Let me process the article and construct the critique.
[Antichurch] When “Casting Out Demons” Becomes Denouncing Political Regimes: The Modernist Reduction of the Supernatural
Exiled Nicaraguan auxiliary bishop Silvio Báez, living in Miami after being expelled from his homeland by the Ortega regime, delivered a homily at St. Agatha Parish on June 14, 2026, in which he reinterpreted Christ’s commission to the Twelve Apostles to “cast out demons” as a mandate to “denounce the irrationality and cruelty of regimes that violate human dignity.” The EWTN News article reports that Báez equated the driving out of demons with “committing ourselves to processes of personal and social liberation” and “helping those trapped by idols, fear, or hopelessness to regain their freedom.” The prelate, a vocal opponent of the Nicaraguan dictatorship, further stated that “cleansing the lepers means striving to restore dignity to those marginalized by society or religion, through gestures of inclusion, solidarity, and respectful dialogue.” This homily is a textbook case of the modernist dissolution of the supernatural order into naturalistic social activism — a reduction of sacred ministry to the categories of secular political liberation, dressed in the vestments of the Gospel but emptied of all transcendent content.
The Demons That Are Not Demons: A Modernist Reinterpretation of Sacred Scripture
The most immediate and devastating problem with Bishop Báez’s homily is his systematic redefinition of the supernatural mission of the Church in purely naturalistic and political terms. When Our Lord Jesus Christ empowered the Twelve Apostles to “cast out demons” (Matthew 10:1), He was conferring upon them a genuine spiritual power over real, personal, fallen angelic beings — daimonia, unclean spirits, the very enemies of God and man. The Church has always understood this power in its literal, supernatural sense. The Council of Trent, in its sixth session, canon 21, affirms the reality of the sacramental power to combat the forces of darkness. The Roman Ritual contains an entire order of exorcism, presupposing the objective existence of demonic possession and the Church’s divinely mandated authority to expel Satan and his minions.
Báez, however, performs a hermeneutical operation that would have been condemned by Saint Pius X in the Decree Lamentabili sane exitu (1907), which rejected the proposition that “the prophecies and miracles set forth and recorded in the Sacred Scriptures are the fiction of poets” (proposition 7). By reducing “casting out demons” to “denouncing the cruelty of regimes,” Báez effectively demythologizes the Gospel — he strips it of its supernatural content and reduces it to a program of political advocacy. This is not Catholic exegesis; it is the very rationalism condemned by Pope Pius IX in the Syllabus of Errors, which anathematized the proposition that “human reason, without any reference whatsoever to God, is the sole arbiter of truth and falsehood” (proposition 3).
Consider the precise language Báez employs: “Casting out demons means committing ourselves to processes of personal and social liberation, and helping those trapped by idols, fear, or hopelessness to regain their freedom.” The word “means” here is not analogical — it is redefinitive. He is not saying that the Church’s spiritual combat against demonic forces has social consequences; he is saying that the exorcism of demons is social and political liberation. This is a categorical error of the most dangerous kind, because it replaces the supernatural order with the natural order as the primary field of the Church’s mission.
Saint Pius X, in Pascendi Dominici gregis (1907), identified precisely this tendency as the hallmark of Modernism: the reduction of religious truths to subjective experience and social utility. The modernist, he wrote, treats dogmas not as objective truths revealed by God but as “a certain interpretation of religious facts, which the human mind has worked out with great effort” — a proposition explicitly condemned in Lamentabili (proposition 22). Báez’s homily is a living illustration of this condemned error.
The Omission of the Supernatural: Silence as Apostasy
What is absent from Báez’s homily is just as damning as what is present. Nowhere in the reported text does the bishop mention the reality of Satan as a personal being, the existence of actual demonic possession, the sacramental power of the Church to combat the devil through exorcism, prayer, fasting, and the sacraments. There is no mention of the Most Holy Sacrifice of the Mass as the supreme weapon against the powers of darkness. There is no reference to the necessity of baptism for liberation from the dominion of Satan. There is no call to repentance, confession, or the state of grace as prerequisites for spiritual freedom.
This silence is not accidental — it is theologically diagnostic. The post-conciliar Church has systematically emptied its discourse of supernatural content, replacing the language of sin, grace, damnation, and salvation with the secular vocabulary of “human dignity,” “inclusion,” “dialogue,” and “social liberation.” Pope Pius XI, in the encyclical Quas primas (1925), established the Feast of Christ the King precisely to combat this tendency, declaring 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.” The reign of Christ, Pius XI insisted, is not a metaphor for social justice — it is a real, universal, and supernatural sovereignty over all creation, including “all non-Christians, so that most truly the entire human race is subject to the authority of Jesus Christ.”
Báez’s homily inverts this order entirely. For him, the “compassion” of Christ (which he does mention) leads not to the proclamation of the Kingdom of God but to the denunciation of political regimes. The “power” Jesus granted the Apostles is reinterpreted as “a power at the service of life and human dignity” — language that could have been lifted directly from a United Nations human rights declaration. The supernatural power to cast out real demons, heal real spiritual afflictions, and conquer the kingdom of Satan is reduced to political opposition to the Ortega government.
“Resurrecting the Dead” as Restoring Hope: The Hermeneutics of Dissolution
Perhaps the most revealing passage in Báez’s homily is his interpretation of “raising the dead.” He states that resurrecting the dead “is restoring hope to those who no longer expect anything, helping them discover glimmers of God’s light in the middle of the nights of life. It’s announcing, without tiring, the God of language.” This is not merely a metaphor — it is a systematic dissolution of the miraculous into the psychological.
When Christ raised Lazarus from the dead (John 11:1-44), He performed a literal, physical, supernatural miracle — a sign of His divine authority over death itself. The Church has always understood the power to raise the dead as a genuine miraculous charism, exercised by saints such as Saint Francis Xavier, Saint John of the Cross, and others. To reduce this to “restoring hope” is to deny the reality of the miraculous altogether — an error condemned by the First Vatican Council, which affirmed that “if anyone shall say that miracles can never be recognized with certainty… let him be anathema” (Dei Filius, canon 4).
Furthermore, Báez adds that raising the dead “is also to oppose the oppressive powers that subjugate people, with the conviction that God accompanies and blesses the efforts made for the freedom and dignity of people.” Here, the resurrection of the dead — the supreme sign of Christ’s divinity — is made subordinate to political liberation theology. The God of the resurrection becomes a cheerleader for human political efforts. This is not Catholicism; it is the “dogmaless Christianity” condemned by Saint Pius X in Lamentabili (proposition 65): “Contemporary Catholicism cannot be reconciled with true knowledge without transforming it into a certain dogmaless Christianity, that is, into a broad and liberal Protestantism.”
“Cleansing Lepers” Through “Respectful Dialogue”: The Ecumenical Captivity
Báez’s interpretation of “cleansing the lepers” is equally revealing and equally erroneous. He states that it “means striving to restore dignity to those marginalized by society or religion, through gestures of inclusion, solidarity, and respectful dialogue.” The phrase “respectful dialogue” is a hallmark of the post-conciliar ecumenical project — the same “dialogue” that has led the conciliar sect to treat heretics, schismatics, and even pagans as partners in conversation rather than as souls to be converted to the one true Faith.
When Christ cleansed lepers (Luke 17:11-19), He performed a miraculous act of physical healing that was simultaneously a sign of spiritual cleansing. The Church has always understood the healing of leprosy as a figure of the forgiveness of sins accomplished through the sacrament of penance. To reduce this to “gestures of inclusion, solidarity, and respectful dialogue” is to replace the sacramental order with the order of secular humanitarianism.
Moreover, the phrase “marginalized by society or religion” is deeply ambiguous. Which “religion” marginalizes? Is Báez suggesting that the Catholic Church itself marginalizes? This is the language of the conciliar revolution — the same revolution that, since John XXIII’s aggiornamento, has sought to make the Church “relevant” to the modern world by abandoning its supernatural mission in favor of social activism. Pope Pius IX, in the Syllabus of Errors, condemned the proposition that “the teaching of the Catholic Church is hostile to the well-being and interests of society” (proposition 40). Yet Báez’s language implies precisely this — that “religion” (read: the traditional Catholic Church) is among the forces that marginalize, and that the solution is not conversion but “dialogue.”
The Nicaraguan Context: Persecution Without Supernatural Response
The article notes that Báez was “forced to leave Nicaragua in 2019” and that he “was a victim of persecution by the Nicaraguan dictatorship, which intensified its ruthless campaign against the Catholic Church in 2018.” This is presented as the context for his homily, and it is true that the Ortega regime has persecuted the Catholic Church in Nicaragua — closing Catholic media, expelling religious orders, imprisoning priests, and seizing Church property.
However, the response of the conciliar Church to this persecution has been entirely naturalistic and political. There has been no call for a genuine spiritual crusade — no solemn exorcism against the regime, no call for reparation and penance, no consecration of Nicaragua to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, no appeal to the supernatural weapons of the Church. Instead, the response has been diplomatic protests, appeals to “human rights,” and — as in Báez’s homily — the reduction of spiritual warfare to political denunciation.
This is precisely the error identified in the analysis of the Fatima apparitions: the focus on external threats (in that case, communism; in this case, dictatorship) while ignoring the main danger — modernist apostasy within the Church itself. Saint Pius X, in Pascendi Dominici gregis, warned that the “enemies within” — the modernists who corrupt the faith from inside — are far more dangerous than any external persecution. The persecution of the Church in Nicaragua is a chastisement from God for the sins of the conciliar revolution, and the appropriate response is not political denunciation but repentance, prayer, and a return to the integral Catholic faith.
Pius XI, in Quas primas, declared that “if men were ever to recognize Christ’s royal authority over themselves, both privately and publicly, then unheard-of blessings would flow upon the whole society.” The solution to the Nicaraguan crisis — and to every crisis — is not the denunciation of dictators but the recognition of the universal kingship of Christ and the ordering of all society according to His laws. Báez’s homily, by reducing the Gospel to political activism, offers the Nicaraguan people not the Kingdom of Christ but the kingdom of secular liberalism — which is, in the end, merely another form of the same tyranny.
The “Compassion” Without Truth: A Sentimentalist Christ
Báez repeatedly invokes the “compassion” of Christ, noting that Jesus “had compassion for them, because they were weary and dejected, like sheep without a shepherd.” He then applies this to “individuals who are sad, lonely, disoriented, and disillusioned by deceptive idols; families torn apart by poverty, forced migration, or violence; entire peoples deprived of freedom and a future due to war or dominated by dictatorial regimes.”
There is nothing wrong with noting Christ’s compassion — it is a genuine attribute of His Sacred Heart. But Báez’s compassion is stripped of its supernatural context. The Christ of the Gospels had compassion on the multitudes and then preached repentance, demanded faith, worked miracles, cast out real demons, and offered the Kingdom of God. The Christ of Báez’s homily has compassion on the multitudes and then calls for political denunciation, social inclusion, and respectful dialogue. This is not the Christ of the Catholic Faith — it is the “Christ of faith” that Saint Pius X condemned as a modernist invention, “considerably lower than the historical Christ” (Lamentabili, proposition 29).
The true compassion of Christ is expressed in the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, in the sacraments, in the preaching of the Gospel, and in the call to conversion. It is expressed in the words of Saint Paul: “If even we, or an angel from heaven, should preach to you a gospel other than the one we preached to you, let him be anathema!” (Galatians 1:8). Báez’s compassion, which never mentions sin, never demands repentance, never offers the sacraments, and never preaches the necessity of the Catholic Faith for salvation, is not the compassion of Christ but the compassion of naturalistic humanitarianism — a compassion that, in the end, leaves souls in the very bondage it claims to oppose.
Conclusion: The Abomination of Desolation in the Temple of God
Bishop Silvio Báez’s homily is not an isolated error — it is a symptomatic expression of the systemic apostasy of the conciliar Church. Every element of his discourse — the demythologization of Scripture, the reduction of the supernatural to the natural, the replacement of sacramental power with political activism, the silence about sin and repentance, the embrace of “dialogue” over conversion — is a fruit of the modernist revolution that has occupied the Vatican since 1958.
The Church does not need bishops who denounce dictators — it needs bishops who cast out real demons, who offer the Most Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, who preach the integral Gospel of Christ the King, who administer the sacraments with reverence and fidelity, and who lead souls to eternal salvation. The Church does not need “compassion” that stops at political denunciation — it needs the supernatural charity of Christ, which conquers sin, death, and the devil through the Cross and the Resurrection.
Until the structures occupying the Vatican return to the integral Catholic faith — until they reject the modernist errors condemned by Saint Pius X and Pope Pius IX, until they restore the Traditional Latin Mass as the norm, until they proclaim the universal kingship of Christ over all nations and all aspects of life — homilies like Báez’s will continue to be the norm rather than the exception. And the faithful must recognize them for what they are: not the preaching of the Gospel, but the preaching of another gospel — which is no gospel at all (cf. Galatians 1:6-7).
Source:
‘Casting out demons’ also means denouncing cruelty of dictatorships, exiled Nicaraguan bishop says (ewtnnews.com)
Date: 16.06.2026