EWTN News reports that “Bishop” A. Elias Zaidan, a Lebanese-born prelate occupying a chair within the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops’ Committee on International Justice and Peace, issued an appeal to President Donald Trump on April 9, 2026, urging humanitarian aid and peace negotiations for Lebanon following Israeli strikes that killed over 300 people. Zaidan expressed gratitude for the U.S.-Iran ceasefire while lamenting that Lebanon was excluded from the agreement. He called for the disarmament of Hezbollah, the implementation of U.N. resolutions, and quoted the antipope Leo XIV’s Easter message, concluding with an invocation to Our Lady of Lebanon. The article presents this as a straightforward humanitarian appeal, yet beneath its veneer of pastoral concern lies a profound theological and diplomatic capitulation that merits uncompromising scrutiny.
The Abdication of Supernatural Authority for Secular Diplomacy
The most striking feature of Zaidan’s statement is what it entirely omits: any assertion of the Church’s divine mission, any call to conversion, any mention of the sacraments as the true remedy for souls, and any recognition that the reign of Christ the King is the sole foundation of lasting peace. Pius XI, in Quas Primas, declared with apostolic authority that “the hope of lasting peace will not yet shine upon nations as long as individuals and states renounce and do not wish to recognize the reign of our Savior.” Zaidan’s appeal, by contrast, operates entirely within the framework of secular international relations — ceasefires, U.N. resolutions, humanitarian corridors, and negotiated disarmament. This is not Catholic diplomacy; it is the language of the United Nations dressed in ecclesiastical vestments.
The bishop states: “I am grateful for the ceasefire between the United States, Israel, and Iran, and pray for all sides to engage in effective dialogue to end this devastating war.” The phrase “all sides” is itself a moral relativism that places aggressor and victim on the same plane. Catholic teaching does not pray for “dialogue” between truth and error, between justice and injustice. St. Pius X, in Lamentabili Sane Exitu, condemned the modernist proposition that “the Church listening cooperates in such a way with the Church teaching in defining truths of faith, that the Church teaching should only approve the common opinions of the Church listening” (Proposition 6). Zaidan’s approach mirrors this condemned error: he treats the Church’s role as one voice among many in a pluralistic negotiation, rather than as the sole divinely appointed arbiter of faith and morals.
The Cult of U.N. Resolutions Over Divine Law
Zaidan’s call for “the implementation of the U.N. resolutions concerning Lebanon” is particularly revealing. The United Nations is a secular, humanist organization founded on the principle of the sovereign equality of states — a principle directly contrary to Catholic teaching on the social reign of Christ the King. Pius XI explicitly taught that “the State is happy not by one means, and man by another; for the state is nothing else than a harmonious association of men” and that “rulers of states therefore should not refuse public veneration and obedience to the reigning Christ” (Quas Primas). To place U.N. resolutions — the product of secular diplomacy and often of anti-Catholic agendas — on the same level as, or even above, the divine constitution of society is to commit the very error that Pius IX condemned in the Syllabus of Errors: the subordination of the Church’s authority to civil power (Proposition 19) and the assertion that “the Church ought to be separated from the State, and the State from the Church” (Proposition 55).
The 1917 Code of Canon Law, Canon 188.4, established that any cleric who “publicly defects from the Catholic faith” vacates his office by the very fact and without any declaration. While Zaidan has not formally defected in the juridical sense, his consistent recourse to secular frameworks, his silence on supernatural remedies, and his invocation of the antipope’s words constitute a pattern of practical defection that places his authority in grave doubt.
The Invocation of the Antipope and the Scandal of False Obedience
Perhaps the most damning element of the article is Zaidan’s quotation of the antipope Leo XIV’s Easter message: “May you, in the midst of feelings of pain, anxiety, and mourning, come to know in your hearts a deeper joy: Jesus has gloriously triumphed over death.” This is not a quotation from the true Vicar of Christ; it is a quotation from a usurper who occupies the See of Peter without legitimate authority. St. Robert Bellarmine, in De Romano Pontifice, taught that “a Pope who is a manifest heretic, by that very fact ceases to be Pope and head, just as he ceases to be a Christian and member of the body of the Church.” The line of usurpers beginning with John XXIII has introduced doctrinal novelties — religious liberty, ecumenism, the evolution of dogmas — that are incompatible with the perennial Magisterium. Leo XIV, formerly Robert Prevost, is the current occupant of this usurped throne.
By quoting Leo XIV as “the Holy Father,” Zaidan not only lends legitimacy to an antipope but also commits the sin of scandal, leading the faithful to believe that communion with the conciar sect is communion with the true Church. This is precisely the “negative credentialing” strategy identified in the analysis of the Fatima operation: the gradual normalization of modernist authority through the appearance of pastoral concern.
The Silence on Hezbollah’s True Nature and the Failure to Preach Conversion
Zaidan calls for “the full and immediate disarming of Hezbollah” but frames this exclusively in terms of political and military strategy. There is no mention of the spiritual roots of the conflict, no call to the conversion of Hezbollah’s members, no recognition that the true peace of Christ can only be established through the preaching of the Gospel and the administration of the sacraments. The bishop’s approach reduces the Church’s mission to that of a humanitarian NGO — a role that any secular organization could fulfill.
This silence is not accidental; it is the fruit of the conciliar revolution’s embrace of religious liberty and false ecumenism. Vatican II’s Dignitatis Humanae — a document rejected by sedevacantists as heretical — proclaimed the right of every person to religious freedom, directly contradicting the teaching of Pius IX in the Syllabus of Errors (Proposition 77: “In the present day it is no longer expedient that the Catholic religion should be held as the only religion of the State”) and the teaching of Gregory XVI in Mirari Vos. Zaidan’s appeal, by operating within this framework, implicitly endorses the conciar sect’s abandonment of the Church’s missionary mandate.
Our Lady of Lebanon: A Final Invocation Without Substance
The bishop concludes with the words: “May Our Lady of Lebanon, Queen of Peace, pray for her children in Lebanon and for the peace of the entire world.” This invocation, while superficially Catholic, is rendered hollow by the absence of any call to the means of grace that Our Lady herself has always demanded: prayer, penance, the Rosary, and the consecration of nations to the Immaculate Heart. The title “Queen of Peace” is not a talisman to be invoked at the end of a political statement; it is a title that demands the recognition of her Son’s social kingship over all nations, including Lebanon, Israel, Iran, and the United States.
Pius XI taught that the peace of Christ is only possible “in the Kingdom of Christ” and that “when all willingly accept the reign of Christ and obey Him, and every tongue will confess that our Lord Jesus Christ is in the glory of God the Father” (Quas Primas). Zaidan’s appeal, by contrast, seeks peace through ceasefires, U.N. resolutions, and humanitarian aid — all of which are mere palliatives that address symptoms while ignoring the disease: the rejection of Christ the King by individuals, families, and states.
Conclusion: The Bankruptcy of Conciliar Pastoral Care
The article from EWTN News presents Zaidan’s appeal as an act of pastoral charity. In reality, it is a textbook example of the conciliar sect’s reduction of the Church’s mission to naturalistic humanitarianism. There is no mention of the Most Holy Sacrifice of the Mass as the true source of peace, no call to the sacraments, no recognition of the Church’s divine authority over nations, and no condemnation of the modernist errors that have brought the world to its present state of war and apostasy.
The true remedy for Lebanon — and for the entire world — is not a ceasefire negotiated by the United States, not a U.N. resolution, and not a humanitarian convoy caught in crossfire. It is the social reign of Christ the King, the preaching of the Gospel to all nations, the administration of the sacraments, and the consecration of Russia (and all nations) to the Immaculate Heart of Mary — not as a private devotion, but as a public, official act of the true Church. Until the structures occupying the Vatican return to this immutable teaching, every appeal issued from that quarter will remain what Zaidan’s appeal is: a well-intentioned but spiritually bankrupt gesture that substitutes the diplomacy of Babylon for the peace of Christ.
Source:
Bishop Zaidan appeals to Trump for aid and peace in Lebanon after deadly Israeli attack (ewtnnews.com)
Date: 09.04.2026