The pope has died. As good Catholics we always pray for and commend the souls of all who have died to the mercy of God. This we also do for the man chosen by conclave in 2013 to serve in the office of supreme pontiff for these past twelve years. Requiescat in pace, Pope Francis.
One of the most important consolations for all of us, if not the ultimate gift, are the prayers of the Church, the power of Christ on Earth, through His Mystical Body, to sanctify and save our souls. Above all it is the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass which brings the greatest of graces possible here below: the sacramental presence of the Savior Himself, Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity. Heaven on earth, as it were.
This we will offer for Francis, begging for any graces he may yet need to enter heaven and enjoy the beatific vision forever as the complete and perfect satisfaction, peace and love that only the immediate presence and life of the Holy Trinity can offer the human person.
Many of us will watch from a distance the ceremonies surrounding the Church’s mourning for her global spiritual father. We will attend Masses locally to commend his soul to the Lord. And he will remain in our prayers perpetually as the greatest gesture of Christian love we can offer.
But the Church will go on, her mission to save souls only briefly interrupted by the obsequies for a pope. The cardinals who are eligible to vote will meet in conclave, “with key”, for secrecy to elect a new pope, apart from the lobbying and pressures of the world to better enjoy the spiritual freedom necessary to do the Father’s will.
To speak of the Father’s will includes the lives of everyone in the Church, from the pontiff down to the most newly baptized member. I have lived through six popes in my lifetime, baptized under the pontificate of John XXIII and ordained under the pontificate of John Paul II. Rarely do a pope’s decisions have the effect of a spiritual earthquake. But it was under the last two popes that we have seen a most severe spiritual rupture affecting our lives in ways previously unimaginable.
Benedict XVI opened the Church again fully to her sacred tradition, healing an illegitimate breach imposed in the name of Vatican II, the ecumenical council which met in the 1960’s. But Francis, in an unprecedented rupture which is a thing most un- Catholic, reversed all the good work Benedict had done to unite and heal the Church, banning the offering of the Roman rite in parish churches. Pope vs. pope. Did Francis unwittingly set a precedent that could then result in his policies being reversed by a subsequent pope? We can only pray and hope, as many are now doing. Benedict had acknowledged that tradition is a non-negotiable and that all of the Church’s traditions, to include the liturgy, are matters of divine revelation.
My parish was cancelled. 90% of the parishioners were basically told they were praying the wrong way and sent packing. Whatever happens in the future, many will never come back. They were happy and fulfilled in our thriving and growing parish life, with traditional Mass daily and two on Sunday. We gathered, sometimes nearly a hundred in number, for lunch each Sunday at our parish hall. All gone.
We expended nearly a quarter million dollars to repair our plaster walls and ceilings and redecorate the Church fittingly once again according to our traditional canons of church beauty fitting for the glory of God and the salvation of souls. Traditional Catholics believe in family life and generous child-bearing, they believe in all the teachings of the Church, to include generous financial support. All that energy and dynamism is now gone and my parish has settled back into the senescent remnant it was when I arrived. We get perhaps forty people on a good Sunday, but they will never again financially support a resident pastor. As we spend down our dwindling savings account we can literally count the days until we have to close the parish.
So, for us the days of Francis were disastrous. The work of salvation of souls for priests on his watch became ever more difficult and the unity of the Church took a grave hit as many parish families departed for a nearby canonically irregular traditional chapel. Bishops who reject the apostolic tradition of moral teachings as well as liturgy have been increasingly appointed to better spread the policies of rupture clearly favored by Francis in his actions as well as his words. Some of them are now cardinals. Will they succeed in electing one of their own? We have no doubt witnessed some occult heresy in cardinals of the past, but never have we seen as under the Francis the bold public brandishing and scandal of error. Many souls are in jeopardy as a result.
Edward Pentin wrote of Francis’ “modernizing” pontificate upon his passing: “Francis sought to give women more leadership roles in the Church and was noticeably and controversially eager to embrace LGBTQ people, forcefully speaking out against laws criminalizing homosexuality, disturbing many Catholics — especially in Africa — by allowing non-liturgical blessings of same-sex couples, and permitting civil unions, even though previous popes had firmly opposed such changes.”
The myth that “doctrinal purity” is opposed to authentic pastoral care has dangerously gained ground. The truth is always in love, coming from God. The care of souls can only take place within the sure hope that the truth of Christ confers. After all, “mercy” is also one of the freeing truths about the love of God Incarnate in Christ which comes through His Holy Church. To be Catholic means to obey all the truth in order to share in a saving way the grace of Christ in love.
Pentin again: “Under his watch, bishops, priests, religious and laity who had been bearing good fruit in terms of reverence, spiritual life, fidelity to Catholic doctrine, and booming vocations were cancelled or ostracized. ‘The more spiritual and supernaturally orientated they were, the more persecution they seem to suffer,’ a Portuguese priest told Newsmax on condition of anonymity due to fear of reprisals. ‘Meanwhile, in other quarters, those who committed abuses against doctrine, moral teaching and the liturgy seemed to go unpunished and were allowed to thrive.’”
Cardinals were fired, bishops removed without due process, religious orders dispersed, priests canceled; many injustices remain to be corrected under a future pope. The catalog of the abuse of souls innocent of crime as well as promotion and protection of priest and bishop perverts, abusers and prelates who covered up the crimes of clerics and others is too long to list here.
We can only pray that the cardinal electors will, with the powerful aid of the Holy Spirit, courageously right the barque of Peter, restoring normality with the acceptance of, and obedience once again to, apostolic tradition in all matters as the only and God-given mission of the universal Church of Jesus Christ.
Indeed, it is our duty to bury the dead and to pray for them. It is equally our duty before God and the world to fight each and every one to our last breath any effort to bury the Faith. Let us pray also for that.
A version of this column was published in the May 1, 2025 issue of The Wanderer Catholic Newspaper.
