Summary: The EWTN News article from March 26, 2026, reports statements by Cardinal Pietro Parolin, secretary of state of the post-conciliar Vatican, regarding the U.S.-Israeli military action against Iran and the situation of the Traditional Latin Mass in France. Parolin, speaking for “Pope Leo XIV,” asserts that the war fails the Church’s just war criteria, echoing Cardinal McElroy’s naturalistic calculus of “benefits” versus “harm.” Simultaneously, he addresses the “divisive” issue of the Traditional Latin Mass, urging French bishops to be “inclusive” toward communities attached to it, while implicitly condemning the Society of St. Pius X (SSPX) for its planned episcopal consecrations without papal mandate. The article reveals a profound apostasy: a “Vatican” that prioritizes a relativistic, humanistic “peace” over the duty of Christian rulers to defend their people from Islamic aggression, and that treats the sacred liturgy—the very heart of Catholic worship—as a negotiable “battlefield” to be managed by bureaucratic “formulas.” This is the logical fruit of the conciliar revolution’s abandonment of the Social Kingship of Christ and its embrace of the errors condemned by Pius IX in the Syllabus of Errors.
The Apostasy of “Peace” and the Denial of the Social Kingship of Christ
The article’s primary focus is the Vatican’s diplomatic intervention in geopolitical affairs, framed entirely within the Modernist, naturalistic paradigm of “peace studies” and human rights. Cardinal Parolin’s declaration that the war on Iran “does not seem to meet the conditions” of just war theory is not a principled theological judgment but a repetition of Cardinal McElroy’s subjective, consequentialist reasoning: that the “benefits” will not “outweigh the harm.” This stands in stark, irreconcilable opposition to the integral Catholic doctrine on war, the state, and the duty of rulers, as defined by the unchanging Magisterium before the dawn of the conciliar apostasy.
Pius XI, in his encyclical Quas Primas (1925), established the feast of Christ the King precisely to combat the secularist error that had “removed Jesus Christ and His most holy law from… public life.” The Pope taught that Christ’s reign “encompasses all men” and that “it matters not whether individuals, families, or states, for men united in societies are no less subject to the authority of Christ than individuals.” Consequently, the primary duty of the state is to publicly honor Christ and obey His laws, for “when God and Jesus Christ… were removed from laws and states… the foundations of that authority were destroyed.” The “peace” Pius XI promised is not the mere absence of war but the “unheard-of blessings” of “due freedom, order, and tranquility” that flow from a society ordered according to the divine law. This is the peace of Christ’s reign, not the fragile, godless truce sought by Modernist diplomats.
The Syllabus of Errors (1864), promulgated by Pius IX, anathematizes precisely the mindset displayed by Parolin and McElroy. Error #40 states: “The teaching of the Catholic Church is hostile to the well-being and interests of society.” The Vatican’s current position implicitly accepts this condemned proposition, suggesting that a Catholic judgment on war must be subordinated to a secular calculus of “harm” and “benefit” divorced from the supernatural order. Error #56 declares: “Moral laws do not stand in need of the divine sanction, and it is not at all necessary that human laws should be made conformable to the laws of nature and receive their power of binding from God.” By evaluating the war solely on humanitarian grounds without reference to the defense of the faith, the protection of Christian peoples from Islamic expansion (a clear and present danger), or the vindication of justice against aggressors, the Vatican officials reduce morality to a humanistic utility. This is the essence of Modernism: the “evolution of dogma” applied to ethics, where the unchanging principles of the just war—rooted in the defense of the innocent and the common good as understood in light of the Faith—are replaced by a fluid, sentimental humanitarianism.
Furthermore, the article’s complete silence on the religious nature of the conflict is damning. Iran is an Islamic theocracy whose stated goal is the destruction of Israel and the West, regimes that persecute Christians and seek global submission to Sharia. The pre-conciliar Magisterium, aware of the perennial struggle between the City of God and the City of Man, would have demanded that Catholic rulers consider the defense of Christendom and the protection of the faithful as a primary, supernatural good. Pius IX, in the Syllabus, condemns the error (#63) that “it is lawful to refuse obedience to legitimate princes, and even to rebel against them,” but this presupposes that the princes are defending the rightful order, including the rights of the Church. The Modernist Vatican, having embraced religious indifferentism (Syllabus Errors #15-18), cannot formulate a judgment that sees the defense of a Judeo-Christian civilization against Islamic jihad as a just cause. Its “peace” is a peace of the cemetery for the supernatural order.
The Liturgical “Battlefield”: Modernist Management vs. Sacred Tradition
Parolin’s comments on the Traditional Latin Mass expose the same naturalistic, managerial mindset. He states: “The liturgy must not become a source of conflict and division among us… It will be necessary to find the formula that can meet legitimate needs.” This bureaucratic language—”formula,” “meet legitimate needs,” “divisive issue”—is symptomatic of a profound theological decay. It treats the sacred liturgy, the unbloody sacrifice of Calvary and the primary worship due to God, as a sociological problem to be “managed” to avoid “conflict.” The very notion that the immemorial Roman Rite, codified by Pope St. Pius V in 1570 and used by centuries of saints, could be a “battlefield” is an admission of the revolutionary nature of the post-conciliar “reform” and the deep-seated rebellion it has caused.
The pre-conciliar Church, following the teaching of St. Pius X in Tra le Sollecitudini (1903), held that the liturgy is the “supreme and most sacred law” of the Church, the “first and indispensable source of the true Christian spirit.” It is not a “formula” to be negotiated but a sacred deposit to be preserved. The “division” is not caused by those attached to the traditional rite, but by the sacrilegious imposition of the Novus Ordo Missae—a rite composed by a Freemason (Annibale Bugnini) and approved by Paul VI, which, as the Fathers of the Holy Office noted in their 1969 study, is “marked by a deplorable departure from the Catholic theology of the Mass as defined by the Council of Trent.” The “legitimate need” is the need to worship God according to the rites that have nourished the saints for centuries, a need that the Modernist hierarchy has systematically denied and punished.
Parolin’s vague call for “inclusivity” toward “communities attached to the Traditional Latin Mass” is a masterpiece of ambiguity. It does not affirm the right or the goodness of the traditional rite; it merely suggests that the hierarchy should be less severe in its suppression to reduce “tension.” This is the language of political compromise, not of Catholic principle. It utterly ignores the doctrinal and spiritual bankruptcy of the Novus Ordo, its ecumenical, protestantized prayers, and its inherent instability. The true Catholic position, held by the pre-conciliar Magisterium and by the sedevacantist remnant, is that the traditional Roman Rite is the lex orandi of the Catholic Church, and that any “reform” that departs from it is a sacrilege. The SSPX’s planned consecrations, while schismatic in their claim to act without papal mandate (a canonical irregularity), are a desperate, erroneous reaction to the authentic apostasy of the “Vatican” that has destroyed the Mass. Parolin’s refusal to condemn the Novus Ordo and his failure to restore the traditional rite as the exclusive norm reveal his allegiance to the conciliar sect’s program of liturgical destruction.
Symptomatic of the Conciliar Apostasy: Naturalism, Indifferentism, and the Rejection of Christ’s Kingship
The two issues Parolin addresses—foreign policy and the liturgy—are two sides of the same Modernist coin. The underlying philosophy is the same: a complete rejection of the Social Kingship of Christ as taught by Pius XI and all pre-conciliar Pontiffs, and its replacement by a secular, humanistic “dialogue” and “peace” that has no room for the supernatural finality of society.
The Vatican’s stance on Iran is the logical outcome of Vatican II’s Dignitatis Humanae (religious liberty) and Nostra Aetate (false ecumenism). If all religions possess a “right” to public expression and if the Church must engage in “dialogue” with non-Christian religions, then the state cannot be expected to favor the Catholic faith or defend it against external threats. The “peace” sought is a pluralistic, indifferentist peace where all “rights” are equal, including the “right” of Islamic states to propagate a false religion. This is the peace of the Antichrist, where the “kings of the earth” are invited to a syncretistic banquet while Christ the King is formally excluded from public life.
Similarly, the liturgical “inclusivity” demanded is the fruit of the same indifferentism. If the Church is no longer the sole ark of salvation but merely one “element” in a “dialogue” of religions, then the liturgy must be “open” and “inclusive,” stripped of its exclusive Catholic sacrificial language. The Traditional Latin Mass, with its clear doctrine of propitiatory sacrifice, its prayers for the conversion of the Jews and the “perfidis” (a term removed by Paul VI), and its absolute rejection of anything profane, is an intolerable scandal to this new, inclusive paradigm. Hence, the relentless persecution of those who cling to it, and the bureaucratic maneuvers to “integrate” them into the Novus Ordo system.
Conclusion: The article presents a “Vatican” that is fully aligned with the errors condemned by Pius IX’s Syllabus and St. Pius X’s Lamentabili. Its “peace” is the peace of apostasy, its “inclusivity” is the dilution of the Faith, and its “dialogue” is the rejection of Christ’s exclusive kingship. The only Catholic response is total rejection. As Pius XI taught in Quas Primas, true peace and order flow only from the public recognition of Christ the King. The Modernist “peace” of Parolin is a prelude to the final apostasy foretold by St. Pius X: a synthesis of all heresies that will culminate in the reign of Antichrist. The faithful must flee this conciliar sect and cling to the immutable Faith, worship, and discipline of the pre-1958 Church, which endures in the catacombs, awaiting the restoration of a true pope and the public triumph of Christ’s reign.
Source:
Vatican secretary of state says war on Iran is not just (ewtnnews.com)
Date: 26.03.2026