Vatican News Promotes Naturalistic Narrative on Christian Persecution
The conciliar portal “Vatican News” (January 15, 2026) reports on Open Doors’ World Watch List 2026, citing a record 388 million Christians allegedly facing persecution. It emphasizes Nigeria as the epicenter of violence (3,490 killed) and claims sub-Saharan Africa as Christianity’s “new center of gravity under attack.” Syria’s escalation to “extreme persecution” status and statistics on raped minors (5,202 victims) frame a narrative of victimhood devoid of supernatural perspective.
Reduction of Martyrdom to Secular Suffering Statistics
The article reduces persecution to sociological metrics—”13 killed daily,” “110 million minors at risk”—while ignoring the theology of martyrdom (theologia martyrii) defined by the Council of Trent (Session XXV) as “the most perfect testimony to the truth of the Faith”. By treating martyrs as passive victims rather than witnesses to Christ’s Kingship, the conciliar portal denies the odium fidei (hatred of the faith) required for true martyrdom. Pius XI’s Quas Primas condemned such naturalism: “When God and Jesus Christ are removed from laws… the foundations of authority are destroyed” (1925).
“The number of Christians exposed to persecution and at risk of suffering violence worldwide rose by 8 million people compared to last year—reaching a record 388 million.”
This phrasing equates confessors of the true Faith with Protestants, schismatics, and heretics counted by Open Doors—a pan-Christian entity promoting indifferentism condemned by Pius IX: “They are in error who assert all religions are equally pleasing to God” (Syllabus of Errors, Proposition 16). The report omits that 3,490 Nigerian deaths primarily involve Catholics abandoned by modernist hierarchies who refuse to condemn Islamic jihad as intrinsically evil.
Silence on Apostasy Fueling Persecution
While decrying “fragile governments,” the article ignores how conciliar heresies—especially Vatican II’s Dignitatis Humanae—demolished Catholic states that once restrained Islamist expansion. Leo XIII’s Immortale Dei (1885) established that “civil society must acknowledge God as its Founder”, yet the conciliar sect’s betrayal enabled sharia-based regimes to flourish. The portal’s quoted “expert,” Cristian Nani, laments Syria’s “300,000 remaining Christians” but suppresses how Bergoglio’s 2016 call for Muslim immigration accelerated their extinction through demographic replacement.
Ecumenical Complicity in Persecution
By citing Open Doors—an evangelical Protestant group—the conciliar portal advances the false ecumenism anathematized by Pius XI in Mortalium Animos (1928): “The union of Christians can only be promoted by returning to the one true Church.” Nowhere does the article urge Muslims to convert, instead reducing Christianity to a “minority religion” competing for secular “rights.” This violates Pius IX’s condemnation of “the error that the State should treat all religions equally” (Syllabus, Proposition 77).
Modernist Omissions as Doctrinal Crimes
The report’s gravest sin is its silence about sanctifying grace. While detailing rapes and kidnappings, it never mentions sacramental confession for victims or the Mass as reparatory sacrifice—thereby reducing the Church to a humanitarian NGO. St. Pius X’s Lamentabili Sane condemned this naturalism: “Revelation was merely man’s self-awareness of his relationship to God” (Proposition 20). True Catholics know persecution is permitted by God to purify His Church (2 Tim. 3:12)—not an accident of geopolitics.
Ultimately, this conciliar propaganda serves the Freemasonic “dialogue” agenda by masking Islam’s theological hatred of Christ’s divinity. As the Syllabus warned: “The Church listening should not cooperate with the Church teaching” (Proposition 6). Until Rome returns to the Social Kingship of Christ the King, such reports will remain funeral dirges for a counterfeit church.
Source:
Open Doors: Number of Christians persecuted worldwide rises to 388 million (vaticannews.va)
Date: 15.01.2026