The document “Inde a primis” (30 June 1960), issued by the usurper John XXIII, exhorts the hierarchy “in communion” with the occupied Apostolic See to foster devotion to the Most Precious Blood of Our Lord Jesus Christ, closely uniting it with devotion to the Holy Name and to the Sacred Heart. It praises pre-existing traditional devotions, recalls their papal approvals, promotes the Litany of the Precious Blood (newly arranged and indulgenced), and urges the faithful to draw sanctification, unity, and even social peace from the cultus of the Redeemer’s Blood. The whole text is couched in apparently orthodox language and richly adorned with citations from Scripture, Saint John Chrysostom, and pre-1958 popes. Yet this pious façade functions as a preparatory mask for the conciliar revolution: an orthodox vocabulary strategically detached from the integral Catholic order, deployed by one who was already engineering the subversion of doctrine, liturgy, and ecclesial authority.
Blood without the Cross: How “Inde a primis” Prepares the Cult of a New Religion
Foundational Contradiction: Orthodox Phrases in the Mouth of a Revolutionary
On the factual level, “Inde a primis” appears to affirm central Catholic truths:
– The Precious Blood as price of Redemption.
– The bond of this devotion with the Holy Name and Sacred Heart.
– The principle lex orandi, lex credendi (“the law of praying determines the law of believing”) is explicitly invoked.
– References to:
– Pius XII’s Mediator Dei;
– Leo XIII, Pius XI, Pius XII on the Sacred Heart;
– Benedict XIV and Pius IX on the feast of the Precious Blood;
– Clement VI on the infinite value of the Blood of Christ (Unigenitus Dei Filius).
On the surface, these are not errors but quotations of true magisterial teaching.
However, the decisive problem is not isolated sentences, but the objective context and the person:
– John XXIII inaugurated the “aggiornamento” that led directly to the Second Vatican Council, the doctrinally subversive texts of the conciliar sect, and the systematic overthrow of the social kingship of Christ condemned by Pius IX and Pius XI (cf. Syllabus Errorum, Quanta Cura, Quas Primas).
– By 1960, the same regime preparing this letter was already:
– Elevating condemned modernist tendencies under a “pastoral” mask.
– Disarming vigilance against Freemasonry and liberalism that Pius IX, Leo XIII, and St. Pius X denounced as the organized “synagogue of Satan” warring against the Church (see Syllabus; Leo XIII, Humanum Genus; the appended magisterial excerpts against masonic sects in the provided file).
– Laying foundations for the liturgical dismantling that would culminate in the fabricated 1969 rite.
Thus, the fundamental contradiction: a man objectively inaugurating an apostatic program clothes himself in the language of Precious Blood and Sacred Heart in order to purchase credibility for the coming deformation. The text must be read, therefore, not as an isolated exercise of piety, but as a tactical use of orthodox devotions to anesthetize resistance and to shift their meaning.
This is the first and central indictment: the Blood of Christ is invoked while the doctrinal and social order founded by that same Blood is being prepared for demolition. That is spiritual fraud.
Instrumentalization of True Devotion to Legitimize a False Magisterium
On the factual and theological plane, several points must be dissected.
1. John XXIII repeatedly speaks as if exercising the legitimate care of the “Apostolic See” over “all the Churches,” appealing to Acts 20:28, to the duty of guarding sound doctrine, to the promotion of liturgical piety:
– “Attendite vobis et universo gregi… regere Ecclesiam Dei, quam acquisivit sanguine suo.”
This is true doctrine. But here it is co-opted to authenticate his own rule.
2. He presents himself as the faithful continuer of:
– Benedict XIV on the cultus of the Precious Blood.
– Pius IX extending the feast to the universal Church.
– Leo XIII, Pius XI, Pius XII on the Sacred Heart and on liturgical piety.
3. He explicitly reaffirms:
– The harmony of devotions with dogma:
– “cum lex credendi legem statuat supplicandi… nullae inducantur pietatis formae, quae a verae fidei illimibus fontibus non emanent”.
– The centrality of Christ as “mediator Dei et hominum” (1 Tim 2:5–6).
If this text came from a true pope in continuity with Pius IX–Pius XII, it would be unobjectionable. But in reality:
– By 1960, John XXIII had already:
– Announced the council that would introduce religious liberty, ecumenism, and collegiality in direct tension with the Syllabus, Quas Primas, Mortalium Animos, and Pascendi.
– Openly signaled a new orientation: accommodation to “modern man,” reconciliation with “modern civilization” that Pius IX explicitly condemned (Syllabus, prop. 80).
– Therefore, the appeal to lex orandi, lex credendi is especially grave. He invokes the principle that binds prayer to belief, precisely as his regime is about to falsify both the lex orandi and lex credendi. It is a pre-emptive hijacking of the Catholic code: the same language will soon be used to validate the conciliar liturgical and doctrinal revolution.
In classical theology, the value of devotional directives depends on:
– The orthodoxy of the authority issuing them.
– Their coherence with the entire body of doctrine.
Here we face a deliberate conflation: the authentic cult of the Precious Blood, legitimately promoted by true popes, is placed under the same banner as the program of aggiornamento, thus used as moral cover for that program.
This is the spiritual logic of Modernism condemned by St. Pius X in Lamentabili sane exitu and Pascendi: pious language outwardly retained, internal meaning dissolved and redirected.
Linguistic Cosmetics: Piety as a Veil for Impending Subversion
The linguistic register of “Inde a primis” is intentionally traditional: flowing Latin, citations of Scripture, Fathers, Thomistic hymnody, and pre-1958 magisterium. This is not incidental; it is strategic.
Key observations at the linguistic level:
– Reassuring archaism:
– Emphasis on childhood devotions of John XXIII, domestic recitation of litanies, etc., to project personal continuity with Catholic homes of old.
– Constant use of words like “salutary,” “redemption,” “sacrifice,” “merits of the Precious Blood,” “virtue,” “sanctification.”
– Frequent appeals to obedience:
– Urging bishops and faithful to adopt the Litany of the Precious Blood and related practices as coming from the “solicitude of all the Churches.”
Yet beneath this venerable idiom, there are telling omissions and shifts.
1. No doctrinal battle is named.
– There is no denunciation of Modernism, neo-Modernism, existential or historical-critical attacks, condemned only a few decades earlier by St. Pius X and Pius XII (Humani Generis).
– There is no mention of Freemasonry though, as Pius IX emphasized, these sects wage a “ferocious war on the Church” and infiltrate states and institutions to subject the Church to “cruel servitude.”
– There is complete silence about the rising cult of religious liberty, indifferentism, and democratic naturalism that had been condemned as deadly errors.
2. The language of peace and unity:
– The document suggests that greater devotion to the Precious Blood will promote “fraternal bonds,” unity of peoples and nations, and social concord.
– It orients the fruit of the Precious Blood toward a horizontal pacification of the world rather than, first and foremost, toward separation from error, conversion of heretics and infidels to the one true Church, and restoration of the public reign of Christ the King.
– This anticipates the conciliar sect’s rhetoric: sacrificial imagery pressed into the service of “dialogue,” humanitarianism, and what Pius XI already condemned as laicism.
3. The rhetorical structure is psychologically anesthetizing:
– The text lulls with uncontroversial devotions.
– It evokes respected predecessors to suggest unbroken continuity.
– It gently instructs pastors to integrate the new litany and to emphasize this devotion, forming docile dispositions.
– It treats the papal initiative as a benign “pastoral” expansion rather than as exercise of militant authority against concrete enemies.
This is the language pattern of subversion: maximal orthodoxy in phrasing, maximal strategic silence regarding the real doctrinal lines of battle.
Silence, where the integral Faith demands explicit condemnation, is not neutral; it is complicity.
Theological Dislocation: Precious Blood Abstracted from the Kingship and Exclusivity of Christ
At the theological level, the core error is not an explicit heresy in the letter’s lines, but a systematic dislocation:
– The Precious Blood is praised as:
– Source of Redemption.
– Price of our salvation.
– Infinite in merit.
– Worthily adored.
– The faithful are urged to:
– Meditate on this Blood, especially in July.
– Unite with the Sacrifice of the altar.
– Live more virtuously, grateful for so great a price.
All this is true. Yet what is missing is precisely what pre-1958 doctrine inseparably connected with the Precious Blood:
1. The unique necessity of belonging to the Catholic Church.
– Pius IX condemns the idea that man may find salvation in any religion whatsoever (Syllabus, props. 15–18).
– “Inde a primis” does not once explicitly affirm the necessity of the Catholic Church as the only ark of salvation, nor the duty of all peoples to enter her by true conversion.
2. The social kingship of Christ.
– Pius XI in Quas Primas teaches that peace and order flow only from the public recognition of Christ’s royal rights, legislatively, judicially, educationally.
– He explicitly condemns secularism and the exclusion of Christ from public life as the root of modern calamities.
– “Inde a primis” speaks of improved morals, fraternal bonds, and even civil concord as fruits of devotion, but without reaffirming the binding obligation of states and societies to submit publicly to Christ the King.
– The orientation is internalist, sentimental, compatible with the liberal thesis that religion is private.
3. The militancy against error.
– Authentic devotion to the Precious Blood is intrinsically anti-heretical:
– It proclaims that the same Blood that redeemed us also founded one visible Church, instituted one Sacrifice, one priesthood, one Faith, and condemns all false religions and sects that deny or adulterate these.
– But this letter never connects the cult of the Precious Blood with:
– The anathemas of Nicaea, Trent, Vatican I.
– The Syllabus’ denunciation of religious indifferentism and church-state separation.
– The battle against Modernism as “the synthesis of all heresies” (St. Pius X).
– It therefore abstracts the devotion into a safe, non-combative spiritualism.
This doctrinal dislocation is itself a betrayal. To preach the Precious Blood without proclaiming the exclusive rights of Christ and His Church is to empty that Blood of its juridical and social implications. This is entirely consonant with the soon-to-be conciliar religion of “human dignity,” “religious freedom,” and “dialogue among equals.”
Symptomatic of the Conciliar Revolution: Pious Decorations for a Paramasonic Structure
Seen at the symptomatic level—i.e., as a sign of what is incubating—“Inde a primis” embodies four key features of the conciliar sect:
1. Continuity in vocabulary, rupture in meaning:
– The letter heavily leans on earlier papal documents—Leo XIII, Pius XI, Pius XII—especially Mediator Dei and the Sacred Heart encyclicals.
– However, these pre-1958 documents are mobilized selectively: their insistence on:
– doctrinal intolerance;
– the condemnation of liberalism;
– the demand for public, political submission to Christ;
– the strict rejection of religious liberty and interconfessionalism,
is entirely absent.
– Thus the usurper’s text borrows the aura of tradition while refusing its essential combativeness. This is exactly the modernist method unmasked by St. Pius X: retain formulas, invert their operational context.
2. Preparation for liturgical and doctrinal engineering:
– He underlines lex orandi, lex credendi, while his regime is about to alter the lex orandi via:
– Reforms of Holy Week (already begun),
– “Pastoral” simplifications of rites,
– The paving of the way to the 1962–1969 sequence.
– By associating genuine devotions (Name, Heart, Blood) with his authority, he conditions the faithful to accept subsequent changes as organic developments of the same pious spirit.
– Once the faithful equate “devotion to the Precious Blood” with obedience to this new regime, the later poisoned decrees can more easily pass unchallenged.
3. Naturalization of supernatural realities:
– The letter speaks of the Precious Blood as fostering:
– better morals,
– fraternal charity,
– unity among peoples,
– social peace.
– Given the broader program, this aligns the supernatural mystery with naturalistic aims: peace, fraternity, human solidarity—precisely the language that will dominate the “Church of the New Advent,” culminating in the cult of man.
– Authentic Catholic teaching, as in Pius XI, explicitly roots peace in the submission of men and nations to the objective law of Christ the King, not in a vague effusion of brotherhood.
4. Silence as complicity with apostasy:
– At a historical moment of aggressive Modernism, communist persecution, and secret societies assaulting Church and throne, the document gives no clarion call for:
– resistance to anti-Christian states,
– rejection of liberal constitutions condemned by the Syllabus,
– exposure of masonic influence.
– Instead, it invites anodyne devotion. This quietism serves the enemy: it dissolves the Church’s militant stance into generic piety.
In light of Pius IX’s depiction of masonic sects working to enslave and demolish the Church, such silence—combined with the subsequent trajectory of John XXIII’s successors—must be seen as a symptom of a paramasonic occupation of structures, not as innocent oversight.
Lex Orandi Turned Against Lex Credendi: Blood as Ornament for a Counterfeit Church
Particularly grave is the way “Inde a primis” employs genuine Catholic principles:
– Lex credendi, lex supplicandi is evoked to insist that:
– No forms of piety be admitted that do not spring from true faith.
– All devotions harmonize, with greater devotions subordinating lesser.
But once the “conciliar sect” redefines “true faith” to include:
– Religious liberty (Dignitatis Humanae) versus the Syllabus.
– Ecumenism treating heretical and schismatic bodies as “means of salvation” (Unitatis Redintegratio) versus Mortalium Animos.
– Collegiality undermining the monarchical, papal constitution of the Church.
– Anthropocentric liturgy replacing the propitiatory-sacrificial character of the Most Holy Sacrifice.
then the principle lex orandi, lex credendi is weaponized:
– The new ordo, new rites, new “saints,” new ecumenical gestures are all retroactively declared orthodox because they are “the Church’s liturgy.”
– The devotions to the Precious Blood, Sacred Heart, etc., are either:
– Emptied of their integral doctrinal content and adapted to the new religion of man, or
– Marginalized or syncretistically reinterpreted.
Thus, “Inde a primis” plays a precise role: it welds the cult of the Precious Blood to the authority of the one who is about to invert the very criteria of orthodoxy. Once liturgy is falsified, the once-orthodox appeal to liturgy as rule of faith becomes a trap.
That is why, from the perspective of the integral Catholic Faith:
– The devotions themselves (Holy Name, Sacred Heart, Precious Blood) remain objectively good and were infallibly recommended by true popes.
– But the use of them by the conciliar usurpers is gravely suspect, because it:
– Camouflages their usurpation.
– Blurs the line between the pre-1958 Magisterium and the post-1958 paramagisterium.
– Conditions souls to submit to a structure that will systematically betray the very mysteries it invokes.
Omissions that Accuse: No Anathema, No Clarion Call, No Defense of the True Sacrifice
What a pre-1958 pope, conscious of his duty before the Precious Blood, would emphasize in such a letter—and what “Inde a primis” studiously omits—is decisive:
1. Defense of the Holy Mass as propitiatory Sacrifice.
– A pope writing in 1960, after centuries of Protestant denial, would be expected to reaffirm with force:
– that the Precious Blood is sacramentally and unbloody offered in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass;
– that any attempt to reduce Mass to a mere memorial meal is an abomination.
– Instead, the text offers only gentle pious remarks, without confronting the rising liturgical “reformist” mentality that would soon enthrone precisely that reduction.
2. Assertion of the uniqueness of the Roman Catholic Church.
– The Blood that redeemed the world founded one Church; outside of her there is no salvation rightly understood.
– Given the context of growing interreligious irenicism, a faithful pope would warn against the notion that devotion to Christ’s Blood can coexist with treating false religions as parallel paths.
– “Inde a primis” is silent, thereby harmonizing with the coming ecumenical betrayal.
3. Condemnation of liberal and secular states.
– Pius IX, Leo XIII, and Pius XI link the rejection of Christ’s rights to the triumph of anti-Christian ideologies.
– Here, instead of insisting that nations must acknowledge the Blood that bought them and enact laws in conformity with His reign (Quas Primas), the letter speaks in vague terms about improved social life and fraternity.
– It thus allows liberal regimes to appropriate “Christian values” without submission to Christ’s kingship—exactly what the Syllabus condemns.
4. Absence of warning about counterfeit devotions.
– True popes warn against superstitious, sentimental, or heterodox cults that exploit the language of mercy or the Passion.
– In the epoch leading to the explosion of dubious apparitions and visionaries promoted by the conciliar sect, there is no such warning here.
– The silence helps create an atmosphere in which any “devotion” stamped by the new regime is presumed safe.
These omissions are not neutral; they confirm that this document, while externally adorned with Catholic phrases, is internally subordinated to a project that refuses to engage in the essential polemical and judicial office of the papacy. Qui tacet, consentire videtur (he who is silent is seen to consent) when the obligation to speak is grave.
True Cult of the Precious Blood versus Its Conciliar Counterfeit
From the perspective of unchanging Catholic doctrine before 1958, several criteria define authentic devotion to the Precious Blood:
– It:
– Affirms the hypostatic union and the infinite value of Christ’s merits.
– Confesses the Holy Mass as the unbloody renewal of Calvary, propitiatory for the living and the dead.
– Upholds the necessity of sanctifying grace, sacramental confession, and adherence to the entire Catholic faith.
– Strengthens hatred of sin, repudiation of error, and separation from heresy.
– Confirms the rights of Christ the King over individuals, families, and states.
– Binds the faithful more closely to the true hierarchy and to the definitions of ecumenical councils and Roman pontiffs, in their perennial sense.
By contrast, the conciliar use of this devotion, exemplified in “Inde a primis,” tends in practice to:
– Preserve language of Redemption while omitting the corresponding condemnations.
– Encourage interior piety without demanding rejection of liberal, masonic, and modernist errors.
– Speak of unity and fraternity without requiring conversion to the one true Church.
– Invoke lex orandi on the eve of altering the very oratio that once expressed the true faith.
Therefore:
– The faithful who desire to honor truly the Precious Blood must:
– Embrace entirely the pre-1958 Magisterium in its anti-liberal, anti-modernist, anti-ecumenist firmness.
– Reject the “conciliar sect” and its counterfeit magisterium, which abuse genuine devotions as cosmetic.
– Cleave to the Most Holy Sacrifice offered according to the venerable Roman Rite, maintaining the propitiatory faith of Trent.
– Submit to the doctrinal condemnations of St. Pius X’s Lamentabili sane exitu and Pascendi, recognizing in the conciliar phenomenon the very system he anathematized.
To separate devotion to the Precious Blood from these conditions is to participate, even unwittingly, in its profanation.
Conclusion: The Precious Blood Demands Rejection of the Conciliar Usurpation
“Inde a primis” is thus not salvaged by its beautiful phrases. On the contrary, its beauty convicts it. The more orthodox the vocabulary in the mouth of a revolutionary, the more dangerous the deception. The Precious Blood of Christ is not a sentimental emblem that can be placed atop any structure calling itself “Church”; it is the foundation and seal of the one, holy, Catholic, apostolic Church which:
– Condemns liberalism, relativism, and Modernism.
– Asserts the unique salvific necessity of the Catholic faith and baptism.
– Demands the public kingship of Christ over nations.
– Guards intact the Holy Sacrifice and the sacraments instituted by Our Lord.
Any regime that:
– invokes that Blood,
– while preparing to enthrone religious liberty, ecumenism, and anthropocentric liturgy,
– while refusing to wield the sword of anathema against the errors already condemned,
stands condemned by the very mystery it pretends to honor.
The Precious Blood cries out not for “aggiornamento,” but for fidelity; not for a paramasonic “Church of the New Advent,” but for the restoration of the immutable Faith. Those who truly love the Blood of Christ must, accordingly, repudiate the conciliar usurpation and cling to the integral doctrine and worship that that Blood purchased for all ages: *regnum Christi in terris et in caelis* (the reign of Christ on earth and in heaven), without compromise, without evolution of dogma, without the cult of man.
Source:
Inde a primis, Epistula Apostolica de cultu Pretiosissimi Sanguinis D. N. Iesu Christi promovendo, XXX Iunii MDCCCCLX, Ioannes XXIII (vatican.va)
Date: 11.11.2025