The document attributed to John XXIII, titled “Expedit sane,” declares Raphael the Archangel as principal heavenly patron and John Mary Vianney as secondary patron of the (then) Archdiocese of Dubuque, grounding this choice in local historical references and invoking their intercession and example for the promotion of “Catholic life” in that territory. It appears benign and pious on the surface, yet it is a juridical and liturgical act issued by the first usurper of the Roman See, instrumentalizing authentic saints and an archangel to cloak the nascent conciliar revolution with a counterfeit aura of continuity and sanctity.
Perverting Patronage: How a Usurper Exploits Saints to Legitimize Revolution
Formal Nullity: An Antipope Cannot Bind Heaven as Patron of His Counter-Church
At the factual and canonical level, the central assertion of this act is that “John XXIII,” acting as Roman Pontiff, by his “apostolic authority,” definitively appoints:
“Sanctum Raphaëlem Archangelum universae Dubuquensis archidioecesis praecipuum apud Deum Patronum, Sanctum vero Ioannem Mariam Vianney, Confessorem, secundarium eiusdem Patronum”
(“Saint Raphael the Archangel as the principal Patron with God of the whole Archdiocese of Dubuque, and Saint John Mary Vianney, Confessor, as its secondary Patron”).
The core problem is radical: the validity of this act presupposes that the signatory is truly Roman Pontiff. From the perspective of integral Catholic doctrine, the man known as John XXIII is the inaugurator of the conciliar usurpation. A manifest modernist, convoker of the Second Vatican Council’s destructive program, and a planner of the entire aggiornamento that enthroned religious liberty, collegiality, ecuмenism, and the cult of man, falls directly under the logic articulated by the pre‑1958 Magisterium:
– *Cum ex Apostolatus Officio* of Paul IV declares that if one who has deviated from the Catholic faith or fallen into heresy is elevated to the papacy, such elevation is “null, void, and without effect”. The Bull does not grant ontological legitimacy to a heresiarch elected by men.
– The classical theological tradition (e.g. summarized by Bellarmine and others, as cited in the Defense of Sedevacantism file) affirms that a manifest heretic cannot be head of the Church, because he is not a member of the Church. This principle is not a curious opinion but the application of the simple axiom: the head must be within the body he governs.
Thus a paramasonic, modernist usurper does not possess the potestas to legislate for the Church. His “patronage” acts are canonically and theologically empty with respect to the true Church; they bind only the neo-church which later flowered from his revolt.
The document’s own formula betrays its illegitimacy. It invokes:
“certa scientia ac matura deliberatione Nostra deque Apostolicae potestatis plenitudine”
(“with Our certain knowledge and mature deliberation and from the fullness of Our Apostolic power”).
But there is no *plenitudo potestatis* (fullness of power) where there is manifest rupture with the faith defined by the pre‑conciliar magisterium. To claim such fullness while preparing and inaugurating a council that enthrones religious indifferentism and repudiates the social Kingship of Christ is usurpation, not the exercise of Petrine office.
Therefore:
– The act is devoid of binding force in the order of the true Catholic Church.
– It is an internal ornament of the conciliar sect: a pseudo-pontifical gesture by which the occupying structures dress themselves in traditional names to mask their apostasy.
Manipulated Piety: Using Raphael and Vianney to Sanction a New Religion
The cleverness of this short text lies in its choice of figures.
1. Raphael the Archangel:
– In Scripture he is the healing messenger of God (Book of Tobias), guide and defender.
– Invoking Raphael as patron of a territory about to be submerged in liturgical and doctrinal experimentation is a calculated aesthetic: the revolution wants to appear as “healing,” “pastoral,” medicinal.
2. John Mary Vianney:
– Canonized 1925, pre‑revolution; the Curé of Ars is the model of the sacrificial priest, tireless confessor, enemy of worldliness, embodiment of everything the conciliar clergy would soon despise.
– Making him a secondary patron allows the document to appropriate his immense real authority in conscience of the faithful, as if the Curé silently blesses the coming aggiornamento.
The text states that Vianney is “gloriae sacerdotum et agri Dominici cultoris eximii” (“the glory of priests and an eminent cultivator of the Lord’s field”). This is true in itself; yet when such language emanates from the mouth of the very regime that will destroy the sacrificial priesthood by the 1968 ordination rite and the abolition of the Roman Rite, it becomes poisoned flattery.
We see here a typical modernist maneuver, noted and condemned by St. Pius X in Pascendi: preserve the words, undermine and invert the content. The Curé of Ars is retained as decoration while his whole spiritual universe — horror of sin, centrality of the confessional, asceticism, Eucharistic reparation, unwavering submission to the perennial Magisterium — is practically annihilated by the conciliar program that John XXIII initiates.
Thus:
– The Archangel and the saint are made to serve as symbolic shields for a counterfeit church.
– The implicit claim: “This is the same Catholic Church; see, we love Raphael, we honor Vianney.”
In reality, it is an ideological laundering operation: *tradition-washing* of apostasy.
Rhetorical Cosmetics: Harmless Latin Covering Systemic Rupture
Linguistically, the document uses the classical Roman chancery idiom. A few elements are critical:
1. Pious Teleology:
The opening sentence:
“Expedit sane Sanctos Caelites dioecesium constitui Patronos, ut ipsorum deprecatione vita catholica ibidem provehatur, ipsorum exemplo ad altiora consequenda Christifideles incitentur, praesidio malis universis iidem prohibeantur.”
(“It is indeed expedient that the heavenly Saints be appointed Patrons of dioceses, so that by their intercession Catholic life may be advanced there, by their example the faithful may be spurred on to higher things, and by their protection all evils may be warded off.”)
On its face this is unimpeachable: Catholic life, example of saints, protection from evils. But within months and years:
– “Catholic life” is systematically redefined in naturalistic terms: activism, community, social work, ecuмenical niceness.
– “Evils” are no longer unbelief, heresy, mortal sin, or Masonic and modernist infiltration (exposed by Pius IX’s Syllabus and by St. Pius X), but supposedly “triumphalism,” “rigidity,” “intolerance.”
– The very usurper who pens this pious line is the one who rehabilitates modernist currents condemned in Lamentabili sane exitu and Pascendi.
The rhetoric functions as camouflage. There is no explicit modernist proposition in the text; the poison is in what is presupposed and in what the document carefully does not say.
2. Self-Presentation as Zealous for the Kingdom:
“Nos vero, quibus nihil antiquius est quam ut Regno Dei nova usque afferamus incrementa…”
(“We, for whom nothing is more important than that we should bring new increases to the Kingdom of God…”)
Two layers of critique:
– In the authentic Magisterium (e.g. Pius XI, Quas primas), the *Regnum Christi* is doctrinally concrete: the social, visible, juridical Kingship of Christ, the submission of states to His law, the integrity of dogma and sacraments. Pius XI teaches that peace and order are impossible unless nations recognize and publicly obey Christ the King.
– Here, the formula “new increases” under John XXIII prefigures the entire ideology of Vatican II: “opening to the world”, religious liberty, ecumenical parity, dialogue with heresy and false religions, all condemned in substance by Pius IX’s Syllabus (errors 15–18, 55, 77–80).
The language is smooth, irenic, “pastoral.” But it is precisely this tranquil, bureaucratic Latin that signals the transition from militant anti-liberal doctrine to a liberalized, anthropocentric orientation. The quiet tone is not a virtue; it is a sign of anesthetized supernatural zeal.
3. Absolute Legal Formulae in Service of Illegitimate Power:
The closing juridical section deploys the customary phrases:
“Contrariis quibusvis nihil obstantibus… irritumque ex nunc et inane fieri, si quidquam secus…”
(“Notwithstanding any things to the contrary… and we declare null and void from now on whatever may be attempted to the contrary…”)
These formulae, in a true pontifical act, express the Church’s real authority. In the mouth of a usurper, they become a caricature: the anti-church mimicking the legal solemnity of the Bride of Christ. The more the conciliar sect empties doctrine, the more pompously it asserts its legal and liturgical authority. This document is a minor but telling specimen of that phenomenon.
Silence as Confession: The Omitted Supernatural Battle
Even in a brief letter, one can discern decisive silences. What is missing is as significant as what is said.
1. No mention of:
– The gravity of modern errors condemned repeatedly before 1958: rationalism, religious indifferentism, laicism, socialism, Freemasonry (Pius IX, Pius X, Leo XIII).
– The need for public penance, vigorous preaching of dogma, defense of the Most Holy Sacrifice, and subordination of civil law to Christ the King, as demanded in Quas primas.
– The concrete threats to the faithful in the United States: secularism, Protestantism, Masonic influence in public life, dissolution of modesty, contraception, materialism.
A truly Catholic act appointing patrons for a local church in times of spreading apostasy would:
– Urgently exhort the faithful to the state of grace, frequent confession, Eucharistic reparation.
– Explicitly arm them against modernist theology and liberal moral errors.
– Reaffirm the binding force of the Syllabus and anti-modernist professions, warning against any attempt to “update” doctrine.
Instead, we receive a polished administrative nicety. The saints are invoked, but the real war they would lead the faithful into is never named. This is not accidental; it is programmatic. Silence about modernism is itself complicity with modernism.
2. The functional naturalism:
The text speaks generically of “vita catholica provehatur” (“that Catholic life may be advanced”), but does not once explicitly mention:
– State of grace.
– Salvation of souls against eternal damnation.
– Defense against heresy within the clergy.
– The Four Last Things.
This omission is a microcosm of the conciliar spirit: religious language without eschatological urgency; saints without spiritual militancy; Church without anathema. Such omission, in light of prior magisterial clarity, is not neutral; it is a betrayal.
Patronage Subordinated to a Counterfeit Ecclesiology
The theological core: by this letter, the usurper implicitly places Raphael and Vianney as “patrons” not only of historical Dubuque but of the ecclesiastical body that will soon be structurally reconfigured by Vatican II and its aftermath.
Effectively, it suggests:
– The Archangel and the Curé of Ars are heavenly protectors of a hierarchy that will:
– Replace the Roman Rite with a Protestantized communion service.
– Corrupt ordination rites, casting doubt on sacramental validity.
– Promote ecuмenism, interreligious meetings, religious liberty, and collegiality, in stark contradiction to the Syllabus and prior papal teaching.
– Tolerate and cultivate precisely the “sects” and “systems” (Masonic, liberal, indifferentist) against which Pius IX thundered.
This is morally monstrous: making authentic saints appear as icons of consent to an anti-Catholic program.
Integral doctrine prior to 1958 makes plain:
– *Patroni caelestes* intercede for the faithful who remain in the true faith and in communion with the true Church.
– No saint lends patronage to the establishment of doctrines previously condemned by the Magisterium acting in its perennial sense.
– The notion that Raphael or Vianney could be symbolic guarantors of ecuмenical relativism, neo-liturgy, and democratic ecclesiology is blasphemous in implication.
Therefore, from the perspective of the integral Catholic faith:
– One must sharply distinguish between:
– The real veneration of Raphael and the Curé of Ars within the remnant of the true Church.
– The propagandistic appropriation of them by the conciliar sect to legitimize its authority.
This letter belongs entirely to the latter operation.
Fruit of the Conciliar Seed: Harmless Today, Subversive Tomorrow
Some might object: “But this text says nothing overtly heretical; it simply appoints patrons.” That objection betrays an underestimation of modernist methodology.
St. Pius X in Pascendi describes the modernists as operating through:
– Ambiguous formulations,
– Exploitation of pious language,
– Gradual subversion rather than frontal denials.
This letter must be read:
– In continuity with John XXIII’s broader program:
– Suppression of the anti-modernist oath;
– Convocation of a “pastoral” council intended not to condemn errors but to reconcile with them;
– Atmosphere of “opening to the world” directly contradicting the spirit of Pius XI’s insistence on subjugating nations to Christ the King.
– As a tiny but telling step in habituating the faithful:
– To accept the acts of a modernist usurper as if they were acts of the true papacy.
– To see no contradiction between invocations of saints and a rapid practical relativization of pre‑1958 doctrine.
In other words, the spiritual and theological bankruptcy lies not in the surface statement, but in the structure:
This document is one brick in the façade of apparent continuity behind which the entire conciliar demolition is carried out.
It teaches the faithful to trust the voice signing “Ioannes PP. XXIII” when that voice soon speaks in a council that contradicts the Syllabus, revisions liturgy, and neutralizes the social reign of Christ. By lending this usurper the borrowed clothing of Raphael and Vianney, it encourages submission to illegitimate authority.
True Catholic Response: Veneration of Saints Without Submission to the Neo-Church
From the standpoint of unchanging Catholic doctrine:
– Raphael the Archangel is indeed to be invoked as protector of souls, defender of purity, and guide in trials.
– John Mary Vianney remains a luminous model of the Catholic priesthood: entirely sacrificial, Marian, Eucharistic, anti-worldly, hostile to novelty and compromise.
But:
– Their patronage and example must be consciously detached from the conciliar sect’s structures and pseudo-magisterial acts.
– Faithful Catholics must understand that any “appointment” of patrons by an antipope for a jurisdiction submerged in post‑conciliar errors is:
– Canonically inane (void),
– Theologically abusive (instrumentalizing saints),
– Spiritually misleading (suggesting that fidelity to saints is expressed by obedience to a counterfeit hierarchy).
Under the rule of Christ the King as taught by Pius XI, one cannot accept a revolution that dethrones Him socially and doctrinally, even if it sings hymns to saints. As Pius IX’s Syllabus makes clear, errors do not cease to be condemned because they are wrapped in Catholic vocabulary.
Therefore, a properly ordered, integral Catholic reading of “Expedit sane” must affirm:
– The goodness of authentic devotion to Raphael and the Curé of Ars.
– The utter non‑authority of John XXIII as legislator of the Church.
– The necessity of rejecting the conciliar structures that parasitically appropriate saints while crucifying their faith.
To confuse these levels is to fall into the trap carefully laid by this kind of document: to mistake a cosmetic affirmation of piety for real continuity of the Church, thus surrendering to the very apostasy the saints would rather die than condone.
Source:
Expedit sane (vatican.va)
Date: 08.11.2025