The document, issued by John XXIII on April 2, 1959, purports to erect a new apostolic prefecture of Bechuanaland by detaching territories from the dioceses of Kimberley and Bulawayo and from the apostolic vicariate of Windhoek, entrusting this new structure to the Congregation of the Passionists. It is an apparently technical, administrative act of missionary reorganization in Southern Africa, clothed in solemn canonical form, whose very bureaucratic dryness reveals the deeper tragedy: the self-assured exercise of authority by a man already preparing the conciliar revolution, extending his claimed jurisdiction while silently uprooting the very notion of the Church as the *regnum Christi* that must subdue nations, not dissolve into colonial cartography and diplomatic conveniences.
The Colonial Cartography of a Neo-Church Power: Bechuanaland as Laboratory
Administrative Decrees without Christ the King: Spatial Engineering of a Coming Revolt
From the outset, the constitution is a showcase of juridical formalism emptied of supernatural clarity. John XXIII speaks of the Cardinals of Propaganda Fide, of consultations with Celestine Joseph Damiano, and decrees:
“…ex iisdem novam condimus praefecturam apostolicam, Bechuanalandensem appellandam…”
He assigns this to the Passionists *ad Nostrum tamen et Apostolicae Sedis nutum* (at Our and the Apostolic See’s disposition). The text:
– Meticulously enumerates territories and religious congregations.
– Grants to the new prefecture “all the rights and privileges” foreseen by the Code of Canon Law.
– Threatens canonical penalties for any who would disregard its provisions.
– Wraps itself in the formula ad perpetuam rei memoriam and intones the authority of the “Supreme Pontiff.”
What is missing is more decisive than what is present:
– No confession of the exclusive necessity of the Catholic faith for salvation in these lands.
– No proclamation of the sovereign rights of Christ the King over Bechuanaland, as taught by Pius XI in Quas Primas, who insists that peace and order will not return until states and peoples recognize Christ’s social reign.
– No call to extirpate paganism, sects, secret societies, or modernist infiltration condemned by Pius IX in the Syllabus Errorum.
– No mention of the Most Holy Sacrifice as the heart of evangelization, no insistence on the state of grace, no warning of eternal damnation for infidelity and apostasy.
In place of an apostolic roar, one finds a managerial whisper. The act claims to expand “the Christian cause,” but in reality prefigures a Church reduced to a network of territories managed by a leadership that, within a few years, would enthrone religious liberty, false ecumenism, and dialogue in place of the divinely revealed exclusivity of the Catholic religion.
Lex orandi, lex credendi (“the law of prayer is the law of belief). Here: lex administrandi, lex dissolvendi (“the law of administration becomes the law of dissolution”).
Language of Power without Dogma: The Cold Bureaucracy of an Emerging Sect
The linguistic texture is revealing. The document is saturated with:
– Procedural formulas: territorial detachment, execution mandates, documentary certifications.
– Emphasis on legal validity: decrees “now and in the future effective,” derogation of any contrary prescriptions, threats against those who would disregard the act.
– The self-assertion of personal authority: de apostolica Nostra potestate decernimus ac iubemus (“by Our apostolic power we decree and order”).
Yet it is almost entirely mute about:
– The Cross as the only means of salvation.
– The supernatural end of missions: incorporation into the unique Church of Christ.
– The obligation of rulers and civil authorities in Bechuanaland to submit publicly to the reign of Christ and support the true Church, as taught by Pius IX and Pius XI.
– The scourge of Freemasonry and liberalism, explicitly identified by Pius IX in the Syllabus and appended texts as the driving force of the war against the Church, particularly in modern states and colonies.
This stylistic profile is not neutral. The careful avoidance of strong dogmatic assertions and condemnations, even in a missionary constitution, foreshadows the conciliar and post-conciliar rhetoric: sterile technocracy, “pastoral” non-judgment, talk of jurisdictions and competencies while the faith is bled out under the scalpel of modernization.
The tone’s key symptoms:
– A sacralized bureaucracy, where holiness is silently displaced by organizational expansion.
– A juridical absolutism severed from the dogmatic absolutism of the one true Faith.
– A counterfeit majesty: the language of commanding penalties, without the language of guarding souls from hell.
This is precisely the inversion condemned by St. Pius X in Lamentabili sane exitu and Pascendi: exalting method, historicism, human procedures, while muting the immutable, transcendent authority of revealed truth.
Theological Emptiness: Mission Without Conversion, Authority Without Orthodoxy
On the theological level, the constitution is gravely symptomatic.
1. It presents territorial and congregational rearrangements as self-sufficient goods, without specifying:
– That all who live and die outside the Catholic Church, knowing her divine institution, cannot be saved.
– That Protestant sects, pagan cults, and syncretistic lodges in Southern Africa are not alternative paths but instruments of damnation.
– That the divine mandate is not geographical but dogmatic: “Praedicate Evangelium omni creaturae” (“Preach the Gospel to every creature” – Mk 16:15), i.e. to teach, baptize, subject nations to Christ’s law.
2. It assumes, without questioning, the validity and orthodoxy of the entire conciliar apparatus being prepared by John XXIII—the same figure who:
– Announced and convoked the council that would enthrone the condemned notion of religious freedom and reconcile with “modern civilization” (explicitly rejected in Syllabus n. 80).
– Fostered precisely the “opening to the world” denounced by prior popes as suicidal.
3. It deploys canonical threats against hypothetical opponents of this territorial act, while maintaining total silence about the real enemies:
– Modernism, condemned as the “synthesis of all heresies” by St. Pius X.
– Secret societies and paramasonic networks exposed by Pius IX as the “synagogue of Satan” waging war on the Church.
– Naturalism and secularism eroding any sense of Christ’s social kingship.
Thus, we behold **authority used maximally inward, minimally upward**: harsh against any who might question an administrative decree; indulgent, even speechless, in the face of the ideological systems that destroy the faith and enslave nations to Satan.
This inversion is itself a sign of spiritual bankruptcy.
Integral Catholic Evangelization vs. Conciliar Missionary Technocracy
Prior to 1958, true missionary legislation consistently treated:
– Evangelization as the explicit call to abandon false religions.
– The hierarchy’s duty as the guardianship of dogma and morals, not their adaptation.
– The civil order as bound objectively to recognize and favor the Catholic religion.
The Kimberleyensisbull stands in unspoken tension with this Tradition.
From an integral Catholic perspective:
– Bechuanaland was not primarily a “protectorate” to be carved administratively, but a portion of the world enslaved by paganism, sects, and the rising forces of socialism, Freemasonry, and liberal nationalism.
– A true apostolic prefecture should be explicitly ordered to:
– Root out superstition and idols.
– Condemn syncretism and lodge influence.
– Impose strict doctrinal, sacramental, and disciplinary integrity among missionaries.
Instead, this document:
– Treats missionary expansion as a managerial problem.
– Subordinates supernatural language to the language of territorial efficiency.
– Hands responsibility to congregations already operating within a climate increasingly tolerant of ecumenical and liberal tendencies.
It is the embryo of the conciliar missionary model: broaden structures, thin doctrine.
Ubi fides languescit, ordo inflatur (“Where faith grows weak, structure swells”).
Silence on Christ’s Kingship: A Direct Clash with Quas Primas
Pius XI in Quas Primas teaches unequivocally:
– That the root of modern disasters is the exclusion of Christ and His law from public life.
– That there will be no true peace until individuals and states recognize and submit to Christ’s kingship.
– That the Church must constantly assert these rights publicly, not hide them.
The Kimberleyensisbull is issued barely three decades after this magisterial proclamation. Yet:
– It mentions no duty of local rulers or colonial authorities to recognize the Catholic religion as the only true one.
– It does not demand that civil statutes conform to divine and natural law.
– It does not explicitly assert that the purpose of the new prefecture is to bring about the public reign of Christ in Bechuanaland.
This omission is not accidental. It is a concrete, textual anticipation of what would become the conciliar sect’s program:
– Replacing the confession of Christ the King with vague pastoral presence.
– Trading the rights of God for “human rights” and “religious freedom.”
– Leaving nations in supposed “neutrality,” which Pius IX had branded an illusion and a betrayal.
The document’s quietism regarding Christ’s social kingship thus implicitly contradicts the doctrinal line of the pre-1958 Magisterium it pretends to continue.
From Juridical Self-Assertion to Doctrinal Self-Destruction
Note the internal paradox:
– John XXIII’s act is emphatic: those who oppose this constitution “shall incur the penalties” for disobeying orders of Supreme Pontiffs.
– It demands absolute juridical docility to its provisions.
Yet:
– The very same authority structure will shortly:
– Open the doors to Modernism rehabilitated.
– Undermine the dogma that the Catholic Church is the only ark of salvation.
– Produce texts lauding religious liberty and ecumenical parity.
Lex iniusta non est lex (“An unjust law is not a law”). The deeper principle, witnessed by Bellarmine and the traditional theologians, is that manifest heresy severs one from the Church and with it the authority to bind in Christ’s name.
Seen in this light:
– The authoritarian precision of the Kimberleyensisconstitution is an empty husk: a paramasonic structure speaking with the tone of Peter, preparing to mutilate the faith of Peter.
– Its threats against dissenters are tragically ironic: those who would resist the deformation of true Catholic missions are, in reality, defending the very doctrine the conciliar sect would soon betray.
Symptoms of the Conciliar Revolution: Naturalization, Managerialism, and Territorialism
The text functions as a clinical specimen of the pre-conciliar mutation:
1. Naturalization of the Church’s presence:
– Prefecture as an “administrative unit” aligned with colonial protectorate borders.
– Suppression of the Church’s supra-political, supernatural sovereignty.
2. Managerialism over apostolic zeal:
– Stress on execution, documentation, faculties.
– No reference to martyrdom, sanctity, doctrinal militancy against error.
3. Territorialism without dogmatic exclusivity:
– Talk of jurisdiction replaces talk of conversion.
– Juridical continuity masks approaching doctrinal rupture.
This is how revolutions begin inside institutions: not with explicit denials at first, but with a methodical absence of what once was central—until that absence hardens into a new orthodoxy of silence.
Silence on Modernism and Secret Societies: A Grave Omission
Given the historical moment—1959—one expects from any true successor of Pius X:
– Constant vigilance against Modernist exegesis, sacramental minimalism, and liturgical subversion.
– Open warnings against Freemasonry and its political instruments in decolonizing regions, as Pius IX condemns the “synagogue of Satan” steering anti-Catholic policies.
Instead, the constitution:
– Is mute on every front where the modern enemies of the Church operate.
– Treats mission territory as a neutral field for canonical engineering.
– Provides no safeguards against the penetration of the very forces that would soon deform catechesis, worship, and discipline there.
This silence is itself culpable. It aligns with the pattern condemned by St. Pius X: shepherds who do not bark, structures that do not protect, and an ecclesiastical language that refuses to name heresy, lodge, or apostasy.
True Ecclesial Authority vs. Conciliar Usurpation
Integral Catholic doctrine teaches:
– The Church is a *societas perfecta* (perfect society) endowed with all necessary means for the salvation of souls.
– Her authority is ordered essentially and primarily to the defense and transmission of the integral faith.
– Any authority that systematically facilitates the destruction, relativization, or silencing of this faith betrays its mandate.
The Kimberleyensisconstitution, in itself, is not an explicit dogmatic denial. Its significance lies in:
– Its manifestation of an authority increasingly content with governing “structures” while avoiding explicit doctrinal militancy.
– Its synergy with the person and program of John XXIII, who launched the council that enthroned principles explicitly condemned by previous popes.
– Its canonical self-confidence contrasted with its doctrinal timidity.
A power that:
– Speaks loudly in micro-territorial decrees,
– But consigns the kingship of Christ and the unique truth of the Catholic faith to implicit, dwindling assumptions,
exposes itself as the juridical mask of a spiritual revolution.
Abusus non tollit usum (“Abuse does not abolish proper use”), yet persistent abuse reveals where true authority is no longer morally, and eventually no longer ontologically, present.
Conclusion: A Small Stone in the Foundation of the Abomination
The Apostolic Constitution on Bechuanaland is not a spectacular text. Its importance is precisely in its banality:
– A mission decree without missionary clarity.
– An assertion of papal authority divorced from robust doctrinal confession.
– A territorial maneuvering that prefigures the conciliar sect’s reduction of the Church to a geo-pastoral NGO.
Measured by the immutable teaching upheld by Pius IX, Pius X, Pius XI, and the perennial Magisterium, this constitution is:
– Theologically undernourished.
– Spiritually anemic.
– Symptomatic of a leadership preparing to enthrone precisely those principles earlier condemned as destructive: religious indifferentism, reconciliation with liberal modernity, silence about Christ’s sovereign rights over nations.
The tragedy of Kimberleyensis et Aliarum is not in its lines about borders, but in the silence between those lines: a silence that already resounds with the coming language of “dialogue,” “pluralism,” and “religious liberty”—the vocabulary of a neo-church that has chosen cohabitation with error over the kingship of the Crucified.
Source:
Kimberleyensis et aliarum (Bechuanalandensis) (vatican.va)
Date: 08.11.2025