The U.S. Department of Justice has secured a court victory allowing a copper mine to proceed on Oak Flat, a site sacred to Apache Native Americans, despite opposition from the Apache Stronghold coalition. The coalition, supported by the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops and the Knights of Columbus via amicus briefs, argued the land transfer violates the Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA). The federal government asserts the mine is crucial for domestic copper supply. Apache Stronghold vows continued legal fight, calling Oak Flat their “spiritual lifeblood.” This case reveals the post-conciliar hierarchy’s fundamental apostasy: using Catholic influence to defend a non-Catholic “sacred site” while remaining silent on the absolute, exclusive reign of Our Lord Jesus Christ over all nations and peoples.
The Naturalistic Trap of “Religious Freedom”
The central argument advanced by the “U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops” and the Knights of Columbus is a profound theological error. Their amicus brief claims the lower courts displayed a “grave misunderstanding” of RFRA by not applying the “least restrictive means” test to the land transfer. This frames the conflict within the secular, naturalistic paradigm of “religious freedom” as a civil right, a concept condemned by the Church. Pope Pius IX’s Syllabus of Errors explicitly anathematizes the notion that “every man is free to embrace and profess that religion which, guided by the light of reason, he shall consider true” (Error 15) and that “man may, in the observance of any religion whatever, find the way of eternal salvation” (Error 16). By entering the legal arena on the side of a non-Catholic religious practice, these “clerics” do not defend the rights of the true Church; they actively promote the indifferentist error that all religions possess equal dignity and merit civil protection. They treat Apache traditional spirituality as a legitimate “religion” deserving of state accommodation, thereby placing it on a level with the one true religion—a direct repudiation of the Catholic axiom, Extra Ecclesiam nulla salus (Outside the Church there is no salvation).
The Omission of Christ the King: A Cry of Apostasy
The most damning aspect of the article and the bishops’ action is the total, deafening silence on the social kingship of Jesus Christ. Pope Pius XI, in his encyclical Quas Primas, instituted the feast of Christ the King precisely to combat the secularism that “denied Christ the Lord’s reign over all nations.” The Pope declared that the state must publicly honor Christ and obey Him, for “all power in heaven and on earth is given to Christ the Lord.” He warned that when “God and Jesus Christ… were removed from laws and states… the foundations of that authority were destroyed.” The article quotes Apache Stronghold’s Wendsler Nosie Sr. calling Oak Flat the place to “connect with our Creator,” yet not a single “Catholic” voice is cited pointing these souls to the only true Creator and Redeemer, Jesus Christ, and His one, holy, Catholic, and apostolic Church. This omission is not neutrality; it is apostasy. It conforms to the Modernist principle, condemned by St. Pius X in Pascendi Dominici gregis and Lamentabili sane exitu, that reduces religion to a natural, human sentiment and denies the supernatural mission of the Church to teach all nations. The “bishops” prefer a legal battle over a natural right to a pagan site to the spiritual battle for the conversion of souls to Christ.
The Heresy of “Ecumenical” Solidarity
The alliance between conciliar “Catholic” bodies and a non-Catholic indigenous group is a perfect manifestation of the “ecumenism project” analyzed in the Fatima file—a project that “opens the way to religious relativism.” The “U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops,” an organ of the post-conciliar sect, applies the principles of Vatican II’s Nostra Aetate and the conciliar “hermeneutic of continuity” to treat indigenous spirituality as a praeparatio evangelica worthy of defense. This is a direct contradiction 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). The “bishops” act as if the Apache worship of a vague “Creator” at Oak Flat is a good and holy thing to be protected, when in reality it is a superstitious cult of demons (cf. 1 Cor. 10:20). Their action is not a defense of religious liberty in the Catholic sense—which is the liberty of the Church to operate free from state interference—but an active promotion of a false religion, making them guilty of formal cooperation in the evil of idolatry.
Sedevacantist Perspective: The Usurpers’ Null Acts
From the perspective of integral Catholic faith, the entire framework is invalid. The “Pope” Leo XIV (Robert Prevost) and the entire hierarchy occupying the Vatican since John XXIII are manifest heretics and therefore, according to St. Robert Bellarmine and Canon 188.4 of the 1917 Code, have ipso facto lost all jurisdiction. As the Defense of Sedevacantism file demonstrates, a manifest heretic “cannot be the head of the Church… because he is not a member.” The “U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops” is a committee of a false sect, not the Catholic Church. Its “amicus brief” is a null act, possessing no moral or canonical weight. Its attempt to use the language of RFRA, a product of the secular American state, to defend a pagan site is a logical outcome of a hierarchy that has abandoned the exclusive reign of Christ. The true Catholic position, held by the remnant Church, would be to: 1) Denounce the mining project if it causes genuine injustice to the Apache people as persons, but 2) Unflinchingly condemn their idolatrous practices and call them to conversion; 3) Affirm that the only “sacred site” with objective, supernatural sanctity is the altar where the Unbloody Sacrifice of Calvary is offered; 4) Proclaim that all nations, including the United States, must recognize the social kingship of Christ and frame their laws accordingly, as Pius XI commanded.
The Symptom: A Church That Serves the World, Not Christ
This incident is a symptom of the systemic apostasy of the conciliar sect. The “bishops” do not fight for the rights of God; they fight for the rights of man as defined by a pluralistic, secular state. They employ the language of “rights” and “freedom” from the French Revolution and American liberalism, not the language of the Social Reign of Christ the King. Their silence on the need for the conversion of the Apache people to the one true faith is a direct consequence of the “ecumenical spirit” of Vatican II, which treats non-Catholic religions as containing “elements of truth” and “seeds of the Word.” This is the “abomination of desolation” standing in the holy place: a structure calling itself Catholic that defends the worship of false gods while ignoring the perpetual, unchangeable duty of the Church to bring all men to Christ. The true Catholic, therefore, must reject this “bishops'” action as a work of the world, not of the Church. The only legitimate fight is for the restoration of all things in Christ, through the re-establishment of the Catholic hierarchy and the public confession that Jesus Christ is King, not merely of souls, but of families, societies, and states.
Source:
White House Will Proceed With Mining Project That Will Destroy Site Sacred to Native Americans (ncregister.com)
Date: 25.03.2026