Ecclesia Militans: Profession

Ecclesia Militans

Profession of Faith

We believe firmly in all that our Holy Mother, the Catholic, Apostolic and Roman Church, believes and teaches, and in this Faith we wish to live and die, since only in the Church is God honored and salvation found. We believe that Jesus Christ has founded one only Church, the Catholic hierarchical Church, whose chief pastors are the Pope and the Bishops in union with the Pope, and whose aim is to ensure that men of all ages reach the salvation obtained for us by Our Lord Jesus Christ, together with all the benefits that radiate from it, and to promote on earth the Reign of Our Lord (Mt. 28: 19-20). To do this, the Church does not preach a "new doctrine" but, with the aid of the divine Holy Spirit, faithfully explains the Deposit of Faith received from the Apostles and religiously preserved by her (Vatican Council I).

We profess communion with the See of Peter, in the legitimate successor to which we recognize the primacy and government over the Universal Church, pastors and faithful, and nothing in this world would separate us from the Rock on which Jesus Christ has founded His Church. We believe firmly in papal infallibility as Vatican Council I has defined it. We respect the power of the Holy Father, which is supreme even if not absolute or without limits. It is subordinate to and cannot contradict Sacred Scripture, Traditions and the definitions already proclaimed by the Church in Her constant Magisterium. Moreover this power cannot be arbitrary or despotic, such as to impose unconditional obedience or absolve subjects from personal responsibility. We owe unconditional and unlimited obedience only to God.

We are Catholic, Apostolic, Roman and shall be so until death, with the grace of God, and no power or authority will drive us from Holy Church. We profess the Catholic Faith in an integral and total manner, as it was always professed and transmitted by the Church, by the Sovereign Pontiff, by Councils, and therefore in loyal and perfect continuity and consistency, without excluding a single article of faith. We reject and anathematize, with the same firmness, all that has been refuted and condemned by Holy Church.

Together with all the Popes, we condemn Heresy and all that can favor it. We particularly condemn Protestantism, liberalism, spiritism, naturalism, rationalism, and modernism, in all forms and variants whatever, just as the Popes have done. We reject equally, together with the Popes and in the same way they have done, all the consequences of these errors. For these reasons we condemn the present heresy that takes the name of "Progressivism," an improper name besides, since it is nothing but the repetition of the errors long ago condemned by Holy Church. We accept therefore the entire applicability of the words of St. Paul: "Even if we ourselves or an angel from heaven preach to you a gospel different from that which we have preached, let him be anathema". (Gal. 1:8) Thus, the tendencies of whatever sort emanating even from persons in authority, whenever they be contrary to traditional Catholic doctrine as it has always been taught, giving free rein to the errors already condemned by the Popes and by the Councils, demand from our conscience a formal rejection. We affirm in consequence that, whatever contradiction becomes manifest between what is taught today and what Tradition teaches, there is a duty to follow what was always taught by all and in every part of the Church, because only this is truly and properly Catholic. (St. Vincent of Lekins, Comm., Ench. Patr. 2168)

For all these reasons, and to be consistent with what the Church our Mother has always taught us in Her constant Magisterium, with the Faith of our baptism, of our confirmation, of our first Communion, in order not to be perjurers and contradict what we have always believed-for all these reasons - we reject:

The New Mass, not because it is invalid, but because it is unfitting to the honor due Christ: whether in Latin or in the vernacular, since "it represents, both as a whole and in its details, a striking departure from the Catholic theology of the Holy Mass as it was formulated in Session XXIII of the Council of Trent" (Letter of Cardinals Ottaviani and Bacci to Paul VI, 5/10/69). In fact the new Order of Mass obscures the expressions intended to underline the Eucharistic dogmas, bringing the Mass close to the Protestant supper and not accentuating the clear profession of the Catholic Faith. The New Moral Theology- subjective, opportunist, contaminated by permissive liberalism, in which little or nothing any longer constitutes a sin.

The Profanation of the Church by dress always considered immodest, just as by certain kinds of music and instruments already rejected by the Church for her places of worship. The New Theology of modernism that founds the whole Catholic religion on the evolution of the religious instinct of the first Christian Communities. The New Catechisms, purveyors more or less covertly of the modernist errors and not infrequently vehicles of subversive political doctrines.

The Theology of Liberation, based on a new interpretation of the Gospel, completely opposed to the teachings always held by the Church, and calculated to favor Marxist machinations. The Trend towards Socialism and Communism that manifestly contradicts the whole social doctrine of the Church and scorns the excommunications of Pius XII directed against those who collaborate in any way with communism. The Secularization of the Clergy, causing grave scandal to the faith and the inevitable impoverishment of Christian life. The Conforming to the spirit of the world on the part of the clergy and that faithful in complete opposition to the teaching of our Lord and to the spirit of mortification, teaching and example of Jesus Crucified. The Reform of the Seminaries, carried out in line with these new tendencies. The Obsessive concern for Human Progress that leads to disregard for the specific purpose of the Church which is the salvation of souls.

The Dilution of true spirituality in a vague religious sentimentalism. The Ecumenism that makes the Faith grow cold and makes us forget our Catholic identity, seeking to negate the antagonism between light and darkness, between Christ and Belial (cg. II Cor. 6:14-18), and leads to a panchristianity "a most grave error and capable of destroying the foundations of the Catholic Faith at their base" (Encyclical, Mortalium Animos of Pius XI). Religious Liberty, understood in the sense of an equalization of rights between truth and error, giving supremacy to a supposed subjective right of man, to the prejudice of the absolute right of Truth, of Good, of God, and as a consequence laicizing the State, rendered agnostic towards the true Religion. The Horizontalism of the Religion of Man, that concretizes what St. Pius X calls the "Monstrous and detestable iniquity proper to the times in which we are living, through which man substitutes himself for God" (Enc. Supremi Apostolatus). Democratization of The Church by means of a collegial government in opposition to the hierarchical and monarchical constitution given to Her by Our Lord. Laicization of Society, that brings to life once more the cry of the Jews at the death of Jesus refusing to accept His social Kingship and not even recognizing in Him the Supreme Legislator of human society.

Thus, in the name of Faith, with tranquil conscience, we reject all those who introduce the "smoke of Satan" into the Church and apply themselves to her self-destruction (cf. Paul VI, Allo. of 7/12/68).