Epistolary Incense for a Systemic Betrayal of the Church
This brief Latin letter of John XXIII to Cardinal Efrem Forni, marking five lustra as bishop and ten as priest, is a courtly congratulation: it thanks God for graces, praises Forni’s diplomatic service to the Apostolic See (notably in Ecuador, Belgium, Luxembourg), commends his prudence and constancy, recalls his elevation to the cardinalate, and ends with a blessing and wish for renewed zeal for God’s glory and the good of souls.
Yet in its timing, tone, and silences, this smooth panegyric exemplifies how the conciliar usurper transforms the sacred hierarchy into a self-congratulatory diplomatic corps serving a neo-church rather than the Kingdom of Christ the King.
Factual Glorification of a Diplomatic Machine without Supernatural Edge
On the factual level, the epistle is simple: it rehearses Forni’s curriculum vitae and envelops it in sacral language.
Key elements (paraphrased from the text):
– Daily thanksgiving is due to God; anniversaries particularly highlight divine benefits.
– Forni celebrates:
– 25 years of episcopacy,
– 50 years of priesthood.
– His long service in heavy offices of the Apostolic See merits praise:
– Apostolic Nuncio in Ecuador,
– Later Nuncio in Belgium and Luxembourg.
– John XXIII acknowledges his “prudent,” “diligent” exercise of diplomatic duties, calling the fruits “abundant.”
– As reward, he:
– recalls Forni’s elevation to the College of Cardinals,
– invokes God to guard him, inflame renewed zeal, and strengthen him for works profitable to the “Church.”
None of this, taken as bare facts, is inherently problematic: the pre-conciliar Magisterium recognizes legitimate ecclesiastical diplomacy. But precisely here the rot surfaces: what is presented as continuity is in fact the stabilization of a new orientation already turning the sacred hierarchy into an arm of naturalistic internationalism and concordats with error.
During these very years, John XXIII opens and drives the project that will culminate in Vatican II’s doctrinal subversion, notably:
– the softening toward socialist and Masonic powers solemnly unmasked by Pius IX and Leo XIII,
– the first public signals of religious liberty indifferentism against the Syllabus (Pius IX, Syllabus, prop. 15, 77–80),
– the cult of “aggiornamento” that Pius X had already condemned in principle in Lamentabili sane exitu and Pascendi dominici gregis, when he branded Modernism as the synthesis of all heresies.
The letter is therefore not an innocent formality; it is a fragment of a larger, meticulously engineered façade: an episcopal and cardinalitial corps rewarded not for guarding dogma with blood, but for lubricating relations with apostate states and liberal regimes that deny the social Kingship of Our Lord Jesus Christ.
Self-Congratulatory Rhetoric as Symptom of Ecclesiastical Naturalism
The linguistic texture of the epistle is revealing.
1. Continuous horizontal flattery:
– Forni is praised for “long and faithful service” and “heavy offices” fulfilled for the Apostolic See.
– Diplomatic “prudence,” “constancy,” and “conscientiousness” are the highlighted virtues.
2. Minimal supernatural specificity:
– God is invoked in general terms as source of “every good gift” (James 1:17).
– There is no concrete mention of:
– defense of defined dogmas,
– resistance to error,
– promotion of the true faith against heresy,
– protection of the flock from Modernist poisoning.
3. Reward paradigm:
– The core logic is: loyal service to the central political administration → elevation to the cardinalate.
– The epistle proudly states that John XXIII recognized these “merits” by enrolling him among the Purpurati.
This reveals a mentality: the Church’s highest praise is attached to institutional functionality within a new orientation, not to doctrinal militancy. Compare this to the integral Catholic ethos:
– Pius IX, in the Syllabus and his allocutions, measures fidelity by resistance to liberal, Masonic, and nationalist encroachments that usurp the rights of the Church.
– St. Pius X praises bishops and priests who fight Modernism; he brands those who “prefer novelty,” despise scholastic method, and relativize dogma as enemies of the Cross.
– Pius XI, in Quas Primas, defines the first duty of pastors as restoring the public reign of Christ the King in nations, not as neutral diplomats in secular equilibria.
The letter’s vocabulary is irreproachably pious but completely domesticated. It is pure “sacral bureaucracy”: incense without fire, theology without combat, a “praise of services rendered” that could be applied equally to a successful civil servant of a neutral institution. This is not accidental style; it is the language of a hierarchy that has already accepted coexistence with condemned errors.
Absence of Militant Catholicism: Silence as Condemnation
From the perspective of unchanging Catholic doctrine prior to 1958, what the letter does not say is far more damning than what it says.
In the early 1960s:
– Communism is persecuting the Church.
– Freemasonry and liberal democracy are advancing, in open contradiction to:
– Quanta Cura and the Syllabus of Pius IX,
– the repeated condemnations of secret societies and laicism,
– the duty of states to recognize the true religion.
– Modernism, condemned by St. Pius X, has penetrated seminaries and faculties.
– Preparing Vatican II, the conciliar clique is about to:
– legitimate religious liberty,
– exalt ecumenical relativism,
– dilute doctrinal clarity in the name of “dialogue.”
In this context, a Roman letter celebrating a Nuncio’s “prudence” and “fruits” in Ecuador, Belgium, and Luxembourg ought—if it flowed from the same spirit as Pius IX, Leo XIII, St. Pius X, Pius XI—to make explicit:
– affirmation that the only true Church is the Catholic Church;
– rejection of indifferentism and “equal rights” for false religions (Syllabus, 15–18, 77–80);
– insistence that Catholic diplomats must labor for the public recognition of Christ’s kingship, not for a comfortable modus vivendi with secular pluralism.
Instead, there is complete silence. No reminder to Forni that his duty as Nuncio is to oppose:
– Masonic legislation,
– secularized schooling,
– civil marriage regime contrary to divine law,
– religious liberty as an absolute.
This silence is not benign. It is the practical repudiation of Quas Primas, where Pius XI warns that the calamities of nations come precisely from refusing Christ’s reign in public life, and insists that rulers and states have the duty to honor Him.
By praising a diplomatic career without a single explicit reference to the combat for the social reign of Christ the King, John XXIII normalizes a new model of prelate: a courteous administrator of coexistence between truth and error. This is the embryonic profile of the conciliar sect’s “hierarchy.”
Theological Inversion: From Guardians of Dogma to Courtiers of a Neo-Church
Measured against pre-1958 doctrine, this letter reveals deeper doctrinal inversion.
1. Confusion of merit:
– True Catholic theology teaches: the highest ecclesiastical merits are:
– defense of dogma,
– sanctification of souls through the Most Holy Sacrifice,
– preaching against error,
– suffering persecution for Christ.
– In this letter, the “merits” rewarded are:
– long service in diplomacy,
– loyalty to the conciliar project’s central administration.
This is a practical realization of what St. Pius X condemned: replacing supernatural criteria with human ones, turning the hierarchy into a professional caste.
2. Omission of Modernist threat:
– Lamentabili sane exitu and Pascendi stigmatize those who deny the Church’s right to judge doctrines, relativize dogma, or subject revelation to historical evolution.
– John XXIII, architect and symbol of “aggiornamento,” sends a letter that could be read by any functionary of a neutral Christian federation. There is no warning about errors rampant in theology, no summons to doctrinal vigilance.
The letter sits inside a broader pattern: Modernism is no longer externally fought; it is internally rewarded.
3. Abuse of the Apostolic language:
– Invocations of Psalms and James 1:17 are orthodox themselves; but they are deployed as varnish for a purely this-worldly praise machine.
– The formulaic blessing at the end lacks any call to:
– perseverance in the integral faith,
– rejection of novelties condemned by the Magisterium,
– readiness for martyrdom rather than compromise.
This demonstrates a fundamental betrayal: the words of tradition are retained, but their edge is dulled and reversed. Verba manent, sensus fugit (the words remain, the meaning departs).
Structural Fruits of the Conciliar Revolution Prefigured in Miniature
This epistle is a microcosm of the conciliar revolution.
1. Clerical careerism sacralized:
– The tone normalizes ecclesiastical promotion as a closed system of mutual admiration: the usurper confirms his collaborators, his collaborators execute his line in the nations.
– There is no sense of bishops as defenders of the flock against Rome if Rome deviates; instead, there is a locked vertical of obedience to the emerging neo-church.
2. Replacement of militancy by “courtesy”:
– Everything is moderation, balance, diplomacy.
– Nothing evokes the burning zeal of Pius X who thunders against Modernist infiltrators, or of Pius IX who unmasks the “synagogue of Satan” of Masonic sects.
3. Harmonization with condemned liberalism:
– Nunciatures in liberal states are praised without the slightest qualification.
– The model is convergence with systems that:
– separate Church and State (condemned: Syllabus, 55),
– exalt civil liberty for all cults (condemned: Syllabus, 77–79),
– reduce Catholicism to one tolerated confession among many.
This is why such a “harmless” letter is in fact revealing: it shows that, by 1963, the conciliar structure no longer feels obliged even rhetorically to confront liberalism and Modernism as mortal enemies. The theological soil has shifted.
Language of the Antichurch: Pious Formulas without the Cross
On the linguistic level, several traits typify the paramasonic structure later fully manifested:
– The letter is entirely “positive,” an uninterrupted stream of eulogies.
– There is no trace of odium erroris (hatred of error), only of institutional self-satisfaction.
– The “Church” appears as an organism that primarily:
– distributes dignities,
– manages international relations,
– celebrates internal anniversaries.
Contrast with integral Catholic documents:
– Pius IX’s Syllabus is a catalogue of condemned propositions, delineating truth by anathematizing error.
– Pius X’s decrees name concrete heresies and impose censures.
– Pius XI in Quas Primas explicitly opposes the kingdom of Christ to laicism and secular apostasy; he does not congratulate statesmen for their diplomacy but calls rulers to submit to Christ.
Here, by contrast, the “Church” is functionally depoliticized in the supernatural sense and politicized in the secular sense: a partner among nations, rather than Mater et Magistra of nations bound in conscience to Christ the King.
From Sacramental Hierarchy to Conciliar Sect Apparatus
While this letter predates the full external codification of the conciliar sect, it belongs to that same line of usurpers beginning with John XXIII, culminating today in the antipope occupying Rome.
The logic manifested:
– Rewards are granted for service to the project that will:
– dethrone the pre-conciliar Magisterium in practice (if not in words),
– replace the Most Holy Sacrifice with a horizontal assembly rite,
– propagate religious liberty and false ecumenism,
– enthrone the “cult of man” in place of the social reign of Christ.
Thus, every such epistolary act, however decorous in Latin style, must be read as one brick in the construction of the abomination of desolation within the visible structures.
– The “Purpuratorum Patrum Collegium” praised here is precisely the body that will endorse and implement Vatican II’s novelties.
– This makes the compliment not neutral but programmatic: fidelity to this pseudo-magisterial line is crowned, while fidelity to previous popes’ anti-liberal, anti-modernist stance is silently marginalized.
Lex orandi, lex credendi (the law of prayer is the law of belief). Here we see: lex laudandi – whom and for what the alleged head of the Church praises – reveals the new “faith” of the neo-church.
Integral Catholic Rebuttal: What a True Papal Letter Ought to Have Said
To expose fully the bankruptcy of this epistle, one must measure it against what an authentic successor of Pius IX, Leo XIII, Pius X, Pius XI, and Pius XII would have been bound to emphasize, especially in 1963.
Such a letter should have:
– Reaffirmed without equivocation:
– that the Catholic religion is the only true religion (Syllabus, 21),
– that no one has the right before God to practice or promote false religions publicly (condemnation of liberal religious liberty),
– that state authorities must, as far as possible, recognize and honor Christ and His Church publicly (Quas Primas).
– Exhorted a Nuncio:
– to oppose laws undermining Catholic marriage, education, and ecclesiastical rights (Syllabus, 65–74),
– to unmask Masonic influence and socialist infiltration (as Pius IX, Leo XIII, and Pius XII repeatedly commanded),
– to combat theological Modernism in seminaries and universities in his territories.
– Called the jubilarian bishop to:
– preach against indifferentism, subjectivism, “historical criticism” attacking Scripture (all condemned in Lamentabili),
– promote the Most Holy Sacrifice offered with the traditional Roman rite as expression of the true faith,
– be ready to suffer persecution rather than concede the Church’s divine rights.
Instead, we find:
– sterile compliments for a career,
– no explicit defense of dogma,
– no naming of enemies,
– no insistence on the duty of states,
– no admonition regarding the doctrinal crisis then erupting.
This omission is not mere negligence. It is the sign of a new religion: a religion that retains Catholic vesture while evacuating its militant, exclusive, and supernatural core.
Conclusion: Pious Phrases Masking the Consolidation of Apostasy
This short congratulatory letter, viewed in isolation, is bland. Viewed in the light of pre-1958 doctrine and the unfolding conciliar usurpation, it is emblematic:
– It exhibits a hierarchy celebrating itself instead of contending for the Kingship of Christ.
– It replaces the papal duty to condemn and correct with a syrup of “good wishes.”
– It signals that diplomatic compatibility with liberal regimes is a path to purple; zeal for the anti-liberal, anti-modernist teaching of previous popes is nowhere honored.
What shines through the carefully polished Latin is the absence of the Cross, the absence of doctrinal intransigence, the absence of supernatural combat. That absence is the loudest word of this text. In the face of the solemn condemnations issued by true pontiffs—Pius IX in the Syllabus, Pius X in Lamentabili and Pascendi, Pius XI in Quas Primas—it reveals not a harmless formality, but one more act in the progressive enthronement of a conciliar sect where once stood the Catholic Church.
Source:
Quamvis a religioso – Ad Ephraem tit. S. Crucis in Hierusalem S. R. E. Presbyterum Cardinalem Forni, a suscepta episcopali dignitate quinque implentem lustra, decem autem lustra celebraturum exacta, e… (vatican.va)
Date: 08.11.2025