At the end of the so‑called Marian Jubilee of Lourdes (1958), John XXIII addresses Gregory Peter Agagianian, Armenian patriarch and head of Propaganda Fide, appointing him as his legate to preside over a Marian Congress in Saigon. The letter enthusiastically approves the Vietnamese bishops’ plan to celebrate the Lourdes apparitions, extols obtaining the “powerful patronage” of the Immaculate, and grants the legate faculties to pontifically preside, bless the faithful in his name, and proclaim a plenary indulgence. It is a brief, programmatic gesture: Rome’s public embrace of Lourdes, Marian congresses, and indulgences as instruments of its global policy in a strategically anti-communist region.
Exeunte iubilari anno: Marian Piety Weaponized for the Conciliar Revolution
The Spurious Authority of an Antipope and the Cultic Scaffolding of the Neo-Church
From the first words, we stand in AD mode: this is an act of John XXIII, the first usurper of the Roman See, whose entire program inaugurated the conciliar subversion. The document is a distilled specimen of how the coming revolution cloaked itself in seemingly traditional Marian devotion while displacing the very foundations of Catholic ecclesiology and worship.
John XXIII, styling himself “PP.”, writes to Cardinal Agagianian:
“At the end of the Jubilee year, proclaimed to commemorate the apparition of the Immaculate Mother of God in the grotto of Lourdes… we have gladly approved the intention of the bishops of Vietnam… to solemnly celebrate a Marian Congress.”
The entire text is a short diplomatic and devotional note. Yet precisely in its brevity it reveals the mechanism of the coming apostasy:
– There is an uncritical enthronement of post-Tridentine, apparition-centered Marianism detached from the integral doctrinal armature of the pre-1958 Magisterium.
– There is the explicit deployment of Lourdes apparitions (which, unlike the public deposit of faith, are non-binding and fallible) as quasi-foundational for a universal “Jubilee year.”
– There is the bestowal of indulgences and pontifical blessings by a man whose claim to the papacy is theologically dismantled by the very principles codified by the pre-1917 and 1917 canonical and theological tradition (cf. Bellarmine, Wernz–Vidal, Canon 188 §4).
This text is not neutral. It is part of the program. It is a brick in the construction of the *conciliar sect*, masking its incipient naturalism and ecumenism under a Marian varnish.
Factual Level: Lourdes, Vietnam, and the Political Instrumentalization of Devotion
1. The letter situates itself “at the end of the Jubilee year” connected with Lourdes (1858). The Lourdes cult, in itself, is a 19th‑century apparition devotion tolerated and promoted by true popes, but never constitutive of faith. Under John XXIII it is inflated into a quasi‑universal axis.
2. The Vietnamese bishops, three centuries after the establishment of vicariates, propose a Marian Congress in Saigon. John XXIII:
“We have gladly approved this plan… for nothing can the faithful do more fruitful and salutary than to obtain for themselves the most powerful patronage of the Immaculate Virgin, that from this sweetest Mother all the treasures of the divine Redemption may be opened to them, and thus they may have life and have it more abundantly.”
This language deliberately shifts accent:
– From the objective channels of grace instituted by Christ (*Sacramenta ex opere operato*, the Most Holy Sacrifice, the immutable doctrine) to the emotive appeal of congresses and special events.
– From the integral, hierarchical mission of the Church to the mass mobilization mechanics typical of 20th‑century political cults, here baptized as “Marian congresses.”
3. Agagianian, as Propaganda Fide proprefect, is made legate, authorized to preside, bless, and grant a plenary indulgence. The structural reality underneath:
– The same Propaganda Fide that would, under the conciliar regime, become an engine of inculturation, relativism, and liturgical profanation is here advanced under “pious” colors.
– The indulgence, which according to the pre‑conciliar theology presupposes a true Roman Pontiff and communion with the Catholic Church, is simulated by one who, by adherence to and promotion of modernist errors, falls under the scope of the doctrinal tradition that he himself is betraying.
The facts are thus:
– Seemingly orthodox vocabulary.
– A deliberate centering of a private revelation.
– An unspoken but decisive repositioning of gravity from the perennial dogmatic edifice to devotional spectacle and papal personality cult.
Already here the conciliar sect reveals itself as a paramasonic structure: Marian language on the surface, slow demolition of the reign of Christ the King in substance (cf. Pius XI, Quas primas, exposing secularism and demanding public subjection of nations to Christ, not to vague “Marian congresses” shaped by geopolitical interest).
Linguistic Level: Pious Rhetoric as a Veil for Programmatic Ambiguity
The style of the letter mimics traditional curial Latin but is symptomatically hollowed out.
Key phrases:
– “validissimum Immaculatae Virginis patrocinium sibi conciliare” – obtaining “the most powerful patronage” is presented as what the faithful can do that is “more fruitful and salutary” than anything else.
– “Nonne Dominus totum nos habere voluit per Mariam?” – “Did not the Lord will that we have everything through Mary?”
At first glance, this seems to echo legitimate Marian maximalism. Yet the rhetoric, detached from doctrinal precision, becomes **functional ambiguity**:
1. The letter does not once explicitly root Marian mediation in the unique, objective mediation of Christ, as solemnly taught by Trent and the pre‑conciliar Magisterium. Marian language is absolutized, risking to function as a sentimental surrogate for the hard edges of dogma, penance, and kingship of Christ.
2. The letter speaks of the “treasures of the divine Redemption” being opened by Mary, but the concrete, non-negotiable conditions—*state of grace, repentance, adherence to the one true faith, rejection of error*—are conspicuously absent.
3. This sugary tone, devoid of doctrinal steel, is the preparatory acoustics of Vatican II: anodyne phrases, no condemnation, no warning against communism, Freemasonry, or modernist infiltration, although:
– Pius IX in the Syllabus denounced the masonic sects and liberal errors undermining states and Church.
– Leo XIII and St. Pius X unmasked modernism, socialism, and laicism as mortal threats.
– Pius XI in Quas primas exposed the lie of a neutral public order.
Here, in 1959, from the lips of the new regime: silence.
This is not accidental. The linguistic choice is a theological choice.
Theological Level: Apparitionism against the Deposit of Faith
The letter’s central theological claim, condensed, is:
“For nothing can the faithful do that is more fruitful and salutary than to secure the most powerful patronage of the Immaculate Virgin…”
Measured by integral Catholic theology:
1. The greatest, most necessary, and objectively fruitful acts for the faithful are:
– Participation in the Unbloody Sacrifice of Calvary, the true Mass.
– Worthy reception of the sacraments instituted by Christ.
– Adherence with divine and Catholic faith to the revealed truths.
– Penitence, sorrow for sin, and life in the state of grace.
– Public profession of the faith and obedience to the true Church.
2. Marian devotion is great and necessary, but always as:
– Subordinate to Christ.
– Integrated within the doctrinal, sacramental, and moral order.
– Guarded against exaggerations or deviations that would obscure the unique mediation of the Redeemer.
By formulating, without qualification, that “nothing” is more fruitful than securing Marian patronage, this letter introduces a **theological displacement**: effective Catholic life is implicitly rerouted from objective sacramental life and doctrinal fidelity to participation in a Marian congress “jubilee,” mediated by a legate of an antipope, anchored in a private revelation.
This is amplified by the broader context (outside, but organically linked to, this act):
– The post‑1958 regime elevates apparition-centered devotions (Lourdes, and later others) into quasi-structural pillars.
– Such emphasis conveniently lends itself to emotional mass mobilization while avoiding clear doctrinal confrontation with modern errors condemned in the Syllabus, Lamentabili, and Pascendi.
In light of Pius X’s condemnation of Modernism:
– Modernism reinterprets dogma as evolving religious experience.
– Apparitionist overgrowth and sentimental Marianism, detached from doctrinal rigor, easily becomes the experiential raw material for that evolution.
This letter is not openly heretical in formula; it is worse in method: it shifts the faithful toward a praxis where the *rule of faith* (Pius XI: “the liturgical prayer of the Church is the rule of faith”) is increasingly replaced by the emotive and spectacular.
Silence as Accusation: Omitted Truths, Omitted Warnings
From the perspective of pre‑1958 doctrine, the most damning elements in this letter are its silences.
1. Silence about the public kingship of Christ:
– Vietnam is a land of persecution, war, and ideological conflict.
– Pius XI in Quas primas commanded that nations must recognize Christ’s social kingly rights, under pain of chaos and divine punishment.
– John XXIII, addressing Vietnamese bishops, says nothing of the obligation of state and society to subject themselves to Christ the King. The “Marian Congress” floats in a vacuum of liberal religious pluralism.
2. Silence about modernist and communist infiltration:
– The pre‑conciliar Magisterium unmasked masonic and anti-Christian conspiracies.
– Pius IX explicitly pointed at such sects as the “synagogue of Satan” assaulting Church and states.
– This letter, at the dawn of the same infiltration that will produce the conciliar revolution, is mute. No warning. No doctrinal armament. Only a feel-good Marian event.
3. Silence about the necessity of the true faith:
– No insistence that salvation is found only in the Catholic Church, as defined dogmatically by the perennial Magisterium.
– Instead, an amorphous invitation to obtain “patronage” and “treasures of redemption” without any reference to rejecting false religions, errors, or the apostasy denounced by St. Pius X.
4. Silence about sin, penance, judgment:
– No mention of mortal sin, confession, amendment of life, fear of hell, or final judgment.
– The entire supernatural order is reduced to consoling slogans.
This silence is itself a doctrinal deviation. The integral Magisterium never announced spiritual consolations severed from the hard conditions of conversion and obedience. The letter exemplifies the conciliar method: sentimental piety without doctrinal combat; devotions without dogmatic clarity; unity in events rather than unity in truth.
Symptomatic Level: How This Text Prefigures the Systemic Apostasy
Viewed with the full evidence of subsequent history, this letter is emblematic.
1. The cultic inflation of private revelations:
– Elevating Lourdes into a global jubilee normalizes the idea that the Church’s spiritual life is driven by post-apostolic “events” rather than the closed deposit of faith.
– This mentality later makes it easier to enthrone other dubious phenomena as engines of spirituality, preparing souls to accept “new messages,” ecumenical reinterpretations, and the displacement of dogmatic clarity.
2. The abuse of Marian devotion:
– Genuine Catholic Marian doctrine defends Christ’s unique mediation and the unchanging faith.
– Here Marian devotion is used as **a soft front** behind which the conciliar sect can appear orthodox while dismantling the doctrinal ramparts erected by Pius IX, Leo XIII, Pius X, Pius XI, and Pius XII.
3. The manipulation of indulgences:
– A plenary indulgence is attached to congress participation, mediated by a false pontiff’s legate.
– If, according to pre‑conciliar theology, a manifest heretic cannot be head of the Church (*non potest esse caput qui non est membrum*), then the supposed indulgence is null: a spiritual placebo replacing the real treasury of the Church.
– The faithful are thus trained to associate grace with media-spectacle events approved by an antipope, not with the sacramental life under a true Catholic hierarchy.
4. The diplomatic tone:
– No anathemas, no doctrinal precision, only “hope,” “joy,” “patronage,” “sweetest Mother.”
– This anticipates the entire style of the neo-church: endless “dialogue,” “accompaniment,” “celebration,” while dogmatic content is neutralized and the Syllabus, Lamentabili, and Pascendi are effectively buried.
5. The continuity of personnel:
– Agagianian, at the helm of Propaganda Fide, is a key conduit: the same institutional framework that will enforce the conciliar deformation of missionary activity, shifting from conversion to “dialogue of cultures,” here still cloaked in Marian solemnity.
The result: masked revolution. The letter to Saigon is a discreet but real instance of the new regime exercising a simulacrum of papal authority to promote a spirituality that, while using Marian terms, is disconnected from the militant, doctrinal, and anti-liberal Catholicism taught infallibly before 1958.
Christ the King or Marian Congresses: The Irreconcilable Alternatives
Pius XI in Quas primas taught with crystalline firmness:
– Peace and order will not come to nations until they recognize and obey the social reign of Christ.
– The Church demands freedom and independence from secular powers by divine right.
– States and rulers are bound to publicly honour Christ and shape law according to His commandments.
Contrast this with the atmosphere of John XXIII’s letter:
– No call for Vietnam to submit publicly to Christ the King.
– No denunciation of atheistic communism, laicism, or masonic liberalism that Pius IX identified as *synagoga Satanae*.
– Instead, a Marian congress, structurally innocuous to the liberal and communist powers, but useful to the new regime as a sentimentalizing instrument.
This is the inversion:
– The pre‑1958 Magisterium: from Christ the King flows Marian honor, sacramental life, doctrinal clarity, and militant opposition to error.
– The conciliar sect: from orchestrated Marian events flows emotional unity, camouflage for doctrinal capitulation, and the rewriting of mission into diplomacy.
Lex orandi, lex credendi (the law of prayer is the law of belief). Here the “lex orandi” is gradually retooled: indulgences and congresses under a usurper are devices reshaping the faithful’s belief in authority, Church, and salvation.
The Responsibility of the Faithful: Rejecting the Sentimental Trap
From the perspective of integral Catholic faith:
– One must categorically reject the claim of John XXIII to papal authority, in light of the doctrinal principles laid down by Bellarmine, the unanimous Fathers cited on manifest heretics, and the canonical axiom that public defection from the faith (Canon 188 §4, 1917 Code) empties an ecclesiastical office ipso facto.
– One must see in documents such as Exeunte iubilari anno not “harmless piety,” but programmatic rhetorical moves: replacing militant Catholicism with devotionalism, apparitions elevated above dogma, indulgences used to legitimize an emerging paramasonic pseudo-church.
– One must not be deceived: participation in “Marian congresses” presided over by legates of the neo-church, receiving “blessings” and “indulgences” from the conciliar sect, is not only spiritually sterile but becomes complicity in the usurpation of the visible structures of the Church.
The remedy is not lay anarchic self-judgment or inventing private churches, but a humble, firm adherence to what the Church certainly taught and was before 1958:
– The dogmas defined by ecumenical councils and pre‑conciliar popes.
– The condemnations in the Syllabus, Lamentabili, Pascendi, and anti-liberal, anti-modernist teachings.
– The Most Holy Sacrifice and sacraments as handed down, not mutilated by the conciliar revolution.
– Authentic Marian devotion: guarding doctrine, inspiring penance, leading to Christ the King and obedience to the true Church, not sentimental congresses under usurpers.
In this light, Exeunte iubilari anno stands revealed as a polished, pious-sounding fragment of the same edifice that would soon issue Vatican II and enthrone the abomination of desolation in the holy place. The faithful are bound, by fidelity to the unchanging Magisterium, to see through the sweetened rhetoric and to repudiate the false authority and spiritual counterfeit it serves.
Source:
Exeunte Iubilari Anno – Ad Gregorium Petrum Tit. Sancti Bartholomaei in Insula, S. R. E. Presb. Card. Agagianian, Ciliciae Armenorum Patriarcham ac Sacrae Congregationis de Propaganda Fide propraefect… (vatican.va)
Date: 11.11.2025