Keep Right — Column by Ralph K. Ginorio
The condemnation of benefactors, the censure of our own defenders thus began; there was a sermon preached against the very necessity of carrying the global burden of suppressing evil; demonstrations were given to show that this burden was imaginary, that there was no evil, that those who compel and suppress [evil] were the only real villains.
“On Resistance to Evil by Force”, Ivan Alexandrovich Ilyin
The author of the quote experienced nothing less than the loss of his homeland and his church when the Communists replaced his Russia with the Soviet Union and his Russian Orthodox Christian Church with Communism. Ilyin well knew that “True Communism” is a jealous cult which abides no competition. It hypnotizes us to demolish our own defenses and betray our own protectors.
Evolutionary Socialists and Revolutionary Communists employ differing means to achieve the same objective: totalitarian control over the thoughts, words, and deeds of every individual in existence. In their Millennium, the withering away of the state will be accomplished only when all of humanity adopts their hive-mind and their collective identity.
In service to this goal, Communists and their fellow travelers have been engaged in a “long march through the institutions” of Western Civilization since well before I was born. The educational, governmental, and religious institutions intended to strengthen us are now largely turned against us. The damage they have inflicted on the innocents indoctrinated in their schools, the citizens abused by their bureaucracies, and the faithful confused by their dogmas is immeasurable.
One of their first and most thorough successes was achieved in the Second Vatican Council of the Roman Catholic Christian Church. In the century before Vatican II in 1962, the Church warned against the temptations of Modernism. Popes and theologians railed against abandoning universal and eternal truth in favor of passing trends. The Church could lose itself in one historical moment.
Vatican II was not satisfied with reforming Catholic tradition. It replaced it. The Church became “The People of God”. The Latin Mass became a babble of vernacular rites. The guiding philosophies of St. Augustine and St. Thomas Aquinas were eclipsed by efforts to fuse the legacies of Christ and Marx.
The primary focus of Church efforts was shifted away from cultivating godly souls to fight the secular evil of poverty instead. Strengthening the individual against sin was de-prioritized in favor of creating a “preferential option for the poor”. As part of an Ecumenical outreach to other Christian denominations, distinctive Roman Catholic traditions were suppressed in favor of universalism.
Negative consequence of Vatican II include a dwindling of Vocations in the West, a dramatic reduction in Church attendance in the West, and a moral confusion that led to a massive decades-long cover-up of acts of pederasty perpetrated by members of the Clergy.
For the faith to be passed on intact to coming generations and for Christianity to form a basis for Western society, there needs to be a healthy, organized Christian faith. Because of our human limitations, Christian churches may need to thrive in a multitude of denominations. However, under no circumstances can a genuine Christianity flourish under the twin Modernist heresies of legalistic Fundamentalism or the Communist “Christianity” of Liberation Theology.
Recently, Pope Leo XIV excommunicated the Society of St. Pius X. This Catholic group was dedicated to pre-Vatican II ideas and practices. Their consecration of new Bishops provoked Pope Leo to sunder them from the Roman Catholic faith. With all of its vaunted toleration for cultural diversity, today’s Church has utterly rejected those who are dedicated to its own pre-Vatican II convictions.
Anti-Modernist Catholics have always had this problem. Just as was St. Ignatius of Loyola, they are Papists through-and-through. They identify their legitimacy as having come through Cannon Law and Papal traditions stretching back to the Apostle St. Peter. Their chief criticism of Martin Luther, John Calvin, and of all Protestant and Reformed traditions is that they reject Rome.
With Rome now led by Liberation Theologian Popes like Francis and Leo XIV, and before them reforming Popes like John XXIII, Paul VI, and even in many respects John Paul II, where is a self-consciously legitimist Papist to go? Will those in sympathy with the Society of St. Pius X form their own denomination?
It wouldn’t be the first time that faithful Catholics endured a schism. The last erupted six centuries ago, after the French King captured his own pet Pope and moved him to Avignon. Ultimately, eight would-be Popes warred alongside different royal sponsors, calling all seven others “Anti-Pope” and “Antichrist”. After decades of war, a church council healed the breach by calling for a new Conclave to choose a new Pope, beholden to no king.
The excommunication of Latin-rite Catholics is but one small part of a global Christian crisis. Most mainline Protestant and Reformed denominations have experienced their own decline caused by activists advocating normalizing homosexuality, fostering economic “justice”, practicing “the Social Gospel”, and abandoning cherished traditions. Coupled with the Fundamentalist backlash against all of this, Christianity shudders under the strain.
At our historic moment:
- Humanity has the capacity to destroy all life on Earth
- Super-science seduces us with cloning, robotics, and A.I.
- Normal childbearing is disrupted by birth control and abortion
- The current world population requires electricity and global trade
- Ubiquitous personal electronics are rewiring the brain and society
At this moment when people of all ages in every part of our world need truth, our religious institutions are so weakened by factional worldly politics that they have themselves become sources of confusion.
We Christians should reject all Modernisms of Left and Right, rededicating ourselves to serve Christ with humility, sincerity, and bravery. Each of us can live in imitation of Christ. Everyone called by a vocation can recall that their loyalty is to the Living God, rather than to any institution of Man. We can restore Christ to primacy within Christianity, and in His service can return a meaningful Christian influence to individuals, societies, and a needy world.
