Like many other papal encyclicals prior to Vatican II, several aspects of Pope Gregory XVI’s 1832 encyclical on “Liberalism and Religious Indifferentism,” Mirari Vos, directly contradict ideas that were explicitly promoted at the Council. For instance, whereas Vatican II’s “Declaration on Religious Freedom,” Dignitatis Humanae, stated that a person should not be “restrained from acting in accordance with his conscience, especially in matters religious,” Gregory XVI had this to say about freedom of conscience:

“This shameful font of indifferentism gives rise to that absurd and erroneous proposition which claims that liberty of conscience must be maintained for everyone. It spreads ruin in sacred and civil affairs, though some repeat over and over again with the greatest impudence that some advantage accrues to religion from it. ‘But the death of the soul is worse than freedom of error,’ as Augustine was wont to say. When all restraints are removed by which men are kept on the narrow path of truth, their nature, which is already inclined to evil, propels them to ruin.”

Gregory XVI’s discussion of religious indifferentism also repudiates the false ecumenism that served as a driving force at Vatican II. As profitable and enlightening as it is to reflect on how Mirari Vos condemns the specific novelties of Vatican II, though, we might draw greatest value from the encyclical if we can truly appreciate what it said about the permissibility of novelties in general.

Although the defenders of Vatican II tell us that nothing changed with the Council, they also tell us that we must follow the Council’s new orientations and teachings. Actual Catholic teaching allows us to cut through this contradictory nonsense and affirm that we must resist the novelties.

After insisting that bishops must exercise the utmost vigilance in guarding the Church against “common enemies,” Pope Gregory XVI explained how the bishops should keep guard over sound Catholic teaching:

“Indeed you will accomplish this perfectly if, as the duty of your office demands, you attend to yourselves and to doctrine and meditate on these words: ‘the universal Church is affected by any and every novelty’ and the admonition of Pope Agatho: ‘nothing of the things appointed ought to be diminished; nothing changed; nothing added; but they must be preserved both as regards expression and meaning.’”

In his Against the Heresies, Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre commented on the first part of this passage from Mirari Vos:

“How should they watch over their doctrine? ‘. . . by repeating incessantly to yourselves that every novelty attempts to undermine the Universal Church.’ Here he is paraphrasing the holy Pope Celestine: ‘Universalem Ecclesiam quacumque novitate pulsari.’ If only this adage from St. Celestine, imbued with great wisdom, had inspired the Conciliar Fathers at Vatican II, then they would not have engaged the Church in the path of all the reforms that have led to such an upheaval.” (pp. 188-189)

Although the defenders of Vatican II tell us that nothing changed with the Council, they also tell us that we must follow the Council’s new orientations and teachings. Actual Catholic teaching —as found in the words of Popes Celestine and Gregory XVI, as well as Archbishop Lefebvre — allows us to cut through this contradictory nonsense and affirm that we must resist the novelties.

Archbishop Lefebvre also commented on Pope Gregory XVI’s quote from Pope St. Agatho:

“The Sovereign Pontiff also quotes Pope St. Agatho: ‘Nothing that has been regularly defined can bear diminution, or change, or addition, and repels every alteration of sense, or even of words.’ Not only must one not change the meaning of what has been defined, but not even the expression can be modified. . . One must not change the expression once it has been defined. It is the terms themselves that have been defined. If they change, the doctrine is ruined.” (p. 189)

If Vatican II’s liberal Council Fathers and theologians had followed Pope Gregory XVI’s guidance, they would have been completely handcuffed at the Council — their only real chance of success in changing Church teaching depended entirely on deviating from the clear formulations of the pre-Vatican II popes. To accomplish this, they had to introduce the notion that Vatican II was a “pastoral council” that would not define anything new.

The innovators at Vatican II said it was “pastoral” so that they could avoid having to use precise theological language, but they ended up crafting ambiguous formulas that are well beyond the comprehension of theologians, let alone the laity.

From the beginning of the Council, Archbishop Lefebvre and others saw that this “pastoral approach” was leading to ambiguities in the drafts of the Council documents. Archbishop Lefebvre’s November 27, 1962 intervention at Vatican II shows that he tried to persuade his fellow Council Fathers to avoid this ambiguity that ultimately undermined Catholic teaching:

“[I]t is of the highest importance that ‘the whole of traditional Christian doctrine be received in that exact manner, both in thought and form, which is above all resplendent in the Acts of the Council of Trent and of Vatican I,’ according to the very words of the Sovereign Pontiff. So for these very important reasons, it is absolutely essential to maintain these two objectives: to express doctrine in a dogmatic and scholastic form for the training of the learned; and to present the truth in a more pastoral way, for the instruction of other men.” (I Accuse the Council!, p. 5)

He proceeded to suggest two sets of documents: “one more dogmatic, for the use of theologians; the other more pastoral in tone, for the use of others, whether Catholic, non-catholic or non-Christian.” This would have solved a problem that the liberal Council Fathers and theologians actually desired, and so they rejected his proposal:

“The proposal met, however, with violent opposition: ‘The Council is not a dogmatic but a pastoral one; we are not seeking to define new dogmas but to put forward the truth in a pastoral way.” (I Accuse the Council!, p. 4)

In hindsight, it should be obvious that all of this was subterfuge. The innovators at Vatican II said it was “pastoral” so that they could avoid having to use precise theological language, but they ended up crafting ambiguous formulas that are well beyond the comprehension of theologians, let alone the laity. It was all a fiendishly anti-Catholic operation to have the Council “accept” ideas that had been condemned by the pre-Vatican II popes.

Pope Gregory XVI’s Mirari Vos went on to condemn the spirit of “restoration and regeneration” that animated Vatican II:

“To use the words of the fathers of Trent, it is certain that the Church ‘was instructed by Jesus Christ and His Apostles and that all truth was daily taught it by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit.’ Therefore, it is obviously absurd and injurious to propose a certain ‘restoration and regeneration’ for her as though necessary for her safety and growth, as if she could be considered subject to defect or obscuration or other misfortune. Indeed these authors of novelties consider that a ‘foundation may be laid of a new human institution,’ and what Cyprian detested may come to pass, that what was a divine thing ‘may become a human church.’”

Even before evaluating specific novelties of the Council, we can say that the entire approach of Vatican II violated fundamental Catholic ideas about how truth must be presented and defended.

Archbishop Lefebvre applied this passage to what he saw transpire at the Council:

“Restoration, regeneration, aggiornamento . . . It was by using these terms denounced by Gregory XVI that everything was perpetrated by Vatican II. Of course it is true that in the Church the faithful always need to renew themselves according to the doctrine of the Church and by the grace of the Church, by the supernatural and spiritual benefits of the Church. But it is something else entirely to dare to say that the doctrine of the Church, the sacraments, the Church’s institutions and structures need restoration and renovation.” (p. 190)

Thus, even before evaluating specific novelties of the Council, we can say that the entire approach of Vatican II violated fundamental Catholic ideas about how truth must be presented and defended.

Today we see the full extent of the damage caused by rejecting Gregory XVI’s holy wisdom. Not only do Catholics have doubts and misconceptions about particular Church doctrines, they no longer have any sense of the immutable nature of Church teaching. Catholics have seen their supposed shepherds manipulate Church teaching for sixty years, twisting it to fit their anti-Catholic objectives, and so they naturally believe that virtually everything is subject to change. Francis’s Synod on Synodality takes this to its diabolically ludicrous conclusion by showing us that a group of openly heterodox bishops, priests, nuns, and laity sitting around tables can change Church teaching if they can find a “spirit” to guide them.

Thus, we can outline the baneful consequences of deviating from Pope Gregory XVI’s holy wisdom as follows:

• Prior to Vatican II: Catholic truth must be preserved both as regards expression and meaning, and shepherds should always try to convey it as accurately as possible.
• Vatican II to Francis: You can deviate from, or even contradict, Catholic truth so long as you can look at it from a certain angle and see some faint resemblance to something that is arguably Catholic.
• Francis and His Collaborators: You can say whatever you want so long as it is not rigid Catholicism and you can find some group of nominal Catholics who will support it.

This is the fruit of Vatican II’s great sin — taking what was clear Catholic teaching and obscuring it. Yes, the innovators used this method to introduce specific ideas opposed to constant, immutable Catholic teaching, but the process itself called everything into question. So many Catholics are no longer Catholic because they have no concept that the Faith they purport to profess does not change with the whims of man.

Those clear expressions of Catholic truth from the Council documents are valid; everything else that called into question what the Church has always taught must be rejected. This is what popes prior to Vatican II taught, which is why Francis insists that we cannot be backwards Traditional Catholics.

In addition to causing unprecedented apostasy for six decades, this great sin of Vatican II constitutes a profound and ongoing offense against God. Pope Leo XIII expressed the reason in his 1896 encyclical on “The Unity of the Church,” Satis Cognitum:

“But he who dissents even in one point from divinely revealed truth absolutely rejects all faith, since he thereby refuses to honour God as the supreme truth and the formal motive of faith.”

As we say in our Act of Faith, God can neither deceive nor be deceived. But if Catholic truth changes from year to year based on the whims of shepherds, then we have been deceived and God is a liar. Through the holy wisdom of Gregory XVI and so many others, God taught His Church to reject novelties — but with Vatican II the false shepherds abandoned this great protection God had given His Church. This is arguably the single most important reason we have suffered through this crisis for over sixty years.

Faithful Catholics today naturally beg God to intervene to remove Francis and replace him with an actual Catholic pope, but we do not need to wait for this to happen to begin to emerge from the Vatican II nightmare. All confirmed Catholics can defend the Faith by insisting that no novelties or ambiguities from Vatican II or its aftermath can be Catholic. Those clear expressions of Catholic truth from the Council documents are valid; everything else that called into question what the Church has always taught must be rejected. This is what popes prior to Vatican II taught, which is why Francis insists that we cannot be backwards Traditional Catholics.

Finally, we can see from Pope Gregory XVI’s conclusion that we should ask for the Blessed Virgin Mary to intercede to crush the heresies that pollute the Church and world:

“That all of this may come to pass prosperously and happily, let Us raise Our eyes and hands to the most holy Virgin Mary, who alone crushes all heresies, and is Our greatest reliance and the whole reason for Our hope. May she implore by her patronage a successful outcome for Our plans and actions.”

Immaculate Heart of Mary, pray for us! St. Anne, pray for us! St. Athanasius, pray for us!

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