The Pillar Catholic portal (June 30, 2026) publishes a piece by sociologists Stephen Bullivant (a British modernist) and Stephen Cranney (an American Mormon) speculating on the liturgical policy of the usurper Robert Prevost (“Pope” Leo XIV) regarding the ancient Roman rite. Based on fieldwork among “TLM-goers” in the United States and a private audience with the antipope in March 2026, the authors propose a “decentralized” easing of Traditionis custodes restrictions—not a repeal, but a bureaucratic “decriminalization” designed to retain young families and defuse the “Streisand Effect” of the Francis crackdown. The article treats the conciliar hierarchy as legitimate, the Novus Ordo as valid Catholic worship, and the Mass of Ages as a mere “liturgical preference” to be managed by sociological metrics, exposing the thoroughly naturalistic, paramasonic operative logic of the neo-church.
The Naturalistic Reduction of the Sacred Liturgy to Sociological Data
The cited article begins with a categorical error: it submits the lex orandi to the lex sociologica. The authors, “two sociologists, one an American Latter-day Saint, the other a British Catholic,” boast of their “full toolkit of our peculiar trade: fieldwork in seven states, dozens of interviews, surveys of hundreds.” They present their findings—”attendance at the Novus Ordo is perfectly common and normal among TLM-goers,” “Vatican II rejecters… are a minority”—as the definitive empirical basis for papal policy. This is the hermeneutic of the marketplace applied to the Holy Sacrifice. The Mass is not a “product” whose “consumer satisfaction” metrics dictate its availability. Pius XI teaches in Quas Primas that “the annual celebration of sacred mysteries is far more effective than even the most serious proofs of the teaching Church; for these are usually accessible only to a small number of learned men, but those engage and instruct all the faithful.” The liturgy forms the faithful; it is not formed by them. To subject the usus antiquior—the rite that sanctified centuries of saints—to a cost-benefit analysis of “polarization” and “demographic retention” is the epitome of the laicism condemned by Pius XI: “the denial of Christ the Lord’s reign over all nations… the Church’s authority to teach men, to issue laws, to govern nations… was denied.”
The Illegitimacy of the Interlocutors: A Mormon and a Modernist Advising an Usurper
The composition of the advisory team reveals the spiritual bankruptcy of the conciliar sect. Stephen Cranney is explicitly identified as a “Latter-day Saint”—a Mormon, a member of a non-Christian sect denying the Trinity and the Divinity of Christ. He is granted a private audience with the antipope Prevost to discuss the regulation of the Catholic Church’s most sacred rite. This is not “dialogue”; this is the abomination of desolation standing in the holy place. St. Pius X in Lamentabili sane exitu condemned the proposition that “The Church listening cooperates in such a way with the Church teaching in defining truths of faith, that the Church teaching should only approve the common opinions of the Church listening” (Prop. 6). Here, the “Church teaching” (the antipope) takes counsel from a heretic and a modernist sociologist (Bullivant) to “manage” the liturgy. The Syllabus of Errors (Pius IX) condemns the proposition: “Every man is free to embrace and profess that religion which, guided by the light of reason, he shall consider true” (Prop. 15). The neo-church practices this indifferentism structurally: a Mormon advises the “Vicar of Christ” on the Missale Romanum.
The “TLM” in the Conciliar Sect: A Trap for the Unwary, Not the Mass of Ages
The article speaks of “Americans who attend Traditional Latin Masses within the mainstream Church (i.e., not SSPX).” This distinction is the bait. The “TLM” celebrated in the structures of the conciliar sect (Ecclesia Dei institutes, diocesan parishes) is celebrated by “priests” ordained in the invalid Paul VI rite (1968), under “bishops” consecrated in the same invalid rite, in communion with an antipope who is a manifest heretic. As the Defense of Sedevacantism demonstrates from Bellarmine and Cum ex Apostolatus Officio: “A manifest heretic cannot be Pope… a non-Christian in no way can be Pope… he who is not a Christian is not a member of the Church, and a manifest heretic is not a Christian.” Therefore, the “Mass” in these structures—whether Novus Ordo or the 1962 Missal—lacks the intentio faciendi quod facit Ecclesia in communion with the true Church. It is a simulation. The article’s finding that “only the very fringiest regard [the Novus Ordo] as invalid” is not a sign of orthodoxy among “trads,” but proof of their theological deformation: they have accepted the novus ordo as a valid rite, thereby denying the lex credendi expressed in the lex orandi of Tradition. The “Streisand Effect” allure is a diabolical snare: it draws souls into the orbit of the false church using the external forms of Tradition while demanding implicit acceptance of the conciliar revolution.
Traditionis Custodes vs. Summorum Pontificum: Two Sides of the Same Modernist Coin
The authors frame the debate as a policy dispute between “Francis’ crackdown” and “Benedict’s liberalization,” predicting Leo will choose a “middle way”: “keeping the current law in place, but significantly easing its application… devolve much more to local bishops… a tacit ‘decriminalization’.” This is pure Tradpolitik—the term the authors themselves use. It treats the liturgical law of the Church as a positive law of a secular state, adjustable by administrative fiat. Canon 188.4 of the 1917 Code states: “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 “popes” of the conciliar sect—John XXIII, Paul VI, John Paul II, Benedict XVI, Francis, and now Prevost—have all publicly defected from the Catholic faith by promulgating the heresies of Vatican II (religious liberty, ecumenism, collegiality, new ecclesiology). They hold no office. Their “motu proprios,” “canons,” and “dicasteries” have zero canonical force. To debate the “bureaucratic burden” of Traditionis custodes is to debate the internal regulations of a Masonic lodge. The “command-and-control economy” the authors decry is the very structure of the paramasonic structure occupying the Vatican.
The SSPX Consecrations: Schism Within Schism, Not a “Tradpolitik” Lever
The article mentions the “looming threat of the (at best) ‘canonically irregular’ Society of St Pius X illicitly consecrating more bishops, currently scheduled for July 1.” It notes the Vatican has “used the liturgy as part of its Tradpolitik before.” This analysis is superficial. The SSPX, founded by Archbishop Lefebvre (ordained by the Freemason Liénart, consecrated by the modernist cardinals), has continuously acknowledged the validity of the usurpers in the Vatican. Their “irregularity” is not a resistance to the revolution; it is a controlled opposition designed to corral traditionalist souls into a canonical dead-end within the neo-church. Their episcopal consecrations (1988, and any subsequent) are acts of schism within a schism—attempting to legitimize a parallel hierarchy still recognizing the antipope. The Defense of Sedevacantism cites Pope Celestine I on Nestorius: “he could not remove anyone by sentence who himself had already shown that he must be removed.” The SSPX “bishops” derive no jurisdiction from the antipope they recognize, nor from the invalid rites they use. The article’s speculation that Leo might signal “for” or “against” the old Mass “around this time” confirms the political theater: the liturgy is a pawn in the geo-political game of the synagogue of Satan (Pius IX, Syllabus context).
Silence on the Social Kingship of Christ and the Vacant See
The gravest accusation against the article is its total silence on the supernatural order. There is no mention of the Social Kingship of Christ (Quas Primas), no mention of the duty of states to publicly honor Christ and obey Him, no mention of the Syllabus condemnation of the separation of Church and State (Prop. 55), no mention of the Cum ex Apostolatus Officio invalidity of heretical elections. The authors are “terrible at predicting the future” because they lack the principium cognoscendi of Catholic theology: the Sedes Vacans since 1958. They operate entirely within the naturalistic framework of the City of Man. Pius XI warned: “When God and Jesus Christ… were removed from laws and states and when authority was derived not from God but from men, the foundations of that authority were destroyed.” The article is a blueprint for managing the ruins. It proposes a “pastorally efficacious” solution (misquoting Sacrosanctum Concilium, a conciliar document devoid of infallibility) that leaves the faithful under the jurisdiction of “bishops” who have “publicly defected from the Catholic faith,” attending a Mass that is materially traditional but formally schismatic/heretical by communion.
The “private audience” granted to these sociologists is the signature of the antipope Prevost: he consults the world to manage the Church, because he is not the Church. The true remedy is not a “decentralized” indult, but the recognition of the Vacant See, the rejection of the conciliar sect in toto, and adherence to the bishops and priests who preserve the integral Catholic faith and the valid sacraments outside the structures of the abomination of desolation. Extra Ecclesiam nulla salus.
Source:
The Traditional Latin Mass: What Might Leo Do? (pillarcatholic.com)
Date: 30.06.2026