Catholic News Agency reports on the “Adopt a Bishop” initiative launched by Lauren Winter of Brick House in the City and The Dorothea Project. The program randomly assigns participants a post-conciliar “bishop” to pray for throughout the year, citing Cardinal Luis Antonio Tagle’s anecdote about offering candy to Robert Prevost (Leo XIV) during the conclave as inspiration. Winter claims this addresses the “enormous spiritual weight” carried by these prelates, framing prayer as “reciprocity” between laity and hierarchy. Over 1,000 participants have joined this ecumenical endeavor, which purports to strengthen “bonds within the Church” through “the quiet work of prayer.” The article concludes with Winter’s hope that participants feel “more connected to their bishop” through this exercise.
Naturalism Disguised as Piety
The initiative’s foundation reveals a naturalistic reduction of the episcopal office to mere human sentimentality. By highlighting Tagle’s candy offering as the inspiration, promoters reduce the sacramental character of the episcopacy to emotional human interactions. This contradicts Quas Primas (1925), where Pius XI emphasizes that Christ’s kingship demands “not only private individuals, but also rulers and governments have the duty to publicly honor Christ and obey Him”. The program’s focus on psychological “weight” rather than doctrinal fidelity ignores the Lamentabili sane exitu condemnation of Modernist tendencies to reduce ecclesiastical authority to human sentiment (Proposition 22).
When Winter states that bishops carry “pastoral and spiritual responsibility that most of us never see,” she omits the canonical requirement that bishops must publicly profess and defend Catholic truth (1917 CIC 1408). The initiative’s random assignment mechanism deliberately avoids discernment about whether these “bishops” uphold Apostolic Tradition, thereby implicitly endorsing heresy. As Pius IX’s Syllabus of Errors condemns: “The Church ought to be separated from the State, and the State from the Church” (Error 55) – a principle violated when pseudo-bishops demand prayer while rejecting their duty to uphold Christ’s Social Reign.
Theological Omissions Expose Modernist Agenda
Nowhere does the initiative require participants to pray for the conversion of modernist prelates to Catholic truth. This mirrors the ecumenical relativism condemned in Pius XI’s Mortalium Animos: “The union of Christians can only be promoted by promoting the return to the one true Church of Christ.” The article’s claim that this creates “reciprocity of prayer” ignores the fundamental distinction between valid shepherds and wolves in shepherd’s clothing.
The program’s silence on the sacramental crisis is deafening. Participants aren’t warned that many assigned “bishops” may lack valid episcopal consecration due to the 1968 Pontificalis Romani reforms. Pius XII’s Sacramentum Ordinis (1947) definitively established the matter and form of Holy Orders – requirements systematically violated in post-conciliar “ordinations”. To pray for pseudo-bishops as if they were legitimate successors of the Apostles constitutes material cooperation with deception.
Dangerous Ecumenical Subtext
By assigning “bishops from anywhere in the world,” the initiative implicitly validates schismatic and heretical sect leaders. This violates the Decree on the Church from the Council of Trent: “If anyone says that the ministers of the Church… are not members of the Catholic Church by the institution of Christ, let him be anathema.” The program’s description of prayer as strengthening “one body of Christ” employs the conciliar sect’s false ecclesiology, condemned by Pius XII in Mystici Corporis Christi: “Only those are to be included as members of the Church who have been baptized and profess the true faith.”
Winter’s admission that participants might adopt “a bishop that is someone that you have disagreed with” reveals the initiative’s true purpose: enforcing acceptance of heresy through false charity. St. Pius X’s Pascendi Dominici Gregis identifies this Modernist tactic: “They make their own opinions abide by the common mind, and thus they chime in with the opinions of others.” Nowhere does the program distinguish between praying for a prelate’s conversion versus affirming his errors – a distinction St. Augustine emphasized in his prayers for heretics like the Donatists.
Conclusion: True Charity Demands Repudiation, Not Affirmation
This initiative exemplifies the conciliar sect’s inversion of Catholic priorities. While St. Paul commands “prayers for all men: For kings and all that are in high station, that we may lead a quiet and peaceful life in all piety and chastity” (1 Timothy 2:1-2), he immediately clarifies this requires “the knowledge of the truth” (1 Timothy 2:4). The “Adopt a Bishop” program replaces this truth-oriented prayer with sentimental attachment to apostate hierarchy.
As the Syllabus of Errors declares: “The Roman Pontiff cannot, and ought not to, reconcile himself, and come to terms with progress, liberalism and modern civilization” (Error 80). True Catholics must instead pray for these men’s abjuration of error and return to the Church’s immutable Tradition – not for the success of their modernist agendas. Any initiative failing to make this distinction actively undermines Christ’s Kingship and aids the forces of apostasy.
Source:
‘Adopt a Bishop’ initiative invites faithful to pray for Church leaders (catholicnewsagency.com)
Date: 11.01.2026