The constitution published under the name of John XXIII on 10 January 1959, titled “CUSCHENSIS (SICUANENSIS)”, performs a purely juridical act: it detaches several provinces (Canchis, Canas, Espinar, Chumbivilcas) from the Archdiocese of Cuzco and erects from them a new territorial prelature nullius, Sicuani, defines its boundaries, assigns the cathedral church, its suffragan relation to Cuzco, prescribes a seminary, regulates the ascription of clergy and the temporal goods in accord with the 1917 Code, and entrusts execution to the papal nuncio.
Administrative Engineering in the Dawn of Revolution
This apparently technical document stands as an early and revealing symptom of the conciliar usurpation: a cold bureaucratic manipulation of ecclesiastical structures at the threshold of the great apostasy, clothed in traditional Latin formulas, yet internally ordered to the future “aggiornamento” that would devastate Peru and the whole Latin American continent.
Factual Level: A Realignment Prepared for a Counterfeit Church
The text of the constitution can be summarised in its principal determinations:
– It invokes the pretext of better pastoral care and more “apt” ecclesiastical circumscriptions to justify the carving out of a new prelature nullius from Cuzco:
“Desiring to provide as suitably as possible for the affairs of the universal Church, and to assist the needs of all the faithful through more convenient divisions of circumscriptions…”
– It separates the civil provinces of Canchis, Canas, Espinar, and Chumbivilcas from the Archdiocese of Cuzco and erects them into the new Prelature nullius of Sicuani, with boundaries coinciding with those civil units.
– It makes Sicuani suffragan to Cuzco; elevates the church of the Immaculate Virgin in Sicuani to prelatic church; prescribes erection of at least a minor seminary; determines the incardination of clergy according to the territory where they hold office or reside; assigns to the new prelature a portion of goods from Cuzco in conformity with can. 1500 of the 1917 Code; and orders the transfer of relevant acts and documents.
– It vests the nuncio Francesco Lardone with powers of execution, specifying notarial requirements and legal force.
All this is formally aligned with the juridical framework of the 1917 Code and uses the classic language of papal constitutions. Yet precisely here lies the problem: the act is dated 1959, signed by the man who would convoke the catastrophic “council” that unleashed *religious liberty*, *false ecumenism*, and *collegial democratization* condemned in substance by the constant Magisterium. From the perspective of integral Catholic teaching, this tidy canonical operation, instead of being neutral, functions as preparatory infrastructure for the conciliar sect’s future penetration and dissolution of the Faith in the Andes.
Alignment with the World: Ecclesiastical Borders Bent to Civil Demarcations
A first striking feature is the deliberate assimilation of ecclesiastical boundaries to civil administrative lines:
“…from these [civil provinces] We erect a new Prelature nullius, called Sicuani, to be bounded by the same limits as the civil provinces from which it is formed.”
This is not per se always illicit—historically Rome sometimes conformed dioceses to stable political realities. But Catholic doctrine has never allowed the State to become the norm of the Church’s structure. Pius IX condemns the thesis that the civil power defines the rights and limits of the Church (Syllabus, prop. 19, 55). Yet this constitution, without doctrinal clarification, simply presupposes civil borders as the organizing principle.
The silence is eloquent:
– No reaffirmation that ecclesiastical circumscription is rooted in the supernatural mission of salvation, not administrative convenience.
– No warning to civil authority that the Church’s jurisdiction is *iure divino* distinct and superior in spiritual matters.
– No mention of the rights of Christ the King over nations, so vigorously proclaimed only three decades earlier by Pius XI in *Quas Primas*, where he insists that “the states must not refuse public worship and obedience to Christ and His law.”
Instead, we find a functionalist language that treats the Mystical Body as a multinational institution optimizing its internal logistics. The prelature is drawn as if the Church were a parallel bureaucracy shadowing the State. This technocratic docility is precisely the spirit that will in a few years surrender Catholic nations to laicism, “religious liberty,” and masonic “human rights” ideology.
Linguistic Level: Traditional Formulas as a Veil for Institutional Naturalism
The rhetoric of the constitution imitates the solemn cadences of genuine papal acts:
– “Desiring to provide for the affairs of the universal Church…”
– “By Our supreme authority We decree and command…”
– “Whoever shall act contrary to these Our decrees shall incur the penalties…”
Yet behind the façade of *servus servorum Dei* stands the initiator of the conciliar revolution. The style attempts to borrow credibility from the pre-1958 papal Magisterium while planting an administrative framework that will be handed over to the neo-church within a few years.
Observe what the text never mentions:
– No call to defend the flock against modernist errors already condemned by Pius X in Lamentabili and *Pascendi*.
– No reference to guarding the integrity of the Faith against socialism, liberalism, and secret societies so clearly denounced by Pius IX’s Syllabus and Leo XIII.
– No insistence that the new prelature must combat idolatry, syncretism, superstition, or masonic infiltration, despite the known activity of such forces across Latin America.
– No mention of the necessity of the *Most Holy Sacrifice* as propitiation for sin, the state of grace, the last ends, or the reign of Christ in public life.
The language is purely managerial. Where Pius XI tied institutional acts to the proclamation of the kingship of Christ and the condemnation of secular apostasy, here we have a sterile redistribution decree, as if the Church were an NGO. This absence is not accidental; it manifests the new mentality: *ecclesia as efficient apparatus,* not as militant Ark of salvation.
Silentium de supernaturalibus gravissima accusatio est (silence about supernatural realities is the gravest accusation).
Theological Level: Disconnection from the Immutable Mission of the Church
Measured by pre-1958 doctrine, several profound problems appear.
1. Reduction of Pastoral Care to Geography and Administration
The text speaks of assisting the “needs of all the faithful through more convenient divisions.” Yet:
– There is no articulation of what these “needs” are in Catholic terms: perseverance in the true Faith, worthy reception of the sacraments, avoidance of heresy, resistance to paganism and sects, sanctification of temporal life under Christ’s law.
– It nowhere affirms the exclusive necessity of the Catholic religion for salvation, explicitly taught and defended by the Magisterium (cf. Syllabus, prop. 16–18 condemned).
The “needs” thus slide toward a naturalistic reading: better coverage, easier administration, more clergy distribution—without link to the dogmatic content of the Faith. This is the same conceptual void that will shortly be filled with Vatican II’s language of “dialogue,” “inculturation,” and “option for the poor” severed from doctrinal combat against error.
2. Technocratic Seminary Vision without Anti-Modernist Safeguard
The constitution insists the Prelate must quickly erect at least a minor seminary and send selected students to the Pontifical College Pio Latin Americanum in Rome for philosophy and theology.
On its surface, this echoes the perennial duty to form clergy. But:
– There is zero mention of the Oath against Modernism (in force at that time, imposed by St. Pius X, binding clergy and teachers).
– There is no requirement that formation adhere strictly to Thomistic doctrine as commanded by Leo XIII and Pius X.
– There is no reminder of *Lamentabili* or *Pascendi*, although Latin American seminaries were already permeated by progressive and nationalist errors.
Instead, the link is made precisely to Roman institutions which, in the late 1950s, were already being infiltrated by the nouvelle théologie—Rahner, Congar, de Lubac and others—openly contesting the immutable notion of dogma, revelation, and Church, in direct conflict with St. Pius X’s condemnations.
Thus, the constitution effectively orders that the future clergy of Sicuani be placed under formation centers soon to become engines of conciliar subversion. Juridically, it appears orthodox; concretely, it channels vocations into the schools of those who would tear down the Faith. This is not accidental; it is structural.
3. Blind Confidence in Future Governance within a Coming Apostasy
The constitution entrusts execution to the nuncio and to the Archdiocese of Cuzco, without any discernment about doctrine. All is predicated on the assumption that those structures are and will remain Catholic in doctrine and worship.
Yet:
– Within a few years, the same hierarchy will embrace the new “Mass,” false ecumenism, religious liberty, and the cult of man, in defiance of the pre-conciliar Magisterium.
– The new prelature, created without doctrinal fortification, simply becomes another organ ready to receive the conciliar virus.
A true Catholic act of governance must be intrinsically ordered to preserve and defend the Faith. Here governance is detached from doctrine: jurisdiction is redistributed as if orthodoxy were guaranteed automatically—precisely when leading figures are preparing its overthrow.
4. Misuse of the Authority Formula to Protect Merely Structural Acts
The document employs the maximal language of binding, penalties, nullity of contrary acts, and the solemn anathema of disobedience:
“Those who despise or in any way reject Our decrees should know that they will incur the penalties established in law for those who do not obey the orders of the Supreme Pontiffs.”
Such language, in traditional teaching, girds acts that safeguard divine law and right order of the Church. But here it is expended entirely on the acceptance of a territorial rearrangement. There is:
– No parallel severity directed against heresy.
– No invocation of penalties against modernists or enemies of the Church, despite the explicit papal condemnations in the decades immediately prior.
Thus, the full weight of juridical solemnity is diverted from defending doctrine to enforcing bureaucratic compliance. This inversion of priorities reveals a deep disorientation: the shell of authority remains; the object worthy of that authority (protection of the Faith) is evacuated.
Symptomatic Level: An Ante-Chamber of the Conciliar Sect in Latin America
Seen in the context of subsequent events, this constitution becomes a case study in how the conciliar revolution entrenched itself:
– By 1959, John XXIII is already preparing the so-called council. His record will include the rehabilitation of theologians previously censured under Pius XII, the softening of anti-modernist discipline, and the reorientation of Roman structures away from doctrinal clarity.
– The same apparatus that erects Sicuani will in short order:
– Replace the *Unbloody Sacrifice of Calvary* with the protestantized “new order” of Paul VI.
– Promote “religious liberty” against the Syllabus.
– Celebrate ecumenical gestures that deny the unique salvific authority of the Catholic Church.
– Encourage liturgical experimentation and theological relativism that Pius X had explicitly condemned as modernism, “the synthesis of all heresies.”
Within that trajectory, the Sicuani prelature:
– Is built on territorial lines ideal for implementing decentralised “pastoral” experiments.
– Receives clergy trained in Rome precisely during the most turbulent years when traditional doctrine is being systematically undermined.
– Functions as a compliant suffragan unit in an episcopal conference system soon to be weaponized against integral Catholic faith and morals.
This is how the conciliar sect operates: not first by openly denying dogma, but by:
mutare structuram, mores, formationem (changing structure, customs, formation),
while reciting old formulas. The doctrinal demolition follows.
Omissions that Condemn: The Missing Militant Catholicism
Several decisive silences of this constitution disclose its spirit.
1. No Assertion of the Exclusive Truth of the Catholic Faith
Pius IX, Leo XIII, and Pius XI tirelessly reasserted that only the Catholic Church is the true Church of Christ, and that error has no rights. In a region where pagan practices, syncretism, and protestant sects already threaten the faithful, a new prelature would be the perfect occasion to:
– Proclaim the rights of the Church.
– Condemn sectarian proselytism.
– Call civil society to recognize the social Kingship of Christ.
Instead: nothing. An entire act of “pastoral” reorganisation is executed without a single doctrinal blow against unbelief.
2. No Anti-Modernist Safeguard in Priestly Formation
Despite St. Pius X’s explicit teaching that modernism must be eradicated with the greatest vigilance, the constitution sends seminarians into precisely those channels where modernism will bloom. No oath, no Thomistic standard, no doctrinal firewall. This is a calculated omission.
3. No Defence against Masonic and Liberal Penetration Denounced by Predecessors
The Syllabus clearly identifies socialism, communism, secret societies, and liberal indifferentism as mortal threats. Pius IX explicitly links the war on the Church to masonic machinations. Latin America in the 20th century is a laboratory of these forces.
Yet the constitution:
– Neither warns the new Prelate to resist these forces,
– Nor calls him to uphold Catholic social doctrine,
– Nor mentions the condemnations of Masonry.
An entire prelature is erected as if these dangers did not exist. This is blindness or complicity.
4. No Emphasis on the Most Holy Sacrifice and the Salvation of Souls
The supreme law of the Church is the salvation of souls (*salus animarum suprema lex*). The Most Holy Sacrifice of the Mass is the heart of that mission. Yet:
– The constitution does not urge the multiplication of reverent, frequent Masses in the traditional rite.
– It does not exhort the Prelate to secure confession, catechesis, modesty, or Eucharistic devotion.
– It treats the prelature as an object of law and property more than as a supernatural organism of grace.
This naturalistic muteness is foretaste of the Council’s anthropocentric language, wherein sacraments are reinterpreted horizontally and the Cross is obscured behind “community” and “service.”
Subtle Abuse of Legitimate Canon Law to Prepare Illegitimate Structures
The constitution constantly cites and presupposes the 1917 Code, including can. 1500 on the division of goods.
In itself, use of the Code is correct. But:
– It instrumentalises the very legal order built to protect a truly Catholic hierarchy to configure territories that, a few years later, will be controlled by those rejecting that Code in practice.
– It disguises, under obedience to law, the construction of a framework that will be filled with heterodox content.
This is the method of the conciliar usurpation:
forma manet, res mutatur (the form remains, the reality is changed).
The law’s authority is borrowed to erect bodies that will later turn against the spirit and letter of that law.
The Contradiction with Pre-Conciliar Magisterium: A Brief Synthesis
Measured against the integral Catholic doctrine prior to 1958, the mentality expressed (or suppressed) in this act conflicts in effect with:
– Pius IX, Syllabus of Errors:
– Condemnation of State supremacy over the Church (props. 19, 55).
– Condemnation of indifferentism and the notion that one can find salvation in any religion (16–18).
– Leo XIII:
– Teaching on the social kingship of Christ and the necessity that institutions manifestly submit to divine law (e.g., *Immortale Dei*, *Libertas*).
– St. Pius X:
– Condemnation of modernist relativization of dogma, history, and structures (Lamentabili, *Pascendi*).
– Demand for strict Thomistic formation and anti-modernist oath.
– Pius XI, *Quas Primas*:
– Assertion that peace and order are only possible where Christ reigns socially; silence about this in public acts is a grave infidelity.
The constitution’s positivistic, purely structural tone sits uneasily beside this clear teaching. It is not an explicit heretical manifesto; it is worse in a sense: it is the quiet normalization of a Church that thinks and legislates as though these truths were secondary, optional, or already overcome. That mentality blossoms openly a few years later in the conciliar sect.
Conclusion: An Apparently Harmless Decree as a Stone in the Edifice of Apostasy
What, then, does “CUSCHENSIS (SICUANENSIS)” reveal?
– It cloaks itself in the language and legal apparatus of the true Church while proceeding from the initiator of a revolution condemned in seed by earlier popes.
– It reshapes ecclesiastical territory in subservience to civil structures without reaffirming the divine supremacy of the Church.
– It channels vocations into seminaries destined to be poisoned by modernism, without a word about defending the Faith from condemned errors.
– It expends the full solemnity of papal authority on administrative rearrangement while remaining silent about the pressing doctrinal and moral war engulfing the Church.
In isolation, a territorial prelature may seem benign. In its historical and doctrinal context, however, this act is a calculated element of a broader strategy: preserving the external carcass of canonical order while preparing it to be inhabited by a new, conciliarly reprogrammed religion.
The true Catholic must therefore:
– Refuse to be deceived by Latin phrasing and juridical flourish when they serve a program of accommodation to the world and of preparation for doctrinal betrayal.
– Judge every structural change by its orientation to the immutable ends of the Church: the glory of God, the reign of Christ, the salvation of souls, the defense of unchanging dogma.
– Recognize in such documents a prelude to the “Church of the New Advent,” which has occupied the visible structures and uses them to propagate indifferentism, false ecumenism, naturalistic humanitarianism, and liturgical profanation.
Where the document is silent about the Kingship of Christ, the exclusivity of the Catholic Faith, the horror of modernism, and the primacy of the *Most Holy Sacrifice*, it betrays itself. The silence speaks louder than the solemnities: an institution already thinking like the world, not like the spotless Bride of Christ.
Source:
Cuschensis (Sicuanensi) Quibusdam ab Archidioecesi Cuschensi detractis territoriis, nova efficitur praelatura nullius, « Sicuanensis » appellanda, die X m. Ianuarii A.D. 1959, Ioannes PP. XXIII (vatican.va)
Date: 11.11.2025