VaticanNews portal (April 26, 2026) reports on the Regina Caeli address of the usurper Leo XIV, in which he invites the faithful to trust the Lord and warns against “thieves” who seek to destroy joy and peace. The address, framed in the language of the Gospel of John, contrasts the Good Shepherd with those who would rob the faithful of their joy. Yet beneath this seemingly innocuous pastoral exhortation lies the same naturalistic, modernist reductionism that has characterized every utterance from the occupants of the Vatican since the abomination of desolation took possession of the Holy Place. What is presented as spiritual counsel is, in reality, a masterclass in omission — a discourse so devoid of supernatural substance that it could have been delivered by any secular motivational speaker, and so saturated with the conciliar spirit of horizontalism that it constitutes yet another act of sabotage against the integrity of the Catholic faith.
The Good Shepherd Without the Cross: A Christ Stripped of His Kingship
The usurper Leo XIV opens his address by recalling the Gospel of John’s parable of the Good Shepherd and the thief. He states: “The Lord does not come to take anything from us. Rather, He is the Good Shepherd who increases life and offers it to us in abundance.” On the surface, this appears unobjectionable. But let us examine what is actually being said — and, more critically, what is being left unsaid.
The Christ of Leo XIV is a Christ who merely “increases life” and offers it “in abundance.” This is the therapeutic Christ of the conciliar revolution — a Christ who exists to enhance our psychological well-being, to make us feel fulfilled, to add to our lives rather than to demand everything from them. Where is the Christ who declares: “If any man will come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me” (Matt. 16:24)? Where is the Christ who says: “I came not to send peace, but a sword” (Matt. 10:34)? Where is the Christ before whom Pilate trembled, the Christ of the Apocalypse who judges the nations, the Christ whose reign demands the obedience of every civil authority, every ruler, every state?
Pius XI, in the encyclical Quas Primas (1925), established the Feast of Christ the King precisely to combat the secularism that was already poisoning human society. He wrote with unmistakable 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.” And further: “The state is happy not by one means, and man by another; for the state is nothing else than a harmonious association of men.” For Pius XI, Christ’s kingship was not a metaphor for personal fulfillment — it was a juridical and theological reality demanding the subordination of every human society to the laws of God.
Leo XIV’s Christ, by contrast, is a Christ who “does not come to take away our life or freedom, but to lead us along the right path.” This is the language of the self-help industry, not of the Gospel. The true Christ does take away — He takes away our sin through the sacrament of confession, He takes away our self-will through mortification, He takes away our attachment to the world through the counsel of perfection. The true Christ demands that we lose our lives in order to save them. The usurper’s Christ merely “enlightens” our conscience and “opens” our joys “to a deeper and lasting happiness.” This is not the Christ of Calvary. This is the Christ of the New Age, dressed in Catholic vestments.
The Anatomy of Omission: What the Usurper Refuses to Name
The most damning feature of Leo XIV’s address is not what he says, but what he refuses to say. He warns against “thieves” who seek to destroy joy and peace, and he offers a catalog of these threats: “people who, regardless of appearances, suppress our freedom or fail to respect our dignity; beliefs and biases that prevent us from viewing others and life with serenity; mistaken ideas that can lead us to make negative choices; or superficial and consumeristic lifestyles that leave us empty on the inside and push us to live constantly beyond ourselves.”
Let us examine this list with the precision it deserves. “People who suppress our freedom” — but who are they? Is Leo XIV referring to the tyrants who persecute the Church? Is he referring to the modernist hierarchy that has systematically dismantled the Most Holy Sacrifice, corrupted the sacraments, and led countless souls into apostasy? No. The language is deliberately vague, encompassing everything and nothing. It could refer to a tyrannical employer, a difficult family member, or a political opponent. It is the language of therapeutic Christianity, in which the greatest enemy is not sin, not heresy, not apostasy, but anything that makes us feel uncomfortable.
Then comes the second category: “beliefs and biases that prevent us from viewing others and life with serenity.” This is the language of indifferentism — the heresy condemned by Pope Pius IX in the Syllabus of Errors, which explicitly rejects the proposition that “every man is free to embrace and profess that religion which, guided by the light of reason, he shall consider true” (Proposition 15) and that “man may, in the observance of any religion whatever, find the way of eternal salvation” (Proposition 16). For Leo XIV, the “thief” is not the heretic who denies the divinity of Christ or the apostate who rejects the authority of the Church — it is anyone whose convictions disturb our “serenity.” The implication is clear: firm doctrinal conviction itself is suspect, because it prevents us from viewing “others and life with serenity.” This is the religion of the Council — a religion in which peace is preferred to truth, and tolerance is elevated above the rights of God.
The third category — “mistaken ideas that can lead us to make negative choices” — is equally vacuous. What constitutes a “mistaken idea”? For the Catholic, a mistaken idea is any proposition that contradicts the defined teaching of the Magisterium. For Leo XIV, it appears to be anything that leads to choices he deems “negative” — a standard so subjective as to be meaningless. And the fourth category — “superficial and consumeristic lifestyles” — reduces the spiritual life to a critique of materialism, as if the greatest danger to the soul were not mortal sin, not heresy, not the loss of the faith, but the acquisition of material goods.
The Thieves Who Go Unnamed: A Conspiracy of Silence
Perhaps most revealing is Leo XIV’s identification of the “thieves” who threaten our future: “those who, by pillaging the earth’s resources, waging blood-thirsty wars, or fueling evil in any form, do nothing but rob each of us of the possibility of a future marked by peace and serenity.”
Here, at last, we arrive at the political dimension of the address — and here the modernist agenda is laid bare. The “thieves” are environmental destroyers, warmakers, and those who “fuel evil in any form.” But who are these people? They are never named. The address operates at the level of abstraction, condemning “evil in any form” without ever identifying the specific evils that are destroying the Church and the world.
Where is the condemnation of Freemasonry, which Pope Leo XIII identified as the driving force behind the persecution of the Church in Humanum Genus? Where is the condemnation of communism, which popes from Pius IX to Pius XII fought with every weapon at their disposal? Where is the condemnation of modernism, which St. Pius X called “the synthesis of all heresies”? Where is the condemnation of the conciliar revolution itself — the greatest theft in the history of the Church, which has robbed the faithful of the Most Holy Sacrifice, the true sacraments, and the unchanging deposit of faith?
The answer is obvious: these thieves go unnamed because they are the very forces that installed Leo XIV on the throne of Peter. The environmentalism, the pacifism, the abstract humanitarianism — these are the hallmarks of the conciliar sect, the fruits of the Second Vatican Council, which replaced the supernatural mission of the Church with a program of dialogue with the world. Pius IX, in the Syllabus of Errors, 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). This is precisely what Leo XIV does — and what every usurper since John XXIII has done. They reconcile the Church with the world, and in doing so, they rob the faithful of the only thing that matters: the means of salvation.
The Language of the New Church: Bureaucratic, Therapeutic, Empty
The linguistic register of Leo XIV’s address deserves its own analysis, for it reveals the theological bankruptcy of the conciliar project more clearly than any doctrinal proposition could.
Consider the vocabulary: “joy,” “peace,” “serenity,” “freedom,” “dignity,” “abundance,” “happiness.” These are the words of a Church that has abandoned its supernatural mission and reduced itself to a provider of emotional comfort. They are the words of the post-conciliar “Church of the New Advent,” a paramasonic structure that has replaced the preaching of the Gospel with the language of human rights and psychological well-being.
Now contrast this with the language of the true Church. St. Pius X, in Lamentabili Sane Exitu (1907), condemned the modernist proposition that “the dogmas of faith should be understood according to their practical function, i.e., as binding in action, rather than as principles of belief” (Proposition 26). This is precisely what Leo XIV does — he treats the Gospel not as a body of truths to be believed, but as a source of practical guidance for living a more fulfilling life. The Good Shepherd is not presented as the Second Person of the Blessed Trinity, truly God and truly Man, who offered Himself as a propitiatory sacrifice for the sins of the world. He is presented as a model of good leadership, a figure who “knows us, calls us by name, guides us, and seeks us out when we are lost.” This is not theology — it is pastoral counseling.
The tone is equally revealing. It is cautious, bureaucratic, and devoid of the fire that characterized the preaching of the saints. Where is the urgency of St. John the Baptist crying out in the wilderness? Where is the wrath of Our Lord driving the money changers from the Temple? Where is the thunder of St. Peter on Pentecost, commanding the crowd to “Do penance, and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ, for the remission of your sins” (Acts 2:38)? In its place, we have the measured, therapeutic tone of a man who is more concerned with not offending anyone than with saving souls.
Mary Reduced to a Travel Companion
Leo concludes his address by “entrusting all to the intercession of Mary, praying the Blessed Mother may accompany us on our journey.” This single sentence encapsulates the Mariology of the conciliar revolution — a Mariology in which the Mother of God is reduced to a gentle companion who “accompanies” us on our journey, rather than the powerful Mediatrix of all graces, the Terror of Demons, the Co-Redemptrix whose Immaculate Heart the true Church has always venerated.
Where is the Mary of Fatima — or rather, where is the authentic Catholic understanding of Mary’s role in the economy of salvation? The conciliar sect has systematically downgraded Marian devotion, replacing the rosary with ecumenical prayer services, substituting the traditional May devotions with interfaith gatherings, and reducing the Blessed Virgin to a symbol of maternal love rather than the Queen of Heaven and Earth. Leo’s Mary is a Mary who “accompanies” — a Mary who walks beside us, rather than a Mary who crushes the head of the serpent.
The Verdict: A Sermon Fit for the Abomination of Desolation
What, then, is the true nature of Leo XIV’s Regina Caeli address? It is a sermon that could have been delivered by any liberal Protestant minister, any New Age guru, or any secular humanist. It contains not a single reference to the sacraments, not a single mention of the state of grace, not a single warning about mortal sin, not a single call to repentance, not a single affirmation of the necessity of the Catholic Church for salvation. It is, in the fullest sense of the word, a sermon without content — a sermon that says nothing, condemns nothing, and demands nothing.
This is the genius of the conciliar revolution: it has created a form of religious discourse that is capable of filling hours of airtime and pages of print without ever communicating a single supernatural truth. It is a religion of words without substance, of gestures without meaning, of rituals without power. It is the religion of the Antichrist — a religion that mimics the forms of Catholicism while emptying them of all content.
St. Robert Bellarmine, whose authority on the question of a heretical pope is beyond dispute, 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” (De Romano Pontifice, Book II, Chapter 30). The usurper Leo XIV, by his persistent refusal to preach the fullness of Catholic doctrine, by his reduction of the Gospel to a program of psychological well-being, and by his reconciliation of the Church with the errors of modern civilization, has demonstrated beyond any reasonable doubt that he is not the Successor of Peter. He is a thief — and the greatest of thieves, for he has entered not through the gate but by another way, and he has come not to give life but to steal it.
The faithful who desire salvation must reject this usurper and his empty words. They must return to the unchanging Tradition of the Church — to the Most Holy Sacrifice of the Mass as offered before the conciliar revolution, to the true sacraments administered by validly ordained priests, to the integral Catholic faith as taught by the Fathers, the Councils, and the popes up to and including Pius XII. There is no other path. As Our Lord Himself declared: “I am the door. By Me, if any man enter in, he shall be saved” (John 10:9). Leo XIV is not the door. He is the thief. And the faithful must not let him rob them of their joy, their peace, or — most importantly — their faith.
Source:
Pope at Regina Caeli: Don't let 'thieves' rob your joy and peace (vaticannews.va)
Date: 26.04.2026