EWTN News portal reports on a statement from the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of India (CBCI) and individual clerics slamming the Indian government’s rejection of the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) 2026 report, which documented increasing atrocities against Christians. The article quotes “Archbishop” Anil Couto, “Archbishop” Andrews Thazhath, and Jesuit Father Cedric Prakash lamenting violence, anti-conversion laws, and the government’s “denial mode.” They frame their appeal in terms of constitutional rights (Article 25 of India’s constitution), “religious freedom,” and “human rights,” while collaborating ecumenically with Protestants through the United Christian Forum (UCF). Their solution is legal reform and state enforcement of existing laws, not the public reign of Christ the King. This entire approach is a capitulation to modernist, naturalistic principles that constitute a complete abandonment of integral Catholic faith and a betrayal of the social reign of Our Lord Jesus Christ.
The Naturalistic Heresy: Substituting Christ’s Kingship for Secular “Rights”
The foundational error of the cited article and the “bishops” it quotes is the substitution of the Catholic doctrine of the Social Kingship of Christ with the modernist dogma of “religious freedom” and “human rights.” This is not a mere rhetorical difference but a fundamental rejection of the Faith as defined before the revolution of Vatican II.
Pope Pius XI, in his encyclical Quas Primas (1925), which the conciliar sect has never formally abrogated but practically nullified, defined the Catholic position with absolute clarity: the Kingdom of Christ “encompasses all men” and extends to “individuals, families, and states.” Rulers have the “duty to publicly honor Christ and obey Him,” for “all power in heaven and on earth is given to Christ the Lord.” The Pope explicitly warns that when “God and Jesus Christ… were removed from laws and states… the foundations of that authority were destroyed.” The “bishops” of the CBCI make no such profession. They do not demand that Narendra Modi and the Indian state recognize the binding authority of the Codex Iuris Canonici (1917) or the Social Doctrine of the Church as summarized by Leo XIII and Pius XI. Instead, they appeal to Article 25 of the Indian constitution—a product of Enlightenment naturalism—and to the findings of a U.S. government commission. This is the precise error condemned by Pope Pius IX in the Syllabus of Errors (1864), Error #15: “Every man is free to embrace and profess that religion which, guided by the light of reason, he shall consider true.” The “bishops” implicitly accept this premise by basing their appeal on a “right” to religious freedom, a right that, according to Catholic doctrine, belongs only to the truth of the Catholic Faith. Their silence on the exclusive salvific role of the Catholic Church and the duty of the state to recognize it as the sole religion is a damning admission of apostasy.
Ecumenism: The Abomination of Interfaith Collaboration
The article highlights the “ecumenical United Christian Forum (UCF)” as the body documenting atrocities, featuring a photo of “Archbishop” Couto “flanked by a Hindu monk and a Protestant bishop.” This is not Catholic action; it is the sacrilegious manifestation of the conciliar error of “dialogue” and “brotherhood of religions,” condemned by the pre-conciliar Magisterium.
The Syllabus of Errors condemns Error #18: “Protestantism is nothing more than another form of the same true Christian religion, in which form it is given to please God equally as in the Catholic Church.” By standing in a public forum with a Protestant “bishop” as an equal partner, “Archbishop” Couto publicly denies the unique truth of the Catholic Church and the necessity of her for salvation. He also collaborates with a Hindu “monk,” thereby endorsing religious indifferentism, which Pius IX calls a “pest” (see the preamble to the Syllabus on “Indifferentism, Latitudinarianism”). This ecumenical action is a direct fruit of Vatican II’s Nostra Aetate and Dignitatis Humanae, documents that are heretical denials of the Church’s exclusive rights. The “bishops” are not defending the Faith; they are participating in the “synagogue of Satan” (Apoc. 2:9; 3:9) by treating idolaters and heretics as co-religionists in a common “Christian” cause. Their cause is not the cause of Christ the King, but the cause of naturalistic “pluralism.”
The Omission of the True Cause: Modernist Apostasy Within
The article and the “bishops” it quotes focus exclusively on external threats—Hindu nationalist violence and government policies. They remain completely silent on the true and primary danger to the Church in India and worldwide: the internal, systematic apostasy of Modernism, which has infected the hierarchy since the mid-20th century. This silence is itself a damning proof of their allegiance to the enemy.
St. Pius X, in his 1907 decree Lamentabili Sane Exitu (condemning 65 Modernist propositions), identified the core error: the denial of the immutability of doctrine and the evolution of dogmas (Propositions 54, 58, 60). The “bishops” of the CBCI, by their very presence in the post-conciliar “Church,” accept this evolution. They accept the heretical declaration on religious freedom, Dignitatis Humanae (1965), which contradicts the Syllabus and the consistent teaching of the Popes. They accept the ecumenical movement, which is the practical application of Modernism’s denial of the Church’s uniqueness. Their fight is not for the integral Faith but for a place within the secular, pluralistic order that the Modernist “Church” has embraced. They are like the false prophets of old who “heal the daughter of my people slightly, saying: Peace, peace: and there is no peace” (Jer. 6:14). They offer a superficial, political solution to a spiritual crisis they have helped create.
The Illegitimacy of the Speakers: Occupiers, Not Pastors
A fundamental principle of Catholic theology, defended by St. Robert Bellarmine and others in the file on sedevacantism, is that a manifest heretic cannot be a member of the Church, and therefore cannot hold any ecclesiastical office, especially not the episcopacy. The current “bishops” of the CBCI, by their public adherence to the conciliar errors of religious freedom, ecumenism, and the evolution of doctrine, are manifest heretics. They publicly reject the doctrine of the Syllabus of Errors and the teaching of Quas Primas. Therefore, according to the theological opinion of Bellarmine (which the file demonstrates is the only tenable one), they have ipso facto lost their office.
Canon 188.4 of the 1917 Code of Canon Law states: “Every office becomes vacant by the mere fact… if the cleric: … 4. Publicly defects from the Catholic faith.” Their public acceptance of the Vatican II sect’s doctrines is a public defect from the Catholic faith. Furthermore, Pope Paul IV’s bull Cum ex Apostolatus Officio declares that any cleric who has “defected from the Catholic Faith or fallen into some heresy” has a promotion that is “null, void, and of no effect.” This applies from the moment of heresy, without need of a declaration. Therefore, “Archbishop” Couto, “Archbishop” Thazhath, and Father Prakash are not legitimate pastors. They are usurpers occupying the temples of the true Church. Their statements have no magisterial weight; they are the voices of apostates speaking from the “abomination of desolation” (Matt. 24:15) standing in the holy place of the post-conciliar sect.
The Sedevacantist Reality: The See Is Vacant
The entire article operates on the false premise that the “Catholic Bishops’ Conference of India” is a legitimate body of the Catholic Church. This is impossible. The line of Roman Pontiffs from John XXIII (1958) through the current antipope “Leo XIV” (Robert Prevost) has consistently, publicly, and obstinately taught, promulgated, and enforced the errors of Modernism condemned by St. Pius X. They have promulgated the heretical Vatican II documents, which are the synthesis of all errors. Therefore, according to the theological doctrine outlined in the sedevacantism file—based on Bellarmine, the 1917 Code, and papal law—these men are not popes. The See of Peter is vacant.
Consequently, there is no legitimate “CBCI.” There is no legitimate hierarchy in India. The true Catholic remnant in India, if any exist, must be outside these conciliar structures, adhering to the Faith as it was always taught, and recognizing that the “ecumenical” and “religious freedom” positions of the article’s speakers are heretical. The “bishops” quoted are not “Church leaders in India” in any Catholic sense; they are functionaries of the neo-church, the “paramasonic structure” occupying the Vatican, fighting for a place in the new world order of religious indifferentism that the Freemasonic “spirit of the Council” has erected.
Conclusion: A Call to Repudiation and Return
The article exposes the utter bankruptcy of the post-conciliar “Church’s” response to persecution. It is a response rooted in the same naturalistic, human-rights-based philosophy that the Syllabus of Errors and Lamentabili Sane Exitu condemned. It is a response that collaborates with heretics and idolaters, denies the Social Kingship of Christ, and remains silent on the internal apostasy that is the root cause of all external troubles. The “bishops” quoted are not defenders of the Faith; they are agents of the Modernist revolution, using the language of “justice” and “freedom” to lead souls away from the absolute necessity of submission to the one, true Church and her Divine King.
The only Catholic response is the one Pius XI called for in Quas Primas: the public confession that “Jesus Christ is King of glory” and the ordering of all individual, familial, and political life according to His law. This means rejecting the false “religious freedom” of the USCIRF and the Indian constitution, and demanding the exclusive public honor of the Catholic Faith. It means breaking all ecumenical ties with Protestants and pagans. It means denouncing the Modernist heresiarchs occupying Rome and their entire conciliar sect. It means seeking refuge and guidance solely from the immutable Faith of the pre-1958 Church, which alone can offer the “abundant blessings” of true peace, order, and salvation. The “bishops” of the CBCI, by their words and actions, have proven themselves to be part of the great apostasy. Their warnings about persecution are meaningless because they themselves are persecutors of the Faith by promoting its synthetic replacement.
Source:
Church leaders in India slam government’s dismissal of religious freedom report (ewtnnews.com)
Date: 21.03.2026