The EWTN News portal reports on a gathering of approximately 55 Capuchin “bishops” in Assisi from September 9–13, 2026, convened under the auspices of the Capuchin “minister general” Roberto Genuin and attended by the “cardinal” Seán O’Malley, “archbishop emeritus” of Boston. The assembly, framed by the “Jubilee of St. Francis” and the approaching 500th anniversary of the Capuchin Reform, focused on the supposed compatibility of Franciscan “vicinanza” (closeness) with the exercise of episcopal governance in the “universal Church.” The “prelates” exchanged experiences of “evangelization” in “mission territories” and praised the “peace and unity” themes of the current usurper “Pope” Leo XIV. The cited article relates a purely naturalistic vision of the episcopate, stripped of the supernatural mandate to teach, govern, and sanctify for the salvation of souls, reducing the successor of the Apostles to a manager of “fraternal solidarity” and social proximity.
The Usurped Episcopate: Invalid Orders and Jurisdiction in the Service of a False Church
The very premise of the article — that men ordained and consecrated within the post-conciliar rites possess valid orders and jurisdiction — is a theological fiction contradicted by the immutable doctrine of the Church. The “bishops” assembled in Assisi derive their “ordination” from the Pontificale Romanum of 1968, a rite stripped of the essential form and intention for the conferral of the sacerdotal and episcopal character, as demonstrated by Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre’s own doubts and the subsequent theological analyses of the Thesis of Cassiciacum and sedevacantist theologians. Furthermore, their “consecrators” belong to a lineage of “bishops” who have publicly defected from the Catholic faith by adhering to the heresies of Vatican II (religious liberty, ecumenism, collegiality), thereby incurring the automatic loss of office ipso facto according to Canon 188 §4 of the 1917 Code and the teaching of Pope Paul IV’s Bull Cum ex Apostolatus Officio: “his promotion or elevation… shall be null, void, and of no effect.”
St. Robert Bellarmine teaches that 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, lib. 2, cap. 30). If the “pope” who appoints them is not the Pope, and the “bishops” who consecrate them are not bishops, then the Capuchin “prelates” in Assisi are nothing more than laymen in purple cassocks, exercising a simulated jurisdiction over a simulated diocese. The article’s citation of “Vatican statistics” — 5,525 “bishops” worldwide — is a census of the abomination of desolation, a counting of the ministers of the “synagogue of Satan” (Apoc. 2:9) who occupy the visible structures of the Church.
Reduction of the Episcopal Office to Naturalistic “Vicinanza”
The central theological category of the assembly is “vicinanza” — proximity, closeness. Archbishop Stanovnik of Corrientes explicitly states that a bishop must “leave behind his identity as a friar and take up the identity of a bishop,” yet claims “vicinanza” unites the two. This is a radical inversion of the Catholic episcopate. The bishop’s identity is not defined by sociological proximity but by potestas ordinis and potestas iurisdictionis received from Christ through the Church for the salus animarum. The Catechism of the Council of Trent teaches that the bishop is constituted “to rule the Church of God” (Acts 20:28), to “feed the flock” with sound doctrine and the sacraments, not to “embrace the leper” as a performative act of social work.
Pius XI, in Quas Primas, declares that Christ’s Kingdom “extends not only to Catholic nations… but His reign encompasses also all non-Christians, so that most truly the entire human race is subject to the authority of Jesus Christ.” The Capuchin “bishops” speak of “closeness to the poor” and “preaching in public squares” while remaining silent on the Social Kingship of Christ the King, the condemnation of laicism, and the duty of the State to profess the Catholic faith. Their “Franciscan instinct” is a ersatz charity, a caritas naturalis divorced from caritas supernaturalis, which St. Thomas defines as “friendship with God” (Summa Theologiae II-II, q. 23, a. 1). Without the state of grace, without the Sacrifice of the Mass, without the confessional, “vicinanza” is mere philanthropy — the “natural religion” condemned by Pius IX in the Syllabus (Error 79).
The “Capuchin Reform” Anniversary: A Celebration of Rupture Disguised as Continuity
Archbishop Ruwa’ichi speaks of the 1528 Reform as a “divine prompting to return to the original charism of St. Francis” and warns against being “fossilized” or “trapped in a certain approach that does not allow us to continue listening to the Holy Spirit.” This language — “listening to the Holy Spirit,” “not fossilized,” “continue responding to promptings” — is the rhetoric of Modernist evolutionism condemned by St. Pius X in Pascendi Dominici Gregis and Lamentabili Sane Exitu. Proposition 58 of Lamentabili condemns: “Truth changes with man, because it develops with him, in him, and through him.” Proposition 59: “Christ did not proclaim any specific, all-encompassing doctrine suitable for all times and peoples, but rather initiated a certain religious movement, applied or applicable to different times and places.”
The Capuchin Reform of 1528 was a return to the Rule of St. Francis and the Testament, a restoration of primitive observance, not a “dynamic fidelity” open to the “signs of the times.” The neo-church’s celebration of this anniversary is a theft of patrimony: they don the habit of St. Francis while denying his theology, his Mariology, his Eucharistic piety, his obedience to the Roman Pontiff. St. Francis wrote in his Letter to All the Faithful: “Let us firmly believe and simply confess that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son… Let us also firmly believe and simply confess that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father and the Son.” The Capuchin “bishops” of 2026 belong to a sect that has obscured the Filioque in ecumenical dialogue with the Orthodox, that has replaced the Tridentine Mass with a Protestantized “memorial,” that has abolished the Oath Against Modernism.
O’Malley and the “Pope Leo XIV” Endorsement: Collaboration with the Antichrist
Cardinal O’Malley — the “archbishop emeritus” of Boston, the epicenter of the clerical abuse catastrophe, a man who covered for predators and promoted sodomites — declares it “very encouraging that the Holy Father, Pope Leo XIV, is trying to bring peace and unity, themes of his pontificate, and they are certainly very Franciscan themes.” This is idolatry of the usurper. Robert Prevost (“Leo XIV”) is a manifest heretic who professes the false religion of Vatican II, who “canonizes” the architects of the Conciliar apostasy (John XXIII, Paul VI, John Paul II), who participates in pagan rituals (Pachamama, Assisi interreligious meetings), who teaches that the Old Covenant is salvific without Christ. To call him “Holy Father” and “Pope” is to deny the faith.
The Syllabus of Pius IX condemns (Error 80): “The Roman Pontiff can, and ought to, reconcile himself, and come to terms with progress, liberalism and modern civilization.” O’Malley’s endorsement of the antipope’s “peace and unity” is precisely this condemned reconciliation. The “peace” of Leo XIV is the pax romana of the Masonic ecumene, the “unity” of the Una Sancta of the pan-heretical “Church of the New Advent.” St. Francis sought peace by converting the Sultan to the true faith; the Capuchin “bishops” seek peace by silencing the truth.
The Author: A Capuchin “Friar” Formed in the Neo-Church’s Propaganda Machine
The article is authored by Emmanuel Ogacheko Idakwo, identified as a “Capuchin friar and priest from Nigeria currently studying for a master’s degree in social communications at the Salesian Pontifical University in Rome.” This is the formation of the neo-clergy: a “pontifical university” erected by the usurpers, teaching the “theology” of the Nouvelle Théologie, “social communications” as a tool for the aggiornamento. The Salesians, like the Capuchins, have been decimated by the Conciliar revolution; their “pontifical university” is a factory for the new evangelization — which is, in reality, the new religion of man.
Idakwo’s bio notes his interests include “culture and digital media.” Not the Summa Theologiae, not the Roman Catechism, not the Breviary, not the Missale Romanum of St. Pius V. The article itself is a product of this formation: it reads like a press release for a corporate retreat, full of “sharing experiences,” “fraternal setting,” “fresh spiritual energy,” “concrete support.” There is not a single mention of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, the Divine Office, the Rosary, penance, mortification, Hell, Judgment, the Immaculate Conception, Papal Infallibility, the Necessity of the Church for Salvation (Extra Ecclesiam Nulla Salus). This silence is the gravest accusation: it proves the total naturalization of the “episcopal” consciousness.
The “Fraternal Solidarity” of the Damned
O’Malley praises the gathering because it helps bishops “know that they are not alone and that there are many brothers who share their ministry.” This is the consolation of the damned. Our Lord warned: “Woe to you when all men shall speak well of you: for according to these things did their fathers to the false prophets” (Luke 6:26). The true bishop is a sign of contradiction (Luke 2:34), isolated by his fidelity to the truth, hated by the world (John 15:18-19). The “fraternal solidarity” of the Capuchin “bishops” is the solidarity of the concilium malignorum (Ps. 25:4), the mutual reinforcement of men who have abandoned the deposit of faith for the approval of the world.
The article mentions “increasing secularization and social divisions as paramount challenges.” The true challenge is the apostasy of the hierarchy. The Syllabus condemns (Error 40): “The teaching of the Catholic Church is hostile to the well-being and interests of society.” The Capuchin “bishops” have internalized this error: they seek to be useful to society, to offer “vicinanza” as a social service, to be “instruments of peace” in the Masonic sense. They have forgotten — or never knew — that the Church’s mission is supernatural: “Go ye into the whole world, and preach the gospel to every creature. He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved: but he that believeth not shall be condemned” (Mark 16:15-16).
Conclusion: The Capuchin Habit as a Mask for the Abomination
The gathering in Assisi is a theatrical farce. Men dressed in the habit of the Poverello — who kissed the leper, who received the Stigmata, who dictated his Testament demanding obedience to the “Lord Pope” and the clergy — assemble under the banner of a false “pope” in a false “church” to discuss “governance” and “pastoral care” in the language of sociology and psychology. They are “whited sepulchres, which outwardly appear to men beautiful, but within are full of dead men’s bones and of all filthiness” (Matt. 23:27).
The 500th anniversary of the Capuchin Reform will be celebrated in 2028 by the paramasonic structure occupying the Vatican as a triumph of “renewal.” In reality, it will mark the final extinction of the Capuchin Order as a Catholic institution, its remnants absorbed into the one-world religion. The true sons of St. Francis are not in Assisi with O’Malley and Genuin; they are in the catacombs, offering the Unbloody Sacrifice of Calvary according to the Missale Romanum of 1962, keeping the Rule without mitigation, rejecting the novus ordo, the new Code, the new catechism, the false “saints,” the false “popes.” Non praevalebunt (Matt. 16:18). The gates of hell shall not prevail against the Church of Christ — but they have prevailed against the Capuchin “bishops” of the neo-church.
Source:
Capuchin bishops reflect on dual calling as friars and diocesan shepherds (ewtnnews.com)
Date: 14.09.2026