The Roots of the Destruction of the Christian Tradition in the West

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The roots of the destruction of the

Christian tradition in the West (i)

Mateus Soares de Azevedo

In the decades and centuries that followed the crucifixion of Christ, Christianity gradually

took root and established itself as a world religion, especially in Europe and the Near East, but

also in Africa and Asia. It reached its highpoint in what we now, retrospectively, call the Middle

Agesapproxi!ately fro! the coronation of Charle!agne in "## A$ to the thirteenth century.

It was in this epoch that the !ystical orders such as the %ranciscans and $o!inicans

flourished& schools of thought such as the 'ho!ist (Aristotelian) and the Eckhartian (*latonic)&

artistic styles such as the +o!anesue and the -othic& sages and saints such as %rancis of Assisi,

Albertus Magnus, ernard of Clairvaux, and $ante Alighieri. Not to !ention the universities,

hospitals, and other institutions the Church established.

'hereafter there have been three /revolutions0, each of which greatly changed the face of

Christendo!. 'he first was the /+enaissance0 (fifteenth century)& the second the

/Enlighten!ent0 (eighteenth century)& and the third and !ost catastrophic the 1atican II Council

(twentieth century).

'he +enaissance was the first funda!ental !ove!ent away fro! /divinis!0 to

/hu!anis!0, fro! theocentris! to anthropocentris!. 'he Enlighten!ent was a repetition of

this, but in a !uch !ore arrogant and explicit way. 'he 1atican II Council (234562347) was thefinal and !ost devastating of the three revolutions because it overturned, fro! the inside as it

were, traditional Catholic beliefs and practices. 'he Council thus reinforced, in an aggressive

and destructive !anner, and within the citadel of religion itself, the two earlier revolutions.

'he na!e itself for what we are referring to as the /first0 revolution is !isleading, for it was

a /death0, not a /renaissance0, of the !edieval intellectual, spiritual, and cultural patri!ony.

'his legacy includes centuries of theological speculation as expounded and synthesi8ed in 9aint

'ho!as Auinas: 9u!!a& $ante:s $ivine Co!edy, co!prising a vision and a teaching

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regarding !an:s posthu!ous destiny& the highly spiritual +o!anesue and -othic art and

architecture& y8antine icons, and !any other things. 'he +enaissance was the first !ove!ent

away fro! spirituality, transcendence, uality, inwardness, depth, and verticality, towards a new

e!phasis on !aterialis!, worldliness, uantity, outwardness, superficiality, and hori8ontality.

Not forgetting the substitution of universalis! by individualis!, of intellectuality by a

rationalis! (devoid of true pre!ises), of ;eaven by earth. In a word, the +enaissance !eant the

beginning of the /reign of uantity0, such as was brilliantly explained by +en< -u<non in his

books, especially in 'he Crisis of the Modern =orld (235>), and 'he +eign of ?uantity and the

9ign of the 'i!es (23@7).

'hree centuries after the /+enaissance0, a second revolution occurred which betrayed its

true purpose by its very na!e& the leaders of the so6called /Enlighten!ent0 saw the!selves as

bearers of the /light0 of reason and science, as opposed to the /darkness0 of /superstition0 and

/dog!a0. It was an ideological battle against religion. Characteristically, the !ove!ent was

disse!inated by a free!asonry which was already seculari8ed and which served as an

ideological basis for the %rench +evolution. 'he reduction of uality to uantity, of spirituality

to !aterialis!, of inwardness to outwardness experienced thus a second stage, and represented a

radicali8ation which went far beyond the revolution that was the +enaissance.

'he /reign of uantity0 which had its first beginnings in the +enaissance, and its expansion

in the Enlighten!ent, reached the citadel of religion itself with the 1atican II Council of 23456

2347. In the council one saw the new hu!anist ideology of science, /progress0, and technology

invading the sacred precincts once reserved for the knowledge and love of -od. ut since

religion is in no way a support for the !aterialistic !entality as pro!ulgated by the +enaissance

and the Enlighten!entand indeed is in direct opposition to itthe leaders of the council

sought above all to achieve a /pact0 and an acco!!odation with !odernity. 'his ai! is a direct

betrayal of the Christian spirit. As +en< -u<non observed in 'he Crisis of the Modern =orld

(written in the 235>, long before 1atican II), /there can be nothing but antagonis! between the

religious spirit, in the true sense of the word, and the !odern !entality, and any co!pro!ise is

bound to weaken the for!er and favor the latter, whose hostility !oreover will not be placated

thereby, since it can only ai! at the utter destruction of everything that reflects in !ankind a

reality higher than the hu!an.0 *rophetic words.

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'he principal architect of this revolution inside the Catholic Church was the %rench esuit

'eilhard de Chardin& he was the /!issing link0 (B) between the +enaissance and the

Enlighten!ent, on the one hand, and 1atican II, on the other hand. 'ogether with 'eilhard, we

could say that our epoch is do!inated by the specters of $arwin, Marx, %reud, and ung. ne

!ay consider their influence to be so!ething of the past, but they have left deep and lasting

i!pressions on our ways of thinking and doing. In a certain sense, they re!ain the essential

co!ponents of the received /religion0 of today, being in fact the roots of our secular /religion0.

'his (pseudo6) religion also has its /funda!entalist0 defenders, who !anifest a /religious

intolerance0 that surpasses even the worst exa!ples of the past. =hat people refer to as the

/religious bigotry0 of past ages has been outdoneby farby the bigotry of the /religion0 of

the present age. Anyone who calls these !odern beliefs in uestion runs a serious riskB

1ery few institutions have not been touched by the ideas associated with these na!es. 'hey

are ubiuitous, and they show the!selves, in different ways and to different degrees, in !any

and varied do!ains. ecause of its i!portance in the =estern world, it is worth considering how

and to what extent these trends have affected the Catholic Church. In fact, they have done so in

the shape of the revolution that was the 1atican II Council. Apart fro! the general influences of

$arwin and Marx, one can say that the behind6the6scenes architect of this council was the

/ghost0 of the already deceased 'eilhard de Chardin (2""262377). 'his %rench esuit beca!e

known for proposing a kind of evolutionistic pantheis! with a Christian veneer. A!ong other

things, 'eilhard used to teach that Christ represented an /evolutionary leap0 of great !agnitude.

;is /testa!ent0 can be su!!ari8ed by a piece fro! his book, Christianity and EvolutionD

/If as a result of so!e interior revolution, I were to lose in succession !y faith in

Christ, !y faith in a personal -od, and !y faith in spirit, I feel that I should continue to believe

invincibly in the world. 'he world (its value, its infallibility, and its goodness)that, when all is

said and done, is the first, the last, and the only thing in which I believe.0

It is not for nothing that so!eone ustly said that while Futher was a Christian who left the

Church , 'eilhard was a pagan who re!ained in itB

'he nature of the 1atican II revolution is !ost clearly revealed in the declarations of the five

post61atican6II popes the!selves.

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Even with a progra! as radical and as unprecedented, it has given rise to little concern on

the part of a passive public. 'he i!!ensity of the break with tradition brought about by the

council is not widely appreciated. 'he uotations below fro! -iovanni attista Montini, the

second of the five post61atican6II popes, indicate all too clearly how drastic the revolution was.

;is words are in direct opposition to Christianity in its very foundations.

Paul VI

At his audience on 5nd uly 2343, *aul 1I, with an exceptional clarity, declaredD

/ne cannot avoid !aking the spontaneous reflectionD HIf the whole world is changing, should

not religion change also:0

pening the fourth session Jof the 1atican II CouncilK on 2@th 9epte!ber 2347, he

stated to the whole asse!blyD /'he Council offers the Church . . . a panora!ic vision of the

world. Can the Church, and can we ourselves, do anything other than to look upon the world

and love it0

ut it is in his closing speech Jat the CouncilK on >th $ece!ber 2347 that we find the

core of the !atterD /A current of love and ad!iration has overflowed fro! the Council onto the

!odern hu!an world. . . . Its values have not only been respected, but honored& its efforts have

been approved, its aspirations purified and blessed.0

At his audience of 7th March 2373, *aul 1I confidedD /;ow does the Church look

upon the world of today 'he way the Church looks upon the world has been enlarged so as to

!odify appreciably the attitude that we have towards it. 'he doctrine of the Church has been

enriched by a !ore co!plete knowledge of its nature and its !ission. . . . 'his presupposes a

different !entality, a !entality we can describe as new.0

*aul 1I, with a particular elouence, enthused at the !ost sole!n !o!ent of the

Council, and I extract these passages fro! his closing speech on >th $ece!ber 2347D /All the

doctrinal richness of the Council has but one ai!D to serve !an. . . . All things considered, does

not the Council deliver a si!ple, new, and sole!n lesson by teaching that we !ust love !an in

order to love -od . . . 'o know -od, it is necessary to know !anB . . . 'he discovery of hu!an

needsand they are all the greater because the son of the earth has beco!e greaterBhas

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absorbed the attention of this synod. +ecogni8e in it, you !odern hu!anists who renounce the

transcendence of supre!e things, at least this !erit, and know how to recogni8e our new

hu!anis!D =e too, =e !ore than anyone, =e have the Cult of Man.0

Benedict XVI

As regards oseph +at8inger, the fifth of the five post61atican6II popes, the following

uotations reveal only too clearly the extent to which the traditional Catholic Church has been

destroyed. ;e is still, but wrongly, called a /conservative0and this since the beginning of his

ecclesiastical career. Already in the 237#s, his habilitation thesis at the %reising se!inar in

-er!any was refused by the then Church:s /pre6revolutionary0 authorities, because of /lack of

theological rigor0, /suspicion of neo6!odernist heterodoxy0, and also for /subectivi8ing the

concept of +evelation0. In his autobiography Fa Mia 1ita, he critici8ed the principal theological

school of Catholicis!, na!ely 'ho!is!, for being /closed in on itself, i!personal, and pre6

fabricated0.

'he true ideology of enedict L1I can therefore be best understood si!ply by paying

attention to his own words. In *rinciples of Catholic 'heology, he praises the /i!pulse given by

'eilhard de Chardin0, whose /bold vision incorporated the historical !ove!ent of Christianity

into the evolutionary process0.

In the sa!e book, he wrote that /'ruth beco!es a function of ti!e. . . . %idelity to

yesterday:s truth consists precisely in abandoning it in assu!ing it into today:s truth.0 'he sa!e

author, nevertheless, described the /dictatorship of relativis!0 as the /central proble! of our

faith today0 (in the Mass Pro eligendo pontifice, one day before he was elected by the

cardinals). ut the core of relativis! is the idea that nothing is definitive, and that truth is

dependent on history. In this connection, Aristotle saidD /'hose who declare that everything,

including the truth, follows a constant flux, contradict the!selves, for, if everything changes, on

which basis can they for!ulate a valid state!ent0

'his /neo6!odernist0 theology is widespread also a!ong the close helpers of enedict L1I.

'o give one exa!ple, he brought to +o!e, as the prefect of the Congregation for the Clergy, the

ra8ilian cardinal Cludio ;u!!es. In an interview for the ra8ilian newspaper %olha de 9o

*aulo (7 Nove!ber 5##4), ust before e!barking for the 1atican, he supported the /evolution of

the dog!as0. According to Catholic theology, the dog!as are divinely revealed truths, therefore

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i!!utable& they are the pillars upon which the edifice of the religion is built& without the!, or

with the! in !utation, or in /evolution0, what would guarantee the stability and per!anency of

the religious building *ope 9aint *ius L (-iuseppe Melchiorre 9arto, 2"G76232@) wrote in the

encyclical *ascendiD /If anyone says that the dog!as evolve, let hi! be anathe!a.0

In his lecture at the Convent of 9aint 9cholastica, in 9ubiaco, Italy (2st April 5##7),

+at8inger saidD /'he Enlighten!ent is of Christian origin and it is no accident that it was born

precisely and exclusively in the real! of the Christian faith. . . . It was the !erit of the

Enlighten!ent that it proposed anew these original values of Christianity. . . . In the pastoral

constitution Hn the Church in the Modern =orld:, 1atican Council II once again underlined this

profound correspondence between Christianity and the Enlighten!ent, seeking to co!e to a true

conciliation between the Church and !odernity.0

'he paradox of the head of the new church clai!ing the /glory0 of the Enlighten!ent for

Christianity is that this eighteenth century !ove!ent, as we have said, was !arked by a strong

anti6religious senti!ent. 'his is attested by the /wish0 !ade by one of the leaders of the

Enlighten!ent, $enis $iderot (2>2G62>"@), who looked forward to a world where /the last Oing

would be hanged in the entrails of the last *ope0. Fet us only hope that the /profound

correspondence0 does not go so farB

Co!pared with his i!!ediate predecessors, enedict L1I opened a new phase in the recent

history of the Church, and inaugurated a new /concept0 of pontifex. 'he si!ple choice of his

na!e !eant so!ething significant. 'he signal he sent is that he is not a ohn *aul III, nor si!ply

one !ore ohn or *aul, !uch less a *ius, whose na!e would indicate an anti6!odernistic

approach, for it was pope *ius L (23#G6232@) who defined !odernis! as the /synthesis of all

heresies0. +at8inger ad!itted that his /point of reference0 is enedict L1 (232@62355), a

conciliatory pope who reigned during the %irst =orld =ar. 'herefore, what enedict L1I

sought to do is /conciliate0& to conciliate, if this were possible, revolution with tradition. In fact,

his actions pointed out in the direction of a correction of /excesses0. At the sa!e ti!e, he sought

an entente between contraries, fro! which ste!ed the whole a!biguity of his approach.

;e infor!ed us that while he was a radical leftist theologian during the 9econd 1atican

Council, he was later considered a /conservative0. ;is e!inence has ad!itted, however, that he

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has not !oved to the right in four decades, but that the world has !oved so far to the left that

even a progressive of his conviction looks a conservative.

/y their fruits ye shall know the!0D this funda!ental teaching of Christ is the key for

understanding the current situation. In fact, since the end of the council in the 234#s, thousands

of priests have abandoned the priesthood& according to Civiltá Cattolica (52April 5##>), the

nu!ber of ex6priests between 234@ and 5##@ reaches 43,#4G. 1ocations are scarce in the secular

clergy as well as in the religious orders such as the enedictines, %ranciscans, $o!inicans, and

esuits. All over the world, se!inars, schools, and convents have been closed.

In the Pnited 9tates, fro! the @3,### se!inarians functioning in 2347, there are only @,>##

today. 'he nu!ber of nuns has dropped fro! 2"#,### in 2347, to >7,### in 5#25. 'here were

2,744 Catholic schools in the P9A in 2347& now there are >"4. 'he students in those schools

dropped fro! >##,### to G"4,### in the sa!e period. Attendance at 9unday Mass has fallen to

less than 5#Q of the faithful, although it was >7Q in the 234#s. In ra8il, /the largest Catholic

country in the world0, with !ore than 2## !illion faithful, the Church has been losing al!ost a

!illion souls a year during the last three decades. %ro! the 234#s until now, the nu!ber of

Catholics has dropped fro! 3#Q of the total population to 4"Q, and continues to drop further.

In the sa!e period, the nu!ber of atheists and agnostics greatly increased, fro! #.7Q to >.@Q of

the total population. In =estern Europe al!ost half of newborn infants are no longer bapti8ed.

It is worth noting that the Eastern Churches, on the other hand, which have not !odified

their beliefs and rites, are faring relatively welland the Catholic churches of the riental rite,

such as the Melkites, the Pkrainian, the Ar!enian, etc., do not face a crisis as intense as do their

+o!an counterpart. n the contrary, they receive !any recruits fro! the +o!an Church, who

are considered /refugees fro! 1atican II0B

All things considered, the core of the !atter is that +at8inger reaped the perverse and distant

effects of the revolution he hi!self helped to fo!ent in the past. ;e sought to control, li!it, or

abolishdepending on the casethe destructive conseuences of the transfor!ations he once

sti!ulated in the past. ut he li!ited hi!self to the effects. ;e took ai! at the /excesses0, not

the roots of what he hi!self once called the Church:s /self6de!olition0 following 1atican II. ;is

agenda, then, pointed in the direction of a contradictory /convergence0 or entente between

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Catholic !odernis! and tradition, towards an i!possible /pact0 between irreconcilable

opponents. ;e could not be successful in this ;erculean task, and so he was forced to abdicate.

“Pope Francis” and the decisive criterion

'o the extent that as a Catholic *erennialist the ChurchRs new situation concerns !e, !ore

and !ore I tend to discard even so!e particular and specific positive signals sent by the new

pontiff of the new church (/pope %rancis0), concerning so!e uestions of !orality. 'his is

good, but it !eans little if co!pared to the infinitely !ore i!portant uestion, a decisive one,

over %rancis: position concerning the !isconceptions and errors of 1atican 5 S errors which,

translated and i!ple!ented through the new liturgy of the 9acra!ents, distorted and corrupted

the +evealed rites.

'he key doctrinal issue was envisioned long before the council, when the great +en<

-u<non wrote in his classic The Crisis of the Modern World D

/(...) ne pas chercher de vaines conciliationsD entre l:esprit religieux et l:esprit !oderne, Il

ne peux y avoir u:antagonis!e& toute co!pro!ission ne peut u:affaiblir le pre!ier et

profiter au second, dont l:hostilit< ne sera pas pour cela d<sar!<e, car Il ne peut vouloir ue

la destruction co!plete de toute ce ui, dans l:hu!anit<, reflete une realit< sup<rieure T

l:hu!anit<.0 ( La crise du monde moderne. -alli!ard, 233@, p. 247.)

'his is the crucial point. %or the whole point of 1atican 5 is precisely to pro!ote and

conduct a Uco!pro!iseU (aggiornamento) of the Church with the relativistic, individualistic and

!aterialistic !entality of !odernity. 'hus, the decisive criterion of /right thinking0, or

orthodoxy, i!plies knowing the opinion of /pope %rancis0 about !odernis! in the Church,

about its conseuences both in the doctrine and the rituals of the religion he allegedly now leads.

All the rest is cos!etics.

As the great %rithof 9chuon has written, ust after 1atican IID

/(...) since ohn LLIII, the Church of +o!e has been occupied by a foreign power, na!ely,

the !odernist clan, whose tendencies are towards both free!asonry and !arxis!& that

conseuently the conciliar and post6conciliar popes, including obviously the hierarchy that

accepts the!, are illegiti!ate& that conseuently it is illegiti!ate to follow the! and to pay

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ho!age to the! in any way whatsoever& that so!e good words, or a reassuring gesture, on

the part of an illegiti!ate pope can in no wise attenuate what has ust been said, as long as

the pope does not return to orthodoxy and does not suppress heterodoxy and its effects& for

exa!ple, that a pope should speak well of the ;oly 1irgin, or reco!!end the rosary, or

organi8e a procession, re!oves nothing of his illegiti!acy as long as he does not abolish the

effects of the council and reintroduce the old Mass& that it is absurd to hope, every ti!e that

there is a new pope, or a so6called pope, that he is a good pope& given that he is necessarily

a heretic, elected by heretics, because he is a heretic. It is true that a heretical pope could by

a !iracle be converted to orthodoxy, but then he would prove it by abolishing all the

conciliar and post6conciliar innovations, instead of !erely exploiting the stupidity of the

Htraditionalists: by throwing the! so!e candies.0

No one has ever seen any sign that /pope %rancis0 includes in his hori8on confronting this

critical challenge S which would prove, !oreover, beyond any a!biguity, his doctrinal

orthodoxy and his ritual orthopraxy. 'his is the funda!ental point that we !ust ask ourselves,

the rest is cos!etics.

In su!!ary, and as =illia! 9toddart already indicated, %rancis see!s to have sound

opinions about this or that !oral issue, but such opinions have no interest concerning the

unfolding of cos!ic events. ;e follows on the sa!e line of the previous five !odernist non6

popes. 'he only decisive criterion in this regard is whether he reects 1atican II and all its

works. Nothing indicates so far that he will confront what one can call the /-olden Calf0 of the

/new church0 S an /idol0 around which a !ultitude of souls sing and dance in an infra6rational

adoration. (ii)

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iNotes

() A version of this paper was published as a chapter in the book Men of a Single Book (=orld =isdo!, 5#2#). uy

the book and help independent writers and publishers.

(ii) I a! indebted to the %rench writer ;ubert Monteilhet for the uotations fro! *aul 1I, and to +a!a

Coo!araswa!y for the uotations fro! enedict L1I. Many !ore such uotations can be found in Monteilhet:s

book /*aul 1I0 (collection Nos -rands ;o!!es, *aris, 23>"), and in Coo!araswa!y:s book /'he $estruction of the

Christian 'radition0 (=orld =isdo!, 5##4). Above all, I a! grateful to =illia! 9toddart for his useful co!!ents.

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The Roots of the Destruction of the Christian Tradition in the West