The EWTN News portal reports on a Lenten sermon delivered on March 6, 2026, by Capuchin friar Father Roberto Pasolini, preacher to the papal household, in the presence of “Pope Leo XIV” and Vatican officials. Drawing on the example of St. Francis of Assisi, Pasolini presented humility and personal conversion as the primary paths to peace, particularly in the context of the Middle East crisis. He described conversion as “God’s initiative” that awakens the divine image within, redefining “how we perceive, judge, and desire,” and emphasized humility as a return to one’s true greatness. The sermon framed peace as emanating from individuals who “humble themselves,” renounce violence, and choose dialogue, positioning these as alternatives to political or military solutions. This presentation, devoid of any reference to the Catholic Church as the sole ark of salvation, the Social Kingship of Christ, or the necessity of sacramental grace, exemplifies the modernist reduction of supernatural conversion to ethical naturalism and psychological interiority.
The Naturalistic Desacralization of Catholic Conversion
Factual Deconstruction: A Gospel Stripped of Supernatural Efficacy
The article presents Father Pasolini’s sermon as a meditation on “Conversion: Following the Lord Jesus on the Path of Humility.” Its core propositions are: 1) Conversion is primarily an interior, God-initiated awakening of the “image of God imprinted within us.” 2) Humility is the path to personal “true greatness” and the foundation for peace. 3) Peace is achieved when individuals “humble themselves,” renounce violence, and choose dialogue, especially in times of conflict. 4) The example of St. Francis illustrates this model of evangelical humility.
A factual analysis reveals a systematic omission of the entire supernatural framework of Catholic conversion as defined by the pre-1958 Magisterium. There is no mention of original sin as a privation of sanctifying grace, no reference to the necessity of sacramental confession for the remission of sins, no invocation of the redemptive sacrifice of Calvary made present in the Most Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, and no assertion of the absolute necessity of membership in the Catholic Church for salvation (*extra Ecclesiam nulla salus*). The “grace” mentioned is an amorphous, internal stirring, disconnected from the sacramental economy instituted by Christ. The “peace” promised is a temporal, psychological, and social harmony achievable through human effort inspired by a vague “evangelical” spirit, not the supernatural peace of Christ that surpasses all understanding (Phil. 4:7) and is predicated on the reign of Christ the King over individuals and societies.
Linguistic Analysis: The Vocabulary of Modernist Subjectivism
The language employed is symptomatic of the post-conciliar theological decay. Key phrases like “the image of God imprinted within us awaits awakening,” “something, long silent, begins to stir anew within the person,” and “redefined the parameters of how we perceive, judge, and desire” reflect a profound subjectivism. This is not the language of St. Augustine or St. Thomas Aquinas, who spoke of grace *infused* into the soul, justifying the sinner and healing the wound of original sin. It is the language of 20th-century personalism and existentialism, where God’s grace is a call to self-actualization rather than a transformative, ontological change. The term “conversion” is emptied of its biblical and doctrinal content—a metanoia, a radical turning from sin to God through repentance and faith—and reduced to a continuous, open-ended “process” of becoming. The emphasis on “humility” as a path to “true greatness” inverts the traditional Catholic understanding: humility is not a path to *greatness* in any natural or psychological sense, but the indispensable virtue that disposes the soul to receive sanctifying grace and submit to the authority of God and His Church. The sermon’s tone is therapeutic and self-help oriented, aligning perfectly with the “cult of man” condemned by Pius IX in the *Syllabus of Errors* (Error #58: “all the rectitude and excellence of morality ought to be placed in the accumulation and increase of riches… and the gratification of pleasure”).
Theological Confrontation: The Unchanging Faith vs. Modernist Synthesis
Every central claim of the sermon stands in stark opposition to the integral Catholic faith, which holds that true conversion and peace are impossible outside the Catholic Church and its sacraments.
1. **On the Nature of Conversion:** The sermon presents conversion as a primarily psychological and moral renewal. The pre-conciliar Magisterium defines it as a supernatural act of God that justifies the sinner. The Council of Trent,Session VI, Chapter 5, declares: “Justification… is not only the remission of sins but also the sanctification and renewal of the inner man… through the grace of the Holy Ghost… freely given to us in Jesus Christ.” This grace is conferred through the sacrament of baptism and renewed through the sacrament of penance. Pasolini’s omission of the sacrament of penance, the instrument of post-baptismal conversion, is a direct denial of Trent’s teaching and a capitulation to the Modernist proposition condemned by St. Pius X in *Lamentabili sane exitu*, #46: “In the early Church, there was no concept of a Christian sinner whom the Church absolves with its authority.”
2. **On the Source of Peace:** The sermon locates the origin of peace in human humility and dialogue. Pope Pius XI’s encyclical *Quas Primas* (1925), on the feast of Christ the King, provides the immutable Catholic doctrine: “Therefore, if men were ever to recognize Christ’s royal authority over themselves, both privately and publicly, then unheard-of blessings would flow upon the whole society, such as due freedom, order, and tranquility, and concord and peace.” The Pope explicitly links peace to the public and private recognition of Christ’s Kingship, not to generic humility. He continues: “For what we wrote at the beginning of Our Pontificate about the diminishing authority of law and respect for power, the same can be applied to the present times: ‘When God and Jesus Christ… were removed from laws and states… the foundations of that authority were destroyed.’” Pasolini’s sermon, by omitting any duty of states and societies to publicly recognize Christ the King, directly promotes the secularist error condemned in the *Syllabus* (Errors #39, #44, #55) and undermines the very foundation of true peace as taught by Pius XI.
3. **On the Role of St. Francis:** St. Francis of Assisi is presented as a model of personal humility and peacemaking. While these are genuine aspects of his sanctity, the pre-1958 understanding of his life is fundamentally centered on his absolute fidelity to the Church and its doctrine. St. Francis’s conversion was a radical turning from a life of sin to a life of penance *within* the Catholic Church, under the authority of the Pope. His peacemaking, notably with the Sultan, was an act of Catholic evangelization, not indifferentist dialogue. His humility was the virtue of a son of the Church, not a generic human quality. To isolate his humility from his total consecration to the Vicar of Christ and the defense of the Faith is to create a “Franciscan” myth divorced from Catholic truth, a common tactic of Modernists to create “saints” who serve as icons for their own agenda.
4. **On the Initiative of Grace:** While the sermon says conversion is “God’s initiative,” it defines this initiative in naturalistic terms: an awakening of an already-present divine image. This is a subtle form of Pelagianism. The Council of Trent,Session VI, Canon 3, anathematizes the proposition that “we are justified by faith alone, in such wise that we be understood to be justified by that faith alone, by which we believe that Christ has been delivered for us, and that our sins are forgiven us… and that no other cooperation is required on our part to obtain the grace of justification.” True Catholic conversion requires the cooperation of the will *with* sanctifying grace, a grace that is a *participation* in the divine nature (2 Peter 1:4), not merely an awakening of an innate potential. The sermon’s language echoes the Modernist error condemned in *Lamentabili*, #20: “Revelation was merely man’s self-awareness of his relationship to God.”
Symptomatic Analysis: The Fruit of the Conciliar Apostasy
This sermon is not an isolated error but a precise symptom of the systemic apostasy of the post-1958 “church.” Its characteristics are the hallmarks of the conciliar revolution:
* **Hermeneutics of Continuity in Action:** The sermon uses traditional Catholic vocabulary (“conversion,” “humility,” “grace,” “St. Francis”) while radically redefining their meaning. This is the exact method of the Modernists condemned by St. Pius X: they “speak and write in a way that is calculated to deceive the simple and unwary” (*Pascendi Dominici gregis*, 1907). The “grace” here is not the sacramental grace of the Catholic Church; the “conversion” is not the justification of the sinner; the “peace” is not the peace of Christ’s reign.
* **Silence on the Supernatural and the Ecclesial:** The gravest accusation is the total silence on the means of salvation: the Catholic Church, its sacraments (especially Penance and the Eucharist), the authority of the Pope and bishops, the necessity of the state’s recognition of Christ the King, and the final judgment. This silence is a direct negation of the *Syllabus of Errors*, which condemns the idea that “the Church has not the power of defining dogmatically that the religion of the Catholic Church is the only true religion” (Error #21) and that “the ecclesiastical power ought not to exercise its authority without the permission and assent of the civil government” (Error #20). A sermon to the “Roman Curia” that never mentions the Church’s divine constitution, its infallible magisterium, or its exclusive right to govern consciences is a sermon from the “abomination of desolation” (Matt. 24:15).
* **Naturalistic and Pelagian Optimism:** The sermon’s core message is that peace is achievable through human humility and dialogue. This is the naturalistic religion of the “cult of man,” where human effort, inspired by a vague spiritual sentiment, can overcome the consequences of sin and build a better world. It directly contradicts the Catholic doctrine of the necessity of grace and the fallen state of human nature after original sin. Pius XI in *Quas Primas* stated that the “plague” of secularism produced “seeds of discord sown everywhere, flames of envy and hostility… domestic peace completely shattered… family ties loosened… the whole society profoundly shaken and heading towards destruction.” The remedy is not human humility but the public reign of Christ the King. Pasolini’s sermon offers the exact opposite: a worldly, psychological remedy for a supernatural problem.
* **The Cult of the Individual over the Social Doctrine of the Church:** The focus is entirely on the individual’s interior disposition (“how we perceive, judge, and desire”) and interpersonal relations (“dialogue”). There is not a single word about the duty of the political community to recognize the Social Kingship of Christ, to enact laws in conformity with His law, or to promote the common good as defined by divine and Catholic law. This is the triumph of the personalist, immanentist heresy that has replaced Catholic social doctrine with a vague gospel of niceness and tolerance. Pius XI explicitly taught that rulers must publicly honor Christ: “it will remind them of the final judgment, in which Christ… will very severely avenge these insults, because His royal dignity demands that all relations in the state be ordered on the basis of God’s commandments and Christian principles.” Pasolini’s silence on this is a denial of papal teaching.
Conclusion: A Sermon from the Synagogue of Satan
This Lenten meditation is a masterpiece of modernist deception. It takes the revered name of St. Francis, the beautiful concepts of humility and conversion, and the urgent need for peace, and empties them of all Catholic supernatural content. It replaces the theology of the cross—where peace is bought by the Blood of Christ and must be sought through penance, sacrifice, and the uncompromising proclamation of the exclusive reign of Christ the King—with a theology of human potential, where peace is a product of psychological adjustment and ethical dialogue.
The preacher stands in the “Paul VI Audience Hall,” a symbol of the post-conciliar revolution, addressing an antipope (“Leo XIV”) and the officials of a “curia” that has systematically dismantled the Catholic Faith. His message is perfectly suited to this context: it encourages personal piety without doctrinal content, promotes a vague peace without justice, and fosters a humility that is not the foundation for the submission of all intellects and wills to the one, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church, but rather a tool for building the “civilization of love” of the anti-Church.
From the perspective of integral Catholic faith, this sermon is not merely erroneous; it is a deadly poison. It leads souls to believe they are practicing evangelical virtue while being deprived of the means of salvation. It reinforces the conciliar sect’s program of replacing the Catholic religion with a naturalistic, humanistic, and ecumenical substitute. The only “conversion” it truly calls for is the conversion of its hearers to the false religion of the “Church of the New Advent.” The true path to peace, as defined by the pre-1958 Magisterium, remains the one proclaimed by Pius XI: the public and solemn recognition of Our Lord Jesus Christ as King of individuals, families, and nations, a recognition that can only come through the Catholic Church, outside of which there is no salvation. This sermon offers the opposite: a recipe for the final, apostate peace of the world, which is enmity against God (James 4:4).
Source:
Father Pasolini at the Vatican: Conversion and humility are paths to peace in times of conflict (ewtnnews.com)
Date: 06.03.2026