Neo-Modernist “Apologetics” Masquerade in Southwark Archdiocese
Catholic News Agency (January 9, 2026) reports the Archdiocese of Southwark, England, has launched an “Ambassadors for Christ” program—a YouTube-based apologetics course promising “evidence-based answers” to questions about Catholicism. The initiative, praised by Archbishop John Wilson and Fr. Dermott O’Gorman, claims to respond to rising conversions while equipping Catholics to answer questions like “Is Jesus really God?” and “What happens during Mass?” Sociologist Stephen Bullivant theorizes this growth reflects secularization’s exhaustion, allowing Christianity to appear “new and exciting” to youth.
Naturalism Disguised as Evangelization
The project’s fixation on “evidence-based answers” exposes its philosophical bankruptcy. Pius X condemned this very error in Pascendi Dominici Gregis (1907), identifying Modernism’s core lie: “Faith is based on experience, not objective truth” (¶7). By reducing divine revelation to empirically verifiable data—treating the Hypostatic Union like a laboratory hypothesis—Southwark’s program undermines the supernatural virtue of faith, which the Catechism of Trent defines as “assent to revealed truths because of God’s authority” (De Fide, Q.4).
Archbishop Wilson’s statement—
“As someone who converted to Catholicism as a teenager myself, I know what it is like to search for answers, to thirst for the truth, which only the Lord Jesus offers”
—reveals a subjectivist foundation. Contrast this with the Oath Against Modernism (1910): “I hold with certainty and sincerely confess that faith is not a blind sentiment of religion welling up from the hidden recesses of the subconscious… but a genuine assent of the intellect to truth received by hearing from an external source”.
The Conciliar Sect’s Self-Referential Authority
Claims that videos are “thoroughly checked by theologians to ensure accuracy and fidelity to Church teaching” ring hollow when emanating from structures that have systematically dismantled dogma since Vatican II. Consider:
– The Lamentabili Sane (1907) condemned the proposition that “Ecclesiastical judgments and censures prove Catholic dogmas contradict Christian origins” (Proposition 3). Yet Southwark’s theologians operate under a sect that has abolished the Index of Forbidden Books and canonized false mystics like Faustyna Kowalska.
– When Wilson states,
“It is the Catholic Church, founded by Jesus, where people will find the answers”
, he deceitfully conflates the eternal Church with the counterfeit conciliar institution—a structure Pius IX anathematized for holding that “The Roman Pontiff can reconcile himself with progress, liberalism, and modern civilization” (Syllabus of Errors, Proposition 80).
Youth Apostasy as Mission Field
Fr. O’Gorman’s lament—
“In a world where [youth] feel disillusioned and lost, our young people are searching for meaning”
—admits the conciliar sect’s catastrophic failure while proposing more of the same poison. The true Church knows youth apostasy stems from the Novus Ordo’s destruction of sacramental piety and the abolition of Catholic education. Pius XI’s Divini Illius Magistri (1929) mandated that education “must have for its immediate and chief aim the Christian formation of souls” (¶95)—not YouTube videos supervised by invalidly ordained clerics.
Bullivant’s sociological analysis—suggesting Christianity thrives because cultural antibodies have “worn off”—confirms the program’s naturalism. The Church has always taught conversions result from grace, not generational mood shifts. As the Council of Trent decreed: “When adults are converted… it is the preparatory disposition itself which is the work of the predisposing grace of God” (Session VI, Chapter VI).
Omissions That Condemn
Nowhere does Southwark mention:
– The necessity of the True Mass (abolished by Paul VI’s apostate rite) for sustaining conversions.
– The sacraments as the sole channels of grace—impossible to receive validly in conciliar structures due to doubtful ordinations and heretical intent.
– The Four Last Things (Death, Judgment, Heaven, Hell)—the very foundation of Catholic urgency.
Instead, the program reduces Catholicism to a self-help scheme, epitomized by Wilson’s injunction:
“Feel confident and assured of your faith”
—a far cry from St. Paul’s “Work out your salvation with fear and trembling” (Philippians 2:12).
Conclusion: Ambassadors for the Antichurch
This initiative is not merely flawed—it is sacramental and doctrinal sabotage. By replacing the sensus fidei with YouTube tutorials, Southwark’s pseudo-clergy perpetuate the conciliar revolution’s defining heresy: that the Church is a human society adaptable to modern “searching,” rather than the sole Ark of Salvation outside which no one is saved (Pius IX, Singulari Quadem). As St. Pius X warned: “The Modernist apologist denies Catholicism to be the work of God; he treats it as the work of man” (Pascendi, ¶36). Until the last usurper vacates Peter’s throne, such programs will only deepen the apostasy.
Source:
English diocese responds to rising conversions with evidence-based faith training (catholicnewsagency.com)
Date: 09.01.2026