Catholic News Agency reports on the posthumous awarding of the “Saint Gianna Molla Award for Pro-Life Heroism” to Thomas Vander Woude, a Virginia farmer who died in 2008 attempting to save his son with Down syndrome from a septic tank. The article describes Vander Woude’s March for Life participation, Natural Family Planning advocacy, and prayer outside abortion facilities, while promoting his sainthood cause under the Diocese of Arlington. The report exemplifies how the conciliar sect substitutes natural virtue for supernatural faith while obscuring its doctrinal deviations.
Theological Substitution of Heroic Virtue for Sanctity
The award’s very premise constitutes theological sleight-of-hand, equating Vander Woude’s natural paternal instinct with heroic virtue (virtus heroica) in the Catholic sense. While the Church has always honored self-sacrifice, Pius XI’s Quas Primas reminds us: “The Kingdom of our Savior…is such that men prepare themselves through repentance, but cannot enter except through faith and baptism” (Quas Primas §13). The article makes no mention of Vander Woude’s sacramental life, state of grace, or devotion to the true Sacrifice of the Mass – the very foundations of sanctity.
Instead, the conciliar sect promotes a humanitarian cult of personality. Chris Vander Woude’s statement that his father “lived by these values right up to his last breath” reduces holiness to ethical behavior – precisely the naturalism condemned in the Syllabus of Errors: “Moral laws do not stand in need of the divine sanction” (Pius IX, Syllabus §56). This modernist reduction explains why the award names “St.” Gianna Molla – canonized by the antipope Wojtyla in 2004 through the defective canonization process established after Vatican II.
Natural Family Planning as Contraceptive Mentality
The article’s praise of Vander Woude’s NFP advocacy reveals the neo-church’s contraceptive mentality:
“Because various NFP methods don’t obstruct conception like contraception does, the Catholic Church accepts it as a form of family planning that is open to life.”
This misrepresents Catholic teaching. Pius XII’s Address to Midwives (1951) permitted periodic continence only for “serious motives” – a restrictive view overturned by the conciliar sect’s Humanae Vitae (1968). The Vander Woude couple’s alleged “openness to life” while teaching NFP to “young couples” suggests promotion of family limitation – condemned by Pius XI as contraceptive mentality in Casti Connubii: “any use whatsoever of matrimony exercised in such a way that the act is deliberately frustrated in its natural power to generate life is an offense against the law of God and of nature” (§54).
Pro-Life Activism Divorced from Integral Catholicism
The March for Life participation touted as proof of Vander Woude’s pro-life commitment constitutes cooperation with evil. These events consistently platform heretics and false ecumenism, exemplified by the 2024 March featuring an Eastern Orthodox speaker and “Catholic” politicians supporting contraception. True Catholic action requires what Pius X called “the union of Catholic forces” against modern errors (Il Fermo Proposito §9), not ecumenical rallies.
Moreover, the article’s focus on Down syndrome children avoids condemning the eugenic abortion regime itself. No mention is made of:
- The Church’s immutable teaching that abortion constitutes murder (Canon 2350, 1917 Code)
- The duty to refuse medical procedures that detect conditions for selective abortion
- The necessity of sacramental confession for those involved in abortion
Illegitimate Sainthood Cause
The Diocese of Arlington’s investigation into Vander Woude’s cause lacks validity, as dioceses under conciliar bishops possess no jurisdiction. True canonizations ceased with Pius XII, as subsequent “popes” lack authority. The article admits the cause’s modernist framework by quoting Karen Fioramonti: “They shared what a blessing each child is and that a parents’ mission is to raise saints” – reducing sainthood to parenthood rather than martyrdom, virginity, or extraordinary sanctity.
Even the miraculous dimension is corrupted. The article mentions an abortion facility’s conversion into a “life-affirming medical clinic” – a naturalistic outcome bearing no resemblance to the miraculous healings required for true canonizations, such as those accompanying St. Thérèse of Lisieux’s cause under Pius XI.
Award’s Masonic Parallels
The Walk for Life’s self-referential award system mirrors Masonic ceremonialism. Just as lodges create their own honors (33rd Degree, Shriner titles), the neo-church invents awards like the “St. Gianna Molla Award” to bypass the Church’s true sacramentals and canonization process. This aligns with Masonic strategy exposed in the False Fatima Apparitions file: “Stage 3 (1958-2000): Takeover of the narrative by modernists…ecumenical reinterpretation.”
The award’s timing – near the January 22 Roe v. Wade anniversary – furthers the conciliar sect’s Americanist fixation on political activism over spiritual combat. Contrast this with Pius XI’s establishment of Christ the King Sunday to combat “the plague of secularism…which has begotten all these evils” (Quas Primas §24).
Conclusion: Natural Virtue Insufficient for Eternal Life
While Thomas Vander Woude’s natural heroism deserves human commendation, the conciliar sect’s exploitation of his memory advances the modernist heresy condemned by St. Pius X: “The symbol of faith is nothing but a formula to be adapted to the varying conditions of life” (Lamentabili Sane §22). By equating earthly fatherhood with sanctity, promoting contraceptive NFP, and ignoring sacramental requirements for salvation, this award exemplifies how the neo-church substitutes the cult of man for the reign of Christ the King. Only a return to integral Catholic doctrine and sacraments can restore true pro-life witness.
Source:
St. Gianna Molla award to go to Catholic father, farmer, potential saint (catholicnewsagency.com)
Date: 11.12.2025