Point 46. Catholic ecumenism: I. East and West

The Latin Church is incontestably the place of the most universal Christian life and faith, as much for its doctrine and multiform holiness as for its application to temporal realities and its extension to the entire world.

1. The first stage in a Christian renaissance and expansion is only conceivable through a “ reform in the head and the members ” of the Roman Church, now infested with the demons of the Reformation and of the Revolution. The men of the Church must first reform themselves according to the Holy Spirit of the Church. They must desist from reforming the Holy Church in accordance with their own spirit, which is wholly infected with modernism and progressivism. It is from Rome that the signal for this conversion must come. And it is in France, the eldest daughter of the Church, whose place has never been taken by any other people, that this appeal must first be heard, so that from France it may pass to the Latin European Catholic nations, whose colonial and civilising expansion was the great instrument of Christ the King in the world.

The Catholic Counter-Reformation in the 20th century has been working at this renaissance of truth and holiness for twenty years. Already it has defined the dogmatic requirements and envisaged the canonical means for this renaissance. It is necessary and sufficient “ that God give us a good Catholic pope ” in the spirit of the holy Popes Pius IX and Pius X. But it would be good that this return be made in solemnity and with the extraordinary infallibility of another Council, a Vatican III of reparation, so that the enormity of error and anarchy now prevailing are answered by the immense splendour of the holy unity and apostolic catholicity of Rome, at last proclaimed and restored.

Then the Latin Church will spontaneously generate – as she has done all through the centuries of her long history – a multitude of saints, scholars and heroes. Immense regions of the earth, currently pagan or Muslim, in Asia, Africa or Latin America, will thereby be powerfully drawn to the light of the Gospel.

2. The second stage will be the return to Roman unity of the Eastern schismatics through their full and sincere recognition of the primacy of the Pope and by their reconciliation with their Arab, Greek and Slav brethren who have valiantly remained united to the See of Peter. The beautiful and rich tradition of the East, paralysed for almost a thousand years as a result of Constantinople’s unfortunate separation from the universal Church, will return to the Common Mother, enriching her with the mystical, liturgical and monastic splendours of “ the Church of John ”, which in turn will rediscover her apostolic life and radiance in “ the Church of Peter and Paul ”.

The Eastern Church will recover her true place in the concert of Rome’s universal government and will resume her missionary work of conquering the East, according to the promises of Our Lady of Fatima, after “ the conversion of Russia ”.