The Pillar podcast (Feb. 14, 2026) discusses the concluding phase of a major reorganization of U.S. diocesan leadership under the current “papal” administration, focusing on new metropolitan archbishops and internal conflict at the University of Notre Dame. The discussion treats these appointments as routine administrative changes within a functioning ecclesial body, analyzing their characteristics and the “backlash” they provoke. This perspective is a naturalistic, bureaucratic view of a “church” that has fundamentally apostatized from the Catholic faith. From the immutable doctrine of the pre-1958 Church, the entire episode is a symptom of the abomination of desolation standing in the holy place—a conciliar sect managing its own internal affairs while utterly divorced from the Reign of Christ the King.
The “Metropolitan Turnover”: A Revolution in Ecclesiastical Governance
The podcast refers to a “great metropolitan turnover.” This language, borrowed from corporate or political science, reveals the fundamental error: the post-conciliar structures are viewed as a human organization undergoing “management” changes. The pre-1958 Church understood the hierarchy as a divine institution, a participation in the hierarchical order of the Body of Christ, where bishops are vicarii Christi (vicars of Christ) possessing ordinary, immediate, and true jurisdiction by divine right. The Syllabus of Errors, promulgated by Pope Pius IX, condemned the notion that “the ecclesiastical power ought not to exercise its authority without the permission and assent of the civil government” (Error 20) and that “the Church has not the power of using force, nor has she any temporal power, direct or indirect” (Error 24). More radically, it condemned the idea that “the Roman pontiffs have, by their too arbitrary conduct, contributed to the division of the Church” (Error 38), affirming the Supreme Pontiff’s ordinary and universal jurisdiction.
The “turnover” discussed is not a renewal but a systematic purge and replacement of bishops who held the Catholic faith with men appointed by the usurper “Pope” Leo XIV (Robert Prevost) and his predecessors since John XXIII. These appointments are intrinsically invalid because the appointing authority is not the legitimate Roman Pontiff. As St. Robert Bellarmine taught, a manifest heretic loses all jurisdiction ipso facto. The men selected are, with few exceptions, proponents of the “errors of Modernism, the synthesis of all errors” condemned by St. Pius X in Pascendi Dominici gregis and Lamentabili sane exitu. They believe in the “evolution of dogmas” (Error 54 of Lamentabili), that “the Church is an enemy of the progress of natural and theological sciences” (Error 57), and that “Christian doctrine was initially Jewish, but through gradual development, it became first Pauline, then Johannine, and finally Greek and universal” (Error 60). Their very appointment is an act of schism and apostasy, not a legitimate exercise of the Petrine ministry.
Notre Dame: The “Backlash” of a Syncretized University
The podcast mentions “internal backlash against an appointment at the University of Notre Dame.” This refers, almost certainly, to the controversy surrounding the appointment of a “priest” with a public record supporting LGBTQ+ ideologies to a leadership role at the university. The “backlash” is framed as a conflict between progressive and conservative factions within the “Church.” This is a diabolical deception. There is no “Catholic” position on this matter that can be negotiated within the conciliar framework.
The pre-1958 Church, through the Syllabus, condemned in the most absolute terms the separation of Church and State (Error 55) and the idea that “it is not lawful for the Church to define that the religion of the Catholic Church is the only true religion” (Error 21). Pope Pius XI, in Quas Primas, established the feast of Christ the King precisely to combat the “secularism of our times, so-called laicism” and to declare that “the state must leave the same freedom to the members of Orders and Congregations” and that “rulers and governments have the duty to publicly honor Christ and obey Him.” A Catholic university, therefore, must be an institution where the per infallibilem Ecclesiae auctoritatem definita (defined by the infallible authority of the Church) are not only taught but are the foundational principle of all knowledge, and where public immorality is condemned and excluded. The “backlash” at Notre Dame is not between Catholics and modernists, but between two kinds of modernists: those who wish to accelerate the revolution and those who wish to manage its pace while maintaining the facade of “Catholic” identity. Both are enemies of the immutable faith. The very existence of a “Catholic” university that must debate whether to uphold the sixth commandment is proof of the apostasy. As the Syllabus states, “the civil authority may interfere in matters relating to religion, morality and spiritual government” (Error 44)—and at Notre Dame, the civil authority of the spirit of the age has fully interfered and conquered.
The “Yes or No” Game: The Spirit of Indifferentism
JD Flynn’s Valentine’s Day “Yes or No” game is a trivialization of sacred realities. It reduces profound doctrines on marriage, the body, and the sacraments to a parlor trick. This is the logical outcome of the “hermeneutic of discontinuity” and the “spirit of Vatican II.” It embodies Error 15 of the Syllabus: “Every man is free to embrace and profess that religion which, guided by the light of reason, he shall consider true.” The casual, playful tone treats supernatural truths—the nature of marriage as a sacrament (condemned as intolerable in Error 65), the indissolubility of the marriage tie (Error 67)—as matters of personal preference. This is the religion of the homo sapiens, not the religion of the Imago Dei. It is the “cult of man” which Pius XI in Quas Primas identified as the root of societal collapse: “When God and Jesus Christ… were removed from laws and states… the foundations of that authority were destroyed.” The podcast’s tone is the very “forgetfulness and neglect of duties” that Pius XI lamented, a domestic peace “completely shattered” within the very walls of the “Church.”
Silence on the Supernatural: The Gravest Accusation
The most damning omission in the entire discussion is the complete absence of any reference to the status animarum—the state of souls. There is no mention of the necessity of actual grace, the sacraments as necessary means of salvation, the reality of mortal sin, the danger of eternal damnation, or the absolute primacy of the worship due to God. The entire conversation is conducted on the natural plane of “appointments,” “backlash,” “institutional health,” and “conversation.” This is the hallmark of Modernism, condemned by St. Pius X: it reduces religion to a “sentiment” or a “life” rather than a body of defined truths to be believed with divine faith. The pre-1958 Church taught that the primary duty of a bishop is the sanctification of souls through the preaching of the word and the administration of the sacraments. The podcast discusses bishops as administrators of a “metropolitan” territory. This is the language of the beast, not the Bride of Christ. The “metropolitan turnover” is irrelevant if the “metropolitans” are not validly ordained bishops (many are likely not, given the changed rite of episcopal consecration) and if they do not possess the Catholic faith. As Bellarmine argued, a manifest heretic cannot be a bishop. Therefore, these men are mere intruders.
Conclusion: The End of the Great Metropolitan Turnover is the Consolidation of the Apostasy
The podcast heralds the “end” of this turnover as a completion of a process. It is. It is the completion of the revolution begun at Vatican II. The new metropolitans are the final generation of the conciliar elite, men formed in the “errors of the [Syllabus]… which have been condemned” but now implemented as policy. They are the “elders fulfilling supervisory functions” of Error 50 of Lamentabili: “appointed by the Apostles as priests or bishops to ensure order in the developing communities, but they did not, in the proper sense, continue the apostolical mission and authority.” They ensure the order of the “neo-church,” not the Church of Christ. The “backlash” at Notre Dame is the last gasp of a pretended “traditionalism” within the sect, a futile attempt to use the sect’s own rules against its inherent modernist logic. The only legitimate response is to reject the entire conciliar structure, its “papal” appointments, and its “universities” as a plena apostasia (total apostasy). The true Church continues in the faithful who hold the integrum fidei depositum (entire deposit of faith) and are shepherded by bishops who have never accepted the errors of Vatican II—a tiny, persecuted remnant, not the sprawling, wealthy, and scandal-ridden “institution” discussed on the podcast. As the Syllabus thundered: “The Church, established by Christ as a perfect society… cannot depend on anyone’s will.” The podcast discusses an entity that depends entirely on the will of the modernist revolutionaries. It is not the Church of Christ. It is the synagogue of Satan.
TAGS: sedevacantism, antipope Leo XIV, metropolitan appointments, University of Notre Dame, Syllabus of Errors, Quas Primas, Modernism, Bellarmine, Pius XI, Pius IX, Pius X, Lamentabili, apostasy, hierarchy, jurisdiction
Source:
Ep. 248: Notre Dame, and the end of the great metropolitan turnover (pillarcatholic.com)
Date: 14.02.2026