The Reduction of Lent to Sentimental Almsgiving
The cited article from EWTN News reports on a Lenten campaign by the Daughters of St. Paul, in partnership with the Salesian Sisters of Don Bosco, which invites the faithful to sponsor Catholic books for distribution to various ministries. While framed as a charitable initiative, the article reveals a profound and systematic evacuation of supernatural content from the Lenten season, replacing the Church’s immutable penitential discipline with a naturalistic, human-centered “almsgiving” that embodies the very errors condemned by pre-1958 Magisterium.
The campaign’s stated purpose—to provide books on “faith formation, prayer, and discipleship”—uses post-conciliar terminology that signifies a departure from Catholic doctrine. The term “faith formation” (formatio fidei) is a Modernist coinage, replacing the traditional concept of doctrinal instruction (doctrina). This shift is not semantic but theological, reflecting the error condemned by St. Pius X: that “dogmas… are not truths of divine origin but are a certain interpretation of religious facts, which the human mind has worked out with great effort” (Lamentabili sane exitu, prop. 22). The selected book titles—such as “Brilliant! 28 Catholic Scientists” and “Jesus in Space”—prioritize natural talents and relatable narratives over the supernatural end of man (finis supernaturalis), which is the vision of God as taught by the Council of Trent. This aligns with the Modernist principle that “the principal articles of the Apostles’ Creed did not have the same meaning for the first Christians as they do for contemporary Christians” (Lamentabili, prop. 62), implying an evolving, non-dogmatic faith.
The Omission of Penance and the Reign of Christ the King
The article’s entire focus on “almsgiving” and “giving” is symptomatic of the post-conciliar Church’s deliberate silence on the essential Lenten practices of fasting, abstinence, and mortification. Sister Dyck’s statement that almsgiving “reminds us of how much we have” reduces the penitential season to a psychological exercise in gratitude, utterly divorced from its primary purpose: repairing the offense to God’s justice (satisfactio) and making reparation for sin. This omission is not accidental but doctrinal. Pope Pius XI, in Quas Primas, established the feast of Christ the King precisely to combat the secular error that “the State… could do without God.” The Lenten season, as part of the liturgical year, is a principal means by which the public and social reign of Christ is manifested through the Church’s penitential discipline. By privatizing and psychologizing Lent, the neo-church implicitly accepts the Modernist error condemned by Pius IX’s Syllabus: “It is false that the civil liberty of every form of worship… conduce more easily to corrupt the morals and minds of the people” (error 79). The article’s campaign operates entirely within the framework of a “secularized” Lent, where the primary relationship is between the individual giver and the human recipient, with God relegated to a vague “blessing” (Sister Dyck’s “He’s just given us everything”). This is the precise “indifferentism” Pius IX condemned.
The “Evangelization” of Naturalism
The Salesian Sisters’ work is described as “evangeliz[ing] through means of communication” and serving “women discerning or beginning religious life.” This use of “evangelize” for the distribution of books on prayer and faith formation is a radical distortion. Evangelization (evangelizatio) in Catholic theology is the proclamation of the Gospel with a view to conversion and incorporation into the Church, the “sacrament of salvation.” Here, it is reduced to the dissemination of religious literature, a purely natural act of information-sharing. This reflects the error from Lamentabili: “The Church… ought to tolerate the errors of philosophy, leaving it to correct itself” (prop. 11), applied now to catechetics. The books themselves—”Forgiven: A Guide to Confession & The Examen Prayer”—promote a subjectivized, non-dogmatic approach to the sacraments. The “Examen Prayer,” a Jesuit technique of personal reflection, replaces the objective, sacramental confession as the normative means of receiving God’s forgiveness, echoing the Modernist denial of the sacraments as ex opere operato. The title “Jesus in Space” further naturalizes the supernatural, framing the Incarnation as a “true story” akin to a scientific discovery, not the unique, historical, and salvific event defined by the Council of Nicaea and Chalcedon.
The Heresy of “One Body” Without Catholic Unity
Sister Dyck’s statement, “we are one body. We are one family in Christ,” is a blatant misuse of Catholic doctrine to promote a false, inclusive unity. In the true Church, the Mystical Body of Christ (Corpus Mysticum) is a hierarchical, sacramental reality comprising only those in the state of grace and in visible communion with the legitimate pastors. The phrase, as used here, is an ecumenical mantra common to all denominations, denying the Catholic doctrine that “the Church is a true and perfect society, entirely free… endowed with proper and perpetual rights” (Syllabus, error 19). By extending “family in Christ” to all recipients of the books, regardless of their faith or moral state, the article promotes the indifferentism condemned by Pius IX: “Man may, in the observance of any religion whatever, find the way of eternal salvation” (error 16). The campaign’s beneficiaries—”inner-city children,” “teens in youth groups,” “sisters in formation”—are treated as a homogeneous group in need of “resources,” not as souls with specific supernatural needs: the sacraments, doctrinal certainty, and the authority of the true Church. This is the “humanitarian” face of the conciliar apostasy, where the corporal works of mercy are separated from and made to supplant the spiritual works of mercy, especially “admonishing sinners” and “instructing the ignorant” in the unchangeable dogmas of the faith.
The Sedevacantist Reality of the “Daughters of St. Paul”
The Daughters of St. Paul, as a post-conciliar congregation, operate within the “paramasonic structure” occupying the Vatican. Their very existence after the 1960s is contingent upon the “reforms” of Vatican II, which constitute a formal rupture with Catholic tradition. The congregation’s focus on “communication” and “media” aligns with the Modernist strategy of using “the press” to disseminate error, a tactic warned against by St. Pius X: “The pursuit of novelty… leads to the most grievous errors, which become particularly pernicious when they concern sacred sciences” (Lamentabili, intro). Their partnership with the Salesian Sisters—another congregation radically altered after Vatican II—demonstrates the unified front of the neo-church. Both congregations, having accepted the conciliar documents on “collegiality,” “ecumenism,” and “religious liberty,” are ipso facto in public schism and heresy. As per the theological principles from the Defense of Sedevacantism file, a community that publicly and obstinately denies defined dogmas (e.g., the social reign of Christ, the exclusive salvific nature of the Catholic Church) is ipso facto separated from the Church. Therefore, any “almsgiving” directed to their ministries is materially and formally suspect, as it supports an apostate structure. The true Catholic, adhering to the faith of Pius IX and Pius X, must instead support only those religious institutes that have remained dogmatically and liturgically integral, which these congregations are not.
Conclusion: The Apostasy of Charitable Works Without the Faith
This Lenten campaign is a microcosm of the post-conciliar apostasy: a charitable activity that is doctrinally vacuous, spiritually lethal, and institutionally corrupt. It presents a naturalistic, Pelagian vision of salvation—where “giving” books is an end in itself, disconnected from the necessity of sanctifying grace, the sacramental system, and obedience to the true hierarchy. The article’s language of “witness” and “unity” is the empty rhetoric of the “Church of the New Advent,” which has exchanged the supernatural end of the Church—the glory of God and the salvation of souls—for a worldly project of “faith formation” and “discipleship” that denies the unique role of the Catholic Church as the sole ark of salvation. The faithful are not called to penance for their sins, nor to the public confession of Christ’s Kingship over all aspects of life as demanded by Quas Primas. Instead, they are invited to a comfortable, consumerist “sponsorship” that perpetuates the very secularism Pius XI sought to combat. This is not Catholic Lenten observance; it is the liturgical and spiritual abomination of desolation standing in the holy place, offering a semblance of piety while denying its power (cf. 2 Tim 3:5).
Source:
Daughters of St. Paul Lenten campaign to support ministry of Salesian Sisters (ewtnnews.com)
Date: 22.02.2026