The document issued by John XXIII on 1 July 1960, under the title Praecipuo pietatis, is a brief decree declaring the Blessed Virgin Mary under the title “Nossa Senhora da Ponte” as principal heavenly patroness of the diocese and episcopal city of Sorocaba in Brazil. On the surface, it is a seemingly pious act: it notes the local Marian devotion, praises filial trust in the Mother of God, recounts the request of Bishop José Carlos de Aguirre supported by Armandi Lombardi, and by invoking “Apostolic authority” it confers liturgical honors and patronal privileges upon this title of Our Lady.
Behind this modest text stands the usurper John XXIII, and therefore the act, while clothed in Marian language, is an early symptom of the conciliar revolution: the Marian name is used as a decorative veil to legitimize an authority already turned away from integral Catholic doctrine.
Marian Language as a Cloak for an Illegitimate Authority
At the factual level, the text is simple:
– It states that clergy and faithful of Sorocaba venerate the Blessed Virgin Mary under the local title “Nossa Senhora da Ponte,” whose image is honored in a church there.
– It affirms that the Mother of God is a secure help for pilgrims on earth toward the heavenly homeland.
– It notes that this Marian devotion is deeply rooted among the inhabitants.
– It records the petition of Bishop José Carlos de Aguirre, supported by Armandi Lombardi, to declare this title the principal patroness of diocese and city.
– John XXIII, “out of zeal for Marian piety,” after consulting the Sacred Congregation of Rites, with “certain knowledge” and the “fullness of Apostolic power,” declares Nossa Senhora da Ponte principal patroness, granting all liturgical honors of a primary patron.
– It concludes with the usual formula of legal perpetuity and nullification of any contrary act.
Taken in isolation, each affirmation about the Blessed Virgin’s patronage is, materially considered, consonant with traditional Catholic piety. The Immaculate Virgin is truly Praesidium ac refugium, and the patronage of Our Lady over particular dioceses has been constantly recognized by the pre-1958 Church.
However, the decisive point is that all of this is presented as an act of papal jurisdiction and liturgical legislation by one who had already set in motion the conciliar subversion. Hence, what seems like a harmless Marian decree functions in context as rhetorical incense offered to mask the deeper usurpation of the Apostolic See and to accustom the faithful to accept any act issuing from that captured structure as if it were from the true Church.
The text’s very harmlessness is its danger: it teaches Catholics to suspend doctrinal vigilance in the presence of soft devotional formulas, while the same author prepares the aggiornamento that will enthrone religious liberty, ecumenism, and the cult of man against the explicit condemnations of the pre-1958 Magisterium (Pius IX, Leo XIII, Pius X, Pius XI, Pius XII).
Instrumentalizing Our Lady While Betraying the Kingship of Christ
From the perspective of unchanging doctrine, authentic Marian devotion is inseparable from the confession of the unique, social reign of Christ the King and the exclusive salvific authority of the Catholic Church.
– Pius XI in Quas Primas unequivocally teaches that peace and order among nations depend upon public recognition of Christ’s royal rights over individuals, families, and states; he condemns the secularist, liberal, and naturalist mentality which expels Our Lord from public life.
– Pius IX in the Syllabus condemns as grave errors:
– the separation of Church and State (prop. 55),
– religious indifferentism and the notion that any religion leads to salvation (props. 15–18),
– the idea that the Roman Pontiff can reconcile himself with “progress, liberalism, and modern civilization” as defined by the enemies of the faith (prop. 80).
Authentic Marian acts of the true Magisterium before 1958 always harmonize with this doctrinal front. When the Church invokes Mary as patroness, she does so as Regina in the Kingdom of Christ, auxiliary and conqueror of all heresies, Mother of the one true Church which tolerates no relativism, no “dialogue” of equals between truth and error.
In Praecipuo pietatis, we find instead:
– Exclusive focus on a local Marian cult without one syllable about:
– the necessity of the Catholic faith for salvation;
– the dangers of liberalism, socialism, Freemasonry, or Modernism in Brazil;
– the obligation of civil authorities in Sorocaba and Brazil to recognize the reign of Christ and the rights of His Church.
– A text which could be signed by any pious functionary of a neutral religious federation: a harmless confirmation of local devotion, devoid of doctrinal edge.
This silence is not neutral: it is symptomatic of the conciliar program that John XXIII was already preparing. It is precisely the type of “soft” Marian text that anesthetizes consciences while the same regime moves toward the overthrow of the Syllabus, Pascendi, and Quas Primas in practice.
Linguistic Softness as Symptom of Doctrinal Erosion
The linguistic texture of the letter reveals more than its minimal content.
1. Continuous recourse to vague, affective formulas:
– “Praecipuo pietatis studio”
– “praesidium tutissimum”
– “Marialis pietas propaganda”
These are in themselves legitimate expressions, yet here they are deployed without doctrinal concreteness, as pious varnish over an act of false authority.
2. Legal formulae of absolute efficacy:
– The text asserts with solemnity that, by the “fullness of Apostolic power,” the act is firm, valid, perpetually effective, and that anything to the contrary is “irritum et inane” (null and void).
Such formulae belong properly to the true Roman Pontiffs. In the mouth of one initiating a process of doctrinal revolution, they become an abuse of the sacred juridical language of the Church. The more the text insists on plenitude of power, the more tragic is the usurpation of that power for the conciliar project.
3. Total absence of militant or apologetic tone:
– No echo of Pius X’s intransigent denunciation of Modernism as the “synthesis of all heresies.”
– No echo of Pius XI’s warning that secularism and liberalism are poisoning nations.
– No echo of Pius IX’s condemnation of Masonic and liberal conspiracies against the Church.
Instead, we see the emerging style of the conciliar sect: bureaucratic, soothingly devotional, theologically undernourished, perfectly compatible with religious pluralism and state secularism—as if the Church had no enemies, as if the Marian patronage concerned only “private” piety and not the public order of Christian society under Christ the King.
Lex orandi, lex credendi (“the law of prayer is the law of belief”): when the official acts invoking Mary are emptied of doctrinal clarity and militancy, they train the faithful to accept a sentimental cult severed from the integral Catholic faith.
Theological Inconsistency: Marian Patronage without Ecclesial Integrity
At the theological level, several contradictions manifest themselves.
1. Invocation of Mary by an authority rejecting the non-negotiable pre-conciliar doctrine
The document assumes as self-evident that John XXIII possesses:
– true papal authority,
– true jurisdiction over the universal Church,
– true power to legislate liturgically.
But:
– The same John XXIII convoked the assembly which would enshrine principles condemned by his predecessors: religious freedom against the Syllabus, collegiality against the primacy properly understood, ecumenism against the dogma of the necessity of the Catholic Church.
– The conciliar and post-conciliar edifice, which flows from his initiative and from the line of usurpers after him, consistently contradicts prior magisterial condemnations.
Principium certum (a most certain principle): Non potest simul esse et non esse (“a thing cannot be and not be at the same time”) in the same respect. The same authority cannot, without ceasing to be Catholic, both condemn liberalism, indifferentism, false ecumenism, and then promote them in practice as “developments.”
Therefore, the Marian patronage proclaimed here is theologically parasitic: it borrows the language of the true Church while serving as a credential for an authority already oriented toward the overthrow of that very Church’s doctrinal positions.
2. Marian devotion abstracted from the war against Modernism
Authentic Marian elevation by the Church is never isolated from the doctrinal battle:
– The proclamation of the Immaculate Conception (Pius IX) was a blow against rationalism and naturalism: Mary as Tota pulchra, preserved from sin, exposes the errors of those who deny original sin and grace.
– The proclamation of the Assumption (Pius XII) confesses the supernatural destiny of man’s body and contradicts materialism and secularism.
– The promotion of the Sacred Heart and Marian consecrations (Leo XIII, Pius XI, Pius XII) are weapons against laicism and the rebellion of nations against Christ.
Here, Nossa Senhora da Ponte is declared patroness without any doctrinal weaponization. The text could have declared:
– that under her patronage, Sorocaba must reject Freemasonry and socialism (explicitly unmasked by Pius IX as the “synagogue of Satan”),
– that civil authorities and people must submit to the social reign of Christ,
– that priests and faithful must guard against Modernism condemned by Lamentabili and Pascendi.
It says nothing. This strategic silence is itself a betrayal. It leaves the faithful disarmed in a century marked by apostasy, while pretending to protect them with a purely sentimental Marian umbrella.
Symptomatic Revelation of the Conciliar Sect’s Method
This brief act illustrates, in miniature, the deeper method by which the neo-church operates.
1. Continuity of external forms, rupture of internal substance
– The structure imitates genuine Apostolic Letters: Latin style, references to the Sacred Congregation of Rites, juridical formulae, insistence on perpetuity.
– The content, however, is doctrinally neutralized and surgically separated from the anti-liberal, anti-modernist Tradition which alone gives meaning to Marian patronage.
This is the essence of the conciliar sect: speciem pietatis habentes, virtutem autem eius abnegantes (“having the appearance of piety, but denying its power”).
2. Use of Marian acts to build credibility for a new religion
By multiplying such decrees, the conciliar edifice sought to reassure the faithful:
– “You see, Marian devotion continues; titles are granted; patronages are recognized; the forms are intact.”
Meanwhile, the same power:
– prepares the overthrow of the immemorial Roman rite and the Most Holy Sacrifice, replacing it with a protestantized communal meal,
– promotes religious liberty and ecumenical relativism,
– tolerates or encourages pseudo-mystical cults and “apparitions” that divert from the true battle against internal apostasy,
– progressively silences or neutralizes the condemnations of Modernism, liberalism, socialism, and Freemasonry.
The Marian name is thus exploited as a psychological shield for the revolution.
3. Collaboration of local hierarchy with the emerging paramasonic structure
The request by Bishop José Carlos de Aguirre, endorsed by Armandi Lombardi, demonstrates how local hierarchies willingly aligned themselves with the authority of John XXIII without demanding fidelity to the integral doctrine of Pius IX, Leo XIII, Pius X, Pius XI, and Pius XII.
– No conditions,
– no doctrinal protest,
– no appeal to the Syllabus or Pascendi.
Thus, the diocesan clergy and faithful are bound to recognize as “papal” an act issued by one whose agenda leads to the very errors previously condemned. This docile submission to an authority that is no longer doctrinally Catholic is one of the principal moral faults of the conciliar epoch.
Omissions that Accuse: Where Is the Call to Conversion of Society?
The gravest indictment of this document lies in what it omits.
In a land threatened (already then) by:
– communist and socialist ideologies,
– secularist and Masonic influence,
– growing Protestantism and religious pluralism,
a true successor of Pius IX and Pius X, invoking Mary as Patroness, would have:
– reminded the faithful that outside the Catholic Church there is no salvation in the proper sense;
– condemned modern errors undermining faith and morals;
– summoned civil authorities to legislate according to the law of Christ the King;
– exhorted priests to preach against Modernism and liberalism, according to Lamentabili and Pascendi;
– made of this patronage a rallying point for restoration of the social kingdom of Christ.
Instead, we read only gentle language about the Virgin as a safe help to the heavenly homeland, without one word about the concrete enemies of that homeland in temporal society.
Silentium de maximis, cum exigant tempora, est maxima accusatio (silence about the greatest matters, when the times demand them, is the greatest accusation). The lack of a clear doctrinal note reveals the modernist tactic of reducing supernatural truths to the private sphere, in harmony with liberal “tolerance” condemned by the Syllabus.
Exposing the Spiritual Bankruptcy Behind the Pious Façade
Bringing these levels together, we see why this seemingly benign letter participates in theological and spiritual bankruptcy:
– It invokes Mary while tacitly disconnecting her from the militant, anti-error mission that the pre-1958 Magisterium consistently affirmed.
– It asserts papal authority where that “authority” is historically and doctrinally aligned with the coming destruction of the true Roman liturgy and the toleration of the very errors solemnly condemned a century earlier.
– It reduces Marian patronage to an administrative, liturgical gesture, bereft of the integral worldview of Christ’s social kingship as taught in Quas Primas.
– It forms the faithful to accept a religion of gentle devotions and juridical formulas, while the foundations of dogma and worship are being eroded.
Under pre-1958 doctrine, as reiterated vigorously by St. Pius X:
– Modernismus est omnium haeresum conlectus (“Modernism is the synthesis of all heresies”).
– To use sacred language and Marian honor as ornaments for a modernist, liberalizing project is a desecration; it instrumentalizes the Mother of God for an agenda that ultimately denies in practice the absolute rights of her Son over Church and society.
Therefore, this letter, small as it is, must be read as:
– part of the continuous counterfeit of Tradition by the conciliar sect,
– an instance of how devotional acts are employed to veil jurisdictional usurpation and doctrinal deviation,
– a paradigm of how silence and softness in official texts prepare the faithful to accept, without resistance, the later, more explicit betrayals of the faith.
True devotion to Our Lady of any title means returning to the integral, anti-modernist Catholic faith, to the full acceptance of the condemnations of liberalism, indifferentism, false ecumenism, and religious freedom, and to the confession of Christ as King not only of souls but of nations, laws, and institutions. Any Marian act detached from this confession is emptied of its Catholic substance and becomes, however pious in wording, a mask for apostasy.
Source:
Praecipuo pietatis (vatican.va)
Date: 08.11.2025