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LETTER FROM THE EDITOR
Dear Brother Soldiers of Christ:
Taking advice from the League Chaplain, let us resolve to undertake the study of the Papal Encyclicals – an enormous source of grace, for certain. But it will do little good merely to study them without their equally important application
– in our spiritual and domestic life, academic and vocational life,
civil and political life; in our life as members of the Church which
summons us to battle as knights and crusaders, as heads and guardians of
our families of which our dear wives are the heart, and as responsible
citizens of our country necessitating that we defend our borders and
Christian culture and the common good. With the stark realization that
we are likely right now to be living through the hour granted to the power of darkness (Gregory XVI, Mirari Vos) and that faith without works is dead
(James 2: 14-17), never have these religious classics from the pens of
the Vicars of Christ been more important to living the Christian life,
overthrowing the antichristian forces, and rebuilding the Christian
Bastions, beginning with the Church herself which has been mutilated the
last 50 years almost beyond recognition. These are the things real men and real Christians will instinctively and untiringly devote themselves to. These and nothing less.
But as Fr. Chazal says, it all begins in the intellect,
property of the soul. The Reign of Christ the King begins there as too
the whole revival of the Life of Grace and restoration of the Catholic
City, enlightening the Christian mind with nothing less than the highest and holiest excellence in learning and knowledge. We need not all become scholars, but at the very least, certainly, men who know and love their religion and who put into practice its most sacred and virile duties. Towards this end, the interior man will automatically turn to Eternal Rome and to the Encyclicals issued there from.
Encyclical: the word has its origins in four Greek words, en, meaning in, enkuklios meaning general or wide, and kuklos or kyklos meaning circle or circulation – in wide circulation. From these three is derived the fourth word, enkyklike, which, taken together, translates a letter to be widely circulated. An encyclical is therefore a PAPAL letter intended to be widely circulated.
They are not, as many mistakenly believe, exclusive to the world’s
bishops and clergy, but are to be made known for the personal benefit of
and missionary vocation common to the laity as well, that is to all of us, exempting no one. And this is an important point, that we are all supposed to know and adhere to these letters from Eternal Rome. Have we not, after all, each and every one, been consecrated soldiers of Christ by the sacrament of confirmation (what used to be known as, and still remains in truth, the sacrament of Catholic Action)?
Christian soldiers, however, at least ideally, are not idle, are not
passive, are not weak or worldly or superficial men. They are fighters. They are men of honor, dedication and courage. They are men that ACCEPT their high mission for God, family and country! But before the Christian soldier can set out to conquer the world for Christ (winning minds, hearts and souls for God and reconstructing the Church and Christian Society) he must first conquer himself
and his household (overcoming one’s particular faults; growing in
grace, faith, virtue and holiness; Christianizing our homes and
offspring). Reading, study and learning are a key part of the
requisite spiritual and doctrinal program, along with prayer,
mortification, detachment and the over-all devout life, aimed at both forming and fortifying
the Christian soldier before advancing him to the battlefront where,
armed with the unbeatable weapons of Christ, he engages the enemy for
the glory of God and in defense of the Catholic faith.
Papal Encyclicals, then, are an important factor in our formation,
strengthening and preparedness as battle-ready soldiers of Christ. They are extremely powerful weapons in the Christian armory.
Intended to be made known among Catholics and Catholics in turn are
intended to introduce them to other men within their own orbit of
influence, with the main points of each Encyclical to be taught by our
consecrated leaders through sermons, conferences, church bulletins,
adult catechism classes, schools, retreats, and in Catholic newsletters,
magazines and newspapers – and yet…
hardly one pastor in ten thousand, it seems, has dutifully fed his
flock with the powerful messages of these letters from the Successors of
St. Peter; and hardly one layman in perhaps a million
has otherwise been introduced to these official documents penned by the
Supreme Pontiffs. Moreover, there are yet unquestionably fewer in number among priests and people who’ve had the sublime truths contained in these Encyclicals thoroughly inculcated in their minds, as they ought to have been. It’s a negligence of no minor consequences. More
than this, it’s a glaring omission which may well have been one of the
BIGGEST FAILURES of modern-day Catholics – clergy and laity alike – and
one of the major reasons Catholics were so ILL-PREPARED to withstand the
onslaught of the neo-Modernist scourge of the 1960s and 70s all the way
to the present-day, not to mention why even traditionalists were back
then and still are today, so DISINCLINED towards Catholic Action, which
the Church DEMANDS of us all to counter the modern apostasy and restore
the Reign of Christ the King.
Why exactly are these Papal Encyclicals so important in forming and strengthening the Christian soldier? Why should Catholics become deeply imbued with at least two-dozen or more select ones of the 19th and first half of the 20th centuries? Why
should every conscientious Catholic study them with great reverence,
resolve and self-mastery, and hold steadfastly to them in the ongoing
spiritual warfare as he labors to re-Christianize the world around him? Because, again, they consist of the venerable and timely teachings – a veritable summa theological, so to speak – of the highest visible authority in the Church, the Papacy and its divinely constituted Teaching Office, the Magisterium; because,
the Christian’s cerebral grasp of Divine Revelation, the Deposit of
Faith and the Doctrine of Christ, which these encyclicals so profoundly
articulate while underscoring their relevance to our particular
situation in these difficult times, is imperative
to his living in accordance with the Divine Plan unto the common moral
and temporal good of peoples and their eternal salvation; because whole
nations have plunged into an abyss of evils and scores of souls are
consequently perishing in the everlasting fires of hell due in no small
part to their ignorance of the great Encyclicals of the recent pre-Vatican II past; because
they constitute nothing less than the Church’s Call to Organized
Resistance in these wicked end times to the twofold assault of apostasy
and totalitarianism; because the crisis of Faith, crisis of Civilization, and yes, even the crisis in the Society of St. Pius X, would never have come about but for the ignorance of the faithful and clergy – a wholesale ignorance of the absolutely-binding Papal condemnations of the modern errors that re-surfaced within the Church on the occasion of the Second Vatican Council…
These are some of the very Vatican II errors that the neo-SSPX/XSPX is no longer inclined to fight against, preferring
instead to harbor the insane and self-defeating delusion of
facilitating “full communion” with the Conciliar enemy rather than
continue the Church’s campaign against Liberalism, Modernism, Communism,
Freemasonry and Talmudic Judaism. But such a tendency is nothing
less than to relinquish their own solemn oath against the modern errors –
an impossible state of passive indifference towards the destroyers of
our holy and divine Faith and their destructive heresies, no less than a
cowardly surrendering to them. It cannot be so without betraying the Sacred Heart of Our Blessed Lord, Christ our King. We must not deceive ourselves, as Archbishop Lefebvre warned Catholics of our day, for, as he also said, we’re in the midst of a tremendous fight.
Whereas the SSPX was once the vanguard spearheading that fight, today’s
XSPS has thrown down its arms in the face of the Conciliar advance.
Their new attitude is as un-Catholic as it can get: “If you can’t beat’em, join’em!” Recall the words of Abp. Lefebvre on the matter of joining apostate Rome: “…We cannot follow the principles of the Council; WE CANNOT JOIN THEM!” And yet joining them is exactly what the XSPX is now bent on doing – and the Resistance Priests are intent on resisting – thanks be to them and to God and to Our Lady !
Here’s what His Grace had to say about the Encyclicals and the teachings from the Chair of Peter: “Let us again listen to the voice of the Sovereign Pontiffs, especially the voice of Pius XII. He is truly, now and forever, the Doctor of the Church in the modern world” (I Accuse the Council). “We must steep ourselves anew in the Catholic faith; that is why we study the Encyclicals… A
distinct knowledge of what the Popes have taught and condemned is thus
indispensable for a correct evaluation of the extremely grave events
which are the order of the day” (Introduction, Against the Heresies).
Archbishop Lefebvre was simply reiterating what the Church had always
taught – it’s what His Grace did his entire Episcopal life against a
virtual tsunami of unbelief, making him one of the greatest churchmen of
our time, heroically loyal to the true Magisterium even as he
intrepidly refused compliance with the false magisterium’s program of
treason against Christ – the opposite stance of Menzigen today under the obstinate and ever-wavering Superior, Bp. Fellay.
Of the true Magisterium Pius XI wrote: “The teaching authority of the Church in the divine wisdom was constituted on earth in order that the revealed doctrines might remain for ever intact and might be brought with ease and security to the knowledge of men. This authority is indeed daily exercised through the Roman Pontiffs and the Bishops who are in communion with him…” (Mortalium Animos).
The First Vatican Council, being dogmatic unlike the pastoral Council of Vatican II, states: “…By divine and Catholic faith, all those things must be believed which are contained in the written word of God and in Tradition, and those which are proposed by the Church, either in a solemn pronouncement or in her ordinary and universal teaching power, to be believed as divinely revealed.” Pope Leo XIII sheds further light on the subject: “Christ instituted in the Church a living, authoritative and permanent Magisterium,
which He strengthened by His own power, taught by the Spirit of Truth
and confirmed by miracles. He willed and ordered under the gravest
penalties that its teachings should be received as if they were His own.
As often therefore as it is declared on the authority of His teachings
that this or that is contained in the deposit of divine revelation, it must be believed by everyone as true” (Satis cognitum).
Elsewhere the same Pope wrote: “As regards opinion, whatever the Roman
Pontiffs have hitherto taught, or shall hereafter teach, must be held with a firm grasp of mind, and, so often as occasion requires, must be openly professed…all must stand by the judgment of the Apostolic See (Immortale Dei). And
Pius XII was clearer yet: “Nor must it be thought that what is
expounded in encyclical letters does not of itself demand consent, since
in writing such letters the Popes do not exercise the supreme power of
their teaching authority, of which it is true to say: ‘He who heareth
you heareth Me.’ And generally what is expounded and inculcated in encyclical letters already for other reasons appertains to Catholic doctrine” (Humani Generis).
It’s a long-established principle that when the Church speaks, the
matter is settled. The truth of the Magisterium and its unmitigated
binding power could not be stated with greater clarity or authority than
what we just saw.
So it came to pass that with the rise of Conciliar Rome and its counterfeit
magisterium, a tiny remnant of Catholics taking their faith seriously
turned with all their heart, mind and soul to the perennial and
unchanging doctrine of Eternal Rome
and its authentic Magisterium. It was the only integrally Catholic thing to do under the circumstances – when a conflict arises obeying God before men (Acts 5:29) – even at times to the extent of disobeying lawful authorities. God is always first served.
The imperative took on a certain urgency 50 years ago when the modern
apostasy rose up inside the Church and began ravaging the holy
Sanctuary. It has taken on a renewed
urgency since 2012 with the liberalization, conciliarization and
Judaization of the Society of St. Pius X coming out of the closet, and
which gave rise to the increasingly cultish XSPX of Bishop Fellay. As we
have stated many times before and repeat now for our new subscribers
and friends, that unfavorable distinction is stressed so as to
differentiate the XSPX from the former SSPX of Archbishop Lefebvre, the
spirit and mission of which is being kept alive by the Resistance bishops, clergy and lay activists.
The real tragedy here, of course, is that the one priestly order raised
up by God through the historic intervention of a saintly French
prelate, the former Superior General of the missionary order of the Holy
Ghost Fathers, to defend the faith throughout the world and save the
priesthood, the Mass and the Church from her destroyers within – and
which priestly order (SSPX) did in fact gallantly defend the faith and rebuild the Church for better than a quarter-century, has now greatly succumbed to the enemy,
allowing itself to become poisoned by dangerously false principles from
the top down. And then to add insult to injury, this by the same heretical revolutionary and apostate Conciliarism the SSPX was originally commissioned to wage war against. No question about it, and notwithstanding the good still being done by some of its priests (the few whose doctrine and charity have not yet been corrupted by their liberal superiors), the XSPX turnabout is nonetheless part of the Diabolical Disorientation of these irreligious times. It cannot be otherwise, given all the proofs of compromise and betrayal in matters not of prudence or discipline but theology – meticulously documented beyond dispute.
But God never abandons those who, however few in number, do not abandon
Him. So even through all the confusion, uncertainty, distrust,
disunity, betrayal and pure heartbreak which the XSPX has engendered by
its wrongful new thinking and ruinous new direction,
earnest defenders of the faith are not without hope. Along with a
strong, loving and trustful attachment to the Mother of God, they are additionally graced with the clear light of Catholic thinking that radiates from the documents of pre-Conciliar Rome – with all the orthodoxy, holiness, authoritativeness and efficacy of the divine wisdom and power that the Rock
upon which Christ built His one Church has been singularly endowed
with. Because the Magisterium has spoken, and spoken with not just
absolute but divine conviction, there is no excuse whatsoever
for today’s Catholic to fall victim to the storm of lies and falsehoods
that has stricken Catholics at some point during the last three
centuries of accelerated apostasy and/or treasonous collaboration with
it, to one degree or another, whether emanating from Hamburg or
Amsterdam, Paris or London, New York, Washington or Moscow, Rome itself since the second half of the 20th century or more recently from Menzigen, world headquarters of the XSPX, which has, again, all but quit the fight against the Novus Ordo apostasy. It is treason because it involves a see-no-evil / turn-the-other-cheek / non-combative tolerance of heresy. In all her motherly wisdom, Holy Church insists that not to denounce and combat heresy is to approve and encourage it. Silence of this nature is a grave sin. All we need do to survive both the Conciliar apostasy and the XSPS’s collaboration with it, today as yesterday, is to familiarize
ourselves with the great counterrevolutionary Encyclicals of the past,
and then with the assist of the Holy Ghost, the Blessed Virgin Mary and
our uncompromising clergy, to live the Catholic principles to the fullest in and through our particular state in life, and to strictly apply them in every instance and to every crisis.
Studying these Encyclicals of yesteryear, we will also see with consummate clarity and conviction the solid footing upon which the Traditional Movement once fought for the faith – and the SSPX Resistance now continues that same fight. It is all-out war against Christ, and we are not permitted to lay aside our arms, quit the fight and flee the battlefield, as the XSPX has tragically been doing, without losing the spirit and sabotaging the mission of the Church Militant. We stress this point over and over because of the number of good people that we know, or who write us, that are still expressing so much confusion and doubt.
And so,
doing our small part while prayerfully urging that our readers and
League members in turn do theirs, we are devoting this issue of our
magazine to providing a number of choice excerpts from a selection of
the most timely and timeless Papal writings of the past, their
pronouncements and exhortations, their decrees, directives and calls to
action. Featured in the next 58 or so pages is but a brief sampling of
what the Vicars of Christ have wanted to make known to Catholics of
these latter days, no matter how few ears were actually opened to them.
Still, these Papal teachings constitute no small treasure of divine truth
to those with the grace to receive them, every sentence of which will
strengthen the faith and embolden the soul of God’s chosen bands of
loyal defenders, as the Popes address various key aspects of the
spiritual warfare and its social dimension. It is, to say the least,
quite serious business, so please dear brothers in Christ, please do take it seriously: Read, study, pray, meditate, share what you read with others, organize and meet with others in prayer and study circles, to review the Encyclicals in FULL
and determine how to apply on the apostolic and practical levels the
Papal principles and exhortations, each man or group of men in his or
their own lives, to the defense of their home and country, and especially in the life of the Church unto her militant re-fortification and ultimate glorious triumph. It is the duty
of every confirmed soldier in Our Lord’s Church, and of every member of
the League of Christ the King, and of every man of the Catholic
Restoration to do so, assertively, generously, and without hesitation or
fear of what it may cost. And too, as part of the same duty and same
cause in their more immediate application, how, armed with such powerful
intellectual and spiritual weapons as these Documents from Eternal
Rome, we men of Catholic Action can more effectively and productively serve the brave and holy Bishops and Priests of the true Resistance.
For those of you sincere men that have asked, “how can I help?” – or
“what can I do?” – or “I am now retired; what should I be doing with my
time?” – we answer: This is it! These are your marching orders, here and in the pages that follow, issued by none other than the Catholic Popes!
Onward then, ye men of true faith!
We have a huge and crucial fight on our hands and it is necessary to
keep our eyes fixed on the high mission that beckons all interior men, moved by God’s grace to set aside all self-interest and time wasted on so many lesser occupations, in this greatest of all challenges and most noble of all causes; a challenge and cause whose impact reaches far into eternity. Therefore, dear brothers, “Like the faithful in the primitive Church, be of one heart and one soul, and, gathered
about the Chair of St. Peter, and united to your pastors, protect the
supreme interests of the Church and of the Papacy, which are also the
supreme interests of…the whole Christian world” (Leo XIII, Custodi di quella fede).
Sincerely in the Hearts of Jesus and Mary,
Hugh Akins, League President
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