The Latin text issued under the name of John XXIII on 5 February 1960 solemnly elevates the church of St Charles Borromeo in Carmel, California, to the rank of a minor basilica, praising its picturesque coastal setting, its historical role in the implantation of Catholicism in California, its association with Junípero Serra, and its function as a popular place of worship and marriage ceremonies; it showers canonical privileges on this sanctuary in formally exalted but theologically hollow language, presenting the act as an expression of piety and pastoral solicitude. In reality, this document is an early, concentrated symptom of the self-referential legalism, historical romanticism, and creeping naturalism by which the conciliar revolution cloaked its usurpation of Catholic authority in a rhetoric of continuity, while preparing to betray the very Faith it sentimentally invokes.
Vacant Words over a Blue Sea: A Neo-Church Cult of Place without the Kingship of Christ
Elevation without Foundation: A Juridical Act Severed from Apostolic Faith
On the factual level, this letter appears deceptively modest: no dogmatic formulations, no overtly subversive program, only the granting of the title and privileges of a minor basilica to the church of St Charles Borromeo at Carmel.
The core elements are:
– Commendation of the scenic setting of Carmel by the “blue sea,” and of the church as a venerable shrine dating back (through successive reconstructions) to early Catholic presence in 17th–18th century California.
– Emphasis on the burial of Junípero Serra, called “Apostle of California,” and on civil recognition he received from the United States.
– Praise of the sanctuary as:
– a historical monument of California due to its architectural style,
– a place where the faithful frequent to “participate in the Lord’s [worship],” venerate the Blessed Virgin under the title “Our Lady of Bethlehem,” and often celebrate weddings.
– Report that Aloysius Willinger, “bishop” of Monterey-Fresno, supported by Hamlet Cardinal Cicognani, asked for the title of minor basilica.
– Declaration by John XXIII, “out of certain knowledge and mature deliberation” and the “fullness of apostolic power,” that the church is elevated to minor basilica with all rights and privileges.
– Assertion of perpetual validity with the usual canonical clauses nullifying contrary acts.
Superficially pious, the text is in fact a juridical performance: invocation of “Apostolic power” to reward “devotion” and “history” with an honorific dignity. But once this act is read in the light of the unchanging doctrine codified before 1958, and in the context of the coming council convoked by the same usurper, its emptiness and internal contradiction become evident. A man who would soon inaugurate the conciliar dismantling of the public reign of Christ and the rights of the Church here plays at being guardian of sacred tradition, distributing titles while preparing to betray the Faith that alone gives those titles meaning.
Aesthetic Sentimentality and Historical Romanticism as Substitutes for Faith
Already in its opening lines, the text reveals the mentality of the emerging neo-church:
– English translation of the key accent:
“The blue sea which washes the Californian shore draws men’s minds to the church dedicated to St Charles Borromeo… not only for the pleasantness of the place, but especially because it is a distinguished seat of piety.”
The order of motives is revealing: landscape, aesthetic charm, national monument status, civil recognition of Serra, architectural value, and finally some generic “piety.” This inversion—where nature, history, and culture are foregrounded, and the supernatural mystery of the *Unbloody Sacrifice of Calvary* remains unnamed—is not accidental. It is the stylistic prelude to the conciliar cult of man and of culture that Paul VI would exult in 1965: man, his dignity, his works, his monuments.
Contrast this with integral Catholic teaching:
– Pius XI in Quas Primas thunders that there is no true peace or order except under the social reign of Christ the King; he grounds ecclesial acts not in picturesque landscapes but in the absolute claims of Christ over individuals and nations: peace is only possible in the kingdom of Christ (Quas Primas).
– Pius IX in the Syllabus (prop. 55) condemns the separation of Church and State that reduces religion to a cultural ornament and denies Christ’s royal rights over nations.
Here, the Carmel shrine is praised as:
– a “distinguished seat of piety”,
– a “principal monument” of California for its architecture,
– a place for “frequent” nuptial celebrations.
But there is no explicit assertion of Christ’s sovereign rights over California or the United States, no denunciation of naturalism, liberalism, Freemasonry, no call for the conversion of American civil power to the one true Church. The sanctuary is engulfed into the American mythos as heritage site plus devotional centre, rather than upheld as the throne of the Eucharistic King demanding the obedience of the nation.
This genteel silence is not neutral; it is betrayal by omission.
The Linguistic Camouflage of Usurped Authority
The rhetoric of the letter is crafted to simulate traditional papal solemnity:
– “Ad perpetuam rei memoriam” (“For a perpetual remembrance of the matter”),
– formulas of “certain knowledge,” “mature deliberation,” and “fullness of Apostolic power,”
– strong nullifying clauses: any contrary attempt is “irritum et inane” (“null and void”).
These were, in the ages of true Popes, the grave legal vesture of authentic *magisterium* and jurisdiction. Here, they are appropriated as costume by one who inaugurated the conciliar revolution. From the perspective of the integral Catholic faith, one must observe:
– A manifest promoter and protector of doctrines and practices condemned by previous Popes cannot wield the authority he invokes; the principle articulated by theologians and canonists, and codified in the spirit of Canon 188.4 of 1917 (public defection from the faith vacates office), stands: a public heretic cannot be head of the Church, nor exercise true Apostolic power.
– St Robert Bellarmine, echoed by classical canonists, affirms that a manifest heretic is not a member of the Church; therefore, he cannot hold jurisdiction in it. The rhetoric of “plena potestas” (fullness of power) in the mouth of a man preparing the demolition of doctrine is evidence not of authority, but of its parody.
This letter belongs to what may be called the “transition liturgy” of the conciliar sect: still mimicking pre-1958 forms, while already reorienting the Church from supernatural mission to cultural-humanistic self-celebration. The solemn clauses here, cut loose from fidelity to prior teaching, expose the contradiction: they claim perpetuity for an act issued from a principle of discontinuity.
Silence on Sacrifice, Sin, and Salvation: The Gravest Indictment
The integral Catholic critique must focus above all on what is absent.
In the entire text, we look in vain for:
– Any explicit mention of the Most Holy Sacrifice as propitiatory offering for sins.
– Any reference to the need for the state of grace, the danger of mortal sin, the Four Last Things (death, judgment, hell, heaven).
– Any exhortation to penance, conversion of the nation, or rejection of liberalism and indifferentism.
– Any affirmation that the only true religion is the Catholic Church, outside of which there is no salvation, as defined by the perennial Magisterium.
Instead, we find:
– Soft language about “piety” and “devotion.”
– Emphasis on civil honor accorded to Serra: his being “counted among the eminent men publicly praised by the United States.”
– Tourism-style appreciation of architecture and scenery.
– The reduction of sacramental life to a sociological note: the faithful come “to participate,” to honour Our Lady, and “often to celebrate weddings.”
This studied naturalism stands in stark opposition to:
– Pius IX’s condemnation of the idea that all religions are equally paths to salvation (Syllabus, props. 15–18).
– The anathemas of the Council of Trent on the Sacrifice of the Mass as propitiatory, on the Sacraments as necessary means of grace, on the supernatural nature of justification.
– St Pius X’s Pascendi and Lamentabili, which condemn the reduction of religion to historical development, sentimental devotion, or cultural expression.
The letter’s silence is thus not a harmless local peculiarity; it is precisely the muting of the supernatural that Modernism always performs. By glorifying a shrine as monument, by citing national praise, by declining to proclaim the hard dogmatic claims of Christ’s Kingship and the Church’s exclusivity, the text exemplifies the incipient cult of “heritage Catholicism”: churches as museums and emotive spaces inside a liberal order they no longer dare condemn.
Junípero Serra and the Co-option of Missionary Zeal into Liberal Mythology
A central pivot of the letter is the burial of Junípero Serra in Carmel:
– He is called “Apostle of California” for his work in Christianising the region.
– The text stresses that he is counted among eminent men publicly honoured by the United States.
Instead of presenting Serra as a witness of the absolute claims of the true Faith against paganism and error, the document subtly integrates him into the American civil narrative. Missionary zeal is transmuted into a precursor of cultural development and national identity.
Prior to 1958, the Church consistently taught:
– The missions exist to convert souls from error to the one true Church, not to produce “monuments” admired by secular power.
– The state must recognize and favour the Catholic religion (cf. Leo XIII, Pius IX).
By foregrounding Serra’s recognition by the American state, the letter signals an accommodationist trajectory: missionary figures will be re-presented as acceptable heroes within a religiously neutral, Masonic civil order—preparing the way for the conciliar endorsements of “religious freedom” and “dialogue.” The shrine is not held up as a call to the United States to submit to Christ the King, but as a jewel in the national crown. This is ecclesial adultery.
Instrumentalization of Marian Devotion and Nuptial Rites
The text mentions:
– Veneration of Our Lady as “Our Lady of Bethlehem.”
– Frequent celebration of weddings according to ecclesial rite.
But note how:
– Marian devotion is used descriptively as a local colour, not as a doctrinal bastion against heresy and apostasy.
– The nuptial use of the sanctuary is praised purely as a sign of its popularity, with no reminder of the indissolubility of marriage, no denunciation of divorce laws, contraception, or moral corruption.
Again, compare:
– Pius XI’s Casti Connubii, which binds marriage indissolubly and condemns divorce and contraceptive mentalities.
– Pre-1958 Magisterium’s insistence that Marian devotion defends dogma (Immaculate Conception, Assumption) and guards against Modernism.
In this letter, Marian and sacramental references are emptied of doctrinal edge; they serve a narrative of “continuous piety” compatible with an American environment already saturated with liberalism. This is the technique the conciliar sect will perfect: keep the vocabulary, drain the content, so that the faithful are lulled while principles are reversed.
Theological Incoherence: Claiming Perpetuity for a Revolutionary Structure
The document concludes with one of the strongest forms of papal legislative language:
– It declares that the act is to remain “firm, valid, and effective” in perpetuity.
– It pronounces any contrary attempt null and void.
Yet the same line of usurpers initiated by John XXIII has:
– Systematically overthrown the liturgical order in which basilicas had their meaning.
– Transformed “basilicas” into stages for anthropocentric spectacles, interreligious rites, and neo-pagan profanations.
– Embraced religious liberty, condemned by Pius IX, and ecumenism that denies the exclusive truth of the Catholic Church.
Thus the very structure invoked here—minor basilica with its special liturgical and indulgential privileges—has, under the neo-church, been turned against its purpose. A dignity created to intensify the cult of the Eucharistic King becomes a logo in the marketing of a “heritage site” within a pluralistic cult of man.
The contradiction is double:
– On the one hand, the text claims a timeless juridical effect grounded in papal authority.
– On the other, the same usurped authority is used by the conciliar sect to relativise and even nullify the inner substance of what “basilica” should express: the triumph of Catholic worship and doctrine.
From the perspective of immutable doctrine, this is not development; it is perversion. Lex orandi, lex credendi (the law of prayer is the law of belief): when those who pervert the law of belief continue to issue ornate laws of prayer, those laws become evidence of imposture.
Symptom of the System: The Conciliar Sect’s Use of Local Honors
This letter must be situated within a broader pattern characteristic of the conciliar sect:
1. Maintain external continuity:
– Latin, solemn formulas, honors for saints (especially pre-conciliar ones).
– Preservation of certain shrines, relics, and titles.
2. Gradually invert doctrinal substance:
– Downplay exclusive claims of the Church.
– Silence on condemnation of liberalism, Freemasonry, indifferentism.
– Introduce a new orientation: man-centered, historically relativistic, evolutionist.
3. Employ local and cultural acts as anesthetic:
– Every new “basilica,” “sanctuary,” or “pilgrimage site” is showcased as proof that “nothing has changed,” while in Rome and in doctrine everything is being overthrown.
– The faithful are encouraged to cling to architecture, heritage, and sentiment, instead of to the clear dogmatic anathemas and the social Kingship of Christ.
The Carmel letter is a classic case: a blue sea, an old mission church, a missionary’s tomb, some devotions, a new honor. No one is alerted that the same hand signing this parchment is also steering the Church toward the very errors condemned in Lamentabili and the Syllabus. This is how revolutions operate: by enveloping novelty in the mantle of tradition.
Contrast with Pre-1958 Papal Practice: The Missing Prophetic Note
When authentic Popes elevated churches:
– They frequently:
– Recalled the doctrinal battles fought there.
– Exhorted to fidelity against contemporary errors.
– Insisted on the rights of the Church against hostile states.
– Explicitly linked honors to increased zeal for orthodox faith and morals.
Examples (paraphrased, not pseudo-quoted):
– Pius IX and Leo XIII, elevating shrines, often tied such acts to the defense against Freemasonry, secularism, or particular heresies.
– Pius XI, in instituting the feast of Christ the King, explicitly did so as a remedy against laicism and the dethronement of Christ in public life.
By stark contrast, the Carmel letter:
– Says nothing about the errors ravaging mid-20th century California and the United States:
– widespread divorce, contraception, secularism, masonic influence, Protestantism.
– Says nothing of the obligation of rulers to submit to Christ the King and His Church.
– Offers no warning against Modernism infiltrating seminaries and universities, despite St Pius X’s explicit condemnations just decades earlier.
This muteness is not an oversight; it is a policy. The conciliar sect’s leaders present themselves as benign administrators of heritage and feelings, not as guardians of dogma. Their letters sound like curial tourism brochures coated in canonical verbiage. The absence of prophetic denunciation is itself a sign of apostasy.
The Carmel Basilica as Emblem of the Post-Conciliar Capture of Sacred Space
Once the conciliar revolution advanced:
– Shrines like Carmel—decorated with the honorary title given in this letter—were absorbed into the liturgical and doctrinal system of the neo-church.
– In many such places, the true Roman Rite was replaced by a fabricated rite which:
– obscures the sacrificial, propitiatory character,
– anthropocentrically reorders prayers around the assembly,
– dilutes or contradicts the theology of the Mass defined at Trent.
Thus, the “basilica” title now functions:
– As a brand within the conciliar sect’s global network of sites, where:
– indifferentism is normalized,
– ecumenical gestures are staged,
– religious tourism replaces Catholic militancy.
The 1960 act—if severed from the integral Catholic faith—becomes a tool by which the neo-church claims continuity: “See, we honor Serra, we protect old missions, we love tradition.” Meanwhile, they overthrow the substance of the Faith for which Serra laboured.
This is why such documents must be completely unmasked: their danger lies less in what they say explicitly, and more in the way they provide a pious façade for a system that denies, in practice and often in words, the unchanging Magisterium before 1958.
Conclusion: From Blue Sea Sentiment to the Need for Integral Restoration
The letter “Caeruleum Mare” is not a grand doctrinal manifesto; its significance is more insidious. It encapsulates in miniature the method of the conciliar usurpers:
– They employ the language and ceremonial of the pre-conciliar Church.
– They bestow honors and cultivate nostalgia.
– They integrate Catholic symbols into the liberal, Masonic order of nation-states.
– They carefully avoid explicit proclamations of Christ’s exclusive Kingship and the Church’s sole salvific authority.
– They refuse to wield the sword of condemnation against the modern errors identified authoritatively by Pius IX, Leo XIII, St Pius X, and Pius XI.
In such a framework, a minor basilica is not raised up as a bastion of the one true Faith in a pagan land; it is curated as a harmonious element within a pluralistic, naturalistic landscape. The blue sea is admired, the monuments are preserved, feelings of “piety” are validated—but the supernatural edge of Catholic truth is blunted.
Against this, the only Catholic response is the return to the uncompromising doctrine of the pre-1958 Magisterium:
– the absolute obligation of every nation, including the United States, to recognize and publicly honour Christ the King,
– the exclusive truth of the Catholic Church against all sects and false religions,
– the objective error and sin of liberalism, indifferentism, and masonic naturalism,
– the centrality of the Most Holy Sacrifice and the sacraments administered according to the traditional rites,
– the necessity of rejecting every structure, document, and “honor” when used as instruments to legitimize a system at war with the Faith.
A church at Carmel can indeed be a true sanctuary of grace—if it is reclaimed for the integral Catholic faith and purged of the neo-church’s sentimental humanism. Otherwise, its title of “basilica” remains a monument not to Christ’s reign, but to the conciliar occupation that dared to invoke Apostolic authority while dismantling Apostolic doctrine.
Source:
Caeruleum mare (vatican.va)
Date: 08.11.2025