Two cardinals, leading theologians and other scholars defended the title of “Co-Redemptrix” for the Blessed Virgin Mary at an international conference in Rome, stressing her unique cooperation in the redemption of mankind while also underscoring that her task is subordinate to Christ’s salvific role.

Cardinal Raymond Burke and Cardinal Gerhard Müller affirmed the Marian title during the Oct. 7-8 conference entitled De Maria numquam satis (“Of Mary one can never say enough”). The gathering brought together more than 400 scholars, religious and laypeople from all over the world to discuss major dogmatic issues underpinning the veneration of the Mother of God and Mary’s role in worship, devotion and history.

The cardinals’ defense of the Marian title of devotion came almost a year after the Vatican published Mater Populi Fidelis. The 23-page doctrinal note was widely criticized for saying that the title “Co-Redemptrix” for the Blessed Virgin Mary is “always inappropriate” (or “inopportune”) in official Church language and the liturgy, as it “risks obscuring Christ’s unique salvific mediation and can therefore create confusion.”

In his talk that opened the conference, which was held at the Patristic Institute Augustinianum in Rome, Cardinal Burke said the title, when properly understood, does not place Mary on Christ’s level. Christ alone is Redeemer, he said, while Mary’s role is wholly dependent on and subordinate to him. Drawing on Scripture, the Church Fathers, Lumen Gentium, St. John Paul II and Mariologists, he underlined Mary’s singular participation in the accomplishment of redemption.

He maintained that Vatican II affirmed the substance of this teaching, even though it avoided the term “Co-Redemptrix” because of possible misunderstanding. Cardinal Burke added that the Guadalupe apparitions of 1531 are a vivid expression of this theology. Mary’s words to Juan Diego, he said, identify her as the Virgin Mother of the true God and reveal her maternal mission to bring Christ’s mercy, healing and salvation to all peoples.

He concluded that devotion to Our Lady of Guadalupe should strengthen fidelity to Christ, encourage consecration to Mary as a path to Him, and inspire the baptized to unite suffering, service and witness with Christ for the salvation of the world.

In his talk on Oct. 8, Cardinal Gerhard Müller described the title “Co-Redemptrix” for the Blessed Virgin Mary as a legitimate expression of Catholic faith and not a misleading exaggeration or a challenge to Christ’s unique place as sole Redeemer and Mediator.

The prefect emeritus of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith said the title recognizes Mary’s singular, subordinate cooperation in salvation, willed “in the freedom wrought by grace.” Her cooperation, he said, was “constitutive” of the Incarnation and inseparably connected to Christ’s redemptive work. “Had she refused her ‘Fiat,’” he noted, “we would all have remained lost for ever.”

Continue reading the rest of this article about the conference at www.ncregister.com

God’s Mighty Little Missionary: The Extraordinary Life and Legacy of Mother Maria Stieren

is now available to pre-order from Sophia Institute Press

All author royalties go to Mother Maria’s Congregation

The title “Co-Redemptrix” for the Blessed Virgin Mary is a legitimate expression of Catholic faith, not a misleading exaggeration or a challenge to Christ’s unique place as sole Redeemer and Mediator, Cardinal Gerhard Müller has said.

Speaking at the Oct. 7-8 international Rome conference De Maria numquam satis (“Of Mary one can never say enough”), the prefect emeritus of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith said the title recognises Mary’s singular, subordinate cooperation in salvation, willed “in the freedom wrought by grace.”

“God made the fulfilment of his saving will in the Incarnation, the Cross and the Resurrection of his Son contingent upon the free consent of a single woman, thus entrusting the salvation of all humanity to her virginal and maternal heart,” Cardinal Müller said. “Had she refused her ‘Fiat’, we would all have remained lost for ever.”

God willed not merely to use Mary as a passive instrument but to seek the free consent of a person whom he had preserved from original sin and prepared by grace, he said. Her co-operation was therefore a constituent part of the Incarnation and inseparably connected to Christ’s redemptive work.

“Christ, in his human nature born of Mary — which is, however, hypostatically united to his divinity and thus makes Mary the Mother of God — is the Redeemer and the Mediator between God and humankind,” he explained. “And for this reason, in this sense, Mary too, through her constitutive cooperation in the Incarnation, is indissolubly and intimately linked to the work of redemption.”

The German cardinal rejected the argument that the title should be abandoned to avoid Protestant objections, maintaining that such concerns reflect a theology that does not adequately recognize humanity’s free co-operation with grace.

He stressed that the title “Co-Redemptrix” must be understood analogically, saying that Christ alone redeems humanity in the primary and perfect sense, while Mary’s role is entirely dependent on and derived from his grace.

Nor, he argued, does the title’s later emergence as a theological formulation undermine the truth it expresses, since the Church often gives precise language to realities it has long believed.

As the new Eve, whose obedient faith answers Eve’s disobedience, he said Mary is both the model of the redeemed human person and an exemplar for every baptised Christian called to cooperate with Christ’s salvation.

Cardinal Müller’s remarks come almost a year after the Vatican published Mater Populi Fidelis, a contentious 20-page doctrinal note stating that using the title "Co-Redemptrix" for the Blessed Virgin Mary is “always inappropriate” (or “inopportune”) in official Church language and the liturgy. The document argued that it “risks obscuring Christ’s unique salvific mediation and can therefore create confusion.”

The Blessed Virgin Mary’s Cooperation in Redemption

Cardinal Gerhard Müller, Rome

1. The fundamental difference between the Catholic and Protestant conceptions of divine grace and human cooperation

One of the greatest theologians of the nineteenth century and a leading figure of the Catholic school of Tübingen was Johann Adam Möhler (1796–1838). In his magnum opus, *Symbolik* (1832), he attributed the numerous doctrinal differences between Catholics and Protestants to Christian anthropology. Reference is made to the doctrine of the natural and supernatural image of God, to original sin—which either totally corrupts human nature or merely wounds it—and to the justification of the sinner through the grace of Christ, the Redeemer (Symbolik, Introduction 18). The unity of Western Christianity has been shattered over the question of the subjective justification of the sinner and his relationship with the objective work of redemption carried out by Jesus Christ. The crucial question is: did Adam’s sin not cause, in addition to the loss of supernatural grace for the whole of humankind, the total corruption of human nature, created in the image and likeness of God?

Catholics and Protestants agree in answering ‘yes’ to the first part of the question. In Adam, we lost supernatural grace, which made us inwardly like God in spirit and will, and we can regain it only through the grace of Christ, the world’s sole Saviour. To the second part of the question, Protestants reply, in accordance with their confessional texts, that nothing good or pleasing to God remains in human nature. In his utterly corrupt nature, the sinner would not even be capable of observing the commandments of the natural moral law (Rom 2:15) nor of recognising God’s existence—at least by reason—nor of thanking and loving him (Rom 1:20). Because of Adam’s sin, our will is said to be utterly evil and to hate God. And according to Protestant doctrine, not even redeeming grace is capable of restoring, healing and elevating the natural image of God in the creature, even though—on the basis of Christ’s divine-human unity—a nuptial union between nature and grace is realised in man. According to Protestant teachings, it is only by trusting in Christ that I am justified by faith. Christ does not, so to speak, pull me out of the lions’ den, where sin, the devil and death threaten me with death, but simply drives away, from time to time, the lions that attack me. As long as I live on earth, I am in constant struggle against my nature, which is opposed to God, and I gain certainty only by constantly trusting, in an act of faith, exclusively in Christ, so that he may keep me away from sin, the devil and death (simul iustus et peccator).

The Catholic, on the other hand, believes that the grace of redemption and justification not only brings about supernatural deification, but also restores human nature, with its spiritual and moral faculties, to its original goodness, making it possible to love God above all things and to love one’s neighbour as oneself. The inclination towards sin, which is opposed to God and to the good—concupiscence—is no longer in itself a sin, but merely the residual weakness of a nature that has been fully and completely healed. The justified person does not sin at all, especially when doing good (DH 1481). The baptised person sins only, as the Catholic faith teaches, when they freely consent to temptation. Indeed, temptation is by no means a sin in a person who is justified and regenerated in Christ. The inclination to sin has been left to us so that we may combat it with the help of grace and so that, through prayer, fasting, spiritual exercises and works of charity, we may grow in love for God and neighbour, build up the Kingdom of God and thus, through our merits in doing good in accordance with God’s universal saving will, be rewarded with eternal life.

And it is precisely on this point that the truth of the Catholic faith is established and its distinctive character is revealed, which we must recognise, defend and proclaim. There is no relationship of rivalry between God and man. Irenaeus of Lyons already affirmed this against the Gnostics of his time and of all times: God neither gains nor loses anything when he allows personal creatures to share in his infinite Being, his Spirit and his inexhaustible goodness. God’s grace does not become greater the less we think of man. His Majesty does not crush us into the dust. On the contrary: the Son, in consubstantiality with the Father, takes on our lowliness and becomes like us humans even unto death on the cross, in order to exalt us in his person to the glory of God the Father. His perfection is manifested in the fact that he creates us without us and redeems us from original sin and personal sins by pure grace.

2. The Catholic Concept of Cooperation with Grace

God does not exclude us from the work of redemption, but includes us, allowing us to participate in and cooperate with the work of redemption and the perfection of humanity within the communion of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. Man’s cooperation with God therefore constitutes the highest dignity that God can bestow upon man, since the nature created and blessed by God is realised in the spiritual acts of knowing God and is perfected in moral action through free causality. Thomas Aquinas summarises this concept. He distinguishes between the level at which God, by His very nature, acts alone, and the way in which, on the level of creation, He bestows upon man the grace of cooperation, so that human beings too may be co-causes of the redemption and justification of sinners, acting as secondary causes and means of the first cause. As the quotation from 1 Corinthians 3:9 states: ‘We are God’s fellow-workers’. The Doctor Angelicus states: ‘This does not stem from a lack of divine power, but from the fact that God makes use of intermediate causes to preserve the beauty of order in things and also to communicate to creatures the dignity of causality — ut etiam creaturis dignitatem causalitatis communicet.’ (S.th. I q. 23 a. 8 ad 2).

We must understand that the creature’s cooperation in God’s plan of salvation is the culmination of our human dignity. And it is here that the fundamental difference between the Catholic faith and Protestantism lies. St Thomas writes: ‘Neque hoc est propter defectum divinae virtutis: sed quia utitur causis mediis, ut ordinis pulchritudo servetur in rebus, et ut etiam creaturis dignitatem causalitatis communicet.’ (Summa Theologiae, I, q. 23, a. 8, ad 3). – This is not due to a lack of divine power, but to the fact that He makes use of intermediate causes so that the beauty of order may be preserved in things and so that He may also confer upon creatures the dignity of causality.

3. Mariology as the criterion of Catholic orthodoxy

Precisely for this reason, Mariology is the culmination of Catholic anthropology and the criterion of Catholic orthodoxy, since the entire redemption depends on God having communicated to Mary the dignitas causalitatis in the fulfilment of His universal salvific will. The act of the Incarnation is the exclusive work of God, for the eternal Son of the Father assumed human nature from Mary and sustains it within his divine person. Indeed, the human nature of the Mother of the God-Man is not a philosophical abstraction, nor a mere instrument of biological procreation, nor even a passive instrument, but rather the spiritual nature of a free person. And for this reason, her ‘Fiat’ is not merely the obedient execution of an order from a superior, as occurs in a military context. Rather, God reveals the greatness of his grace in a love that does not overwhelm, but brings about salvation, by submitting himself to the free consent, the ‘consensus’, of the creature. God made the fulfilment of his saving will in the Incarnation, the Cross and the Resurrection of his Son contingent upon the free consent of a single woman, thus entrusting the salvation of all humanity to her virginal and maternal heart. Had she refused her ‘Fiat’, we would all have remained lost for ever. But God did not take a gamble; rather, He chose Mary from all eternity to become the Mother of His Son. And for this reason, from the very first moment of her conception, she was also preserved from original sin in view of the redemption of the world through her Son. For this reason, her free ‘yes’ was not an arbitrary choice between two equivalent possibilities, but the fulfilment of her most pure love, which unites her in a spousal covenant with the Holy Spirit, precisely as a bride.

To the angel’s announcement that she would become the mother of the Son of God—who would be conceived in her womb, carried there and born of her—she replied, strengthened by the grace bestowed upon her beforehand and by her freedom from Adam’s sin: ‘Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord; let it be done to me according to your word’ (Lk 1:38). Mary declares her willingness, in the freedom wrought by grace, to place herself at the service of God’s universal saving will and thus to cooperate in its historical fulfilment, right up to the cross and the resurrection of Christ. And it is the Holy Spirit himself, who brought about the Incarnation of the Word in her body and will, and who, in his eschatological outpouring upon Jesus’ disciples, makes Mary the Virgin who receives every grace and the Mother of the faithful. For this reason, Mary is in a unique way intrinsically and essentially linked to Christ’s salvific work. Through her preservation from original sin in view of the merits of the Mediator between God and humankind—who, from her womb and through her free ‘yes’, took on our human nature—Mary represents in her person, and in an archetypal way for all redeemed humankind, the new unity of grace and nature. And grace does not remain alien to nature, but divinizes it and reveals to us the goodness and glory of the New Man in Christ. Christ, in his human nature born of Mary – which is, however, hypostatically united to his divinity and thus makes Mary the Mother of God – is the Redeemer and the Mediator between God and humankind. And for this reason, in this sense, Mary too, through her constitutive cooperation in the Incarnation, is indissolubly and intimately linked to the work of redemption. If Mary, with her ‘Fiat mihi secundum verbum tuum’, collaborated in a constitutive way in the Incarnation, this also includes – on behalf of the whole of humanity – her collaboration in redemption through the cross of her Son, beside whom she stood and where her soul was pierced by a sword. Indeed, the body that hung on the cross and in which Christ offered himself to the Father for the salvation of the world is the very same body that was born of her for the salvation of the world.

4. The Eve-Mary typology

Messianic salvation begins with Christ and with Mary’s faith and willingness to allow the Incarnation of God to take place in her womb. This naturally leads us to contrast, in the wake of Paul’s Adam-Christ typology, Eve’s disobedience (= voluntary lack of faith) with Mary’s obedience and faith (Lk 1:38; Gen 3; Rom 5:19). Eve, through her disobedience and lack of faith, became the cause of death, whilst Mary became the cause of life. Mary is truly the ‘mother of the living’ (Jn 3:20), for just as death came through both sexes, so life was to come through Christ, the man, and through Mary, the woman. Mary stands at the beginning of the history of faith of the new humanity, that is, of the Church of the New Covenant reborn in faith. Through her faith, she is, as a virgin, the type of the Church which receives salvation from God and, at the same time, the typological embodiment of the essence of the Church, which, through its preaching and salvific ministry, continually brings forth, by virtue of faith and baptism, new members of the Body of Christ, which is the Church. From the perspective of a doctrine of redemption developed in the light of the Incarnation, Mary appears as Christ’s partner and helper (socia Cristi) and is consequently, in relation to the Church and to humankind, the one who intercedes for them and helps them (adiuvatrix).

Mary’s cooperation does not, however, refer to her supporting the work of Christ, the progenitor of the new humanity. Rather, she stands on the side of the Church which receives salvation and cooperates, through the grace bestowed upon her and her own example, so that the Church and its individual members may allow themselves to be united, in faith and love, to Christ their Head, in accordance with the relationship that exists between the bridegroom and the bride, in which the personal relationship of Christ with the Church and of the Church with Christ is expressed (cf. Eph 5:23).

The theological concept of Eve’s disobedience—typically contrasted with Mary’s obedience and faith, as already attested by Justin Martyr and Tertullian—finds a compelling expression in Irenaeus of Lyons: ‘the Lord came visibly into his own; he was borne by his own creation, which is borne by him; through his obedience on the wood, he brought about the recapitulation of the disobedience that had been committed by means of the wood; and the seduction, to which Eve—a virgin subject to her husband—had so wretchedly fallen victim, was dispelled by the truth that was magnificently announced by the angel to Mary, a virgin already under her husband’s authority. For just as the former was seduced by the angel’s word, so as to turn away from God by transgressing his word, so the latter received the good news through the angel’s word, so as to bring forth God by obeying his word; and just as the former allowed herself to be seduced into disobeying God, so this one allowed herself to be persuaded to obey God, so that the Virgin Mary might become the advocate of the virgin Eve; and just as the human race was bound to death through a virgin, so it was set free through a virgin, for the disobedience of a virgin was counterbalanced by the obedience of a virgin. Thus, the sin of the first man was atoned for by the righteous conduct of the Firstborn, and the cunning of the serpent was overcome by the simplicity of the dove, and the bonds that bound us to death have been broken…’

It therefore remains true that ‘Mary, through her obedience, became the cause of salvation for herself and for the whole human race’. By virtue of the historical fact of her obedience to the word of God—who took flesh from her for the salvation of all mankind—Mary is also the model and standard of the human being perfectly united with God. She is the Full of Grace, the believer par excellence and therefore the fully redeemed.

5. The Development of Mariological Dogma

Here, too, it is evident that the two fundamental terms ‘grace and faith’, interrelated like two focal points, form the starting point of the history of Mariological dogmas. The subsequent statements of faith concerning Mary, which gradually crystallised in the Church’s consciousness of faith, do not therefore merely reflect an isolated interest in the person of Mary. Rather, throughout the history of the faith, the features of the Christian image of humanity have become visible in the mirror of the fundamental Mariological statements.

When, therefore, Mary is called ‘Co-Redemptrix’ in Catholic piety and theology, this is neither a misleading attribution nor an enthusiastic exaggeration, but a truth objectively contained within revelation. This title must not be silenced because of its rejection by Protestants, who, on the basis of their doctrine of justification, conceive of redemption without the free participation of humankind and thus diminish its significance; rather, it requires an explanation within the overall context of the divine-human work of redemption carried out by Christ, the Son of God, and Mary.

Christological titles are also applied to us by analogy. Christ is the consubstantial Son of God, but we too are, by the grace of adoption, children of God. This designation as children in no way calls into question the uniqueness of Christ’s divine sonship within the Holy Trinity and in the Incarnation; rather, it expresses precisely its universal effect. Thomas Aquinas cites another example: the soteriological title of Christ as the sole mediator between God and humankind (1 Tim 2:5) belongs to him alone. Yet priests (bishops and presbyters) may also be described as mediators between God and humankind, since they are servants of the High Priest and Mediator of the New Covenant, and, as vicars of Christ, administer the sacraments of salvation to humankind. They do not, however, exercise the ministry of priest and mediator in a ‘primary and perfect’ manner, but only in a ‘servile and preparatory’ one (Summa Theologiae, III, q. 26, a. 1). And every baptised person is called and obliged to cooperate, in the spirit of Mary, so that all people may share in Christ’s redemption.

Anyone familiar with the principles of Catholic theology, therefore, can find no cause for offence in the analogical use of Christological and soteriological titles. Even in ecumenical dialogue, this is not a matter of false irenicism that compromises the purity of Catholic doctrine, but rather a deeper understanding of the original meaning and its correct conceptual and linguistic formulation. Even with regard to the hierarchy of truths, as discussed in the Second Vatican Council’s decree on ecumenism, this is not a mechanical division between important and less important doctrines, but rather their analogy in relation to the foundation of the Christian faith—namely, God’s will that all people be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth through the one mediator between God and humankind, the man Christ Jesus, Son of Mary, who through the Incarnation and her ‘Fiat’ became the Mother of God.

The principle ‘numquam satis de Maria’ has nothing to do with Mariological maximalism, which one would have to balance diplomatically and pedagogically with Mariological minimalism. The principle simply expresses the fundamental truth of the Catholic faith against Gnosticism. According to the Catholic faith, the greater a person becomes in thought and action, the more they allow themselves to be sustained by grace and led to the heights of God. In Mary, Mother of the Son of God, of the Church of Christ and of all believers, we recognise in a typological and exemplary way what holds true for everyone: ‘gloria Dei est vivens homo, vita autem hominis visio Dei’ (Irenaeus of Lyon, Adv. haer. IV, 20, 7).

6. The truth revealed in the title ‘Mary Co-Redemptrix’

Nor does the objection hold water that the title only appeared from the late Middle Ages onwards. Indeed, the fact that a truth of faith is contained in Revelation must not be confused with its conceptual formulation. From the very beginning, Christianity has believed in the Incarnation of the Son of God, whilst it was only much later that the Magisterium expressed this mystery using the formula of the unity of the divine and human natures in the person of the Son of God—the hypostatic union. Thus, even in Mary’s perpetual virginity and her divine motherhood—clearly attested to by the Bible—their absolute origin lies in God’s election of her, their conception free from the stain of original sin, and their fulfilment in the Assumption of her body and soul into heaven.

Just as all the mysteries of the Christian faith are intimately linked in the analogia fidei and interpret one another, so too the dogmatic doctrine on Mary is not a subjective collection of disparate elements, but the expression of its origin in the single mystery of God’s self-revelation in Christ, his Son, as the truth and life of every person who, together with the Mother of the faithful, says: ‘Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord.’ The Doctor Angelicus asks in the Expositio in Salutationem Angelicum, the Hail Mary: ‘Since Mary is blessed amongst women’, and answers: ‘Mary brought the blessing and opened the gates of heaven; and therefore the name Mary, which translates as “Star of the Sea”, is fitting for her; for just as sailors are guided into harbour by the Star of the Sea, so Christians are guided to glory by Mary.’

Deepl translation from the original Italian text.

Cardinal Raymond Burke has stressed that the absolute beginning and perfect model of human cooperation in the Redemption is the Virgin Mother, who, having participated in a wholly unique way in the mystery of the Incarnation and the Passion, is rightly called the Co-Redemptrix.

In a talk that opened a Oct. 7-8 international Rome conference De Maria numquam satis (“Of Mary one can never say enough”), the American cardinal presented Our Lady of Guadalupe as a powerful manifestation of Christ the King and of Mary’s unique cooperation in his redemptive work.

He argued that the title “Co-Redemptrix,” properly understood, does not place Mary on Christ’s level. Christ alone is Redeemer, he said, while Mary’s role is wholly dependent on and subordinate to him. Drawing on Scripture, the Fathers, Lumen Gentium, St John Paul II and Marian theologians, he underlined Mary’s singular participation in the accomplishment of redemption.

Cardinal Burke maintained that Vatican II affirmed the substance of this teaching, even though it avoided the term “Co-Redemptrix” because of possible misunderstanding.

He went on to say that the Guadalupe apparitions of 1531 are offered as a vivid expression of this theology. Mary’s words to Juan Diego identify her as the Virgin Mother of the true God and reveal her maternal mission to bring Christ’s mercy, healing and salvation to all peoples.

Her request for a shrine, her care for St Juan Diego, and the miraculous imprint on the tilma, or mantle of the saint, are portrayed as signs of her continuing mediation of grace and her call for ordinary Christians to become co-workers in Christ’s saving mission. By uniting their own daily crosses with that of the Saviour, all the baptised are called to become co-redeemers, Cardinal Burke said.

He concluded by saying that devotion to Our Lady of Guadalupe should strengthen fidelity to Christ, encourage consecration to Mary as a path to Him, and inspire the baptised to unite suffering, service and witness with Christ for the salvation of the world.

International Conference «De Maria numquam satis»

“The Blessed Virgin Mary in Dogma and Worship: Theological and Historical Contributions”

Pontificium Institutum Patristicum Augustinianum, Via Paolo VI, 25, Rome

7 October 2026

Opening Address

“Our Lady of Guadalupe and the Reign of Christ the King:

The Mission of Co-Redemptrix and of Co-Redeemers”

Introduction

It is a source of deepest joy for me to offer the Opening Address of this important international conference on the Blessed Virgin Mary in Dogma and Worship; Theological and Historical Contributions. With you, I am deeply grateful to those who have organized the Conference and those who have made it possible. To begin the conference, I offer a reflection on the theme: Our Lady of Guadalupe and the Reign of Christ the King: The Mission of Co-Redemptrix and of Co-Redeemers.

At the very beginning of her first apparition to Saint Juan Diego, Our Lady of Guadalupe identified herself with these words:

Know, know for sure my dearest and youngest son, that I am truly the ever perfect Holy Virgin Mary, who has the honor to be the Mother of the one true God for whom we all live, the Creator of people, the Lord of all around us and of what is close to us, the Lord of Heaven, the Lord of Earth.^[1]

Her apparitions to Saint Juan Diego from December 9^th to 12^th of 1531, can be described as the manifestation of Christ, her Divine Son, as the King of Heaven and of Earth Who restores the right order and peace with which and for which God has created the world and, above all, man, male and female.

In her miraculously made and preserved image, Our Lady of Guadalupe is the “woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet and on her head a crown of twelve stars,”^[2] whom Saint John Apostle and Evangelist saw in his vision of Our Lord’s definitive victory over sin and death. Our Lady of Guadalupe is pregnant with the “male child”^[3]Who indeed is King of Heaven and Earth, Who conquers Satan and his cohorts, so that, notwithstanding their fierce and vicious rebellion, will never prevail over the Church, over the souls of those who are alive in Christ.^[4] The vocation and the mission of every Christian is therefore, in the words of Saint Paul in the Letter to the Ephesians, “to unite all things in [Christ], things in heaven and things on earth.”^[5] Our Lord Jesus Christ, God the Son Incarnate, is alone the Redeemer, but God the Father, in sending His only-begotten Son in human flesh to redeem the world has desired the cooperation of man in the redemptive work, beginning with the Blessed Virgin Mary.

The Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of God, participated in an altogether unique way in the Mystery of Faith, the Mystery of the Redemptive Incarnation, and is rightly called Co-Redemptrix. So, too, to the degree that we unite our hearts, one with her Immaculate Heart, to the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus, we participate in the saving mission of Christ. We can rightly be called co-redeemers. In the words of Saint John Apostle and Evangelist, we are called to be in Christ “fellow workers in the truth.”^[6] Our Lord Himself makes clear the intimacy of our relationship with Him, when He declares: “If any man would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me.”^[7] In addressing this International Conference on the Blessed Virgin Mary in Dogma and Worship, I want to present the unique share in the mission of Christ the King, the mission of the Redemptive Incarnation, which belongs to the Virgin Mother of God as Co-Redemptrix and our share in the same mission as co-redeemers.

The apparitions of the Virgin Mother of God at Tepeyac Hill in present-day Mexico City help us, in a particular way, to understand her mission and our corresponding mission. In fact, Our Lady’s children of Mexico, guadalupanos and guadalupanas, have always understood their mission in the world as service of Christ the King under the maternal care of His Mother whom He gave to us as our Mother as He was dying on the cross for our eternal salvation.^[8] Blessed Miguel Pro wrote two short prayers on the wall of the prison in which he was held before he was martyred on November 23, 1927, by a firing squad during the bloody persecution of the Church in Mexico: “¡Viva Cristo Rey! ¡Viva la Virgen de Guadalupe!” (Long live Christ the King! Long live the Virgen of Guadalupe!).^[9] So, too, Saint José Sanchez del Río, as he was cruelly tortured and killed, also by firing squad on February 10, 1928, repeatedly exclaimed: “¡Viva Cristo Rey! ¡Viva Santa Maria di Guadalupe!” (Long live Christ the King! Long live Holy Mary of Guadalupe!).^[10] Even as the Virgin Mother of God took the wine stewards at the Wedding Feast of Cana to her Divine Son for the remedy of their great woe, instructing them: “Do whatever he tells you,”^[11], so she accompanied these heroes of the faith to give their lives in doing God’s will. So, too, she draws our hearts to her Immaculate Heart leading us to give our hearts totally to the Sacred Heart of Jesus, even to the shedding of our blood with Him for the glory of God and the salvation of souls.

The Doctrine of the Co-Redemption

The Virgin Mary’s cooperation in Christ’s work of the Redemption has two aspects which, over time, theologians have illustrated by distinguishing objective Redemption from subjective Redemption. Monsignor Arthur B. Calkins who has written extensively and profoundly on the title, Co-Redemptrix, explains the distinction:

Traditionally, theologians have distinguished between Mary’s unique collaboration in the redemption as it was taking place in actu primo from the application of the graces of the redemption to individual persons which takes place in actu secundo. Redemption in actu primo or “objective redemption” or the ascending phase of redemption may be defined as the acquisition of universal salvation by means of the sacrifice willed by God to reconcile the world to himself. Redemption in actu secundo or “subjective redemption” or the descending phase of redemption or the mediation of grace may be defined as the application of the fruits of the redemption to particular individuals by means of the mediation willed by God. It has been consistently held that Our Lady participates in both of these phases of the work of redemption while all other Christians can participate in the application of the graces of redemption to specific persons and situations. Hence we can all be coredeemers in actu secundo.^[12]

Holiness of life, in fact, is participation in the saving work of Christ Who alone is our salvation.

Saint Paul declares the truth of our participation in the redemptive work of Christ in the Letter to the Colossians. Writing about his own sufferings, he understands that they are to be united to the Passion and Death of Christ:

Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I complete what is lacking in Christ’s afflictions for the sake of his body, that is, the church, of which I became a minister according to the divine office which was given to me for you, to make the word of God fully known, the mystery hidden for ages and generations but now made manifest to his saints.^[13]

It is not that anything is lacking in the sufferings of Christ for our eternal salvation but that His life in us, the life of grace, must come to maturity in us, especially through the union of our sufferings with His Passion and Death.

For the past several decades there has been an ongoing discussion in the Church about Our Lady’s active collaboration in the work of the Redemption. The question is: In what sense is the Blessed Virgin Mary the New Eve, the helpmate of Jesus, the New Adam (cf. Rm 5, 12-21; 1 Cor 15, 22. 45). For over five hundred years the term Co-Redemptrix has been used to express the concept that Mary, while not being equal to Jesus, but a creature totally dependent upon Him, secondary and subordinate to Him, nonetheless united herself with Him and joined in offering Him to the Father for our salvation on Calvary. The fittingness of the title sustained

a contentious discussion in the drafting of chapter eight of Lumen Gentium, which contains the Second Vatican Council’s fundamental teaching on Our Lady.^[14] Ultimately the Council clearly taught Mary’s active collaboration in the work of the Redemption in numbers 56-58 and 60-62 of the Dogmatic Constitution on the Church, Lumen Gentium, but did not use the word Co-Redemptrix out of fear that it would be misunderstood by non-Catholics.

Our Lady’s mediation of grace flows from her role as Co-Redemptrix. The word, Mediatrix, was used once in number 62 of Lumen Gentium with the appropriate insistence that “it neither takes away anything from nor adds anything to the dignity and efficacy of Christ the one Mediator.”^[15] She is Mediatrix with her Divine Son, the Mediator, as had been taught in very clear language by nineteenth- and twentieth-century Popes as well as by the post-conciliar Popes.

Part of the difficulty is the meaning which the word, Co-Redemptrix, when translated into certain modern languages. The English word, Co-Redemptrix, can signify a joint actor, but it also may mean someone who cooperates in a work which is principally and essentially of another. Monsignor Arthur Burton Calkins addresses the possible confusion about the sense of Co-Redemptrix, indicating clearly that “[i]n the Latin language from which the term, Coredemptrix comes, however, the meaning is always that Mary’s cooperation or collaboration in the redemption is secondary, subordinate, dependent on that of Christ – and yet for all that – something that God ‘freely wished to accept … as constituting an unneeded, but yet wonderfully pleasing part of that one great price’ paid by His Son for the world’s redemption.”^[16]

In his General Audience Address of October 25, 1995, Pope Saint John Paul II described how historically the Church expressed ever more clearly the truth about the participation of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Mother of God, in Christ’s work of the Redemption:

1. Saying that “the Virgin Mary … is acknowledged and honoured as being truly the Mother of God and of the Redeemer” (Lumen Gentium, n. 53), the Council draws attention to the link between Mary’s motherhood and Redemption.

After becoming aware of the maternal role of Mary, who was venerated in the teaching and worship of the first centuries as the virginal Mother of Jesus Christ and therefore as the Mother of God, in the Middle Ages the Church’s piety and theological reflection brought to light her cooperation in the Saviour’s work.

This delay is explained by the fact that the efforts of the Church Fathers and of the early Ecumenical Councils, focused as they were on Christ’s identity, necessarily left other aspects of dogma aside. Only gradually could the revealed truth be unfolded in all its richness. Down the centuries, Mariology would always take its direction from Christology. The divine motherhood of Mary was itself proclaimed at the Council of Ephesus primarily to affirm the oneness of Christ’s person. Similarly, there was a deeper understanding of Mary’s presence in salvation history.

2. At the end of the second century, St. Irenaeus, a disciple of Polycarp, already pointed out Mary’s contribution to the work of salvation. He understood the value of Mary’s consent at the time of the Annunciation, recognizing in the Virgin of Nazareth’s obedience to and faith in the angel’s message the prefect antithesis of Eve’s disobedience and disbelief, with a beneficial effect on humanity’s destiny. In fact, just as Eve caused death, so Mary, with her “yes,” became “a cause of salvation” for herself and for all mankind (cf. Adv. Haer. III, 22, 4; SC211, 441). But this affirmation was not developed in a consistent and systematic way by the other Fathers of the Church.

Instead, this doctrine was systematically worked out for the first time at the end of the 10^th century in the Life of Mary by a Byzantine monk, John the Geometer. Here Mary is united to Christ in the whole work of Redemption, sharing, according to God’s plan, in the Cross and suffering for our salvation. She remained united to the Son “in every deed, attitude and wish” (cf. Life of Mary, Bol. 196, f. 123 v.).

3. In the West St. Bernard, who died in 1153, turns to Mary and comments on the presentation of Jesus in the temple: “Offer your Son, sacrosanct Virgin, and present the fruit of your womb to the Lord. For our reconciliation with all, offer the heavenly victim pleasing to God” (Serm. 3 in Purif., 2: PL 183, 370).

A disciple and friend of St. Bernard, Arnold of Chartres, shed light particularly on Mary’s offering in the sacrifice of Calvary. He distinguished in the Cross “two altars: one in Mary’s heart, the other in Christ’s body. Christ sacrificed his flesh, Mary her soul.” Mary sacrificed herself spiritually in deep communion with Christ, and implored the world’s salvation: “What the mother asks, the Son approves and the Father grants” (cf. De septem verbis Domini in cruce, 3: PL 189, 1694).

From this age on other authors explain the doctrine of Mary’s special cooperation in the redemptive sacrifice.^[17]

As Pope Saint John Paul II illustrates, the use of the term, Co-Redemptrix, adds nothing new to the Church’s teaching but rather develops uniformly the expression of what the Church has always taught.

We see the phenomenon in the solemn definition of the Immaculate Conception by Blessed Pope Pius IX with the Bull Ineffabilis Deus. The saintly pontiff, in defining the dogma of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary, made clear that he was not presenting any new teaching but rather defining what the Church has always believed.^[18]

What Blessed Pope Pius IX wrote expresses an essential aspect of the living presence of Christ Our Lord with us in the Church.

Recent years have seen a strong movement in favor of recognizing Mary’s role as Co-Redemptrix, Mediatrix and Advocate with a solemn papal definition. A commission was convened very briefly at the Mariological-Marian Congresses held in Częstochowa, Poland in August of 1996 to offer the Holy See advice on this matter. One of its counsels was that further study was needed.^[19] Such study continues to be undertaken by a number of competent theologians.

Our Lady’s role as Co-Redemptrix and Mediatrix of all graces pertains to her nature as our spiritual mother to whom we consecrate ourselves so as to belong ever more completely to Jesus. Two of the greatest modern teachers of Marian consecration, Saint Louis-Marie Grignion de Montfort (1673-1716) and Saint Maximilian Maria Kolbe (1894-1941), base their teaching on consecration to Mary explicitly on Mary’s mediation of the graces of the Redemption to us. Living in union with Mary is a great key to growing in our knowledge and love of Jesus. She never draws us to herself for her own sake, but always in order to lead us ever more closely to Jesus. Thus, Saint Louis-Marie Grignion de Montfort prayed: Totus tuus ego sum et omnia mea tua sunt. Accipio te in mea omnia. Præbe mihi cor tuum, Maria [“I belong entirely to you, and all that I have is yours; I take you for my all. O Mary, give me your heart”].^[20] His prayer was the inspiration of the motto of Pope Saint John Paul II’s papal coat-of-arms.

Mary Co-Redemptrix in the Holy Scriptures

The truth of the Blessed Virgin Mary’s unique share in the work of Redemption is foretold in the first promise of salvation made by the Lord at the time of the sin of our First Parents. Speaking to the serpent who had successfully tempted Eve, Our Lord declared: “I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed; he shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise his heel.”^[21] The Protoevangelium, the First Gospel, as it is fittingly called, makes clear that the work of salvation is to involve a woman whose offspring will crush the head of the serpent, of Satan and his cohorts. In other words, a woman will cooperate with the work of salvation in a singular, indeed unique, way.

Our Lord renewed the promise of salvation through the words of the Prophet Isaiah to King Achaz: “Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign. Behold a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and his name shall be called Emmanuel.”^[22] Commenting on the texts of the Protoevangelium and of the Prophet Isaiah, the Second Vatican Council declared:

The sacred writings of the Old and the New Testaments, as well as venerable tradition, show the role of the Mother of the Saviour in the plan of salvation in an ever clearer light and call our attention to it. The books of the Old Testament describe the history of salvation, by which the coming of Christ into the world was slowly prepared. The earliest documents, as they are read in the Church and are understood in the light of a further and full revelation, bring the figure of a woman, Mother of the Redeemer, into a gradually clearer light. Considered in this light, she is already prophetically foreshadowed in the promise of victory over the serpent which was given to our first parents after their fall into sin (cf. Gen. 3:15). Likewise she is the virgin who shall conceive and bear a son, whose name shall be called Emmanuel (cf. Is. 7:14; Mic. 5:2-3; Mt. 1:22-23). She stands out among the poor and humble of the Lord, who confidently hope for and receive salvation from him. After a long period of waiting the times are fulfilled in her, the exalted Daughter of Sion and the new plan of salvation is established, when the Son of God has taken human nature from her, that he might in the mysteries of his flesh free man from sin.^[23]

The freeing of man from sin is accomplished by God the Son Incarnate of the Virgin Mary by the overshadowing of the Holy Spirit. The Virgin Mary cooperates in an altogether singular, indeed unique, manner in the work of the Redemption, according to the plan of God. We find the full expression of the identity of the Virgin Mary in the work of the Redemptive Incarnation. Father Ignace de la Potterie illustrates the mediation of the Virgin Mother of God in the work of the Redemption by studying the Prologue of the Gospel according to Saint John and the account of the Annunciation in the Gospel according to Saint Luke.^[24]

The Heart of Mary was, according to God’s eternal plan, conceived without the stain of original sin so that her womb could be the fitting tabernacle in which God the Son would come to dwell and from which He would be born into the family of Mary and Joseph, her true spouse and the virginal father of Jesus. Her Immaculate Heart remains forever disposed to bring men, with maternal love, to the Heart of her Divine Son with the instruction she first gave at the Wedding Feast of Cana: “Do whatever he tells you.”^[25]

In his Letter to the Galatians, Saint Paul expresses the truth of Mary’s unique cooperation in the Mystery of the Redemptive Incarnation in its relationship to our own call to be “co-workers [with Christ] in the truth”^[26]:

But when the time had fully come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons. And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, “Abba! Father!” So through God you are no longer a slave but a son, and if a son then an heir.^[27]

It is through the mediation of the Virgin Mary, her co-redemptive mission in the Redemptive Incarnation of her Son that we are heirs to eternal life, that we are called to the high dignity of following Christ on the way of the Cross.^[28]

Our Lady of Guadalupe, Co-Redemptrix

The apparitions and message of the Blessed Virgin Mary at Tepeyac Hill in present-day Mexico City from December 9^th to 12^th in 1531 are a powerful expression of her singular, indeed unique, participation in the Redemptive Incarnation, in actu primo, that is in the work by which God the Son Incarnate has accomplished our salvation by His Passion, Death, Resurrection, and Ascension, and in actu secundo, that is in the realization of His saving work in the souls of many, of every time and place, who come to life in Him through Baptism and live in Him in the Church, His Mystical Body. One can say, in fact, that all the apparitions of the Virgin Mother of God are a manifestation of her unique relationship with God the Son, her Divine Son, by which she became Co-Redemptrix and an expression of her mission of Co-Redemptrix in every time and place until the end of the age. Every Marian apparition is the work of Christ, assisted, as He was from the moment of His virginal conception, by His Mother.

Mary declares her identity as Co-Redemptrix in actu primo from the first moment of her apparitions to Saint Juan Diego. On December 9, 1531, Saint Juan Diego was on his way to Tlatelolco to receive catechetical instruction from the Franciscan Friars, when at Tepeyac Hill he experienced something otherworldly, in fact, heavenly, from the sounds of the birds to the appearance of Our Lady in a glorious manner among the stones and plants transformed to appear as precious jewels. The account of the apparition in the Nican Mopohua, which Juan Diego’s good and learned friend Antonio Valeriano composed on the basis of the direct account of Juan Diego, indicates that Juan Diego recognized Our Lady as the Mother of God. Our Lady addresses Juan Diego in a most affectionate maternal way, asking him where he was going, and he responds: “My Lady, my Queen, my Little Girl, I am going as far as your little house in Mexico Tlatelolco, to follow the things of God that are to us given, that are taught to us by our priests, those who are the images of the Lord, Our Lord.”^[29]

Our Lady then declared: “Know, know for sure my dearest and youngest son, that I am truly the ever perfect Holy Virgin Mary, who has the honor to be the Mother of the one true God for whom we all live, the Creator of people, the Lord of all around us and of what is close to us, the Lord of Heaven, the Lord of Earth.”^[30] These words express in a wonderful way the mystery of Our Lady’s Perpetual Virginity and Divine Maternity by which she shares, in an altogether singular, indeed unique, way, in the redemptive work of her Divine Son. Our Lady identifies herself as both ever virgin and as the Mother of God the Son. She declares her participation in the work of the Redemption in actu primo. In other words, she makes clear that our relationship with God the Father Who has redeemed us by the Incarnation of God the Son places us in a filial relationship with her, the Mother of God the Son Incarnate. We are adopted sons and daughters of God in His only-begotten Son, Our Lord Jesus Christ, and therefore share with Him His Mother, even as He declared to Saint John Apostle and Evangelist as He was dying on the cross.^[31]

Saint John Apostle and Evangelist represented the Apostles and the entire flock whom Christ had confided to the pastoral charity of the Apostles, to His pastoral charity. Our relationship with Our Lady has its origin in the very act of our Redemption by Christ’s death on the Cross.

Our Lady, after identifying herself as Co-Redemptrix in actu primo to Saint Juan Diego then expresses her mission as Co-Redemptrix in actu secundo. She makes clear the reason of her apparition:

I want very much that they build my sacred little house here, in which I will show Him, I will exalt Him upon making Him manifest, I will give Him to all people in all my personal love, Him that is my compassionate gaze, Him that is my help, Him that is my salvation.

Because truly I am honored to be your compassionate mother, yours and that of all the people that live together in this land, and also of all the other various lineages of men; those who love me, those who cry to me, those who seek me, those who trust in me. Because there [at my sacred house] truly will I hear their cry, their sadness, in order to remedy, to cure all their various troubles, their miseries, their pains.

And to bring about what my compassionate and merciful gaze would achieve, go to the palace of the Bishop of Mexico, and tell him how I have sent you, so that you may reveal to him how I very much want him to build me a house here, to erect my temple on the plain; tell him everything, all you have seen and marveled at, and what you have heard. And because of it I will enrich you, I will glorify you; and because of it you will deserve very much how I will reward your fatigue, your service in going to petition the matter for which I am sending you. Now, my dearest son, you have heard my breath, my word; go, do what you are responsible for doing.^[32]

The words of Our Lady manifest her unique and irreplaceable service in the work of our salvation, according to God’s plan.

In actu secundo, the Blessed Virgin Mary continues to be the privileged instrument of divine grace in the Church, even as she was the first tabernacle in which God the Son came to dwell, when He united our human nature to His divine nature in her womb by the overshadowing of the Holy Spirit. At Tepeyac Hill, she appeared to Saint Juan Diego to manifest God’s love and mercy toward all men, to manifest the inviolable dignity of human life created in God’s image and likeness and saved from sin and death by the Redemptive Incarnation of God the Son. In words to Saint Juan Diego, when he feared his uncle Juan Bernardino’s death and was postponing his appointment with Our Lady, in order to bring a priest to hear his uncle’s confession before he died, Our Lady expresses her abiding presence with us in the Church as the Virgin Mother of God who is also the Mother of Divine Grace, our Mother, drawing us ever more intimately into communion with her Divine Son. She declared to Saint Juan Diego:

Listen, put it into your heart, my youngest son, that what frightened you, what afflicted you is nothing; do not let it disturb your face, your heart; do not fear this sickness or any other sickness, nor any sharp or hurtful thing. Am I not here, I who have the honor to be your mother? Are you not in my shadow and under my protection? Am I not the source of your joy? Are you not in the hollow of my mantle, in the crossing of my arms? Do you need anything more?

Let nothing else worry you, disturb you; don’t grieve over your uncle’s illness, because he will not die of it for now, you may be certain that he is already healed.^[33]

Our Lady’s words are not figures of speech. Rather, they reflect her continuing mission in the Church, a singular mission in which she has asked Saint Juan Diego to share.

The miraculous imprint of her image on the tilma or mantle of Saint Juan Diego is a most wonderful sign of her participation in the work of the Redemption, accomplished by her Divine Son. In confirming her mission to the Bishop by the sign of the miraculous flowering of roses in the middle of winter on a stony hill on which only weeds and thorn bushes were growing, God gave a further confirmation which He has not given in any other apparition of Our Lady. Let us listen again to the account of the presentation of the sign of the roses to Bishop Juan de Zumárraga by Saint Juan Diego:

And then [Juan Diego] opened his white tilma, in the hollow of which were the flowers. And all the different flowers, like those from Castille, fell to the floor. Then and there his tilma became the sign, there suddenly appeared the Beloved Image of the Perfect Virgin Saint Mary, Mother of God, in the form and figure in which it is now, where it is preserved in her beloved little house in Tepeyac, which is called Guadalupe. And as soon as the Governing Bishop and all those who were there saw it, they knelt, they were full of awe, they stood to see it, they were moved, their hearts were troubled, their hearts as well as their minds were raised. And the Governing bishop, in tears, with sadness, begged Her, he asked Her forgiveness for not having carried out Her venerable will, Her venerable breath, Her venerable word.

And the Bishop got up, and untied Juan Diego’s garment, his tilma, from his neck where it was tied, on which appeared the venerable sign of the Heavenly Queen. And then he took it and placed it in his private chapel. And Juan Diego still stayed for the day in the Bishop’s house who still kept him there. And on the next day he [the Bishop] said to him: “Come, let’s go so you can show me where it is that the venerable will of the Queen of Heaven wants Her chapel built.” Immediately the order was given to make it, to build it.^[34]

In a very brief time, the chapel was built, and Bishop Juan de Zumárraga enshrined the sacred tilma in it. The Nican Mopohua concludes with these words:

And after some time, the Reverend Bishop moved the beloved Image of the Heavenly Maiden to the main church. He [the Bishop] took if from his palace, from his chapel where it had been, so that everyone could see and admire Her precious Image. And absolutely everyone, the entire city, without exception, trembled when they went to behold, to admire Her precious Image. They came to acknowledge it as something divine. They came to offer Her their prayers. They marveled at the miraculous way it had appeared since absolutely no one on Earth had painted Her beloved Image.^[35]

The abiding presence of the Mother of God, the Mother of Divine Grace, with those who came on pilgrimage to the holy place in which the sacred tilma was enshrined was and continues to be indescribably efficacious. The Virgin of Guadalupe brought so many souls to life in Christ through Baptism and led so many of the baptized to abandon their sinful ways and to follow the Way of Christ Who alone is our salvation.

Mary Co-Redemptrix always teaches us, draws us, to share in the work of the Redemptive Incarnation in actu secundo, according to our vocation in life and our God-given talents. As Co-Redemptrix, she is the first among the disciples of her Divine Son, she shares in His saving work both in actu primo et in actu secundo, but she teaches all who are adopted sons and daughters of God in His only-begotten Son through Baptism that they, too, must do all within their power to serve Christ, to be His “fellow workers in the truth.”^[36] When Saint Juan Diego doubted his capacity to serve as Our Lady’s messenger, suggesting that she choose someone more noble, more able, Our Lady responded:

Listen my youngest son, know for sure that I have no lack of servants, of messengers, to whom I can give the task of carrying my breath, my word, so that they carry out my will; but it is necessary that you, personally, go and plead, that by your intercession, my wish, my will, become a reality. And I beg you, my youngest son, and I strictly order you, to go again tomorrow to see the Bishop. And in my name, make him know, make him hear my wish, my will, so that he will bring into being, he will build, my sacred house that I ask of him. And carefully tell him again how I, personally, the ever Virgin Holy Mary, I, who am the Mother of God, sent you as my messenger.^[37]

Whenever we come on pilgrimage to the holy place of Our Lady of Guadalupe, she confirms us in our mission as her messengers, as heralds and instruments of God’s saving love and mercy. She unites our hearts more fully to her Immaculate Heart so that they rest ever more securely and fully in the Sacred Heart of Jesus where they are purified of sin and inflamed with divine love. She speaks to us as she spoke to Saint Juan Diego:

Am I not here, I who have the honor to be your mother? Are you not in my shadow and under my protection? Am I not the source of your joy? Are you not in the hollow of my mantle, in the crossing of my arms? Do you need anything more?^[38]

Especially in the most troubled and troubling time in which we live in the Church, we need to visit Our Heavenly Mother and be confirmed in our fidelity to her Divine Son, so that we remain with Him in the Church, tending whatever portion of His Kingdom, be it little or great, with all our heart, with a heart united to the Immaculate Heart of Mary and thus belonging totally to His Sacred Heart.

It is my hope that this brief presentation has shown you how the apparition of Our Lady of Guadalupe at Tepeyac Hill in 1531 is a most beautiful and eloquent manifestation and expression of the truth of her singular, indeed unique, participation in the saving work of her Divine Son, of the truth of the doctrine of her title, Co-Redemptrix, when properly understood. At the same time, I hope that it has reminded us all of our call to be, with the Virgin of Guadalupe, participants in the work of the Redemptive Incarnation. May we, with Saint Paul, be able to say to our brothers and sisters in the Church: “Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I complete what is lacking in Christ’s afflictions for the sake of his body, that is, the church.”^[39]

Conclusion

While the Second Vatican Ecumenical Council did not make a dogmatic definition, it certainly taught the truth of the Co-Redemption, as I have indicated, in some way. In that regard, we should take care, lest the hesitation about the misunderstanding of the term, Co-Redemptrix, lead to a weakening of the teaching of the Co-Redemption as it applies uniquely to the Blessed Virgin Mary and generally to all the baptized. It is my hope that my presentation has made clear the importance of the teaching of the Co-Redemption to our daily living in Christ.

I close with a reflection of Father Jean Galot, S.J., taken from an article which he wrote on the controversies and doctrinal questions connected with the title of Co-Redemptrix:

Some have accused the Marian privileges of digging a furrow between the Mother of Jesus and us; in reality, those privileges are destined, in the divine plan, to draw Mary nearer to humanity in view of the unfolding of a more abundant grace. While with a unique character and to a level not to be equalled, Mary’s cooperation in the redemption invites us to acknowledge more ardently our mission and our responsibility in a world that needs salvation. If Mary cannot be called Co-redemptrix, neither could Christians be considered as coredeemers. The condition of the whole Church in her coredeeming mission sheds light on Mary, the first model of every redemption.^[40]

Thank you for your kind attention. May God bless you, and may Our Lady of Guadalupe keep you always in her maternal care.

Raymond Leo Cardinal BURKE

^[1] “Sábelo, ten por cierto, hijo mío, el más pequeño, que yo soy en verdad la perfecta siempre Virgen Santa María, que tengo el honor de ser Madre del verdaderísimo Dios por quien se vive, el Creador de las personas, el Dueño de la cercanía y de la inmediación, el Dueño del cielo, el Dueño de la tierra.” Carl A. Anderson y Eduardo Chávez, Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe. Madre de la civilización del amor (México DF: Random House Mondadori, 2010), p. 214, n. 26. English translation: Carl Anderson and Eduardo Chávez, Our Lady of Guadalupe: Mother of the Civilization of Love (New York: Doubleday, 2009), p. 173, no. 26.

^[2] Rev 12, 1.

^[3] Rev 12, 5.

^[4] Cf. Mt 16, 18.

^[5] Eph 1, 10.

^[6] 3 Jn 8.

^[7] Lk 9, 23. Cf. Mt 16, 24; Mark 8, 34.

^[8] Cf. Jn 19, 26-27.

^[9] Cf. Antonio Dragón, Vida íntima del Padre Pro, tr. Rafael Martínez del Campo, 6^a ed. (México, D.F.: Obra Nacional de la Buena Prensa, A.C., 1993), p. 234.

^[10] Cf. Fidel González Fernández, José Sánchez del Río, Il giovane martire che diede la vita per la fede, ED. Federica Picchi Roncali (Firenze: Dominus Production Edizioni, 2016), pp. 129-133.

^[11] Jn 2, 5.

^[12] Calkins, p. 45.

^[13] Col 1, 24-26.

^[15] “ … ut dignitati et efficacitati Christi unius Mediatoris nihil deroget, nihil superaddat.” Sacrosanctum Concilium Oecumenicum Vaticanum II, “Constitutio Dogmatica de Ecclesia Lumen Gentium,” Acta Apostolicae Sedis 57 (1965) 63, n. 62. [LG]. English translation: Second Vatican Ecumenical Council, “Dogmatic Constitution Lumen Gentium, ‘On the Church,’ 21 November 1964,” Austin Flannery, ed., Vatican Council II, Vol. 1, Rev. Ed. (Northport, NY: Costello Publishing Company, 2004), p. 419, no. 62. [LGEng].

^[16] Arthur Burton Calkins, “The Mystery of Mary Coredemptrix in the Papal Magisterium,” Mary Co-Redemptrix: Doctrinal Issues Today(Goleta, CA: Queenship Publishing Company, 2002), p. 30. [Calkins].

^[17] “1. Dicendo che “Maria Vergine è riconosciuta e onorata come vera Madre di Dio, Madre del Redentore” [Lumen Gentium, 53], il Concilio attira l’attenzione sul legame esistente tra la maternità di Maria e la redenzione.

Dopo aver preso coscienza del ruolo materno di Maria, venerata nella dottrina e nel culto dei primi secoli quale Madre verginale di Gesù Cristo e quindi Madre di Dio, nel Medioevo la pietà e la riflessione teologica della Chiesa approfondiscono la sua collaborazione all’opera del Salvatore.

Questo ritardo si spiega con il fatto che lo sforzo dei Padri della Chiesa e dei primi Concili ecumenici, incentrato com’era sul mistero dell’identità di Cristo, lasciò necessariamente nell’ombra altri aspetti del dogma. Sarà solo progressivamente che la verità rivelata potrà essere esplicitata in tutta la sua ricchezza. Nel corso dei secoli la Mariologia si orienterà sempre in funzione della Cristologia. La stessa divina maternità di Maria viene proclamata nel Concilio di Efeso soprattutto per affermare l’unità personale di Cristo. Analogamente avviene per l’approfondimento della presenza di Maria nella storia della salvezza.

2. Alla fine del secondo secolo sant’Ireneo, discepolo di Policarpo, pone già in evidenza il contributo di Maria all’opera della salvezza. Egli ha compreso il valore del consenso di Maria al momento dell’Annunciazione, riconoscendo nell’obbedienza e nella fede della Vergine di Nazaret al messaggio dell’angelo l’antitesi perfetta della disobbedienza e dell’incredulità di Eva, con effetto benefico sul destino dell’umanità. Infatti, come Eva ha causato la morte, così Maria, col suo “sì”, è divenuta “causa di salvezza” per se stessa e per tutti gli uomini [Cfr. S. Irenaei Adversus Haereses, 3. 22, 4]. Ma si tratta di un’affermazione non sviluppata in modo organico e abituale dagli altri Padri della Chiesa.

Tale dottrina, invece, viene sistematicamente elaborata per la prima volta, alla fine del decimo secolo, nella “Vita di Maria” di un monaco bizantino, Giovanni il Geometra. Maria è qui unita a Cristo in tutta l’opera redentrice partecipando, secondo il piano divino, alla Croce e soffrendo per la nostra salvezza. Ella è rimasta unita al Figlio “in ogni azione, atteggiamento e volontà” [Giovanni il Geometra, Vita di Maria, Bol. 196, f. 122 v.]. L’associazione di Maria all’opera salvifica di Gesù avviene mediante il suo amore di Madre, un amore animato dalla grazia, che le conferisce una forza superiore: la più esente da passione si mostra la più compassionevole [Cfr. ibid. f. 123 v.].

3. In Occidente san Bernardo, morto nel 1153, rivolgendosi a Maria, così commenta la presentazione di Gesù al tempio: “Offri tuo Figlio, sacrosanta Vergine, e presenta al Signore il frutto del tuo seno. Per la nostra riconciliazione con tutti offri l’ostia santa, gradita a Dio” (S. Bernardi Sermo 3 in Purif., 2: PL 183, 370].

Un discepolo ed amico di san Bernardo, Arnaldo di Chartres, mette in luce in particolare l’offerta di Maria nel sacrificio del Calvario. Egli distingue nella Croce “due altari: uno nel cuore di Maria, l’altro nel corpo di Cristo. Il Cristo immolava la sua carne, Maria la sua anima”. Maria s’immola spiritualmente in profonda comunione con Cristo e supplica per la salvezza del mondo: “Quello che la madre chiede il Figlio lo approva, il Padre lo dona” [Arnaldi Carnutensis De Septem Verbis Domini in Cruce, 3: PL 189, 1694].

Da questa epoca in poi altri autori espongono la dottrina della speciale cooperazione di Maria al sacrificio redentore.” Insegnamenti di Giovanni Paolo II, XVIII, 2 [luglio-dicembre 1995] (Città del Vaticano: Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 1998), pp. 93 4-935. English translation: “Mary was united to Jesus on the Cross: Down the centuries the Church’s tradition has appreciated ever more profoundly Mary’s very close sharing in her Son’s redemptive mission,” L’Osservatore Romano Weekly Edition in English, 1 November 1995, 11.

^[18] Cf. Petrus Hünermann and Helmut Hoping for the Latin text, and Robert Fastiggi and Anne Englund Nash for the English text, ed., Henrici Denzinger, Enchiridion symbolorum definitionum et declarationum de rebus fidei et morum, 43^rd ed. / Compendium of Creeds, Definitions, and Declarations on Faith and Morals (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2012), p. 574, no. 2802.

^[19] Cf. L’Osservatore Romano, 4 giugno 1997, 10-11. English translation: L’Osservatore Romano Weekly Edition in English, 4 June 1997, 12.

^[20] Cf. Karol Wojtyła. Giovanni Paolo II, Dono e mistero. Diario di un Sacerdote (Città del Vaticano: Libreria Editrice Vaticana, 2011), p. 44. English translation: Pope John Paul II, Gift and Mystery: On the Fiftieth Anniversary of My Priestly Ordination (New York: Doubleday, 1996), pp. 29-30. Cf. also Arthur Burton Calkins, Totus Tuus: Pope John Paul II’s Program of Marian Consecration and Entrustment, 2^nd ed. (New Bedford, MA: Academy of the Immaculate, 2017), p. 308.

^[21] Gen 3, 15.

^[22] Is 7, 14.

^[23] “Sacrae Litterae Veteris Novique Testamenti et veneranda Traditio munus Matris Salvatoris in salutis oeconomia modo magis magisque dilucido ostendunt et veluti conspiciendum proponunt. Libri quidem Veteris Testamenti historiam salutis, qua Christi in mundum adventus lento gradu praeparatur, describunt. Quae primaeva documenta, qualiter in Ecclesia leguntur et sub luce ulterioris et plenae revelationis intelliguntur, clarius pedetentim in lucem proferunt figuram mulieris, Matris Redemptoris. Ipsa, sub hac luce, iam prophetice adumbratur in promissione, lapsis in peccatum primis parentibus data, de victoria super serpentem (cfr. Gen. 3,15). Similiter haec est Virgo quae concipiet et pariet Filium, cuius nomen vocabitur Emmanuel (cfr. Is. 7,14; cfr. Michaea 5, 2-3. - Matth. 1, 22-23). Ipsa praecellit inter humiles ac pauperes Domini, qui salutem cum fiducia ab Eo sperant et accipiunt. Cum Ipsa tandem praecelsa Filia Sion, post diuturnam exspectationem promissionis, complentur tempora et nova instauratur Oeconomia, quando Filius Dei humanam naturam ex ea assumpsit, ut mysteriis carnis suae hominem a peccato liberaret.” LG 59-60, n. 55. English translation: LGEng, p. 415, no. 55.

^[24] Cf. Ignace de la Potterie, “The Mediation of the Mother of Jesus at the Incarnation: An Exegetical Study,” tr. Salwa Hamati, Mary Coredemptrix Mediatrix Advocate, Theological Foundations: Towards a Papal Definition?, ed. Mark I. Miravalle (Santa Barbara, CA: Queenship Publishing, 1995), pp. 173-190. [Potterie].

^[25] Jn 2, 5.

^[26] 3 Jn 8.

^[27] Gal 4, 4-7.

^[28] Cf. Lk 9, 23.

^[29] “Señora mía, Reina mía, Muchachita mía, allá llegaré, a tu venerable casa en México Tlatelolco, a seguir las cosas de Dios que nos dan, que nos enseñan, quienes son las imágenes del Señor, Señor Nuestro, nuestros sacerdotes.” “Apéndice A, El Nican Mopohua,” Carl A. Anderson y Eduardo Chávez, Nuestra Señora de Guadalupe. Madre de la civilización del amor, tr. Gerardo Hernández Clark (México DF: Random House Mondadori, 2010), p. 214, n. 24. [NM]. English translation: Carl A. Anderson and Eduardo Chávez, Our Lady of Guadalupe: Mother of the Civilization of Love (New York: Doubleday, 2009), p. 173, no. 24. [NMEng].

^[30] “Sábelo, ten por cierto, hijo mío, el más pequeño, que yo soy en verdad la perfecta siempre Virgen Santa María, que tengo el honor de ser Madre del verdaderísimo Dios por quien se vive, el Creador de las personas, el Dueno de la cercania y de la inmediación, el Dueño del cielo, el Dueño de la tierra.” NM, p. 214, n. 26. English translation: NMEng, p. 173, no. 26.

^[31] Cf. Jn 19, 25-27.

^[32] “Mucho quiero, mucho deseo, que aquí me levanten mi casita sagrada, en donde lo mostraré, lo ensalzaré al ponerlo de manifiesto, lo entregaré a las gentes en todo mi amor personal, a Él que es mi mirada compasiva, a Él que es mi auxilio, a Él que es mi salvación.

Porque, en verdad, yo me honro en ser tu madre compasiva, tuya y de todos los hombres que vivís juntos en esta tierra, y también de todas las demás variadas estirpes de hombres, los que me amen; los que me llamen, los que me busquen, los que confíen en mí. Porque ahí, en verdad, escucharé su llanto, su tristeza, para remediar, para curar todas sus diferentes penas, sus miserias, sus dolores.

Y para realizar lo que pretende mi compasiva mirada misericordiosa, anda al palacio del obispo de México, y le dirás cómo yo te envío, para que le descubras cómo mucho deseo que aquí me provea de una casa, me erija en el llano mi templo; todo le contarás, cuanto has visto y admirado, y lo que has oído.

Y ten por seguro que mucho lo agradeceré y lo pagaré, que por ello, en verdad, te enriqueceré, te glorificaré; y mucho de allí merecerás con que yo retribuya tu cansancio, tu servicio con que vas a solicitar el asunto al que te envío. Ya escuchaste, hijo mío el menor, mi aliento mi palabra; anda, haz lo que esté de tu parte.” NM, p. 214, nn. 26-37. English translation: NMEng, pp. 173-174, nos. 26-37.

^[33] “Escucha, ponlo en tu corazón, Hijo mío el menor, que no es nada lo que te espantó, lo que te afligió; que no se perturbe tu rostro, tu corazón; no temas esta enfermedad ni ninguna otra enfermedad, ni cosa punzante y aflictiva. ¿No estoy yo aquí, que tengo el honor de ser tu madre? ¿No estás bajo mi sombra y resguardo? ¿No soy yo la fuente de tu alegría? ¿No estas en el hueco de mi manto, en el cruce de mis brazos? ¿Acaso tienes necesidad de alguna otra cosa?

Que ninguna otra cosa te aflija, que no te inquiete; que no te acongoje la enfermedad de tu tío, porque de ella no morirá por ahora, ten por cierto que ya sanó.” NM, p. 220, nn. 118-120. English translation: NMEng, p. 179, nos. 118-120.

^[34] “Y luego extendió su blanca tilma, en cuyo hueco estaban las flores. Y al caer al suelo todas las variadas flores como las de Castilla, luego allí en su tilma se convirtió en señal, se apareció de repente la Amada Imagen de la Perfecta Virgen Santa María, Madre de Dios, en la forma y figura en que ahora está, en donde ahora es conservada en su amada casita, en su sagrada casita en el Tepeyácac, que se llama Guadalupe. Y en cuanto la contempló el Obispo Gobernante y también todos los que allí estaban, se arrodillaron, mucho la admiraron, se pusieron de pie para verla, se conmovieron, se afligió su corazón, como que se elevó su corazón, su pensamiento. Y el Obispo Gobernante con lagrimas, con tristeza, le suplicó, le pidió perdón por no haber realizado su venerable voluntad, su venerable aliento, su venerable palabra.

Y el Obispo se levantó, desaó del cuello de donde estaba atada, la vestidura, la tilma de Juan Diego, en la que se apareció, en donde se convirtió en venerable señal la Reina Celestial. Y luego la llevó allá, la fue a colocar en su oratorio. Y todavía allí pasó un dia entero Juan Diego en la casa del Obispo, quien hizo que se quedara allí. Y al día siguiente, le dijo: ‘Anda, vamos a que muestres dónde es la venerable voluntad de la Reina del Cielo que le levante su templo’. De inmediato se dio orden de hacerlo, levantarlo.” NM, pp. 223-224, nn. 181-193. English translation: NMEng, p. 182, nos. 181-193.

^[35] “Y después de que el Señor Obispo la tuvo algún tiempo, trasladó a la Iglesia Mayor la preciosa reverenciada Imagen de la amada Niña Celestial. La vino a sacar de su palacio, de su oratorio en donde estaba, para que todos la vieran, se admiraran de su preciosa Imagen. Y absolutamente todos, toda la ciudad, sin faltar nadie, se estremecieron cuando fueron a contemplar, a admirar su preciosa Imagen. Venían a conocerla como algo divino. Venían a presentarle sus plegarias. Mucho se admiraban en qué milagrosa manera se había aparecido puesto que absolutamente ningún hombre de la tierra pintó su amada Imagen.” NM, p. 225, nn. 212-218. English translation: NMEng, p. 183, nos. 212-218.

^[36] 3 Jn 8.

^[37] “Escucha, tú, el más pequeño de mis hijos, ten por cierto que no son escasos mis servidores, mis mensajeros, a quien encargue que lleven mi aliento, mi palabra, para que efectúen mi voluntad; pero es necesario que tú, personalmente, vayas, ruegues, que por tu intercesión se realice, se lleve a efecto mi querer, mi voluntad. Y mucho te ruego, hijo mío el menor, y con rigor te mando, que otra vez vayas mañana a ver al obispo. Y de mi parte hazle

saber, hazle oír mi querer, mi voluntad, para que realice, edifique mi casa sagrada que le pido. Y bien, de nuevo dile de qué modo yo, personalmente, la siempre Virgen Santa María, yo, que soy la Madre de Dios, te envío a ti como mi mensajero.” NM, p. 216, nn. 58-62. English translation: NMEng, pp. 175-176, nos. 58-62.

^[38] “¿No estoy yo aquí, que tengo el honor de ser tu madre? ¿No estás bajo mi sombra y resguardo? ¿No soy yo la fuente de tu alegría? ¿No estas en el hueco de mi manto, en el cruce de mis brazos? ¿Acaso tienes necesidad de alguna otra cosa?” NM, p. 220, n. 119. English translation: NMEng, p. 179, no. 119.

^[39] Col 1, 24.

^[40] “Alcuni hanno accusato i privilegi mariani di scavare un solco tra la Madre di Gesù e noi; in realtà, quei privilegi sono destinati, nel piano divino, ad avvicinare Maria all’umanità in vista dello sviluppo di una grazia più abbondante. Pur con un carattere unico e un livello ineguagliabile, la cooperazione di Maria alla redenzione ci invita a prendere più vivamente coscienza della nostra missione e della nostra responsabilità in un mondo che ha bisogno di salvezza. Se Maria non potesse venire chiamata corredentrice, neppure i cristiani potrebbero essere considerati come corredentori. La condizione di tutta la Chiesa nella sua missione corredentrice s’illumina con la condizione di Maria, primo modello di ogni redenzione.” Jean Galot, “Maria Corredentrice. Controversie e problemi dottrinali,” La Civiltà Cattolica, Anno 145 (1994), n., 3459/3460, p. 216. English translation: Jean Galot, “Mary Co-redemptrix: Controversies and Doctrinal Questions,” Mary Co-redemptrix: Doctrinal Issues Today(Goleta, CA: Queenship Publishing Company, 2002), p. 11.

Bishop Erik Varden has called for a balanced approach to immigration, one that rejects viewing every stranger as an enemy, often on the grounds of “ethnic purity,” while reminding immigrants that they have “solemn duties toward their country of adoption.”

In a Sept. 22 address to the autumn plenary assembly of the Nordic Bishops’ Conference, the bishop of Trondheim observed that populism today derives from prevailing domestic and global uncertainties and challenges — from wars, “extreme weather” and an energy crisis, to refugees, concerns over AI, and a “social fabric that is rending.”

Bishop Varden, who led Pope Leo XIV’s Lenten spiritual exercises for the Roman Curia earlier this year, noted that the word “populist” first emerged in the late 19th century and derived from a sense among the “common people” — the majority of a country’s population who make it run — that their voices “were ignored by a distant elite” and thus felt “disenfranchised and left in the dark.”

In such a world of “uncertainty” and alienation, it is “not bad” for citizens to “look to their nation, their people, for stability,” he said, adding that “cries of protest” are “natural, even healthy.” What unites a nation, he added, is a “sense of common origin and of shared purpose.”

But he warned against a nation “seeking coherence in real or imagined roots, by idolizing, say, the chimaera of ethnic purity,” adding that that leads to narrow-mindedness, arrogance, ancestor worship and idolatry.

He condemned “the silly, cheap rhetoric of so-called ‘identity politics,’” warning that “safeguarding national ‘purity’” ends up vilifying anyone who “falls outside a set of narrow conditions given for belonging.” This brand of politics, he said, “thrives on resentment” and often has little to propose by way of “constructive vision and realistic strategy.”

Continue reading the rest of this article at www.ncregister.com

LONDON — A combination of crucial factors led to the defeat of proposed assisted-suicide legislation in England and Wales earlier this month, delivering the country’s pro-life movement one of its greatest victories in modern times.

The bill’s defeat reflected sustained parliamentary scrutiny, growing concern over inadequate safeguards, a broad grassroots campaign, warnings from clinicians and disability advocates, and a renewed focus on the weaknesses in Britain’s palliative- and social-care provision. It also showed how opposition to assisted suicide can unite people across political, professional and religious divides.

So what were those decisive elements, and what might pro-life movements in other countries learn from the bill’s demise?

Lawmakers rejected the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill on Sept. 11 by 286 votes to 270 at its Second Reading in the House of Commons, after it had been introduced by Labour MP Lauren Edwards.

Had it passed, the proposed legislation would have allowed mentally competent adults in England and Wales who had six months or less to live to seek medical help to end their lives, subject to approval by two doctors and an expert panel. It would have changed a longstanding law under which anyone intentionally encouraging or helping another person to die by suicide can face up to 14 years’ imprisonment.

The bill came on the heels of a near-identical measure, introduced in 2024 by Labour MP Kim Leadbeater, that passed key stages in the House of Commons in 2025 but then ran out of time in the House of Lords in April after the tabling of around 1,200 amendments.

Critics of the initial bill said that, despite the many amendments aimed at making it workable, it lacked sufficient safeguards, particularly over protecting people vulnerable to pressure or coercion, disability-related concerns, the operation of eligibility tests, and conscience protections for clinicians.

The bill’s supporters argued that sufficient scrutiny had been carried out in the Commons and accused some peers of tabling large numbers of amendments as a delaying tactic in order to block it. Edwards said her motive in reintroducing the bill was therefore to “finish the job.”

Scrutiny of the Bill

In comments to the Register, representatives of pro-life groups, the bishops’ conference of England and Wales, legislators, and others who followed the debate closely said the most significant factor in defeating the bill was that it could not withstand close examination. This was aided by dozens of groups and experts in healthcare and palliative care who warned about flaws in the bill or called for further safeguards to be added.

“Assisted suicide laws simply do not stand up to sustained scrutiny,” said Alisdair Hungerford-Morgan, CEO of Right To Life UK, a pro-life charity that led a campaign to lobby MPs and the public to oppose the bill. “The case for them falls apart when legislators examine the detail, hear expert evidence and consider the dangers such laws create for vulnerable people.”

He noted that, during the two-year national debate, support for the bill fell as the debate progressed, as happened in the Scottish Parliament in March. In both instances, he said…

Continue reading the rest of this article at www.ncregister.com

God’s Mighty Little Missionary: The Extraordinary Life and Legacy of Mother Maria Stieren

is now available to pre-order from Sophia Institute Press

All author royalties go to Mother Maria’s Congregation

Is Pope Leo XIV missing an opportunity to heal wounds felt by traditional Catholics by not meeting with a large representative group of them next month?

The Holy Father has so far not responded to a request for a papal audience from the leaders of an annual traditional Catholic pilgrimage to Rome — despite the request having been made nine months ago and the Pope saying last year he would like to meet such groups.

The organisers of the Oct. 23-25 Ad Petri Sedem (to the See of Peter) pilgrimage, mostly made up of laypeople, had requested the papal audience in a letter signed by two lay members of the organisation and personally delivered by Bishop Athanasius Schneider when he met Pope Leo at the Vatican last December.

They also asked in the same letter for permission to celebrate a Pontifical Mass at the Altar of the Chair in St Peter’s Basilica, as has happened several years in the past, and during last year’s pilgrimage which took place during the jubilee year and was celebrated by Cardinal Raymond Burke.

The pilgrimage is run by Coetus Internationalis, an association comprising 33 traditional Catholic associations from all over the world. Last year, an estimated 3,000 faithful attended the annual three-day gathering.

After repeated requests for a definitive response, the Secretariat of State on 7 August declined permission for the Pontifical Mass to be celebrated in St Peter’s Basilica. The Mass will instead be held at the Basilica of St Mary Major on 24 October, with Bishop Athanasius Schneider as celebrant.

The organisers expressed their “deep gratitude” to Cardinal Rolandas Makrickas, archpriest of St Mary Major, for granting permission for the Mass.

No official reason was given for the Vatican’s decision. Pilgrims will nevertheless process together into St Peter’s Basilica that day to venerate the relics of the Apostle Peter and join in a time of prayer.

But now comes the absence of a response to the papal audience request, despite there being no publicly announced papal engagements during the pilgrimage, except for the Pope’s Angelus address on Oct. 25.

The silence is especially surprising to traditional Catholics given the Holy Father’s declared willingness to know more about them.

In an interview with Vatican journalist Elise Ann Allen published a year ago, Pope Leo said he had not yet had the opportunity “to really sit down with a group of people who are advocating for the Tridentine rite.” He added: “There’s an opportunity coming up soon, and I’m sure there will be occasions for that.” He then suggested that the matter might need to be addressed through a synodal process: “That is an issue that I think also, maybe with synodality, we have to sit down and talk about.”

Observers see the absence of a papal audience as also contradicting his overt support for synodality, the Pope’s stated wish to listen to all the faithful, and note his openness to many other groups which he regularly receives in private audience.

Over the past month, the Holy Father has received representatives from a wide variety of organisations including participants at the “Fratelli tutti: North–South socio-environmental dialogue” meeting (Sept. 12); Perpetual Adorers of the Blessed Sacrament of the Federation of the Holy Spirit (Sept. 5); a delegation from Oriel College, University of Oxford (Sept. 4); a US delegation of the Society of St Vincent de Paul (Aug. 28); and bishops of the Lutheran Church of Norway (Aug. 26).

In February, Leo XIV received members of Pro Petri Sede, a lay association, explicitly “on the occasion of your pilgrimage to Rome.” He noted that its members make the pilgrimage regularly to meet the Successor of Peter every three years. He has also regularly met pilgrim groups at the end of his weekly general audiences — a possibility also not offered to the organisers of the Ad Petri Sedem pilgrimage.

Some within traditional circles are observing a pattern emerging of excluding traditional Catholics from access to the Holy Father. They are also concerned about continuing and, in some dioceses, increasing restrictions on the vetus ordo — Toronto being the latest example.

With no opportunity to meet the Pope, they are wondering how he can become better acquainted with traditional lay faithful and their very real concerns when the chance for him to meet a highly representative group of them is passed over. Is the Pope, they wonder, perhaps listening only to cardinals, bishops and others who are unsympathetic to the traditional Roman rite and so he rarely hears a balanced view? Are the Pope and the Holy See, in fact, only heeding the views of clergy, contrary to the aims of the post-conciliar era which was supposed to give laity greater say?

Furthermore, they are asking if the Pope is perhaps unaware of the results of a Vatican survey of bishops on which Traditionis Custodes — Pope Francis’ 2021 decree restricting the traditional Roman rite — was said to have been based. The survey found that most bishops were actually in favour of continuing with Summorum Pontificum, Benedict XVI’s decree liberalising the vetus ordo.

For traditional Catholics who have asked only for the Successor of Peter to meet and hear them, the Pope’s silence risks deepening wounds that an audience might have begun to heal.

Coupled with continuing restrictions, it makes it hard for them to detect any actual pastoral concern, and suggests instead that a door is being quietly closed.

God’s Mighty Little Missionary: The Extraordinary Life and Legacy of Mother Maria Stieren

is available to pre-order from Sophia Institute Press

“I am profoundly grateful to Edward Pentin for making Mother Stieren more widely known through this biography. May she inspire us to fidelity and perseverance, to greater reverence for the Blessed Eucharist and to greater missionary zeal in preaching the saving Gospel of Our Lord Jesus Christ!”

His Eminence Robert Cardinal Sarah

Prefect Emeritus, Congregation for Divine Worship and Discipline of the Sacraments.

All author royalties go to Mother Maria’s Congregation

An Austrian Cistercian moral theologian has received both criticism and support after being suspended from his teaching position for comments defending past popes for executing heretics — despite his insistence that he does not advocate such a punishment today.

Father Wolfgang Klausnitzer, rector of the Benedict XVI Philosophical-Theological University in Heiligenkreuz, Austria, suspended Father Edmund Waldstein Sept. 4 from teaching at the college, saying he would not be able to return while the rector served out his term, and redirected Father Waldstein to doctoral study in Rome.

Father Klausnitzer called Father Waldstein’s comments “unspeakable,” adding that he would not accept such theological principles from a first-year student. According to the rector, Father Waldstein did not withdraw the comments when the rector asked for a scholarly explanation; the Austrian priest was on leave when the rector’s decision was reported.

The apparent trigger for Father Waldstein’s suspension relates to remarks he made in a 2019 blog post. After calling for prudence when tending to the baptized, he wrote that sometimes to protect the common good, punishment is required for those who “violate their baptismal obligations,” while at the same time being careful “not to scrape off the rust too violently, lest she break the vessel.”

“In certain circumstances, this can mean that [the Church] needs to call in the secular arm to put heretics to death,” Father Waldstein wrote in the post on his blog Sancrucensis. “This power can be abused, but it also has a legitimate use. In fact, one of the errors of Martin Luther, condemned by Pope Leo X, is the proposition ‘That heretics be burned is against the will of the Spirit.’”

The online article has since been removed but Father Waldstein returned to the subject in a fresh blog post in May last year after Sigrid Rettenbacher, a German theologian, accused him in a letter to Austrian bishops of being a “dangerous right-wing extremist.”

He firmly denied such a charge, and defended what underlies this dispute: his support for neo-integralism — a Catholic political theory that seeks to order society under the social kingship of Christ, holding that political authority should serve humanity’s supernatural end and be subordinate to the Church’s spiritual authority.

‘Fundamental Continuity’

Father Waldstein, whose father, Michael Waldstein, is a widely regarded academic and was a close friend of Joseph Ratzinger, wrote that he has always tried to show “a fundamental continuity” on the level of principles between the teaching of popes in the Middle Ages and popes of the Second Vatican Council and the post conciliar era. And while acknowledging he had “sometimes gone too far” in applying those principles, he stressed that his defense of Pope Leo X’s teaching on the death penalty for heretics, which the Pope made in his 1520 papal bull Exsurge Domine, should be “understood in this context.”

“I do not advocate for such punishments today,” Father Waldstein stressed. “I fully accept that the papal magisterium today rejects the application of the death penalty in general and the punishment of heretics by the secular arm.” He added that he has always wished to show religious submission of will and intellect to the teachings of the popes, including Pope Francis’ change to the Catechism of the Catholic Church to call capital punishment “inadmissible.”

Continue reading the rest of this article at www.ncregister.com

My latest book

God’s Mighty Little Missionary: The Extraordinary Life and Legacy of Mother Maria Stieren

is now available to pre-order from Sophia Institute Press

“I wholeheartedly recommend this compelling, beautifully written, and profoundly Catholic biography.”

Obianuju Ekeocha, President and Founder, Culture of Life Africa

Here below is a statement from the John Paul II Academy for Human Life and the Family on today’s House of Commons vote in the UK Parliament which defeated the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill:

Physician-assisted suicide is an affront to God, a violation of human dignity and fundamentally incompatible with the role of the doctor. So, it is with joy and great relief that the John Paul II Academy for Human Life and the Family welcomes the defeat of the Terminally Ill Adults (End of Life) Bill in the House of Commons. MPs voted by 286 to 270, a swing of 39 votes from last year when a fundamentally identical Bill was debated.

Commenting on the outcome of the vote, Dr Thomas Ward, the President of the Academy, said:

“There are no circumstances in which it is legitimate to take the life of an innocent human being. Yet, even those who do not recognise the inviolability of human life must accept that, once introduced, so-called assisted dying poses a lethal threat to the most vulnerable in society.

We need only look to the experience of nations where euthanasia and assisted suicide have been legalised. Evidence shows that it cannot be contained and that it gradually expands to take the lives of more and more people. The vulnerable feel pressurised to end their lives. Safeguards intended to protect these people come to be seen as unjust restrictions and are soon removed, leading to people who have not expressed a wish to die being euthanised.”

Dr Ward also pointed to research which shows that where assisted suicide has been legalised, its consequent social acceptability has led to an increase in suicide more generally.[1]

“Advocates of the Bill claimed that it was not a threat to the disabled, yet many disabled people fear being pressured to end their lives,” he said.

Although assisted suicide is presented as the only compassionate response to intolerable suffering, statistically the reasons most often cited by those requesting assisted suicide include loss of autonomy, being less able to engage in activities that make life enjoyable, loss of dignity, loss of control of bodily functions and feelings of being a burden. The UK Government’s own assessment of the proposal concluded that disabled people may be more susceptible to feeling as though they are a burden on those around them. It stated:

“Pressure is not necessarily felt or applied by other people — disabled people may feel subtle pressure due to attitudinal barriers or a lack of alternative appropriate services and support (for example, when accessing palliative care). This could also include structural pressures such as neglect, poverty, and difficult living conditions. Disabled people are also twice as likely (when compared to non-disabled people) to be victims of domestic abuse, which includes coercive behaviour.”

Dr Ward said:

“Politicians of all parties, members of the medical profession, and all people of good will share a moral duty to help build a society in which the dignity of each person is recognised and protected. In Evangelium Vitae, Pope St. John Paul tells us that this task is the particular responsibility of civil leaders. Through the legislative measures they support, our elected representatives can either defend the most vulnerable or endanger their lives. The John Paul II Academy for Human Life and the Family warmly welcomes the defeat of this dangerous and deeply flawed Bill.”

[1] D Jones and D Paton, “How Does Legalisation of Physician-Assisted Suicide Affect Rates of Suicide?” (2015) S Med J, 108, 10 599-604

A major Marian conference in Rome next month aims to reaffirm the Blessed Virgin Mary’s unique role in salvation history and to help the faithful grow in their devotion to the Mother of God.

The conference, entitled De Maria numquam satis (“Of Mary, one can never say enough”), will take place Oct. 7-8 and will reflect on the mystery of the Blessed Virgin Mary in doctrine, worship and history.

Speakers will include Cardinal Raymond Burke, Cardinal Gerhard Müller, papal theologian Dominican Father Wojciech Giertych, and the German Mariologist professor Manfred Hauke.

The conference is intended to “shed new light by connecting doctrine with lived piety,” showing how Our Lady opens, in the words of St. Bernard of Clairvaux, “vast horizons onto the wisdom and mercy of God,” says one of the organizers, Virginia Coda Nunziante.

In this Sept. 3 interview with the Register, Coda Nunziante, president of the Italian pro-life group Associazione Famiglia Domani and founder of the Italian March for Life, shares more details of the conference and why it is not intended to fuel controversy following the Vatican’s much-contested diminution of two ancient Marian titles last year.

Rather, she says, the seminar aims to restore “theological clarity” around Mary, stressing that Marian devotion “is not an optional ornament of Catholic life, but an intrinsic dimension of it.” Coda Nunziante hopes that, at a time of much spiritual emptiness, each participant will leave knowing “how God willed to involve Mary in salvation, how the Church has always honored her, and how turning to her helps me follow Christ more closely today.”

Virginia, why is De Maria numquam satis a necessary conference now, and how did it come about?

The conference arose from the initiative of several Catholic associations and individuals eager to pay homage to the Blessed Virgin Mary. We live in a time when the figure of Our Lady risks being pushed to the margins of theological reflection and spiritual life, while her unique role in the history of salvation is sometimes downplayed or obscured. It therefore seemed necessary to reaffirm, with clarity and serenity, the singular cooperation of the Mother of God in the work of redemption and the place that belongs to her in the life of the Church.

The conference, which will take place in Rome on Oct. 7-8 at the Pontifical Patristic Institute Augustinianum, is not intended as the culmination of a reflection, but rather as a starting point. Our hope is that it will help give rise to a genuine Marian movement, capable of involving priests, religious and laypeople in the shared commitment to know, love and promote devotion to Mary.

St. Bernard of Clairvaux said that reflection on the Blessed Virgin Mary is “inexhaustible” and always timely. How does the conference possibly aim to rehabilitate this focus of the saint?

Indeed, the congress takes its title from the maxim traditionally attributed to St. Bernard of Clairvaux — “Of Mary one can never say enough” — to express the conviction that reflection on Mary is inexhaustible and always timely. St. Bernard’s phrase captures the traditional view that Mary’s mission in Christ and the Church continually opens new horizons for faith.

This is not about “rehabilitating” St. Bernard in the strict sense, since his teaching already belongs permanently to the Church’s spiritual heritage. Rather, it is a matter of restoring to him the visibility he seems to have lost today. St. Bernard’s Mariology is profoundly Christ-centered: Mary keeps nothing for herself but always leads us to Christ. It is precisely for this reason that the saint affirms that God willed that nothing should come to us without passing through the hands of Mary.

Certain Church authorities recently tried to diminish the ancient Marian titles of Co-Redemptrix and Co-Mediatrix — what do you hope the conference might achieve in terms of redressing this teaching?

The conference is not intended to fuel controversy, but to restore theological clarity.

Continue reading the rest of this interview at www.ncregister.com

My latest book

God’s Mighty Little Missionary: The Extraordinary Life and Legacy of Mother Maria Stieren

is now available to pre-order from Sophia Institute Press

“I wholeheartedly recommend this compelling, beautifully written, and profoundly Catholic biography.”

Obianuju Ekeocha, President and Founder, Culture of Life Africa

LONDON — Archbishop Richard Moth says the Church is currently in a “sweet spot,” with many people thirsting for the Gospel, and so she must “step into that space” where people are searching “in a new way, with a new confidence.”

Speaking to the Register Sept. 7 in his first wide-ranging conversation since his installation in February, the archbishop of Westminster shared his thoughts on signs of a “quiet revival” of the faith across the world, a growing migration crisis in the U.K. and its impact on the culture, and his views on new attempts to pass assisted-suicide legislation in the country.

Archbishop Moth, who heads the Bishops’ Conference of England and Wales, also discussed his approach to Traditionis Custodes, persecuted Christians, Britain’s first prime minister to be born and raised Catholic, and whether the bishops of England and Wales need to speak up more and with greater clarity in defense of the Church’s moral teaching.

Your Excellency, at your installation Mass in February, you called on the faithful to fan into flame the gift of God and courageously live out the gifts of the Holy Spirit in a world currently crying out for hope. What do you see as the main challenges at the moment as archbishop of Westminster, and how can the faithful bring that hope of Christ in a society that’s very much in need of the Gospel?

There’s a phrase that’s perhaps rather hackneyed: that the “challenge is also an opportunity,” but I think there is a truth in that, particularly at the moment in the life of the Church, because I sense a kind of sweet spot, if you like, at the moment. As I expressed in the homily at my installation Mass, the world around us is looking, is searching, and it’s into that space that we now step. We’ve always been there, but I think we’ve got an opportunity to step into that space where people are searching, to step into it in a new way, with a new confidence.

Do you see this talk of a Catholic revival as part of that, too, that perhaps because of this spiritual darkness we’re in, young people especially are looking for the Gospel and they’re gravitating more to it?

I see quite a lot of spiritual light around, actually, as well. I wouldn’t say we’re completely in the dark; there’s a lot of wonderful Christian living going on around us. That’s always the case, in my experience, [but] one would be a little bit careful about the word “quiet revival.” A statistician, for instance, would say, well, yes, we’ve seen increased numbers of baptisms at Easter over three or four years. Let’s give it a bit longer. That said, definitely we’re seeing increasing numbers of people coming to faith. […] I’m also conscious of a growth in faith in other countries too. So, yes, the Holy Spirit is at work here, most definitely.

Connected with that, there’s been a lot of talk in the past of a sort of reconversion of England. Do you see it as part of that as well?

Well, we pray for this, absolutely. One sees the Holy Spirit at work and prayers are being answered, most definitely. Let’s see how things go. [We must] take up our baptismal vocation and the vocations that then flow from that, be that marriage, a priesthood, diaconate, religious life, and live those lives to the full. When that happens, then I really do believe that we’ll be in a place where the mission of the Church will be unstoppable. But, of course, that’s going to take time.

The migration crisis in the U.K. appears to be worsening. What are your main concerns about that, about what we’re seeing in this regard?

Every person has dignity. That’s where we must begin from. Every person. So regardless of where they’re coming from, where they’re going to, we must proclaim the dignity of the human person. Most people do not want to leave their homeland, and we mustn’t lose sight of the fact that a vast majority, I’m sure, of the people who are making these journeys are not doing this easily. So we need to recognize their hardship.

One criticism is that the emphasis of Church leaders is heavily weighted on the stranger but not enough thought or concern given to those in the countries that they’re going to and not upholding the culture, perhaps the Christian culture, of those recipient countries. What do you say to that?

Continue reading the rest of this interview at www.ncregister.com

Watch a fuller version of the interview here:

My latest book

God’s Mighty Little Missionary: The Extraordinary Life and Legacy of Mother Maria Stieren

is now available to pre-order from Sophia Institute Press

“I wholeheartedly recommend this compelling, beautifully written, and profoundly Catholic biography.”

Obianuju Ekeocha, President and Founder, Culture of Life Africa

LONDON — A high attendance at the U.K. March for Life on Saturday, coupled with the most intense visible counterdemonstrations by pro-abortion protesters witnessed at the annual event, shows that life issues are becoming a central focus of British public life, the pro-life event’s founder has said.

Isabel Vaughan-Spruce, who serves as the march’s co-director, observed “certainly more opposition” than in previous marches, including a group that disrupted the march’s opening Mass in Westminster Cathedral and had to be forcibly removed.

The protesters, most of them masked, then accompanied much of the rally, chanting through loud hailers and deliberately making noise to drown out pro-life speakers. London’s Metropolitan Police were criticized for allowing them to protest in close proximity and to have a location in Parliament Square directly in front of the March for Life stage, where they caused further noise and disruption and provoked pro-life participants.

But Vaughan-Spruce told the Register that she did not see the protests in themselves as “necessarily a bad thing” because she took them to be “an indication that abortion is becoming more of a live public issue.”

“For too long there’s been an extraordinary complacency surrounding abortion in Britain,” she said. “It has been treated as something that should simply be accepted. But that seems to be changing.”

Reflecting on the high attendance, Vaughan-Spruce, who has prayed for many years outside of abortion facilities and is currently facing prosecution for doing so, said the march showed that “people are finding it culturally acceptable” to be pro-life. They are seeing it as “increasingly necessary to voice concerns about abortion” and are “beginning to find the courage to challenge the culture of silence that has surrounded abortion for so long.”

Unprecedented Pastoral Presence

A record 15 Catholic bishops took part in the event this year. They concelebrated the opening Mass, whose chief celebrant was Archbishop Richard Moth of Westminster, and 14 walked the entire march, offering the final prayer and imparting a blessing at the end.

In his homily at the Mass, Bishop Frank Dougan of Galloway, Scotland, warned against succumbing to the temptation to “believe in the inevitability of things only going in one direction and that our arguments and our statement and our witness aren’t getting anywhere.”

“That temptation is the enemy of hope,” he said. He urged the faithful to look to the example of saints such as St. Monica, to “keep doing what we’re doing, keep saying what has to be said, and to keep speaking up for those who cannot speak for themselves.”

“Why do we do this? Because each child has a place in God’s heart from all eternity. Once he or she is conceived, the Creator’s eternal dream comes true,” he said.

Remarking on the protests at Mass, one of the bishops said that while the protesters “may not understand the truth about the dignity of human life, they do seem to understand where the heart of their adversaries lies: in the Catholic Church and, particularly, in the Eucharist.”

To fervent applause, Pope Leo XIV also sent a message of encouragement and good wishes, assuring the participants of his prayers and imparting his apostolic blessing. Every truly just society is “built upon the recognition of the inviolable dignity of the human person,” he said, adding that it “belongs to every human being by the very fact of their existence.” For this reason, he continued, “it must guide every positive legal decision. When this certainty is obscured, the most vulnerable are the first victims, and the law loses its deepest meaning to serve and protect every human being.”

Bishop Paul Mason, ordinary of the bishopric of the British Armed Forces, attributed the large numbers of marchers this year to people “increasingly” seeing the evil “fruits of the culture of death.” He told the Register that they “know in the depths of them that it’s just not right” and are therefore standing up for the value of the human person in the absence of a culture that often does not.

Continue reading the rest of this report at www.ncregister.com

CANTERBURY, England — “Candlelight concerts” are taking place every week this fall in many of Britain’s ancient, historic and once-Catholic cathedrals, but these are not lofty performances of sacred or even classical music.

In Worcester Cathedral, founded in 680, rebuilt by St. Wulfstan, and the burial place of King John who issued the Magna Carta, the late pop singer Whitney Houston’s greatest hits will be performed. On other nights, the once-hallowed nave will be the setting for cover bands playing songs by the Eagles, Coldplay and Tina Turner.

Selby Abbey in Yorkshire, which survived Henry VIII’s Dissolution of the Monasteries and is famous for featuring the 14th-century “Washington Window,” which inspired the U.S. flag, will become the venue for the Beatles and Queen tribute bands in October.

A Luther Vandross impersonator is performing in various cathedrals including the nave of St. Albans Cathedral, the oldest site of continuous Christian worship in Britain that stands on the burial place of Britain’s first martyr, St. Alban.

Meanwhile, Wells Cathedral, founded in 1175 as the first entirely Gothic-style cathedral in Britain, will be the venue for an imitation David Bowie concert on Nov. 21.

Every medieval cathedral in England appears to be hosting these concerts, except for two: Westminster Abbey and Christ Church Cathedral in Oxford. The events, aimed principally at generating much-needed funds, are commercially operated by a Spanish company called “Fever” that introduced them in early 2021 with classical music. The concerts then expanded, becoming pop and rock cover bands a year later. The Register reached out to the company for comment, but it had not responded by press time.

Arguably more controversial than the candlelight concerts are “silent discos,” organized by another company, London-based MEGA Events, and which have been taking place in some of England’s most historic cathedrals for the past couple of years. One of the most recent was in Canterbury, for centuries England’s mother Church and where St. Thomas Becket was martyred, held on the Solemnity of the Assumption. The entertainment involves partygoers wearing headphones and waving strobe lights as they dance to pop music from the 1980s and ’90s over the tombs of deceased noble citizens.

Canterbury Cathedral’s most recent disco featured multiple bars and stalls in the nave’s side aisles selling alcohol and merchandise. The dean’s office stressed this all took place away from the site of St. Thomas Becket’s martyrdom in 1170. The historic cathedrals of St. Albans, Truro, Durham and Salisbury are also among those hosting these discos — coined “raves in the nave” by their critics. MEGA Events has been contacted for comment.

Online reaction to the recent Canterbury disco — its second since 2024 — was overwhelmingly negative, including from Anglicans.

“I abhor this,” said Adrian Hilton, an Anglican commentator, responding to the Canterbury disco on X. “It is the desecration of a sacred space.” Tim Dieppe, head of public policy for Christian Concern, an evangelical Christian advocacy group, commented that the Church of England “no longer believes in the attracting power of the gospel, and resorts to secular music instead.”

Fading Opposition

In 2024, a petition against the first silent discos drew more than 3,000 signatures, and a prayer vigil was held outside Canterbury Cathedral. But the opposition has since faded, and the discos have now become “regular fixtures,” lamented Cajetan Skowronski, who organized those protests.

“Now we are invited to make St. Paul’s Cathedral a nightclub and dance on the tombs of national heroes like Nelson, Wellington, Wren and Fleming,” he observed, referring to the announcement Sept. 1 that St. Paul’s, the mother church of London’s Anglican diocese, had signed a four-year deal with a London nightclub owner to stage music events.

The 18th-century English Baroque Anglican cathedral, designed by Sir Christopher Wren, has been the setting for many events of national historical importance. Lord Horatio Nelson’s descendants have called the development an insult to his memory and a “sad reflection on where spiritual integrity and Christianity are today.”

Continue reading this article at www.ncregister.com

Enzo Bianchi, the founder of the progressive ecumenical Bose Monastic Community who had recently called for “liturgical peace” between devotees of newer and older forms of the Roman Rite, died Tuesday at the age of 83.

An essayist, traveler, cook, biblical scholar and lay monastic brother, Bianchi formed the Bose Community in Magnano, northern Italy, in the mid-1960s, having been influenced by visits to Catholic, Orthodox and Protestant contemplative communities.

Some 50 years later, the community was subjected to a Vatican visitation that ordered Bianchi to leave the monastic society he had founded, but not before it had made a significant impact, especially on Italy’s post-conciliar Church.

The Bose Community came into being after a group of Catholics and Protestants, whom Bianchi had befriended in Turin, began visiting him while he lived as a hermit immediately after the Second Vatican Council. Bianchi devised his own rule for the community whereby both men and women would live celibate lives in community while continuing their careers.

Such an ecumenical experiment led to tensions with Church authorities, and in November 1967 all public liturgical celebrations were prohibited in the community, a measure taken largely because of the frequent presence of non-Catholics among Brother Enzo’s guests.

Only through the help of his friend, progressive Cardinal Michele Pellegrino of Turin, was Bianchi able in 1968 to have the prohibition lifted. In 2001, the community was recognized as a private association of the faithful; and as a monastery sui iuris of diocesan right in 2023.

Widely known for his “assertive personality,” the left-leaning Italian newspaper Il Fatto Quotidiano lauded Bianchi on Tuesday as “unstoppable, always able to envision a future (especially for others), merciful yet with a gentleness that was anything but pious, a gifted orator, ironic, theatrical, a lover of good food and good wine as well as true friends.” He had time for whoever they might be, it added, whether they were “the homeless, politicians, priests, young people in search of meaning.”

Bianchi became an influential figure in the post-conciliar Church. He took part in various synods and his comments were widely reported in the Italian press. He collaborated with the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity, and Pope St. John Paul II included him in a 2003 delegation that returned the icon of Our Lady of Kazan to Patriarch Aleksey in Moscow.

Growing Criticisms

But as his community grew, both Bianchi and his confreres were criticized for a faulty ecclesiology, permitting members from Christian denominations to remain where they were rather than become Catholic, and so fostering syncretism and indifferentism. The community did not celebrate Mass daily, nor did it reserve the Blessed Sacrament in a tabernacle, arguing that by not doing so, it would help accommodate non-Catholic members.

Bose was also criticized for not representing a fully coherent form of Catholic monasticism, and both Bianchi and his confreres were accused of ascribing to a “hermeneutic of rupture,” viewing the Second Vatican Council as inaugurating a “new” Church rather than developing continuous tradition.

Continue reading the rest of this article at www.ncregister.com

LONDON — Päivi Räsänen, a Finnish Christian politician who had been barred from entering the United Kingdom to give a talk on free speech at a Northern Ireland church conference last week, was eventually granted a visa to enter the country — but it arrived too late.

After her Electronic Travel Authorization (ETA) was canceled in July, Räsänen applied for a full visa and wrote to the U.K.’s home secretary personally to ask that it be granted ahead of the conference.

The visa eventually arrived, but just 45 minutes before her scheduled speaking time at the conference in Northern Ireland, despite the government knowing the dates of the conference and her flight schedule. Räsänen had been slated to speak on Aug. 19 and 21 but had to contribute virtually instead.

“The visa approval also took more than four weeks, when she was told it would take three weeks to process her application,” said Lorcán Price, legal counsel for the free-speech legal advocacy organization Alliance Defending Freedom. “By granting the visa when they did, it is undeniable that the Home Office knew, or ought to have known, that they were blocking Päivi from attending her event.”

The withdrawal of Räsänen’s ETA and the late granting of her visa are believed to have been connected with her conviction by Finland’s Supreme Court of “hate speech” in March 2026 for expressing her Christian beliefs on marriage and human sexuality. She made her beliefs known in a 2004 booklet titled Male and Female He Created Them: Homosexual Relationships Challenge the Christian Concept of Humanity.

The Supreme Court held that passages in the booklet, which called homosexuality an “aberration of psychosexual development” and a “sexual deviation,” were derogatory toward homosexual people as a group on grounds of sexual orientation.

Under U.K. law, the home secretary may exclude a foreign national if it is believed that admitting him or her is “not conducive to the public good.” The policy is normally reserved for extremism or serious crime but can be applied to “unacceptable behavior” in the form of speech, publication, preaching, websites or a position of influence that “fosters hatred” that it believes might lead to inter-community violence in the U.K.

Price, who is representing Räsänen in her appeal before the European Court of Human Rights, told the Register that her barring was “yet another example of the U.K.’s free- speech crisis, which is deeply entrenched and worsening,” and that her case “demonstrates yet again that Christian expression is increasingly being censored, both in the U.K. and Europe.”

Continue reading the rest of this article at www.ncregister.com

LONDON — A Finnish Christian parliamentarian has been barred from entering the United Kingdom following her conviction by Finland’s Supreme Court for calling homosexuality a “sexual deviation” and an “aberration.”

In July, the U.K. government informed Päivi Räsänen, a long-serving Christian Democrat politician, that her Electronic Travel Authorization (ETA) had been denied, after initially approving it in June.

Räsänen had been due to travel to Northern Ireland to address a conference on religious freedom and free speech on Wednesday and Friday this week, but she will now have to contribute virtually.

Her ban from entry into Northern Ireland follows the U.K. government’s refusal to allow a number of other high-profile figures to visit the country over the past year, often on grounds of what it deems to be “hate speech.”

After her ETA was canceled, Räsänen applied for a full visa and wrote to the U.K.’s home secretary personally to ask that it be granted ahead of the conference, but she did not receive a reply and was told not to expect a response before the event.

Räsänen’s blocked entry to the U.K. comes after Finland’s Supreme Court convicted her in March 2026 for expressing her Christian beliefs on marriage and human sexuality in a 2004 booklet titled Male and Female He Created Them: Homosexual Relationships Challenge the Christian Concept of Humanity.

The Supreme Court held that passages calling homosexuality an “aberration of psychosexual development” and a “sexual deviation” were derogatory toward homosexual people as a group on grounds of sexual orientation. The views expressed in the book reflect Christian sexual ethics, namely, that marriage is between a man and a woman and that same-sex sexual acts are sinful.

Court Conviction

The court convicted not only Räsänen, a member of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Finland, but also Lutheran Bishop Juhana Pohjola, who co-wrote the booklet, and the Luther Foundation Finland, which published it. The court fined them all and ordered that the relevant passages be removed. Regarding a separate charge, the court acquitted Räsänen for 2019 social-media comments criticizing the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Finland for sponsoring the Helsinki “pride” event.

Räsänen, Pohjola and the Luther Foundation have now taken their cases to the European Court of Human Rights, aided by the free-speech legal advocacy organization Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF).

“It is shocking that the UK has blocked me, a democratically elected politician in an allied European state, from entering the country,” Räsänen told ADF.

“I was convicted of ‘hate speech’ in Finland for peacefully expressing my Christian views,” she said. “This was an egregious case of state censorship, noted with concern by observers around the world, including the U.S. State Department and the U.S. Religious Liberty Commission.”

Continue reading the rest of this article at www.ncregister.com

Auxiliary Bishop Rob Mutsaerts of ‘s-Hertogenbosch has become the latest prelate to criticise synodality, asking what are its fruits and voicing deep skepticism about its entire model — one, he argues, that fails to teach the Gospel authoritatively and clearly at a time when that is most needed.

In a lengthy open letter to Pope Leo XIV published on his website Aug. 13 (see full English translation below), the Dutch bishop makes many significant points, including what he views to be the “greatest tragedy” of the whole enterprise.

He writes:

“The modern world is undergoing an extraordinary spiritual crisis. People are searching for meaning. Young people are searching for an identity. Loneliness is on the rise. Families are breaking down. Technology is penetrating ever more deeply into human existence. Pornography distorts sexuality. Materialism fails to satisfy. Climate change is becoming a surrogate religion for many. People are afraid of death, yet they hardly know what they are living for anymore.

And in the midst of that world, the Church possesses something extraordinary. It possesses the Gospel. The sacraments. The Eucharist. Confession. Two thousand years of wisdom. Scripture. The Church Fathers. Thomas Aquinas. Augustine. The mystics. The saints. An unrivalled tradition of art, music, philosophy, morality and spirituality. And above all: Jesus Christ.

The world is not waiting for yet another organisation to listen to it. There are already enough of those. The world is waiting for someone to tell it why it was created.”

Bishop Mutsaerts joins a number of other prelates who have been publicly critical of the Synod on Synodality. They include Cardinals Joseph Zen Ze-Kiun, Raymond Burke, Walter Brandmüller, Robert Sarah, Juan Sandoval Íñiguez, Gerhard Müller, and the late George Pell. Outspoken episcopal critics have included Bishop Joseph Strickland, Auxiliary Bishop Athanasius Schneider and retired Auxiliary Bishop Marian Eleganti.

Here below is the full text of Bishop Mutsaerts’ letter, translated using Deepl (h/t Il Blog di Sabino Paciolla):

Holy Father,

Out of respect for the ministry entrusted to you as the successor of Saint Peter, and in solidarity with the Church which Christ built upon the apostles, I address you with this open letter. I do not do so lightly. What prompts me to speak these words publicly is a concern which, ultimately, transcends every other ecclesial consideration: the salvation of souls. Salus animarum suprema lex — the salvation of souls is the supreme law. My question is simple and serious: does the synodal process truly help to draw souls closer to Christ and to eternal salvation? For me, this is the decisive question.

Holy Father, I am fully aware that the Petrine ministry entails a responsibility of which those who do not hold that office can only have a vague idea. It is precisely for this reason that I write these words, not out of any lack of respect for the papal ministry, but out of love for that very ministry. Peter, in fact, received from Christ not only the mandate to unite his brothers, but also to strengthen them in the faith: ‘And you, once you have come to your senses, strengthen your brothers.’ After all, the world has very little use for a Church that merely repeats what the world itself already thinks. It needs a Church that, with love but without fear, points it towards Christ.

My concern regarding the Synod on Synodality should be understood in this light. Above all, I wonder what all this means for the ordinary faithful, who do not expect a permanent process from their Church, but clarity on the path to God.

This letter is therefore not an indictment of individuals. Nor do I intend to deny the good intentions of the many who have sincerely committed themselves to the synodal process. Good intentions deserve recognition. But good intentions do not exempt us from the duty to examine their fruits. Christ himself has provided us with a simple criterion for this purpose: ‘By their fruits you shall recognise them.’ For this reason, I believe that, after years of synodal consultations, meetings, reports and documents, the time has come to ask ourselves in all frankness about these fruits. Not out of cynicism, but out of love for the Church. Not out of nostalgia for an idealised past, but out of concern for her future. And not to wage a political-ecclesial struggle, but because behind all the discussions lies a reality of infinitely greater importance: the eternal salvation of the souls which Christ has entrusted to his Church. Driven by this concern, Holy Father, I submit the following reflection to you.

The Synod on Synodality

Anyone who assesses the Synod on Synodality solely in the light of its own objectives can easily draw a positive conclusion. People listened to one another. People spoke. Thousands of people were consulted. Bishops, priests, religious and laypeople came together. There was talk of communion, participation and mission. A whole new ecclesiastical vocabulary has even emerged: synodality, listening, discernment, participation, conversation in the Spirit, initiating processes.

But one can also look at the same story from a completely different perspective. Allow me to ask the uncomfortable question: What has all this actually achieved? Not: how many meetings were organised? Not: how many reports were drawn up? Not: how many people took part?

But: has faith been strengthened? Has Christ been proclaimed more clearly? Has Catholic identity been deepened? Have more people been converted? Has attendance at Sunday Mass increased? Are there more priestly vocations? Has catechesis become more effective? Has greater respect for the Eucharist arisen? Has the Church’s moral teaching become clearer? Has missionary courage increased?

When one asks such questions, it is impossible to regard the Synod as a success. To this is now added another aspect. The synodal initiative has not really come to an end. The official implementation phase is continuing and, through diocesan, national and continental meetings, is set to culminate in an ecclesial assembly in Rome in October 2028. In May 2026, the Vatican once again published a detailed roadmap to this end. This makes the criticism all the more pertinent. What once began as a synod running from 2021 to 2024 risks becoming a permanent form of governance.

A synod on a synod

The first noteworthy aspect is already in the name itself: Synod on Synodality. Traditionally, a synod was convened because the Church needed to discuss something: evangelisation, marriage and the family, the priesthood, the Eucharist, Scripture, a heresy, a pastoral crisis or a specific problem. In the Synod on Synodality, however, it is the process itself that becomes the subject. One might compare it to a meeting that drags on indefinitely to discuss how meetings should be held from now on.

The Church has had councils and synods since ancient times. The apostles gathered in Jerusalem. Bishops deliberated amongst themselves. Popes consulted the bishops. The great ecumenical councils are inconceivable without joint ecclesial consultation. But this is quite different from synodality understood as a permanent ecclesial paradigm. The classical synod was a tool. In today’s synodal discourse, synodality risks becoming an end in itself. And it is precisely here that, from a traditional Catholic perspective, the problem begins.

The Church is not a dialogue, but a reality received

The Church, in fact, does not begin with our dialogue. It begins with Christ. This seems obvious, but it has far-reaching consequences. Christ did not found a discussion group. He called the apostles. He conferred authority upon them. He sent them out to preach, baptise and teach: ‘Go therefore and make disciples of all nations’. Leadership is fundamental in this context. Faith does not arise from the Church first taking stock of what people believe and then distilling a common conviction from all those experiences. Faith is received.

Paul constantly uses words such as receive, pass on and preserve. The Church does not possess Revelation because it devised it, but because it received it. This means that Christianity, by its very nature, cannot be democratic. Not because democracy as a form of government is bad, but because truth does not arise from a majority of votes. If tomorrow 90 per cent of Catholics were no longer to believe in the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist, Christ would not be any less truly present for that reason. If 80 per cent were to reject a particular moral doctrine, that doctrine would not automatically become false. Truth is not produced by consensus. This constitutes the first major point of tension surrounding the synodal project.

Listening: to whom?

A key word throughout the entire process has been listening (as if we had never done so before). In itself, there is nothing to object to. A bishop must listen. A priest must listen. Christians must listen to one another. A shepherd who never listens to his flock is not a good shepherd. But the question immediately arises: to whom, above all, must the Church listen? The traditional answer is: to Christ, to Scripture, to the Apostolic Tradition, to the saints, to the witness of twenty centuries of Christianity, and to the Magisterium. And, of course, to the faithful as well.

In some synodal texts, however, the order seems easily to be reversed. We start with the experiences, desires, frustrations and expectations of people today, and then ask ourselves how the Church should respond to all this. This may seem pastorally appealing, but it conceals a danger. For what happens when the desires of modern man clash with the Gospel? In that case, it is not the Gospel that must change; it is man who must change. In Christianity, this is called conversion. And it is precisely this word that is surprisingly rarely heard in many modern ecclesial discussions.

The great absentee: conversion

Herein lies the deepest weakness of the entire project. The Church does not exist primarily to confirm people in what they already are. It exists to lead them to Christ. The first words of Jesus’ public preaching were not: ‘Tell me first how you feel about the current ecclesiastical structures.’ But: ‘Repent and believe in the Gospel.’ This is decidedly less bureaucratic. And decidedly more radical.

The Church of the martyrs did not change the Roman world by organising listening sessions on how Romans might perceive the Christian community in a more inclusive way. It proclaimed Christ. Peter proclaimed Christ. Paul proclaimed Christ. Francis proclaimed Christ. Dominic proclaimed Christ. Francis Xavier proclaimed Christ. John Mary Vianney proclaimed Christ. Mother Teresa proclaimed Christ. John Paul II proclaimed Christ. Undoubtedly, they listened to people. But listening was never the end goal. The end goal was conversion to Christ.

The elephant in the synod hall

There is also a curious discrepancy between the issues discussed at length in the synodal process and the actual crisis facing the Western Church in particular. The fundamental problems facing the Church in the Netherlands, Belgium, particularly in Germany, but also across much of Western Europe, are not hard to recognise. Churches are emptying. Parishes are being merged. Monasteries are disappearing. Religious orders are ageing. Knowledge of the Catholic faith is dwindling. Confession has all but disappeared for many Catholics. The number of priestly vocations remains low in many places. Many baptised Catholics barely believe in the fundamental truths of the faith. Among large groups of Catholics, sacramental life is severely weakened. In this context, one would expect a global ecclesial initiative to ask, above all, one question: how can we win the world back for Christ?

Yet much of the focus is on structures, participation, decision-making processes, the role of women, inclusivity, relationships of authority and the way in which ecclesiastical bodies function. These may be legitimate topics. But a house on fire has different priorities from administrative matters.

A sort of ecclesiastical ‘Parkinson’s Law’

Institutions that lose sight of their original purpose often tend to talk ever more intensely about their own organisation. Companies then talk endlessly about processes. Universities about governance. Public administrations about models of participation. And ecclesiastical organisations about structures. The less evangelisation there is, the more committees on evangelisation are set up. The fewer vocations there are, the more documents on vocations are drawn up. The fewer people attend church, the longer the meetings on ‘being the Church’ become. It may sound cynical, but there is a serious point behind it: bureaucracy can create the illusion of activity whilst reality shows the opposite. We are sailing without a compass.

Expectations that cannot be met

The synodal process has raised expectations. This has happened above all because, during the various consultative phases, topics were admitted that touch on issues on which the Church already has a clear doctrine. The female diaconate. The priesthood. Sexual morality. Same-sex relationships. The relationship between laity and clergy. Ecclesiastical authority. Decentralisation. The position of women. When such topics are ‘discussed’ for years on end, the impression naturally arises that they might eventually be changed. Otherwise, indeed, they would not be discussed ad infinitum.

This creates a pastoral paradox. People are asked to express their expectations. Subsequently, some of these expectations prove impossible to fulfil without jeopardising continuity with Catholic doctrine. What happens then? Widespread disappointment. The Church has thus itself raised expectations that it ultimately cannot fulfil. This is not a positive pastoral outcome. It is a recipe for frustration.

The Protestantisation of the Catholic conception of the Church

From a traditionalist perspective, there is also a historical irony to be glimpsed here. Certain elements of modern synodal culture bear similarities to developments that have been observed for decades in Protestant Churches. Greater emphasis on participation. A greater say in administrative matters. More consultative structures. Greater weight given to local communities. Greater emphasis on individual experience. Greater debate on changing social attitudes. Less unquestioned acceptance of hierarchical authority. All this, in itself, need not necessarily be wrong. But the historical question is unavoidable: has this model led, in the Protestant world, to a spectacular Christian revival? In much of Western Europe, the answer is clear: no. Why, then, should the Catholic Church adopt the administrative and pastoral models of ecclesial communities that have often undergone the very same secularisation even earlier and to a greater extent? A sick person rarely recovers by taking the medicine prescribed for the patient in the bed next to them, who is even worse off.

The forgotten alternative: striving for holiness

Major Catholic reforms have almost never begun with structures. They began with the saints. After periods of corruption, the reformers arrived. Benedict, Bernard, Francis, Dominic, Catherine of Siena, Ignatius of Loyola, Teresa of Ávila, Charles Borromeo, Francis de Sales, John Bosco, Thérèse of Lisieux, Maximilian Kolbe, John Paul II. Their programme was surprisingly simple: to become saints.

For a saint possesses a missionary power that no policy document can match. A parish with a saintly parish priest has a brighter future than a diocese with twenty working groups on synodality and highly paid executives. A monastery with ten fervent religious evangelises more effectively than a hundred pages of ecclesiastical jargon. A priest who visibly believes he is standing before God at the altar can lead more people to the faith than a conference on participatory liturgy.

Perhaps this is precisely where the alternative lies that the Synod has not sufficiently emphasised: not less listening, but more holiness. Not less participation, but more conversion. Not less dialogue, but more proclamation.

The liturgy as a litmus test

From a traditional perspective, it is also surprising that the crisis in the liturgy has played a relatively marginal role. For if one truly wishes to know the state of the Church, one must look to its worship. Lex orandi, lex credendi. The way in which one prays is the expression of faith.

When Catholics hardly understand any longer that the Mass makes Christ’s sacrifice sacramentally present, when the sense of the sacred weakens, when silence disappears, when the confessionals are empty and Eucharistic adoration becomes marginal, then the Church does not have a management problem. It has a problem of faith. A new structure for participation cannot solve this problem. Nor can a new assembly. Perhaps a rediscovery of God.

The paradox of participation

The synodal project emphasises participation. But here a curious paradox emerges. People who participate intensely in ecclesial consultation processes are not necessarily representative of the whole Church. The silent Catholic who goes to Mass every morning, prays the Rosary and teaches the catechism to their grandchildren, does not usually draft a synodal report. The young Catholic who travels three hours to attend a traditional liturgy is not usually part of the diocesan working group. The mother of six who is trying to bring up her family in the Catholic faith probably has little time to attend listening sessions. A contemplative nun does not fill in a questionnaire. Yet their faith may be more deeply rooted than that of those who regularly attend church meetings. Anyone who listens only to those who step up to the microphone can easily forget that the People of God are greater than the circle gathered round the meeting table.

Synodality or collegiality?

Perhaps some of the confusion would disappear if we were to return to using more precise language. Catholic tradition recognises a clear concept: collegiality. The bishops, together with Peter and under his guidance, form the episcopal college. There are also presbyteral councils, pastoral councils, synods, chapters, religious communities and countless other forms of deliberation. Why, then, was a new, all-encompassing category needed: synodality?

Precisely because the concept is so broad – it defies definition – everyone may understand something different by it. For some, it means listening. For others, decentralisation. For others still, democratisation. For others, pastoral renewal. For others, reform of the ministry. For others, a different sexual morality. A concept that can mean everything ultimately means nothing. This is why the question of proportionality is justified. How much more energy must still be invested in this? How many meetings? How many synodal groups? How many reports? How many evaluations of the evaluations?

And above all: what would happen if the same amount of time, money, intellectual energy and episcopal attention were invested in catechesis, seminaries, Catholic education, the liturgy, confession, Eucharistic adoration, marriage pastoral care and direct evangelisation? It strikes me as a rhetorical question.

The deeper problem: ecclesiology

Ultimately, therefore, the discussion is not really about meetings. It concerns the question: what is the Church? Is it, first and foremost, a community that seeks together what it is to become? Or is it, first and foremost, a divine reality that has received what it is to be? The Catholic answer can only be the latter. The Church must continually be converted, but she is founded on the apostles. She safeguards a faith that she did not invent for herself. For this reason, all synodality must, in the final analysis, be bounded by something that is not the subject of synodal discussion: the truth revealed by Christ.

The world is not waiting for a synodal Church

And herein perhaps lies the greatest tragedy. The modern world is undergoing an extraordinary spiritual crisis. People are searching for meaning. Young people are searching for an identity. Loneliness is on the rise. Families are breaking down. Technology is penetrating ever more deeply into human existence. Pornography distorts sexuality. Materialism fails to satisfy. Climate change is becoming a surrogate religion for many. People are afraid of death, yet they hardly know what they are living for anymore. And in the midst of that world, the Church possesses something extraordinary. It possesses the Gospel. The sacraments. The Eucharist. Confession. Two thousand years of wisdom. Scripture. The Church Fathers. Thomas Aquinas. Augustine. The mystics. The saints. An unrivalled tradition of art, music, philosophy, morality and spirituality. And above all: Jesus Christ.

The world is not waiting for yet another organisation to listen to it. There are already enough of those. The world is waiting for someone to tell it why it was created.

From Emmaus to Jerusalem

Perhaps the Gospel account of the disciples of Emmaus ultimately offers the best model for authentic Catholic synodality. Christ walks alongside the disciples. He truly listens to them. He asks them what is troubling them. He lets them speak. He gives space to their disappointment. Up to this point, any synodal handbook could enthusiastically agree. But then the decisive moment occurs. Christ does not confirm their interpretation. He corrects it. He opens the Scriptures to them. He teaches them how to understand the events. And in the end, they recognise him in the breaking of bread. This is Catholic synodality in its purest form. And after that, the disciples do not remain gathered indefinitely at Emmaus to reflect on their experience of the journey. They set off. They return to Jerusalem. They go to proclaim the Gospel. The synodal process has run aground at Emmaus, and the question is whether they will still manage to break free from it. We are so busy discussing how the Church should walk together that we sometimes forget where she is heading.

The Catholic Church, after all, does not need a permanent synod on itself. It needs saints. Bishops who teach. Priests who pray. Religious who live radically for God. Parents who pass on the faith. Young people who discover that the truth is more than just an opinion. A liturgy in which God is truly at the centre. Confessions in which sinners find forgiveness. Seminaries where men are trained to give their lives to Christ. Catholics who do not constantly ask themselves how the Church should adapt to the world, but who have the courage to invite the world to allow itself to be transformed by Christ.

For, after all, Christ did not send his Church into the world saying: Go and organise synodal processes everywhere. He said: ‘Go into all the world and preach the Gospel to every creature.’ That is how the Church came into being. And every time it has been truly renewed, it has set out anew from there.

Holy Father, allow me to conclude this letter with the same thought with which I began it: the salvation of souls. I hope and pray that under your pontificate it may once again become abundantly clear that the Church is not called to discuss itself endlessly, but to proclaim Christ; not to reflect the spirit of the times, but to lead the world to eternal life.

It is precisely from the Successor of Peter that the faithful can expect, amidst the confusion of our times, that he will strengthen his brothers and sisters in the faith. May he remind us that the truth which the Church proclaims is not a possession we can dispose of as we please, but a precious treasure which we have received and which we must pass on intact. May he instil courage in priests who faithfully fulfil their vocation, in religious who have consecrated their lives to God, in parents who, going against the tide, seek to bring up their children in the Catholic faith, and in young people who, precisely in an age of relativism, yearn for truth, holiness, beauty and the radical adventure of a life with Christ.

My prayer for you is therefore simple: grant us clarity. When the world speaks with uncertainty, ensure that Peter speaks with clarity. When the Church grows weary because of internal disputes, direct us once more towards Christ. When we lose ourselves in procedures and structures, remind us of our mission. When we are afraid to proclaim the Gospel in its fullness because it might upset modern man, remind us of the words of Peter himself: ‘Lord, to whom shall we go? Your words are words of eternal life.’

Holy Father, I write all this with sincere respect for your ministry and with love for the Church. My criticism of the synodal process does not stem from a desire to sow division, but from the fear that we are wasting precious time whilst so many people no longer know Christ. The harvest is plentiful. The labourers are few. The churches of the West are emptying, whilst at the same time the younger generations seem to be seeking truth and transcendence once more. Right now we do not need a hesitant Church, but a missionary Church that knows what its treasure is and is not afraid to show it to the world.

For this reason, I pray that your pontificate may be characterised by a renewed focus on what, ultimately, lies at the heart of every true ecclesial reform: Christ, conversion, holiness, the Eucharist, evangelisation and the salvation of souls. For, once all the synods have ended, all the documents have been drafted, all the commissions have been dissolved and our names have been forgotten, only the question that truly matters will remain: have we brought the people entrusted to us closer to Jesus Christ?

May Saint Peter intercede for you. May the Blessed Virgin Mary, Mater Ecclesiae, keep you under her protection. And may the Lord grant you the wisdom, courage and paternal steadfastness to guide his Church in truth and love.

With sentiments of sincere veneration, united in prayer,

in Christ,

+Rob Mutsaerts

Auxiliary Bishop of the Diocese of ‘s-Hertogenbosch

Recent last-minute cancellations of two Catholic funerals for prominent Italian Freemasons have revealed growing confusion over Freemasonry and its relationship with the Italian Church after a decade of controversial efforts to establish dialogue with the secretive group, long proscribed by the Church.

In early August, a funeral had been scheduled for Bruno Battisti D’Amario, 88 — an accomplished Italian classical guitarist known for his long collaboration with the late film-score composer Ennio Morricone — who died on Aug. 5.

Due to take place on Aug. 7 at the Church of Santa Maria in Montesanto, otherwise known as the “Artists’ Church” in Rome, the funeral was canceled after the Grande Oriente d’Italia, one of the country’s main Freemasonic lodges, revealed in an online tribute (since removed) that the musician was a top-ranking (“33rd degree”) Freemason.

After the Italian Catholic daily La Nuova Bussola Quotidiana alerted the local priest to the deceased’s Masonic connections, the priest informed the church’s rector, Bishop Antonio Staglianò. Staglianò then contacted Cardinal Baldassare Reina, the Vicar General of Rome, who consulted the diocese’s legal office before refusing authorization for the funeral Mass. As Bishop Staglianò put it, Cardinal Reina “had no choice but to refuse authorization of the funeral Mass.”

Two days later, Bishop Antonio Suetta of Sanremo-Ventimiglia announced a similar measure, halting at the 11th hour the funeral rites of Mario Tarducci, a former grand master of the Grande Oriente d’Italia. The funeral for Tarducci, 73, was to be held in the St. Mark the Evangelist Church in Camporosso, near Sanremo. Bishop Suetta learned about Tarducci’s Masonic connections after local newspapers revealed them.

Both funerals were forbidden under Canon 1184, which stipulates that, unless the person shows some signs of repentance before death, “notorious apostates, heretics and schismatics” must be denied a requiem Mass. It also applies to those who choose cremation for “anti-Christian motives,” or “other manifest sinners to whom a Church funeral could not be granted without public scandal to the faithful.” If there is any doubt, it must be left to the ordinary’s discretion.

But various questions are being asked about the two funerals, including how they came so close to taking place.

The Catholic Church has consistently and formally prohibited Catholic membership in Freemasonry since Clement XII’s 1738 bull In eminenti, with the Vatican issuing a doctrinal note forbidding such membership as recently as November 2023.

Continue reading the rest of this article at www.ncregister.com

For St. Edith Stein, divine beauty is “the ultimate ground or cause of everything that is beautiful” and the remedy to the emptiness and superficiality of a world that seeks beauty without recourse to God.

This is according to Elizabeth Mitchell, author of the 2025 book St. Edith Stein’s Aesthetic: Beauty and Sanctity, Masterpiece of the Divine Artist — a seminal work on the Jewish convert to Catholicism who became a Carmelite nun, took the name St. Teresa Benedicta of the Cross, and died a martyr at Auschwitz in 1942. Stein was canonized by Pope St. John Paul II in 1998.

Stein saw God as “the Eternal Artist, the Divine Artist” who is “always creating, always shaping, always perfecting His creation,” Mitchell explains in this Aug. 11 interview with the Register. She also discusses the saint’s conversion, how her life and teaching can help us understand suffering, and what practical lessons artists, writers and everyday believers can learn from her heroic life today.

Mitchell, who wrote her doctorate on Stein, currently serves as principal of Trinity Academy, a private Catholic school in Pewaukee, Wisconsin.

Dr. Mitchell, what first drew you to St. Edith Stein, and why did you want to write a book about her understanding of beauty?

I have learned through my own friendship with St. Edith that, as a member of the communion of saints, she intercedes for people and can, through God’s providence, become present to them in surprising ways. I believe it’s not too much to say that if you are reading this interview right now and are wondering why it came across your path, God may be using this encounter with Edith Stein — through her intercession — to draw you toward something specific. It could be a deeper friendship with her, her intercession in a particular need, or perhaps, like me, a project she is helping you toward through her prayers before God. When I sat in St. Peter’s Square at her canonization in 1998, I had zero idea that I would come to know her better. Yet she had other plans! She says firmly [in her book Finite and Eternal Being]: “What did not lie in my plan lay in God’s plan.”

The threads of her aesthetic are woven throughout her various works. Her papers were scattered, due to the evacuations and bombings of World War II. My book is a synthesis of her life’s work on the subject.

How did Edith Stein understand beauty, and how is it different from how people often think about beauty today?

Again, your question gets to the essentials. Beauty is an obsession in today’s culture. We chase it and desire to possess it in a myriad of forms. The sleek iPhone, the perfect selfie. But these manifestations of beauty are superficial, and they leave us empty. They purport to fulfill us and satisfy us. But they do not. Why not? Because true beauty leads us to its source; it is not an end in itself; it is an attribute of God. He is Beauty. Expressions of true beauty attract us because they are a glimmer of the absolute, eternal, divine, unfathomable Beauty of God. God is Beauty, Truth and Goodness. A smile, a warm word of encouragement, a landscape, a symphony, are expressions of something deeper, something Divine. They are revelations of their archetype: the Divine Archetype.

Stein is so bold to assert, in her final work — The Science of the Cross, which lay open on her desk on the day she was arrested — “all genuine art is revelation, and all artistic creation is sacred service.”

And insofar as we feel joy in beauty, we are human. “Only a human being,” she explains [in Finite and Eternal Being], “but not an irrational animal, finds joy in beauty.” We experience this encounter as something which touches and moves our soul to respond.

How were Stein’s ideas on beauty, truth and goodness formed, and how can they be applied to a culture that often separates beauty from truth and goodness?

Continue reading the rest of this interview at www.ncregister.com

By Bishop Marian Eleganti OSB

On 31 July 2026, Pope Leo XIV held a 40-minute private audience at the Apostolic Palace in the Vatican with the American rock musician, poet and artist Patti Smith (born 1946), the so-called “Godmother of Punk.” Both are from Chicago. The meeting was attended by Father Antonio Spadaro. There are several official photographs and a video of the encounter.

This innocuous meeting — I imagine that it mainly involved an exchange of pleasantries, with hardly anything of great significance for the Church — raises questions for me.

For a long time now, I have personally been troubled by the fact that, since John Paul II, popes have increasingly been speaking in a purely informal manner on all sorts of occasions (e.g. on a plane or by the roadside, as Pope Leo XIV does in Castel Gandolfo). They give spontaneous interviews and express personal opinions. They are accessible to all sorts of people who want to have their photograph taken with them.

Given a pope’s workload and responsibilities, does he really have nothing more important to do than grant such private audiences — which are particularly popular when the petitioners come from the world of show business or have some sort of cultural or elitist relevance?

Such appearances reinforce the impression among the secular public that the Pope is, at heart, simply another member of the international establishment. The humble fisherman from Galilee, at any rate, knew nothing of such “glamour.” Nor did Paul seek the limelight; rather, he went to the Areopagus in Athens to preach. I shall refrain here from discussing protocol obligations and state visits of significance.

Among those favoured with a private audience may also be people such as Emma Bonino, who spent her entire life at loggerheads with Church doctrine. Pope Francis even paid her a private visit to her home on 5 November 2024. However, the Pope’s role is not that of individual pastoral care. Nor should he teach through images, but through unambiguous words.

Nor should we forget this Pope’s repeated and lengthy conversations and telephone calls with the atheist Eugenio Scalfari, founder of the left-wing newspaper La Repubblica. From these, Scalfari reconstructed controversial interviews from memory.

On several occasions, the Vatican had to distance itself from alleged statements attributed to the Pope. With Pope Francis, this way of floating ideas while himself remaining doctrinally non-committal had almost become a method. Above all, I would point out this: when a pope receives such people in private audience, he cannot, out of courtesy, publicly distance himself from them afterwards. Consequently, to many, such a reception appears to downplay what these individuals stand for. In this way, the Pope himself obscures the Church’s position and — depending on the circumstances — may even cause offence to the faithful.

These audiences take on all the more false significance the less the Pope simultaneously upholds the doctrine of the faith in its entirety, publicly corrects the erroneous views of these people, and puts a stop to abuses (cf. the exploitation of private audiences with the Pope by the Jesuit James Martin for his own pro-homosexual agenda).

I believe that, as a result, the most recent popes have lost authority and spiritual capital. Their personalities — spin doctors need images — come to the fore. Their private preferences and details irrelevant to their office become messages to the mainstream and take centre stage. We see Pope Benedict at the piano, or Pope Francis — squeezed into a Fiat far too small for his bulk — going to a Rome record shop to indulge a personal whim.

Popes certainly have more important things to do than pay for their hotel room out of their own pocket, as Francis did at the start of his pontificate. Do they even have enough time for that? Do they have enough time to ponder matters in prayer, to linger long before God so as to be guided by Him? Do they have enough time to read, to study documents and to prepare statements in which they truly teach — authoritatively and unambiguously — rather than offering speculations that are of no use to us?

But no, they must constantly attend audiences, shake hands and receive people indiscriminately. At papal Masses, they themselves take centre stage as a sort of “Church star,” pushing Christ — “the actual subject” — into the background. The papal throne towers over the altar. The Holy Mass in St Peter’s Square ought rather to serve as an encounter with the LORD, and not be a “happening” centred on his servant, the Pope — to put it somewhat polemically.

I cannot comprehend this. Collections of interviews, off-the-cuff remarks of varying quality, personal appearances at all manner of events, such as the blessing of a block of ice at a climate conference in Rome: All these things do the office more harm than good. They serve only those who are keen to use the Pope to further their own agenda. And popes have recently been lending themselves to such things. One sees them, for the media and to the delight of business leaders, test-driving the first electric Ferrari and much more besides. Here, too, one should be mindful of the ambivalence of the images!

For me, there is a lack of distance, in the positive sense of the word. I am not talking about aloofness, but about dignity. This is often emphasised more by silence than by speech — by speaking at the right moment, and then in a warm and engaging manner, using few, unambiguous and clear words. Pope Francis found such moments particularly when dealing with traditionalists and Mafiosi, or in the context of migration. He was able to clearly condemn abortion, yet welcome its proponents warmly and even appoint them to significant Vatican commissions. This, too, undermines the Church’s doctrinal position.

We need discernment in the sense of tradition (not in the sense of so-called “new synodality”). But the popes have almost no time for this. They spend far too much time on audiences, welcoming addresses, handshaking and travelling. I see the danger of activism. It masks the lack of a clear condemnation of heretical positions, which are also held by bishops (cf. the German Synodal Path). These positions must be clearly identified, and their proponents admonished or removed from office.

Burning issues such as the liturgical question are being put on the back burner. As advisers to the Pope, the cardinals do not really have a say.

St Pope John Paul II — perhaps nolens volens (whether he wanted to or not) — gave his public appearances as Pope the character of a superstar, particularly through the World Youth Days. In 2003, John Paul II published the “Roman Triptych – Meditations,” a new cycle of poems. The Vatican documented its official presentation on 6 March 2003 as though it held similar significance to the great doctrinal texts from the same pen.

Even whilst serving as Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Benedict published collections of interviews, a practice he continued as Pope. With his valuable books on Jesus, he did not intend to teach authoritatively as Pope, but rather to make an academic (?) contribution, as in the old days when he was a university professor. All this is unusual for popes, who are expected to teach authoritatively.

Pope Francis produced several autobiographies at once, a format hitherto unthinkable for popes. Moreover, he did not write them himself, as one might suppose. Through all these innovations, the media portrayal of his personality and style took on almost greater significance than what he taught or was supposed to teach. In the age of the media, there was a concerted effort to ensure one came across well. This was also evident with Pope Francis. Any cracks in his image were quickly patched up by the media (cf. his brusque reaction in St Peter’s Square when a Chinese woman grabbed his hand and pulled him towards her on 31 December 2019, and the ‘mea culpa’ that became necessary during the Angelus on the following Sunday).

For the Lord to shine through, however, other matters — the irrelevant, the overly personal — must take a back seat. The media, however, take particular delight in turning precisely the latter into a main attraction: the swimming pool or tennis court at Castel Gandolfo, the black shoes beneath the white cassock, the worn leather briefcase from days gone by, Benedict’s cute cat, the piano, the Fiat, the Ferrari. The list goes on and on.

Who cares about that when popes are teachers of the truth? A revealed truth!

I do not think that, for the sake of this truth, they need to constantly undertake elaborate and gruelling journeys that physically exhaust them, whilst a single sentence from their lips travels round the globe in the blink of an eye without them having to move a muscle. How much personal energy is lost in this way, energy that is then lacking elsewhere (partly due to their constant absence): in the running of the Curia; in meetings with people who are truly relevant to the Pope’s decision-making; in staff meetings to prepare sound statements and coordinate the various dicasteries. Their presence is not required merely to witness processes initiated by others, to let them run their course without providing leadership, to act as a mere student, or even just to be a good listener. Are they not the teachers of Christendom, whose words everyone awaits? Do they not sit on the Chair of St Peter, and not on some other chair? Are they not needed above all in Rome?

The popes have become all too human in the exercise of their office. It is their personality, not their office, that now takes centre stage. This may strike some as endearing; they are keen to snap a photo with them, perhaps subsequently exploiting it to promote their heretical views.

The mainstream wants to see them as approachable: as perfectly ordinary people like the rest of us. Pope Francis, in particular, wanted the latter. For this reason, on 25 March 2017 in Milan, to the annoyance of many believers, he spontaneously used a nearby portable lavatory, which his spin doctor, Antonio Spadaro, of course appropriately reframed afterwards. Most recently, he allowed himself to be pushed in a wheelchair by his carer, dressed in everyday clothes, through the bustling St Peter’s Basilica, as if he were just any elderly neighbour (with all due respect to his terminal illness!). For me, this was yet another historic low point for the papacy.

Popes, after all, are not people like us. They should have respect for their office and, as guardians of the Church’s doctrine, personally step back like John the Baptist, who wished only to be a voice, albeit one that speaks the truth. In comparison, his own profile was without significance. Popes should remain mindful of this: that it is not their personality that counts, but their office. That is a cross to bear. “HE must increase, but I must decrease” (John 3:30). They are merely the friends and representatives of the Bridegroom, not the Bridegroom himself. Only the latter is of any significance or interest!

Bishop Marian Eleganti OSB was an auxiliary bishop of the Diocese of Chur from 2009 to 2021 and Abbot of St Otmarsberg Benedictine Abbey in St Gallen from 1999 to 2009.

This commentary was originally published in German on Bishop Eleganti’s website and has been republished here with his kind permission.

LONDON — Quantum physics, or quantum mechanics, is rapidly emerging not just as a means to develop new technologies but also as a scientific method that can help mankind better understand the truth about creation pointing to the mystery of its Creator.

In this July 31 interview with the Register on the sidelines of “A Day With Mary”conference in London, Catholic professor Vincenzo Tamma discusses what quantum mechanics is, how it relates to divine action, and how it can be a useful tool in the dialogue between science and theology.

“Quantum mechanics helps the faithful think about how God made the world because it describes the deepest level of how nature works,” explains professor Tamma, founding director of the Quantum Science and Technology Hub at the University of Portsmouth in the U.K. “It gives the most fundamental epistemological, ontological insights into nature, the way God willed it and has ordered it.”

To help maximize its potential in this field, he is calling for the recovery of an interdisciplinary idea of the university, as proposed by St. John Henry Newman, in order to deepen the intersection of Catholic theology, philosophy and quantum science and educate the wider public.

Professor Tamma, what in a nutshell is quantum physics?

Quantum physics is the rulebook for how reality works from the smallest scale. It is, if you like, the science of the fundamental building blocks of the universe — such as atoms, electrons and photons. Quantum physics says these things do not behave like ordinary objects; instead, they can be observed in probabilistic ways, where you can only predict the chances of any measurement outcome, not the exact result.

In simple terms, it gives us an understanding of nature at the most fundamental level. It explains why tiny particles can seem to be in more than one place at once, why light can act like both a wave and a particle, and why particles can be linked together in different ways over distance. Furthermore, quantum physics is not just a theory about the universe’s basics — it also powers new technologies like quantum computers, ultra-precise sensors and secure communication. All this technology is now based on the fundamental physics of quantum mechanics, so it helps us not only to understand the universe in its fundamental nature but can be used to develop new technologies.

How can it help us understand the truth of creation?

Quantum mechanics helps the faithful think about how God made the world because it describes the deepest level of how nature works. It gives the most fundamental epistemological, ontological insights into nature, the way God willed it and has ordered it. In that sense, the laws of physics — and especially the quantum laws — are part of the “book of nature,” and God is the one who gives those laws. As St. Augustine said, the book of nature and the Book of Revelation are two complementary ways of learning about God. They are not the same book, and they should not be merged into one, but they help us understand God together.

Does quantum physics support the meaning of mystery as we understand it as Catholics?

Yes, I believe so. Quantum physics and the empirical sciences in general cannot prove God because God is beyond the natural world and beyond the scientific method, even the laws of quantum physics. But the fact that the laws of nature, and especially the quantum laws, are intelligible at all is itself a sign of something deeper and greater. In other words, the laws of physics cannot explain themselves. The mystery is that the universe has intelligible laws that can be understood by a rational observer. So, in essence, quantum mechanics allows us to point towards higher-order realities and to point about the mystery of nature, its intelligibility. That points beyond the laws to a higher order of reality.

That is why many physicists have spoken with awe and wonder about the universe. Einstein famously said that the world’s comprehensibility is a mystery and even called it a miracle. He realized that intelligibility of nature was pointing towards a transcendent. So the answer is: Yes, quantum physics can support a Catholic sense of mystery because it shows that creation is intelligible, yet still ultimately points beyond itself to God.

How might quantum physics relate to divine action? How can it help us understand divine action perhaps in a way that previous science couldn’t?

Read the rest of this interview at www.ncregister.com