the many souls who would join his Knights of the Immaculata:
“Catholicism conquers souls. It will always conquer souls, because it alone has the Truth. And ‘the Truth shall make you free,’ says Lord Jesus. It gives them happiness, insofar as it can be experienced in this valley of tears; it satisfies the understanding, which seeks answers to the various questions of the present day. Only Catholicism can provide this — and it does provide it!”
The world hungers for the Truth, which is why Satan and his pathetic lieutenants and foot soldiers do all they can to obscure the Catholic Faith. We stand in the way of their efforts to eradicate the Faith— let us never budge. As St. Edmund Campion said, “The expense is reckoned, the enterprise is begun; it is of God, it cannot be withstood.”
May the Blessed Virgin Mary, who hast conquered all the heresies throughout the world, help us to be worthy of the promises of Christ, Her Son. Immaculate Heart of Mary, pray for us!
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