EWTN News reports that “Bishop” Andrew Cozzens of Crookston, Minnesota, delivered a keynote address at the National Catholic Educational Association (NCEA) convention on April 7, 2026, in which he played a video performance of pop singer Gracie Abrams singing her song “Camden” to illustrate the “gaping wounds” in the hearts of young people. Cozzens stated that educators must invite youth to “encounter Christ in their wounds” rather than seeking value from social media, AI, or politics. The article also notes that the NCEA convention featured a butter sculpture of “Pope” Leo XIV and “Puppy Love” sessions with rescue dogs. This spectacle is a damning indictment of the conciliar sect’s reduction of the Catholic faith to therapeutic emotionalism, where the salvific power of the Most Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and the sacraments is supplanted by the sentimentalism of secular pop culture.
The “Gaping Wounds” of Modernism: A Self-Inflicted Catastrophe
The very premise of Cozzens’ speech is a grotesque inversion of reality. He laments the “gaping wounds in the hearts” of young people, yet he is a prominent hierarch of the very institution — the post-conciliar Vatican II sect — that inflicted those wounds. For nearly seven decades, the structures occupying the Vatican have systematically dismantled the integral Catholic faith, replacing the unchanging dogmas, the sacred liturgy, and the rigorous moral teaching of the Church with a anthropocentric, secularized parody. The “wounds” are the direct and predictable fruit of the Modernist revolution condemned by St. Pius X.
The Saint, in his encyclical Pascendi Dominici Gregis (1907), warned that the Modernists — “the synthesis of all heresies” — would reduce religion to a mere sentiment, a feeling of the heart divorced from objective truth. Cozzens’ elevation of a Gracie Abrams pop song to the status of a pedagogical tool for “encountering Christ” is the fulfillment of this prophecy. The lyrics he cites — “All of me, a wound to close / But I leave the whole thing open” — are not a path to Christ; they are an anthem of despair, a glorification of unhealed trauma. The true remedy for the wounds of sin is not wallowing in popular culture but the grace of God received through the sacraments: Confession, where sins are actually forgiven; and the Holy Eucharist, where one receives the Author of Grace Himself.
The Abomination of Desolation: Butter Sculptures and Puppy Love
The atmosphere of the NCEA convention itself reveals the spiritual bankruptcy of the conciliar establishment. While Cozzens waxes poetic about pop singers, the convention floor featured a butter sculpture of the antipope Leo XIV and “Puppy Love” sessions with rescue dogs. This is not Catholicism; it is the abomination of desolation standing in the holy place. The reverence due to Christ the King and His Vicar has been replaced by the veneration of a heretic sculpted in dairy fat, while the spiritual needs of the faithful are addressed with animal-assisted therapy.
Pius XI, in Quas Primas (1925), established the Feast of Christ the King precisely to combat the secularism that removes Christ from public life and the governance of nations. He wrote that “the manifold evils in the world were due to the fact that the majority of men had thrust Jesus Christ and His holy law out of their lives.” The conciliar sect has not only thrust Christ out but has replaced Him with a menagerie of secular distractions. Where is the call to adore Christ in the Most Blessed Sacrament? Where is the preaching of the necessity of Confession and penance? It is drowned out by the whimpering of puppy dogs and the melting of butter idols.
“Encountering Christ in Wounds”: The Protestantization of Catholic Education
Cozzens’ exhortation to “encounter Christ in their wounds” is a hallmark of the therapeutic model that has infected Catholic education since the 1960s. This approach, rooted in the humanistic psychology of Carl Rogers and Abraham Maslow, places the “self” at the center of the spiritual journey, rather than God. It is a subtle form of the Pelagian heresy condemned by the Council of Trent, which taught that man can take the first steps towards his own salvation without the aid of prevenient grace.
The Catholic understanding of suffering is radically different. As St. Paul wrote, “I fill up in my flesh what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ for the sake of His body, which is the Church” (Colossians 1:24). Suffering, when united to the Cross of Christ, has redemptive value. It is not a wound to be “left open” in a perpetual state of emotional vulnerability but a cross to be carried with faith and hope in the promises of the Gospel. The role of a true Catholic educator is not to validate the culture of victimhood but to point the way to the Divine Physician, who alone can heal the wounds of sin through the sacramental life of the Church.
The Catechism of the Council of Trent teaches that the purpose of Christian education is to lead the soul to the knowledge and love of God, to form the mind in the truths of faith, and to direct the will towards the practice of virtue. The NCEA, by contrast, has become a platform for the dissemination of secular ideologies under a thin veneer of “Catholic” identity. The “encounter” Cozzens promotes is not with the Risen Christ of the Gospels but with the wounded “Christ” of liberal Protestantism — a Christ who is merely a facilitator of human potential, not the Judge of the living and the dead.
The Chicago Funding Cut: Persecution as a Consequence of Apostasy
The article also reports that the Chicago Public Schools (CPS) abruptly terminated funding for students with disabilities in Catholic schools, affecting over 800 students. The Archdiocese of Chicago, under “Cardinal” Blase Cupich, has protested this action as “shocking and possibly discriminatory.” While the injustice of this decision is manifest, it is necessary to ask: why is the conciliar sect surprised by persecution?
The Church has always taught that the world will hate her, just as it hated Christ (John 15:18). However, the current hostility is exacerbated by the conciliar sect’s own capitulation to the spirit of the age. By adopting the language and methods of secular humanism, the post-conciliar establishment has lost its prophetic voice. When “Catholic” schools are indistinguishable from their secular counterparts in all but name, why should the state treat them with any special consideration? The true Church, faithful to her divine mission, has nothing to fear from the world, for her strength comes not from government grants but from the promise of Christ: “The gates of hell shall not prevail against her” (Matthew 16:18).
Sacred Heart Virtual Academy: The Democratization of Mediocrity
The launch of the Sacred Heart Virtual Academy by the Archdiocese of Atlanta is presented as a response to the demand for home-schooling options. However, this initiative is fraught with danger. The history of “Catholic” online education in the post-conciliar era is a history of doctrinal compromise and liturgical abuse. The partnership with Catholic Education Services, a provider of “flexible learning platforms,” raises serious questions about the content and orthodoxy of the curriculum.
True Catholic education requires the formation of the whole person — soul, mind, and body — under the guidance of the Church’s Magisterium. It is not a product to be delivered via a “flexible learning platform.” The Code of Canon Law (1917), in Canon 1372, mandates that Catholic education must be under the authority of the Church and must conform to the principles of faith and morals. The virtual academy, by its very nature, risks further isolating young people from the communal life of the Church and the sacramental grace that is the true source of their salvation.
Conclusion: The Bankruptcy of the Conciliar Project
The spectacle of a “bishop” citing Gracie Abrams as a guide for the youth, while the convention floor hosts butter sculptures and puppy therapy, is a microcosm of the conciliar sect’s total collapse. The faith has been reduced to a feeling, the liturgy to a social gathering, and the hierarchy to a group of middle managers navigating the currents of secular culture.
The way forward is not through more “encounter” sessions with pop stars but a return to the unchanging Tradition of the Church. As the Syllabus of Errors (1864) of Pius IX condemned the proposition that “the Roman Pontiff can, and ought to, reconcile himself, and come terms with progress, liberalism and modern civilization” (Proposition 80), so too must the faithful reject the false reconciliation of Cozzens and his ilk. The only true healing for the wounds of the modern world is the integral Catholic faith, preached in its fullness, lived in the sacraments, and defended without compromise. Extra Ecclesiam nulla salus — outside the Church, there is no salvation. And the Church is not a butter sculpture; she is the Mystical Body of Christ, founded on the Rock of Peter, and guided by the Holy Ghost until the end of time.
Source:
Minnesota bishop: Singer Gracie Abrams helps young people confront 'gaping wounds in their hearts' (ewtnnews.com)
Date: 11.04.2026