EWTN News portal reports that on June 22, 2026, the usurper Robert Prevost, styling himself “Pope Leo XIV,” received members of the Jérôme Lejeune Foundation at the Vatican. During this audience, he declared that “no doctor should ever allow himself, on the basis of laboratory algorithms, to decide on the life of an embryo or of an elderly person,” and exclaimed, “Medicine must never become a servant of programmed death!” He praised the foundation’s work, recalled the figure of Jérôme Lejeune — whose cause for beatification was advanced by the apostate Bergoglio — and encouraged the promotion of a “culture of life.” While these words may sound superficially aligned with Catholic moral teaching on the sanctity of life, a deeper analysis from the perspective of integral Catholic faith reveals them as yet another exercise in the conciliar sect’s characteristic rhetoric: a rhetoric that, by its systematic omissions, its modernist framework, and its tacit endorsement of a revolutionary ecclesiastical structure, undermines the very truths it pretends to uphold. The devil, after all, can quote Scripture.
The Usurper’s Platform: Speaking Truth from a False Throne
The fundamental and insurmountable problem with this audience is not merely the content of the statements made but the authority from which they purport to emanate. Robert Prevost, known as “Leo XIV,” occupies the See of Peter without legitimate claim, being the successor of a line of usurpers beginning with John XXIII, who convened the Second Vatican Council — an assembly that, as the Defense of Sedevacantism document demonstrates through the authoritative teaching of St. Robert Bellarmine, produced manifest heretics as popes who automatically lose their jurisdiction and office by the very fact of their manifest heresy. Bellarmine is unequivocal: “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). The canonical foundation is equally clear: Canon 188.4 of the 1917 Code of Canon Law states that “every office becomes vacant by the mere fact and without any declaration by reason of tacit resignation… if the cleric: … 4. Publicly defects from the Catholic faith.” The post-conciliar manifestos on religious liberty (Dignitatis Humanae), ecumenism, and the collegiality of bishops — all of which contradict defined Catholic dogma — constitute precisely such a public defection.
When “Leo XIV” speaks about the dignity of human life, he does so from a position that Catholic theology recognizes as devoid of any jurisdiction whatsoever. His words carry no more doctrinal authority than those of any other private Catholic, and considerably less than those of the Church Fathers, the ecumenical councils, and the pre-conciliar Magisterium whose authority he implicitly claims while systematically betraying. The faithful are reminded that obedience belongs only to legitimate authority exercised in conformity with divine law, and that a manifest heretic cannot demand obedience precisely because he has severed himself from the body to which obedience is owed. As Pope Celestine I declared regarding Nestorius, “he who has departed from the faith with such preaching cannot depose or remove anyone” — a principle that applies with full force to the conciliar usurpers.
The Omission That Condemns: Silence on the True Nature of the Church’s Authority
The most damning aspect of this audience is not what was said but what was systematically left unsaid. “Leo XIV” spoke warmly of Jérôme Lejeune, praised his defense of the unborn, and encouraged the foundation’s work — all things that any Catholic might do and approve. But at no point did he articulate the supernatural framework that alone gives the defense of life its full Catholic meaning.
There was no mention of the state of grace as the fundamental prerequisite for eternal life — a life far more important than biological existence. There was no mention of the necessity of the sacraments — Baptism, Confirmation, Penance, Holy Eucharist — for salvation. There was no mention of the Most Holy Sacrifice of the Mass as the center of Christian life and the propitiatory sacrifice through which grace flows to the world. There was no reminder that the children with Down syndrome whom the foundation serves have souls destined for eternity, and that the greatest service one can render them is to ensure their Baptism and their mothers’ access to true sacramental life.
This silence is not accidental. It is the hallmark of the conciliar revolution, which has reduced the Church’s mission from the salvation of souls through the sacramental economy to a naturalistic humanitarianism indistinguishable from secular philanthropy. Pius XI, in Quas Primas, defined the reign of Christ the King as encompassing “all men” and extending “not only to Catholic nations or to those who, by receiving baptism according to law, belong to the Church… 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 reign is primarily spiritual, relating to the soul’s orientation toward God, and only secondarily to temporal affairs. By reducing the “culture of life” to a purely biological and medical concern, “Leo XIV” implicitly denies the very kingship of Christ that Pius XI so emphatically proclaimed.
The Lejeune Foundation: Good Works in the Service of a Corrupt Structure
The Jérôme Lejeune Foundation, whatever the personal merits of its founder, operates within and receives endorsement from the conciliar sect — a structure that, as the False Fatima Apparitions document argues, functions as a vehicle for modernist apostasy and potentially as a “psychological operation” against the Church. Jérôme Lejeune himself, while personally admirable in his defense of the unborn, operated within a scientific and ecclesial framework that had already been deeply compromised by the revolutionary changes following Vatican II.
The foundation’s work — medical research, patient care, bioethical advocacy — is laudable in itself, but it is directed and blessed by authorities who simultaneously promote religious liberty (condemned by Pius IX in The Syllabus of Errors, proposition 77: “it is no longer expedient that the Catholic religion should be held as the only religion of the State”), false ecumenism (condemned as the “pest” of indifferentism), and the democratization of the Church (condemned by Lamentabili sane exitu in propositions 52-56). The faithful must ask: Can good fruits grow from a corrupt tree? Our Lord Himself warned: “A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit” (Matthew 7:18). The conciliar structure, having produced the fruits of apostasy — the near-destruction of the priesthood, the emptying of convents, the collapse of doctrine, the scandal of millions of faithful receiving counterfeit sacraments — cannot be the vehicle for authentic Catholic action, no matter how noble the intentions of individuals within it.
The Language of “Culture”: A Modernist Substitute for the Language of Faith
“Léo XIV” encouraged the foundation to “continue promoting a culture of life and the common good.” This phraseology is revealing. The conciliar sect consistently employs the language of “culture,” “common good,” “human dignity,” and “service to humanity” — all concepts that, while not inherently evil, have been deliberately stripped of their supernatural content and repurposed as instruments of the modernist agenda.
Pius X, in Pascendi Dominici Gregis, identified the modernist error as the reduction of supernatural truths to naturalistic categories: “The philosopher must lay aside his convictions of faith… when he is dealing with historical or scientific questions” (condemned in Lamentabili, proposition 14). The “culture of life” promoted by the conciliar sect is precisely such a reduction: it defends biological existence while remaining silent about the supernatural life of grace, the necessity of true faith, and the reality of eternal judgment.
The authentic Catholic position is expressed not in the language of “culture” but in the language of faith, grace, and the supernatural order. Pius IX, in The Syllabus of Errors, condemned the proposition that “the principle of non-intervention, as it is called, ought to be proclaimed and observed” (proposition 62) — a principle that would preclude the Church from exercising her divinely given authority to condemn error and defend the faith. The conciliar sect’s rhetoric of “dialogue” and “encounter” is the practical application of this condemned principle, dressed up in the language of pastoral concern.
The Beatification of Lejeune: Sanctity in the Conciliar Framework
The article notes that Jérôme Lejeune’s cause for beatification advanced when “Pope Francis” signed the decree recognizing his heroic virtues in 2021. This fact must be evaluated with the utmost rigor. The process of beatification and canonization, as understood by the pre-conciliar Church, is an exercise of the Church’s infallible teaching authority, guided by the Holy Spirit, to declare with certainty that a given person is in heaven and worthy of universal veneration.
However, as the False Fatima Apparitions document notes, “private revelations (even approved ones) do not have the guarantee of the Church’s infallibility” — and the same principle applies a fortiori to the acts of a manifest heretic occupying the papal throne. If, as Catholic theology teaches, a manifest heretic automatically loses his jurisdiction and cannot legitimately exercise the Church’s teaching or governing authority, then the “beatifications” and “canonizations” performed by the conciar usurpers are null and void, carrying no more weight than the private opinions of any Catholic.
The faithful are reminded that true sanctity is recognized not by the decrees of a corrupt structure but by the fruit of the sanctified life — a life lived in communion with the true Church, in the state of grace, in the practice of the virtues, and in fidelity to the unchanging deposit of faith. Whether Jérôme Lejeune meets these criteria is a matter for the true Church — not the conciliar sect — to judge, and that judgment must await the restoration of legitimate authority.
The Underlying Apostasy: Religious Liberty and the Denial of Christ the King
The deepest error underlying this audience — and indeed the entire conciliar project — is the implicit denial of the social kingship of Christ. Pius XI, in Quas Primas, declared with unmistakable clarity: “The rulers of states… if they wish to maintain their authority inviolate and contribute to the increase of their homeland’s happiness” must recognize Christ’s reign. He further stated that “the entire government of public schools… may and ought to appertain to the civil power” only insofar as it does not contradict the Church’s authority — a principle directly condemned by Pius IX in The Syllabus of Errors (proposition 45).
Yet the conciliar sect, through Dignitatis Humanae, proclaimed the right to religious liberty — a doctrine condemned by Pius IX in proposition 77 of the Syllabus and by Gregory XVI in Mirari Vos. This proclamation effectively abdicates Christ’s social kingship and declares that the state has no obligation to recognize the true religion or to suppress public errors against the faith. The “culture of life” promoted by “Leo XIV” operates within this framework of religious indifferentism: it defends the unborn while simultaneously affirming the “right” of parents to choose false religions, the “right” of states to legislate against Catholic moral teaching, and the “right” of the conciliar sect itself to propagate its revolutionary doctrines without correction from legitimate authority.
Conclusion: The Necessity of Rejecting the Conciliar Facade
The audience of “Leo XIV” with the Jérôme Lejeune Foundation is a microcosm of the conciliar sect’s method: it adopts the language of Catholic truth while emptying it of supernatural content; it performs acts of natural goodness while remaining silent about the sacramental and doctrinal foundations that alone give such acts their ultimate meaning; and it claims an authority that, by Catholic principles, it does not possess.
The faithful are called not to reject the natural good — the defense of the unborn, the care of the disabled, the pursuit of scientific truth — but to refuse the conciar framework within which these goods are presented. True defense of life is inseparable from true faith, true sacraments, and true authority. As Pius X declared in Lamentabili, the pursuit of novelty leads to “deplorable consequences” and “the most grievous errors” — errors that the conciliar sect has institutionalized and that no amount of naturalistic humanitarianism can remedy.
The path forward is not reform of the conciliar structure but rejection of it and return to the unchanging Tradition of the Church — the Tradition that produced the saints, the martyrs, and the Doctors whose teaching remains the sole criterion of truth. Stare decitus et nollere novas res — stand by the old and do not seek new things. The conciliar revolution, for all its rhetoric of life and dignity, is the abomination of desolation standing in the holy place, and the faithful must flee from it as they would flee from the devil himself, however fair his words may sound.
Source:
Pope Leo XIV warns no doctor should ever 'decide on the life of an embryo' (ewtnnews.com)
Date: 22.06.2026