The Gospel of Jesus and Mary

IN an article that will soon be published, Brother Pierre-Julien will show that the great ‘synodal’ conversion that Pope Francis wants to inflict on the whole Church, as well as his reform of the Curia, are the resumption of the the aggiornamento   undertaken during the Council. At last this Church will become the radiant and effective focal point of universal fraternity. This is not the fraternity that our dear Heavenly Father dreams of – we are well aware of he His sovereign Will since 1917 –, but that of Pope Francis himself.

Since his election, our Holy Father has appeared to be very ‘evangelical’: he constantly speaks about the Gospel, and ‘evangelisation’ is his watchword. In his inaugural encyclical, Evangelii Gaudium (2013), he defined “the fundamental message” as “the personal love of God Who became man, Who gave Himself up for us, Who is living and Who offers us His salvation and His friendship” (no. 128). When this affirmation is read from a Catholic standpoint and with trust in the Holy Spirit Who inspires the Supreme Pontiff – as I have done since 2013 –, it is beautiful, true and moving.

Yet when we understand what Pope Francis’ great “dream” is, it makes us fear that the conciliar rot that set in this beautiful fruit has putrefied everything.

In the rest of his encyclical, he explained: “To believe in a Father who loves all men and women with an infinite love means realising that ‘he thereby confers upon them an infinite dignity’ [reference to John Paul II]. To believe that the Son of God assumed our human flesh means that each human person has been taken up into the very heart of God. To believe that Jesus shed his blood for us removes any doubt about the boundless love which ennobles each human being.” (no. 178)

For Pope Francis the Gospel is a revelation of the dignity of man, of every man. It is in this light that, in Fratelli tutti, he dwells at length on “the old story of the Samaritan”, as Paul VI used to say, in order to throw this pearl before swine (Mt 7:6), by making it a lesson in humanity, a lesson of exemplary fraternity for “all people of good will, regardless of their religious convictions” (no. 56). The Pope finds in the Gospel only what he is seeking, namely, first-class fuel to hasten the realisation of his universal Progressivist fraternity.

He is really not breaking any new ground here, since Saint Pius X already condemned, in his Letter on the Sillon, the “distortion of the Gospel” practised by the Christian Democrats:

“As soon as the social question is being approached, it is the fashion in some quarters to first put aside the divinity of Jesus Christ [this is exactly what the Holy Father did in Fratelli tutti], and then to mention only His unlimited clemency, His compassion for all human miseries, and His pressing exhortations to the love of our neighbour and to the brotherhood of men. True, Jesus has loved us with an immense, infinite love, and He came on earth to suffer and die so that, gathered around Him in justice and love, motivated by the same sentiments of mutual charity, all men might live in peace and happiness. But for the realisation of this temporal and eternal happiness, He has laid down with supreme authority the condition that we must belong to His Flock, that we must accept His doctrine, that we must practice virtue, and that we must accept the teaching and guidance of Peter and his successors. […]

“Finally, Jesus Christ did not announce for future society the reign of an ideal happiness from which suffering would be banished; but, by His lessons and by His example, He traced the path of the happiness which is possible on earth and of the perfect happiness in Heaven: the royal way of the Cross. These are teachings that it would be wrong to apply only to one’s personal life in order to win eternal salvation; these are eminently social teachings, and they show in Our Lord Jesus Christ something quite different from an inconsistent and impotent humanitarianism.”

Pope Francis inherited the spirit of Marc Sangnier from Paul VI. Our Father was the only one of his generation who understood the genius of Saint Pius X, his clear-sightedness and the gravity of his warnings. Since it is our Father’s analyses, based on those of Saint Pius X, that allow us to denounce the reform that Pope Francis wants to inflict on the Church, and since his doctrine shows us the sure path to the Renaissance of “one Church, Holy, Catholic, Apostolic”, it is as his disciples that we must meditate on Sacred Scripture, in order to harvest its fruit.

For if Pope Francis claims to draw from the Gospel the revelation of the ‘infinite dignity of every human person’ as the foundation of his chimerical world and multi-religious fraternity, this, for the moment, is fomenting a third world war! It is then vital for us to return to the true Gospel in order to arrive at the devotion of reparation to the Immaculate Heart of Mary that God wants to have established throughout the world.

Let us make reparation, let us pray, that our poor Holy Father himself may make this ‘return to the Gospel’.

Brother Bruno of Jesus-Mary.