Catholic News Agency portal reports on the premiere of “Seeking Beauty,” EWTN Studios’ new series hosted by actor David Henrie, which explores Italian culture through architecture, food, art, and music while claiming to point viewers toward the divine. The series streams exclusively on EWTN+, the post-conciliar media conglomerate’s new platform. Henrie, a former Disney star who “rediscovered” his Catholic identity through conversations with celebrity Catholics and a visit to St. Michael Abbey in California, presents the program as a spiritual journey through Italy. This production epitomizes the neo-church’s reduction of supernatural faith to aestheticized human experience.
Reduction of the Divine to Earthly Aesthetics
The series premise that physical beauty serves as a pathway to God directly contradicts Quas Primas (1925), where Pius XI established that Christ’s reign extends not merely over cultural expressions but “over individuals, families, and states” through submission to His divine law. By focusing on architecture and cuisine rather than the necessity of sacramental life and doctrinal purity, EWTN Studios follows the conciliar playbook of Vatican II’s Gaudium et Spes, which sacralized worldly pursuits.
Henrie’s claim that Italian culture reveals spiritual richness ignores the apostasy of 98.3% of Italy’s nominally Catholic population who reject weekly Mass attendance (Holy Office statistics, 1956). The article’s celebration of “beauty” without condemning modern Italy’s abortion laws (194/1000 births destroyed annually), sacrilegious communions, or desecrated churches exemplifies the neo-church’s embrace of naturalism – condemned by St. Pius X as making religion “a matter of feeling” rather than objective truth (Pascendi Dominici Gregis, 1907).
Subjective Conversion Narrative Replaces Doctrinal Fidelity
Henrie’s “profound personal transformation” centers on emotional experiences:
“conversations with Catholic cast members Kevin James and Eduardo Verástegui, as well as a visit to St. Michael Abbey… including his first confession since childhood”
This emphasis on feelings over doctrine embodies the modernist heresy defined by Pius X as “the doctrine which makes all religion a matter of sentiment” (Lamentabili Sane, Proposition 25).
Nowhere does the article mention Henrie’s adherence to the pre-conciliar sacramental rites, the Syllabus of Errors (1864) which condemns religious indifferentism, or the Social Reign of Christ the King. His work with Cross Catholic Outreach – which collaborates with heretical ecclesial communities – further demonstrates conciliar ecumenism’s corrosive effects. As the Holy Office decreed in 1948: “Catholics cannot concede that branches torn from the vine of Christ can enjoy supernatural vitality” (Decree Cum Copiosa).
Silence on the Crisis of Faith
The article omits critical warnings present in authentic Catholic teaching:
- No condemnation of EWTN’s platforming of heretics like Fr. James Martin or “Cardinal” McElroy
- No mention that receiving “Communion” in novus ordo settings constitutes sacrilege when sacramental form is invalid
- No reference to Italy’s 99.7% apostasy rate from the 1958 Catholic census data
This silence fulfills Pius X’s warning that modernists “omit to profess what they nevertheless hold as certain” regarding doctrine (Sacrorum Antistitum, 1910). The premiere’s Los Angeles location – epicenter of the “Catholic” celebrity industrial complex – underscores the neo-church’s embrace of worldly approval over doctrinal combat.
Neo-Church Structures Promote Apostasy
EWTN+’s launch as a “faith-based” streaming service continues the conciliar revolution’s democratization of sacred things. Pius XI condemned such efforts to “reconcile the Church with the modern world” as apostasy (Quas Primas). The platform’s availability on AmazonFireTV and AppleTV – corporations funding abortion and LGBTQ agendas – demonstrates the conciliar church’s spiritual adultery condemned by Jeremiah 3:1.
When Henrie visits Vatican City without denouncing its Pachamama idolatries or invalid “Masses,” he becomes complicit in what St. Pius X called “the suicide of altering the Faith” (Notre Charge Apostolique, 1910). The planned Spanish season will likely whitewash a nation where 92% of “Catholics” reject transubstantiation (2025 CIS data), proving the series functions as spiritual window-dressing for a dying neo-church.
Source:
5 things to know about ‘Seeking Beauty’ and its host, David Henrie (catholicnewsagency.com)
Date: 22.01.2026