The Pillar portal reports on a January 2026 meeting between the apostolic nuncio to the United States, Cardinal Christophe Pierre, and Pentagon officials, including Undersecretary of Defense Elbridge Colby, which was described by some sources as “tense” and “aggressive.” The meeting reportedly followed a speech by Leo XIV to the Vatican diplomatic corps interpreted as hostile to Trump administration policies. According to the Free Press, one U.S. official invoked the Avignon Papacy as an implied threat regarding papal independence. Both the Pentagon and Vatican denied threats were made, though the meeting’s occurrence is confirmed. The article also covers Leo XIV’s upcoming Africa trip, Chaldean patriarchal elections, Portuguese bishops cutting abuse compensation, and various other news from the conciliar structures. The entire episode exposes the fundamental impotence of the post-conciliar “Vatican” as a spiritual authority and its reduction to a geopolitical actor subject to the intimidation of secular powers.
The Avignon Threat: A Revealing Anachronism
The reported invocation of the Avignon Papacy (1309-1377) by a Pentagon official is, whether accurate or embellished, profoundly illuminating. During the original Avignon period, the French Crown exercised temporal pressure upon the papacy, but the pope in question — however personally virtuous or flawed — still claimed and exercised genuine spiritual authority as the Vicar of Christ. The threat, such as it was, concerned temporal leverage over a recognized spiritual power.
The situation in 2026 is categorically different. The conciliar sect occupying the Vatican has, through its own doctrinal revolution, systematically dismantled the spiritual authority it once possessed. The “pope” is not a spiritual leader being coerced by temporal power; he is the figurehead of a naturalistic, humanitarian organization that has already surrendered its supernatural mission. The threat is therefore hollow not because the Holy See is immune to pressure — it manifestly is not — but because there is no genuine spiritual authority left to threaten. The edifice is already hollow.
Pius XI, in Quas Primas (1925), declared with apostolic clarity: “His reign, namely, extends not only to Catholic nations or to those who, by receiving baptism according to law, belong to the Church, even though their erroneous opinions have led them astray or discord has separated them from love, but His reign encompasses also all non-Christians, so that most truly the entire human race is subject to the authority of Jesus Christ.” This universal kingship of Christ, which the pre-conciliar Church proclaimed without apology to states and emperors alike, has been entirely abandoned by the post-conciliar structures. In its place stands a “dialogue” with power that is, in reality, capitulation to power.
The Nuncio’s Visit: Diplomacy Without Doctrine
The meeting between Cardinal Pierre and Pentagon officials is presented by The Pillar as a “robust discussion of real issues,” with varying recollections of tone. What is conspicuously absent from the entire report is any indication of what was actually said regarding matters of faith and morals. The “issues” in question are, by all indications, purely political and diplomatic — matters of statecraft, immigration policy, or international relations.
This silence is deafening. The authentic diplomatic mission of the Holy See, as understood by the pre-conciliar Church, was to defend the rights of God and of souls in the temporal order. Pius IX, in the Syllabus of Errors (1864), condemned the proposition that “the Roman Pontiff can, and ought to, reconcile himself, and come to terms with progress, liberalism and modern civilization” (Proposition 80). The entire post-conciliar diplomatic apparatus is precisely this reconciliation made institutional and permanent.
The nuncio does not go to the Pentagon to proclaim Christ the King; he goes to negotiate the terms of the conciliar sect’s accommodation with secular power. The “tension” reported is not the tension between the City of God and the City of Man — it is the tension between two temporal bureaucracies disputing their respective spheres of influence. St. Augustine’s Civitas Dei has been reduced to a non-governmental organization lobbying a defense department.
The Free Press Narrative and the Conciliar Leak
The Pillar’s author, Ed Condon, engages in considerable speculation about the provenance of the Free Press story, suggesting it may have been embellished by “a junior government staffer getting a bit big for his tan shoes.” This analysis, while possibly accurate in its narrow focus, misses the larger point.
The entire episode — the meeting, the leak, the denials, the counter-denials — follows the pattern of secular political journalism. It is a story about power, perception, and leverage. The “Vatican” is covered as one more actor in the Washington political ecosystem, no different in kind from a foreign embassy or a lobbying group. This is exactly what the conciliar revolution has produced: a “Church” that operates according to the logic of secular statecraft rather than the logic of the Gospel.
Condon’s observation that “curial civil servants” do not typically leak stories that make their office look “faintly ridiculous” is telling. It reveals that the post-conciliar curia operates on the same principles of institutional self-preservation and public relations management as any secular bureaucracy. The raison d’État has replaced the salutem animarum (the salvation of souls) as the governing principle of Vatican diplomacy.
The Deeper Apostasy: Silence on the Supernatural
The most damning aspect of the entire article is what it does not say. There is no mention of the supernatural mission of the Church. There is no mention of the salvation of souls. There is no mention of the Most Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, the sacraments, the state of grace, or the final judgment. There is no mention of the rights of Christ the King over the United States or any other nation.
The article treats the “papacy” as a purely temporal and diplomatic institution, concerned with international relations, public perception, and institutional management. This is not an oversight; it is a faithful reflection of what the conciliar sect has become. The “pope” is a global diplomat and moral commentator, not the Vicar of Christ governing the universal Church in matters of faith, morals, and discipline.
St. Pius X, in Lamentabili Sane Exitu (1907), condemned the modernist proposition that “the Church is not a true and perfect society, entirely free — nor is she endowed with proper and perpetual rights of her own, conferred upon her by her Divine Founder” (cf. Syllabus, Proposition 19). The entire post-conciliar diplomatic posture confirms this condemned proposition in practice. The “Vatican” does not act as a free and divinely constituted society with its own proper rights; it acts as a supranational NGO seeking accommodation with the powers of this world.
The Africa Trip: Evangelization Without the Gospel
The article notes Leo XIV’s upcoming trip to Algeria, Equatorial Guinea, Angola, and Cameroon, with special mention of a visit to Annaba (ancient Hippo), where St. Augustine served as bishop. The invocation of St. Augustine is rich with irony.
St. Augustine, the Doctor of Grace, spent his episcopal career combating heresy, defending the necessity of grace, and proclaiming the absolute sovereignty of God over all creation. His De Civitate Dei is the definitive refutation of the notion that the City of God can be reconciled with the City of Man on the latter’s terms. The conciliar “pope” visiting Hippo is a pagan visiting the tomb of a saint whose entire theological legacy has been repudiated by the visitor’s own doctrinal revolution.
The trip is presented as “evangelization,” but the post-conciliar understanding of evangelization has been emptied of its supernatural content. It is reduced to humanitarian outreach, interreligious dialogue, and social development — the very naturalism condemned by Pius IX in the Syllabus (Propositions 1-7) and by St. Pius X in Pascendi Dominici Gregis (1907). The “first evangelization” mentioned in the article’s reference to the Dicastery for Evangelization is a bureaucratic category, not a supernatural reality.
The Chaldean Election: Eastern Churches in the Conciliar Web
The article’s coverage of the Chaldean Catholic Church’s patriarchal election following Cardinal Sako’s resignation is presented as an internal ecclesiastical matter. However, the entire framework of “Eastern Catholic Churches” as organized within the conciliar structures is itself a product of the post-conciliar revolution.
The authentic Eastern Churches have their own legitimate traditions, liturgies, and disciplines, received from the Apostles and the Fathers. But their incorporation into the conciliar system — subject to the authority of the antipope and his dicasteries — places them within the same apostate structure. The election of a new “patriarch” within this framework is not an act of the true Church; it is an act of the conciar sect wearing Eastern vestments.
Portuguese Bishops and the Abuse Crisis: Justice Without Truth
The report that Portuguese bishops cut compensation amounts recommended by an independent commission for clerical sexual abuse victims is presented as a financial and administrative matter. The Pillar notes the bishops’ conference declined to confirm the cuts initially, offering only bureaucratic procedural language.
This episode illustrates the fundamental incapacity of the conciliar structures to address the abuse crisis authentically. The pre-conciliar Church had the theological and juridical tools to address clerical crime: the theology of the priesthood, the sacrament of penance, the canonical penalties for grave offenses, and the spiritual theology of reparation. The conciliar sect, having gutted these disciplines and replaced them with therapeutic and bureaucratic models, is left with financial compensation as its only response — and even that it cannot administer honestly.
The Cardinal Electors: Managing the Conciliar Machine
The article notes that 14 cardinals have turned 80 since Leo XIV’s election, reducing the number of electors to 121, just above the limit set by John Paul II. The question of who will receive “red hats” is presented as a matter of ecclesiastical politics and demographics.
This entire framework is illegitimate. The “cardinal electors” are members of a conciliar sect that has repudiated the deposit of faith. Their “election” of a “pope” is not an act of the Holy Spirit guiding the Church; it is a political process within a human organization. The pre-conciliar Church understood the cardinalate as an office of service to the Vicar of Christ in governing the universal Church. The conciliar cardinalate is a managerial board for a global religious corporation.
Conclusion: The Abomination of Desolation Speaks and Is Heard
The entire article, read in light of the pre-conciliar magisterium, reveals the complete spiritual bankruptcy of the post-conciliar structures. The “Vatican” is not the Holy See; it is a geopolitical actor subject to the same pressures, temptations, and limitations as any secular institution. The “pope” is not the Vicar of Christ; he is the CEO of a global religious organization navigating the currents of international politics.
The Avignon threat, whether real or imagined, is ultimately irrelevant. The true Avignon — the true captivity of the Church — is not a matter of physical relocation or military intimidation. It is the doctrinal captivity that began with the conciliar revolution: the surrender of the Church’s supernatural mission to the spirit of the world. The “Vatican” does not need to be taken to Avignon; it has already surrendered to Babylon.
The faithful who desire the true Church must look beyond the conciliar structures to the integral Catholic faith preserved in the unchanging magisterium of the pre-conciliar popes, the Fathers of the Church, and the ecumenical councils — the faith that proclaims without compromise: Non est salus in alio quam in Christo (There is no salvation in any other than Christ). The conciliar sect, for all its diplomatic maneuvering and media management, has nothing to offer but the echo of its own emptiness.
Source:
Living well, listening to Leo, and living with the dead (pillarcatholic.com)
Date: 10.04.2026