The document issued in Latin under the name of John XXIII on July 8, 1959, titled “Essendiae in urbe,” declares that the Blessed Virgin Mary, under the titles “Mother of Good Counsel” and “Our Lady Golden Madonna” (Domina Nostra Aurea, “Goldene Madonna”), is established and confirmed as the principal heavenly patroness of the Diocese of Essen. It describes Essen as a busy industrial city, points to the ancient veneration of Our Lady there (linked to the historic abbey and its abbess), recalls that Pius XII erected the diocese and entrusted it to Our Lady, and, at the petition of Bishop Franz Hengsbach, it solemnly confirms Mary under these titles as the patroness of the whole diocese, with all liturgical rights of a principal patron.
Marian Ornament as Veil of Revolution: The Essen Patronage in the Service of the Conciliar Sect
Substitution of Apostolic Authority by a Forerunner of the Conciliar Usurpation
From the perspective of integral Catholic faith, the entire text suffers from one decisive, mortal defect: it proceeds from an authority already interiorly preparing the conciliar usurpation. The act is presented as an exercise of Apostolic jurisdiction, yet it bears the name and signature of John XXIII, the first in the post-1958 line of antipopes, and is later archived and propagated by the paramasonic structures occupying the Vatican. The problem is not Marian patronage as such—this is in itself traditional and laudable when grounded in true authority—but the use of Marian language as an ecclesial cosmetic, legitimizing a project that would soon enthrone Modernism in the sanctuary.
The document’s juridical formulae echo pre-1958 style, but they serve another master. Under a seemingly orthodox decree, the groundwork is set for a new “church” to cloak itself in continuity while severing itself from the dogmatic, anti-liberal, anti-modernist Magisterium of Gregory XVI, Pius IX, Leo XIII, St. Pius X, Pius XI, and Pius XII.
Here is the core duplicity: a text that says nothing heretical on the surface is deployed to normalize an illegitimate “pontificate” and the nascent conciliar revolution. This is theological cosmetics in the service of apostasy.
Factual Level: Marian Patronage Detached from the Concrete Kingship of Christ
On the factual plane, the letter pretends to be a simple juridical recognition:
“We confirm and declare the Blessed Virgin Mary, invoked under the name of Mother of Good Counsel and Our Lady Golden Madonna, as principal Patroness of the whole Diocese of Essen, with all liturgical honors and privileges…”
The vocabulary and structure closely imitate genuine Catholic acts:
– Invocation of Marian titles.
– Reference to ancient cultus at Essen.
– Mention of the diocesan erection by Pius XII.
– Formulae of “certa scientia,” “matura deliberatio,” and plenitude of Apostolic power.
However, several factual and contextual elements expose the deeper problem:
1. Rapid linkage to a newly erected industrial diocese:
– Essen is described as “a busy city where multiple trades are exercised and work is at its most intense,” and where Mary has “a noble ancient seat” calling her children from business to religion.
– This is accurate historically: the Golden Madonna of Essen is an ancient and venerable statue.
– Yet the document uses this historical continuity to anchor a new diocesan structure that will soon be organically integrated into the conciliar sect and its liturgical and doctrinal demolitions.
2. Association with Bishop Franz Hengsbach:
– Hengsbach, as the first Bishop of Essen, stands at the gateway between the anti-modernist era and the conciliar revolution; he will operate fully within the post-conciliar system.
– The Marian patronage functions as a halo placed on a jurisdiction almost immediately to be absorbed into post-1962 apostasy: new “Mass,” ecumenism, religious liberty, reconciliation with Modernism condemned in Lamentabili sane exitu and Pascendi.
3. Canonical posture:
– The text claims, in classical language, that any contrary acts are “null and void,” demanding recognition of the signatory as true Roman Pontiff.
– Here lies the crucial factual inversion: the style of orthodoxy is instrumentalized to demand obedience to a man under whom the doctrinal demolition of orthodoxy will be initiated.
Thus the facts invoked (ancient Marian devotion, Pius XII’s erection of the diocese, juridical formulas) are true in themselves but are exploited to create a continuum from the true Church into a neo-church. This is precisely the “hermeneutic of pseudo-continuity” by which Modernism disguises its rupture.
Linguistic Level: Pious Ornamentation Masking Institutional Mutation
The rhetoric is deliberately edifying:
– The city is depicted as a place of intense labor where Our Lady sweetly recalls souls to eternal goods.
– The Golden Madonna is called a clear, resplendent sign, “piously exalted through ages.”
– The tone is gentle, pastoral, and uncontroversial.
Yet several linguistic traits betray its function:
1. Absence of Militant Catholic Categories:
– No explicit insistence on the social Kingship of Christ over industrial life, contrary to Pius XI, who declared that true peace and order can only exist when individuals and states submit to Christ the King and His law (Quas Primas).
– No use of the strong doctrinal language characteristic of anti-liberal Magisterium: no mention of the condemnation of indifferentism, secularism, naturalism as in the Syllabus of Errors of Pius IX.
– The industrial city is mentioned, but without any explicit condemnation of the anti-Christian spirit ruling such modern centers, nor of Freemasonic or socialist forces that Pius IX and Leo XIII denounced relentlessly as enemies of the Church.
2. Reduction of Mary to Sentimental, Apolitical Patroness:
– Mary is presented primarily as a consoling Mother who calls from “the magnitude of business” to “religion” and “sweetness.”
– Missing is the clear, doctrinally offensive-to-the-world dimension of Mary as Terribilis ut castrorum acies ordinata (“terrible as an army set in array”) and as destroyer of all heresies, intimately bound to the visible, militant, doctrinally uncompromising Church.
– The rhetorical softening fits precisely the imminent aggiornamento program: Marian devotion without Marian militancy, piety without open war against error.
3. Legal Grandiloquence as Smokescreen:
– The exhaustive canonical closure (“irritumque ex nunc et inane…”) is used to give the impression of high juridical seriousness, while the same usurped “authority” will soon be used to convoke Vatican II, invite observers from heretical sects, and unleash doctrinal ambiguity.
– Language once used to defend the deposit of faith is now co-opted to defend the authority of the coming revolution.
The text thus manifests a characteristic modernist tactic: maintain a devotional surface while hollowing out the doctrinal and militant content. This linguistic anesthesia prepares the faithful to accept later, open subversion.
Theological Level: Marian Patronage Without Anti-Modernist Teeth
In traditional Catholic theology, Marian patronage is never a decorative gesture. It presupposes and reinforces:
– The visible, hierarchical, indefectible Church founded by Christ.
– The unity of faith, sacraments, and governance under a true Roman Pontiff.
– The integral condemnation of liberalism, indifferentism, rationalism, socialism, and secret societies.
– The primacy of the supernatural order over temporal order.
Measured by pre-1958 doctrine, this letter is gravely deficient in what it omits.
1. No Assertion of the Integral Catholic Faith:
– The decree never explicitly binds the Diocese of Essen to defend the whole integral Catholic doctrine against modern errors.
– There is no echo of St. Pius X’s condemnation of Modernism as “the synthesis of all heresies” (Pascendi; reconfirmed with excommunication in the reaffirmation of Lamentabili).
– There is no warning, as demanded by the Syllabus of Errors, against religious indifferentism or the false idea that all religions may be tolerated as equally legitimate in public life.
2. No Connection to the Social Kingship of Christ:
– Pius XI in Quas Primas teaches that peace and order depend on public recognition of Christ’s Kingship; civil rulers and societies must submit to His law.
– Essen, as an industrial and economic center that shapes social life and law, should be called to explicit subjection to Christ the King.
– Yet the letter isolates Marian patronage from this doctrinal demand. Mary is invoked above a diocese that will, under the conciliar sect, bless religious liberty, ecumenism, “dialogue,” and the cult of man condemned by prior Popes.
3. Instrumentalization of Marian Devotion:
– Authentic Marian devotion leads to sharper hatred of error, love for dogma, fidelity to Tradition, and resistance to revolution.
– Here Marian patronage is harnessed to legitimize:
– the authority of John XXIII, who would call a council that broke with the anti-modernist magisterium in practice;
– bishops like Hengsbach integrated into conciliar structures;
– a diocese that will embrace the new “Mass” and ecumenical abuses.
This is a sacrilegious appropriation: using the Immaculate Virgin as a shield for an incipient apostasy.
4. Silence on Sacraments, State of Grace, Judgment:
– The letter does not exhort the faithful of Essen to:
– frequent worthy reception of the sacraments,
– avoid mortal sin,
– live in a state of grace,
– fear the Last Judgment and hell.
– Silentium de novissimis (silence about the last things) is not accidental. It is characteristic of the coming conciliar framing: emphasis on consoling imagery, eclipse of eschatological seriousness, removal of salvific urgency.
This silence is itself the gravest indictment. A Marian decree that refuses to speak clearly about salvation, sin, and judgment in a modern industrial, secularized context is not an innocent omission; it is a deliberate softening. It trains souls to receive a future religion of “human fraternity” without dogmatic edges.
Symptomatic Level: Proto-Conciliar Pastiche of Tradition and Revolution
The Essen letter must be read as a symptom of the systemic mutation about to be unleashed.
1. Continuity of Forms, Inversion of Ends:
– We see intact:
– Latin,
– legal solemnity,
– Marian piety,
– reference to Pius XII.
– Yet the signatory is the same antipope who would:
– initiate Vatican II, carefully constructed to accommodate the very errors condemned in the Syllabus and Lamentabili;
– surround himself with periti and “experts” committed to ecumenism, religious liberty, and aggiornamento;
– open the way to the “new Mass” and doctrinal relativization under his successors in the same usurping line.
This is classic modernist praxis as described by St. Pius X: preserve appearances while subverting substance. The Essen act shows how the neo-church clothes itself in Marian vesture while preparing to enthrone man in place of Christ.
2. Cultic Legitimization of a Neo-Church:
– By declaring a principal patroness of the Diocese of Essen, John XXIII implicitly seals:
– the diocesan structure as a stable ecclesial reality,
– under his supposed pontifical authority,
– within the juridical order that will soon be transformed into the Church of the New Advent.
– Marian patronage is thus made to “baptize” an institutional framework that will defect from integral Catholic doctrine.
– This is not mere sentiment; it is a deliberate strategy: the conciliar sect must drape itself in Marian and sacramental continuity to deceive the faithful.
3. Indifference to the War Against Freemasonry and Liberalism:
– Pius IX and later Popes unmasked Freemasonry and liberalism as the organized “synagogue of Satan,” engaged in legislative and cultural warfare against the Church.
– Industrial centers like Essen are obvious theaters of secularist, Masonic, socialist influence.
– A truly Catholic apostolic letter would:
– call on Mary to crush the sects,
– formally encourage resistance to anti-Christian state and economic systems,
– link Marian patronage with confession of the Kingship of Christ and rejection of “modern civilization” understood as anti-Christian.
– Here, none of this appears. The text is “non-political” and “non-controversial”—that is, it is perfectly adapted to the conciliar rhetoric that will accept religious liberty, democracy without Christ, and ecumenical collaboration.
The omission is not neutral; it is consent. It signals the retreat of the public claims of Christ and His Church and the entrance of a tamed, decorative Catholicism into the liberal order condemned by the pre-1958 Magisterium.
Marian Co-optation: From Destroyer of Heresies to Emblem of Conciliar Sentimentalism
The attempt to enlist the ancient Golden Madonna of Essen into the project of the conciliar sect must be resisted and unmasked.
1. True Marian Patronage:
– True devotion to Mary is inseparable from:
– unconditional submission to the perennial Magisterium,
– rejection of all modernist novelties,
– fidelity to the Most Holy Sacrifice as handed down,
– combat against heresy and Freemasonry.
– Mary is the Mother of Good Counsel because she leads to the unchanging counsel of God, not to the evolving “pastoral” relativism of post-1958 structures.
2. The Essen Decree as a Counterfeit Seal:
– The decree uses Our Lady to certify:
– a hierarchy soon to be complicit in the new “Mass,” religious liberty, ecumenism, and doctrinal dilution,
– a structure that will feed its faithful with invalid or doubtful rites and a naturalistic gospel.
– To invoke the Immaculate Virgin as “principal patroness” over such a project is an implicit blasphemy: it suggests that she blesses the path away from the very doctrines defined under her protection at Trent, Vatican I, and in anti-modernist encyclicals.
3. The Necessary Response:
– From the perspective of the integral Catholic faith, it is necessary to:
– distinguish the authentic, pre-conciliar Marian devotion rooted in Tradition from its conciliar instrumentalization,
– refuse to see in John XXIII’s act a legitimate pontifical exercise,
– reaffirm that authentic Marian patronage cannot be invoked to sanctify structures and “bishops” who participate in the systemic betrayal of the faith.
The faithful attached to the true Church must honor Our Lady of Good Counsel and the ancient Golden Madonna precisely by refusing to interpret such acts as legitimizing the conciliar sect. Rather, they should see in this co-optation yet another sign of how the abomination of desolation seeks to sit in the holy place, wearing the garments of Tradition.
God’s Rights Above Human Sentiment: Why This “Innocent” Decree Must Be Rejected
Some may protest: “But the text is Marian and pious; why such severity?” Because:
– Salus animarum suprema lex (the salvation of souls is the supreme law); any act that objectively strengthens obedience to an illegitimate, modernist usurpation is harmful, however pious its phrasing.
– The unchangeable Magisterium before 1958, especially Pius IX’s Syllabus and St. Pius X’s anti-modernist measures, condemns the very orientation that John XXIII and his successors embody.
– To accept the Essen decree as a true exercise of papal authority would be to accept the subsequent chain of conciliar enormities as legitimate developments of the same authority—which contradicts the principle that veritas numquam sibi contradicit (“truth never contradicts itself”).
Therefore:
– One must distinguish and hold fast:
– to the authentic Marian devotion of Essen, rooted in centuries of true Catholic life;
– while utterly rejecting the attempt of an antipope and the conciliar sect to annex this devotion as a prop for their counterfeit magisterium.
– The Virgin Mary is indeed the patroness of all who keep the integral faith; she is not, and cannot be, the emblem of the neo-church which has enthroned religious liberty, ecumenism, and the cult of man in defiance of the anti-modernist Popes.
To defend the honor of the Mother of God is, here and now, to refuse her instrumentalization by the conciliar revolutionaries and to return to the immutable doctrine and worship that alone are worthy of her and of her divine Son.
Source:
Essendiae in Urbe (vatican.va)
Date: 08.11.2025