This Latin letter of John XXIII, issued on 9 February 1963, is a brief congratulatory note addressed to Carlo (Ephrem) Forni on the double jubilee of his priesthood and episcopate, praising his loyal diplomatic service to the Holy See (especially in Ecuador, Belgium, and Luxembourg), justifying his elevation to the “College of Cardinals,” and imparting an “apostolic blessing” while invoking divine grace upon his past and future labours.
In reality, this seemingly pious compliment encapsulates the essence of the conciliar mutation: the reduction of the Church’s supernatural mission to diplomatic careerism, bureaucratic flattery, and a counterfeit “apostolic” authority issuing from an antipope presiding over a paramasonic neo-church.
Hollow Benedictions from a Hollow Throne
Celebration of Careerist Prestige Instead of the Cross of Christ
At the factual level, the document is disarmingly simple. John XXIII:
– Notes that God is to be thanked always, especially on anniversaries.
– Highlights Forni’s:
– ten lustrums (50 years) of priesthood,
– five lustrums (25 years) of episcopal dignity,
– “long service” in the diplomatic corps as Apostolic Nuncio in Ecuador, Belgium, Luxembourg.
– States that, for these merits, he has raised him to the “College of Cardinals” and conferred the “sacred purple.”
– Wishes that God protect and strengthen him so that he may persevere in his labours for God’s glory and the salvation of souls.
– Grants an “Apostolic Blessing” to him and to all participating in his jubilees.
On the surface, this appears as a conventional Roman note of congratulation. Yet precisely here lies the indictment. The entire text is a eulogy of ecclesiastical diplomacy and institutional success, cloaked in pious generalities, systematically avoiding any reference to the concrete, supernatural demands of the Catholic episcopate and to the dogmatic crisis already consuming the Church.
Several elements demand attention:
– Forni is praised as having “deserved well” of the Apostolic See through his diplomatic service; his “reward” is incorporation into the “College of Cardinals.”
– There is no doctrinal content, no reminder of *munus docendi*, *regendi*, *sanctificandi*, no reference to guarding the deposit of faith, no insistence on combating heresy, Freemasonry, secularism, or Modernism.
– The “fruits” of his activity are stated but never defined; only bureaucratic effectiveness is honored.
This is not an accident of brevity. It manifests an ecclesiology in which ecclesiastical power is treated as a human institution that remunerates loyal civil servants, while the true marks of apostolicity and sanctity are replaced by protocol, diplomacy, and promotion: *honores pro officiis*, not *crux pro fide*.
Authentic pre-1958 Catholic doctrine, codified for example by Pius IX in the *Syllabus Errorum*, explicitly condemns the subjugation of the Church to secular paradigms and the reduction of her mission to a function within worldly systems (cf. condemned propositions 39-42, 55, 77-80). Pius XI in *Quas Primas* insists that peace and order come only from the social Reign of Christ the King, not from accommodation to liberal states or mutual compliments between prelates and governments. Measured against this constant teaching, the letter’s silent glorification of diplomatic success is not innocent: it is symptomatic of the conciliar revolution that was being architected under John XXIII.
Linguistic Flattery as Mask for Ecclesiological Subversion
The rhetoric of the letter is revealing. The vocabulary is almost exclusively:
– honorific: “Dilecte Fili Noster” (Our beloved Son), “Purpuratorum Patrum Collegium,” “sacro laticlavio honestavimus;”
– bureaucratic: emphasis on *munera gravia*, long service in nunciatures, enumeration of lustrums and offices;
– generic-pious: scattered citations of Psalms and the Epistle of James, vague wishes for divine blessings, “for God’s glory and the salvation of souls.”
Nowhere do we find:
– explicit confession of the Kingship of Christ over nations, which pre-conciliar popes tirelessly proclaimed and defended against liberal states;
– any mention of the duty of a bishop to combat error, protect the flock from wolves, defend Catholic doctrine against Modernism, denounce Freemasonry and the masonic political projects then ravaging states and persecuting the Church;
– any assertion of the exclusive truth of the Catholic religion and the necessity of submission to the Roman Pontiff in the sense defined by Vatican I.
Instead, the linguistic focus is on career-milestones and courtly praise. This sort of language is not merely “nice.” It signals a perverse shift in values: from *episcopus martyr et confessor veritatis* to *episcopus functionarius diplomaticus*.
Where earlier pontiffs used congratulatory letters as occasions to recall dogma, condemn errors, and exhort to holiness and fortitude, here we find only a polished curial compliment, utterly void of doctrinal clarity. Such stylistic emptiness is intrinsically theological: it replaces the language of combat and confession with the language of secular recognition and neutral benevolence.
This verbal softness is one of the classic marks of Modernism condemned by St Pius X in *Pascendi* and in the syllabus *Lamentabili sane exitu*: the refusal to speak clearly where truth and error collide, the perpetual recourse to “higher” sentiments while the foundations of faith are being dismantled.
Absence of the True Papal Munus: A Self-Disclosure of Usurpation
From the perspective of integral Catholic doctrine, the gravest feature of this text is not what it says, but what it systematically omits.
A true Roman Pontiff, bound by the definitions of Vatican I, is the guardian of the deposit of faith, obliged to confirm his brethren, resist errors, and defend the rights of Christ and His Church. Yet in this letter we find:
– no mention of:
– the encyclicals and condemnations of Pius IX, Leo XIII, St Pius X, Benedict XV, Pius XI, Pius XII as living, binding norms;
– the plague of Modernism, whose “synthesis of all heresies” had been unmasked and anathematized, but which in the very years of John XXIII was being rehabilitated within seminaries and chancelleries;
– the objectively mortal danger of religious liberty ideology, condemned in proposition 15-18, 77-80 of the *Syllabus*, now being prepared for enthronement at the upcoming “council”;
– the attacks of secret societies against the Church, explicitly denounced by pre-conciliar popes as the “synagogue of Satan” working through governments—precisely the states where Forni was a diplomat.
– no exhortation:
– to confess Christ publicly as King of societies as Pius XI demanded in *Quas Primas*;
– to resist the growing cult of man and creeping naturalism;
– to defend the integrity of the Most Holy Sacrifice and sacramental discipline against experimentation.
The silence is thunderous. In place of the true papal office, we see the posture of a benevolent, religiously-toned administrator, content to reward “good service” as any temporal prince might reward a loyal envoy. But the See of Peter is not a courtly chancery; it is the rock of faith and tribunal of truth.
This is why such documents serve as evidence, not of a merely “pastoral” style, but of **a different religion** cohabiting the external structures of the Church: a religion in which the supernatural order is acknowledged in language, but functionally subordinated to human diplomacy and institutional continuity. *Lex orandi, lex credendi*: the “benediction” that never defends doctrine betrays an authority that no longer understands or accepts its own divine mandate.
The Theological Vacuum: Careerism Rewarded, Supernatural Fidelity Ignored
The text explicitly justifies Forni’s elevation by his “long service” and “dutiful performance of grave offices” in diplomatic posts. There is no mention of:
– his fidelity to dogma;
– his zeal in opposing heresy or public sin;
– his defence of Catholic education, Catholic marriage, Catholic social order;
– his readiness to suffer persecution for Christ.
Instead, the criterion is utilitarian and political: he served well in modern states; he is thus rewarded with purple.
This logic stands in tension with the perennial doctrine that ecclesiastical dignity is ordered to, and justified by, supernatural purposes:
– Bishops and cardinals are to be defenders of the faith and counsellors of the Pope in safeguarding dogma and discipline, not professional negotiators in liberal systems that refuse to submit to Christ the King.
– The reduction of purple to career reward hollows out its symbolism of readiness for martyrdom (*usque ad effusionem sanguinis*).
While the letter mouths “glory of God and salvation of souls,” it never states concretely that this requires the public assertion of the unique truth of the Catholic faith and the exclusive salvific authority of the Church. This omission aligns perfectly with the post-1958 tendency toward a naturalistic, diplomatic religion which Pius IX had preemptively condemned: the idea that peace and social well-being can be secured apart from the uncompromising reign of Christ.
By praising a nuncio’s political effectiveness without a single word about his duty to confront states with the demands of the Gospel and the rights of the Church, the letter embodies precisely the worldly mentality anathematized as liberal Catholicism and Modernism.
From Catholic Rome to the Conciliar Sect: A Symptom of Systemic Apostasy
This document, drawn from the official archives of the paramasonic “Church of the New Advent,” must be read as a manifestation of a deeper mutation.
1. It comes from John XXIII, the inaugurator of the conciliar revolution, who convoked a “pastoral” council deliberately refusing to condemn errors that previous popes had solemnly judged, who rehabilitated and promoted precisely those currents—historicism, false ecumenism, religious liberty—that had been rejected by St Pius X and his predecessors.
2. It reveals a practical theology:
– in which the Church adapts to liberal regimes rather than calling them to the yoke of Christ;
– in which doctrinal militancy is displaced by “dialogue” and diplomacy;
– in which the hierarchy is celebrated for administrative seniority and secular-friendly performances, not for confessing the faith.
3. It testifies to the progressive substitution of:
– *Ecclesia militans* with an NGO-like entity seeking favour with governments;
– the supernatural mission to save souls with polite wishes and “blessings” devoid of binding doctrinal content.
4. It participates in the falsification of authority:
– An antipope, presiding over a conciliar sect, uses the language of the papal magisterium without exercising the substance of the office (defence and explication of the deposit of faith).
– The “College of Cardinals” he expands is thereby transformed from guardian of Roman orthodoxy into an electoral body of the neo-church, structurally oriented to perpetuate error.
Within this light, the letter is not a harmless curiosity. It is a small but pure specimen of the post-1958 pathology: *pious verbiage harnessed to naturalistic, worldly criteria; silence where dogmatic witness is demanded; human recognition in the place of supernatural judgment.*
Silence on Modernism, Freemasonry, and the Reign of Christ: The Gravest Accusation
The most decisive accusation against this text is its deliberate silence regarding the real enemies of the Church and the real demands of the faith.
– In the decades preceding 1963, the true popes had:
– Condemned Modernism as the “synthesis of all heresies” (*Pascendi*, *Lamentabili*).
– Warned repeatedly against Masonic and revolutionary sects infiltrating governments and institutions and waging war on the Church.
– Affirmed with insistence that states owe public worship and obedience to Christ and must conform their laws to divine and natural law.
– Yet this letter:
– Commemorates a nunciature in states permeated by liberal, Masonic, and secular principles.
– Never once reminds the recipient of his duty to resist these forces or to proclaim Christ’s social Kingship to them.
– Speaks as if the mere exercise of diplomatic function were sufficient “merit” before the Apostolic See.
This silence is not neutrality; it is complicity. *Qui tacet consentire videtur* (he who is silent is seen to consent). When a supposed supreme pastor consistently replaces prophetic denunciation with conciliatory compliments to officials functioning in apostate systems, he shows himself as aligned with those systems rather than with the immemorial Magisterium which cursed their principles.
As Pius XI taught in *Quas Primas*, true peace and order are impossible until individuals and nations acknowledge the Kingship of Christ. A letter that celebrates a bishop’s dealings with nations without recalling this absolute demand, and that does so during the very years in which the conciliar sect was preparing to enthrone religious liberty and ecumenism, is a document of doctrinal abdication.
Conclusion: A Small Document, a Complete Self-Exposure
Examined against the doctrinal standard of the pre-1958 Church, this letter:
– exhibits a naturalistic valuation of ecclesiastical career over heroic confession of faith;
– replaces doctrinal precision with vague devout language, calculated never to offend the liberal order;
– omits every reference to the concrete, supernatural, and exclusive claims of the Catholic Church over states and souls;
– confirms the deformation of the “College of Cardinals” into an organ of a conciliar para-church;
– manifests, in its very gentility, the apostasy of an authority that blesses, promotes, and congratulates, but no longer teaches, judges, or condemns according to the immutable faith.
Thus this short piece stands as a concise icon of the conciliar sect’s spirit: courteous, accommodating, self-congratulatory, and utterly estranged from the militant, doctrinally rigorous, and supernaturally oriented Roman Catholicism taught and defended up to Pius XII. It is the smile of a usurper enthroned where Peter once spoke with the voice of Christ the King.
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