The NC Register commentary by Andrea M. Picciotti-Bayer celebrates the Supreme Court’s 8-1 decision in *Chiles v. Salazar*, which struck down Colorado’s ban on so-called “conversion therapy” for minors as a violation of the First Amendment. The article frames the ruling as a win for Christian counselors like Kaley Chiles and the families who seek their guidance, praising the Court for subjecting the law to “rigorous First Amendment scrutiny” and condemning viewpoint discrimination. The commentary further notes the shifting medical landscape, citing the Cass Review and other studies questioning gender transition for minors, and concludes that the decision protects the freedom of Catholic and Christian families to seek counseling aligned with their faith. While the article presents this as a constitutional victory, its underlying assumptions are profoundly naturalistic and modernist, utterly divorced from the integral Catholic doctrine that predates the 1958 rupture. It operates entirely within the secular liberal framework of “rights” and “free speech,” ignoring the absolute primacy of Christ’s kingship over all nations and the state’s duty to enforce divine law. The analysis fails to condemn gender ideology as an intrinsic evil, reduces the spiritual struggle of gender confusion to a psychological issue solvable by “talk therapy,” and celebrates a legal win that merely adjusts the parameters of a godless system rather than demanding its complete submission to the Social Reign of Christ the King.
The Naturalistic Foundation: A “Victory” Within the Anti-Christ System
The entire commentary rests on the naturalistic premise that the First Amendment’s guarantee of free speech is the ultimate shield for religious practice. This is a fatal error. The article never questions whether the state has any legitimate authority to regulate the spiritual care of souls in the first place. From the perspective of integral Catholic faith, the state’s attempt to ban certain forms of counseling is, in itself, an illegitimate intrusion into the domain of the Church, which alone has authority over the formation of conscience and the cure of souls. The article’s celebration of the Court’s application of “strict scrutiny” is a surrender to the premise that the state’s interest in “public health and safety” can even be weighed against the rights of the Church and the family. This is the error of *Gallicanism* and *liberalism* condemned by Pope Pius IX in the *Syllabus of Errors*.
The *Syllabus* explicitly anathematizes the notion that the state can regulate religious practice or that the Church’s rights are subject to civil definition. Error 19 states: “The Church is not a true and perfect society, entirely free… but it appertains to the civil power to define what are the rights of the Church, and the limits within which she may exercise those rights.” Error 20 adds: “The ecclesiastical power ought not to exercise its authority without the permission and assent of the civil government.” By arguing that the state’s law must pass “strict scrutiny” rather than being declared *null and void* as an assault on the Church’s exclusive domain, the article accepts the modern, secular separation of Church and State—a separation Pope Pius IX called “abominable” (*Syllabus*, Error 55: “The Church ought to be separated from the State, and the State from the Church”). The commentary’s language of “free speech” and “viewpoint discrimination” is the vocabulary of the anti-Christ system, which enshrines the “right” to error while persecuting truth.
Omission of the Supernatural: Reducing Salvation to Psychological Adjustment
The article’s most damning silence is its complete omission of the supernatural framework within which any true “counseling” for a Catholic must occur. It speaks of helping children “explore their feelings honestly” and “reconcile what they are experiencing with what they believe.” This is psychological jargon, not Catholic doctrine. The article never mentions sin, grace, the sacraments, the state of grace, or the ultimate end of man—the Beatific Vision. It treats gender confusion as a mere identity issue to be “explored,” rather than what it is: a profound disorder of the soul, often linked
Source:
SCOTUS Defends Christian Counselor’s Right to Confidentiality (ncregister.com)
Date: 31.03.2026