Antipope’s “Friendship with Christ” Distorts Revelation and Undermines the Church
Vatican News portal reports (January 14, 2026) on an address by the antipope Leo XIV during his Wednesday General Audience, continuing a series on the Second Vatican Council. The article focuses on his commentary regarding Dei Verbum, the conciliar document on Divine Revelation, which he describes as “one of the most beautiful and important of the Council.” The antipope emphasizes Jesus’ words in John 15:15—”No longer do I call you servants…but I have called you friends”—claiming this establishes a “relationship of friendship” as “the only condition of the new covenant.” He urges daily personal prayer and meditation to “cultivate friendship with the Lord,” while omitting any reference to the sacraments, the necessity of grace, or the hierarchical nature of the Church. This relativistic presentation of divine revelation exemplifies the neo-modernist subversion of Catholic doctrine.
The Usurpation of Authority by a Manifest Heretic
The very premise of the article—that “Pope Leo XIV” possesses legitimate authority to interpret conciliar documents—collapses under the weight of Catholic ecclesiology. Canon 188.4 of the 1917 Code explicitly states that any cleric who “publicly defects from the Catholic faith” loses office ipso facto without declaration. St. Robert Bellarmine’s De Romano Pontifice affirms: “A pope who is a manifest heretic ceases to be pope and head, as he ceases to be a Christian” (II.30). The conciliar sect’s rejection of the Social Kingship of Christ (condemned by Pius XI’s Quas Primas), its embrace of religious liberty (against Pius IX’s Syllabus Errorum §15-18), and its destruction of the Mass (contrary to Trent’s De Defectibus) constitute public defection from divine revelation. As Pius V’s bull Quo Primum establishes, the Church’s liturgical law cannot be abrogated, yet the antipopes imposed a “table of assembly” replacing the propitiatory sacrifice. These acts confirm the vacancy of the Apostolic See since the death of Pius XII in 1958.
Dei Verbum: A Trojan Horse of Subjectivist Revelation
The antipope’s praise for Dei Verbum as promoting “friendship with Christ” masks its radical departure from Catholic teaching on revelation. The conciliar document asserts that “
God’s revelation is realized by deeds and words having an inner unity
” (§2), effectively equating historical events with divine truth—a condemned proposition from Pius X’s Lamentabili (§22: “Dogmas are interpretations of religious facts by the human mind”). This denies the depositum fidei as a completed body of unchanging truths (Trent, Session IV), reducing revelation to an evolving human experience.
By claiming friendship is “the only condition of the new covenant,” the antipope suppresses the necessity of baptism (John 3:5), membership in the Catholic Church (Boniface VIII, Unam Sanctam), and obedience to divine law (Matthew 7:21). The Council of Trent anathematizes those who say “fidem justificare sine…observatione mandatorum Dei” (faith justifies without observance of God’s commandments—Session VI, Canon XIX). Yet Dei Verbum §21 speaks of Scripture nourishing the soul in abstraction from the Church’s infallible magisterium—precisely the indifferentism condemned in Pius IX’s Syllabus (§15-17).
The Naturalization of Supernatural Life
The audience’s exclusive focus on “speaking with God” through prayer and meditation—while ignoring the sacraments as channels of grace—exposes the conciliar sect’s Pelagian tendencies. Pius XII’s Mediator Dei warns against “those who…assert that prayers offered to God in private are of more value than public liturgical prayer” (§34). The antipope’s exhortation to “
make time for prayer each day
” distills the spiritual life into a self-referential exercise, discarding the ex opere operato efficacy of the sacraments. This aligns with Modernism’s “vital immanence” condemned in Pascendi §6, where religious experience replaces objective truth.
Nowhere does the address mention repentance, the state of grace, or the Four Last Things—omissions symptomatic of the neo-church’s abandonment of the Church’s missionary mandate (Ad Gentes). As Pius XI declared in Quas Primas §18: “When once men recognize…Christ the King, society will at last receive the great blessings of real liberty, well-ordered discipline, peace and harmony.” The conciliar sect’s “friendship” paradigm reduces Christ from King to therapist.
Silence as Apostasy
The gravest failure lies in what remains unspoken: no mention of the Mass as sacrifice, no call to conversion, no warning against receiving sacraments from invalid ministers. Pius XII’s Sacramentum Ordinis and Sacra Tridentina defined the matter and form of Holy Orders and the Eucharist, yet the neo-church’s sacraments lack valid form (Paul VI’s Missale Romanum altered the ordination rite). To participate in their rituals constitutes idolatry (2 Corinthians 6:14-18). The antipope’s silence on these dangers—while promoting “liturgical and community prayer” in the conciliar rites—makes him complicit in leading souls to perdition.
St. Vincent of Lérins’ Commonitorium (§23) rebukes such innovators: “They interpret divine words…according to their private judgment, of which they think that their interpretation…cannot err.” Until the Roman See is freed from modernist occupation, the faithful must cleave to the unchanging faith preserved by true bishops consecrated before 1968, who alone offer the immemorial Sacrifice of the Mass.
The Vatican II sect’s “friendship with Christ” is a satanic parody—offering communion without conversion, revelation without authority, and salvation without the Cross. As Our Lord warned: “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 7:21).
Source:
Pope at Audience: Vatican II calls us to friendship with Christ (vaticannews.va)
Date: 14.01.2026