Vatican News portal reports that on April 15, 2026, the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) published a statement by Bishop James Massa, chairman of the USCCB’s Committee on Doctrine, defending the statements of the usurper Leo XIV regarding the Church’s teaching on war and peace. Massa asserts that Leo XIV, as “supreme pastor of the universal Church,” exercises his “ministry as the Vicar of Christ” when speaking on these matters, and references the Catechism of the Catholic Church (no. 2308) to justify the position that war is only legitimate in self-defense after all peace efforts have failed. The statement concludes by emphasizing the duty of “all people of good will” to pray and work toward lasting peace. This declaration is not a defense of Catholic doctrine but a textbook example of the subordination of immutable moral teaching to the authority of a manifest heretic occupying the Vatican, thereby revealing the complete theological bankruptcy of the conciliar sect.
The “Holy Father” Who Is Not: A Manifest Heretic Invoked as Vicar of Christ
The most immediate and damning feature of Bishop Massa’s statement is its unqualified attribution of supreme pastoral authority to Leo XIV, whom the article and the USCCB consistently refer to as “Pope” and “Holy Father.” Massa declares: “When Pope Leo XIV speaks as supreme pastor of the universal Church, he is not merely offering opinions on theology, he is preaching the Gospel and exercising his ministry as the Vicar of Christ.” This sentence alone constitutes a public act of adhesion to a usurper. As established by St. Robert Bellarmine in De Romano Pontifice, a manifest heretic “by that very fact ceases to be Pope and head, just as he ceases to be a Christian and member of the body of the Church.” The 1917 Code of Canon Law, Canon 188.4, confirms that every office becomes vacant by the mere fact of public defection from the Catholic faith, without any declaration required. Leo XIV, as a product and protector of the conciar revolution—which has systematically denied, contradicted, and undermined defined dogmas from the First Vatican Council to Quas Primas—is a manifest heretic. He is not the Vicar of Christ. He is an antipope. By invoking his authority as the source and guarantor of Catholic teaching on war, Massa does not defend the faith; he demonstrates that the USCCB has fully embraced the very error that has destroyed the Church from within: the substitution of the immutable Magisterium for the living voice of a heretical occupant of the Vatican.
This is not a matter of private judgment or theological opinion. Pope Celestine I, in his letters concerning Nestorius, stated unequivocally: “he who has departed from the faith with such preaching cannot depose or remove anyone.” Cardinal Billot summarized this principle: “if he who is not in the Church cannot have power in the Church, and a hidden heretic can have it, and indeed sometimes does have it, it clearly follows that a hidden heretic is not yet cut off from the body of the Church.” But Leo XIV is not a hidden hereric. His entire pontificate, like those of his predecessors from John XXIII onward, is a public, continuous, and systematic act of defection from the Catholic faith. Therefore, he possesses no jurisdiction, no authority, and no power to teach, govern, or sanctify. Massa’s statement is not merely erroneous; it is an act of formal cooperation with the abomination of desolation that sits in the temple of God (2 Thess. 2:4).
The Distortion of Just War Theory: From Moral Doctrine to Pacifist Sentiment
Massa’s statement reduces the Catholic doctrine on war to a single conditional principle: “A constant tenet of that thousand-year tradition is a nation can only legitimately take up the sword ‘in self-defense, once all peace efforts have failed’ (Catechism of the Catholic Church, no. 2308).” While this principle is not in itself heretical, its isolation from the fullness of Catholic moral teaching on war reveals the modernist method of selective quotation and deliberate omission. The Catechism cited is a product of the conciliar sect, compiled under the authority of John Paul II—a manifest heretic and apostate—and reflects the systematic dilution of Catholic doctrine that has characterized post-conciliarism.
The authentic Catholic teaching on war, as articulated by the Church’s approved theologians and the pre-conciliar Magisterium, is far more comprehensive and far more demanding than the anemic formula Massa presents. War is not merely a regrettable last resort for self-defense. It is, under certain strict conditions, a positive moral duty for the defense of justice, the protection of the innocent, and the vindication of violated rights. St. Augustine, whose authority Massa implicitly invokes by referencing the “thousand-year tradition,” taught that war waged by a legitimate authority with just cause and right intention is not merely permissible but can be an act of charity: “The real evils in war are love of violence, revengeful cruelty, fierce and implacable enmity, wild resistance, and the lust of power, and such like.” The just war tradition, properly understood, is not a concession to human weakness but an application of the virtue of justice to the ordering of nations.
Moreover, Massa’s statement omits entirely the teaching of Pope Pius XI in Quas Primas on the social reign of Christ the King. Pius XI taught that “the Kingdom of our Redeemer encompasses all men” and that rulers and governments have the duty to publicly honor Christ and obey Him, ordering all relations in the state on the basis of God’s commandments and Christian principles. The just war doctrine cannot be divorced from this broader framework. A war fought to defend a state that has publicly repudiated Christ the King, that has enshrined religious indifferentism in its laws, and that has submitted to the authority of a heretical antipope is not a just war—it is a war in service of the enemies of Christ. Massa’s silence on this point is not accidental; it is symptomatic of the conciliar sect’s systematic erasure of the social kingship of Christ from its moral teaching.
“All People of Good Will”: The Language of Religious Indifferentism
The concluding sentence of Massa’s statement is perhaps the most revealing: “The consistent teaching of the Church is insistent that all people of good will must pray and work toward lasting peace while avoiding the evils and injustices that accompany all wars.” The phrase “all people of good will” is not Catholic language. It is the language of the conciliar sect, borrowed directly from the modernist spirit of Vatican II’s Nostra Aetate and Dignitatis Humanae, which proclaimed the religious liberty of all men and the salvific value of non-Christian religions. Pope Pius IX, in the Syllabus of Errors, condemned the proposition that “every man is free to embrace and profess that religion which, guided by the light of reason, he shall consider true” (Proposition 15) and that “man may, in the observance of any religion whatever, find the way of eternal salvation” (Proposition 16). The phrase “people of good will” in the mouth of a bishop—even a conciliar one—is a direct echo of the modernist heresy that salvation is possible outside the Catholic Church and that all religions are equally valid paths to God.
Furthermore, Massa’s statement reduces the Church’s teaching on peace to a vague aspiration for “lasting peace” without any reference to the only true source of peace: the reign of Christ the King. Pius XI, in Quas Primas, taught: “the hope of lasting peace will not yet shine upon nations as long as individuals and states renounce and do not wish to recognize the reign of our Savior.” Peace, in Catholic doctrine, is not the absence of conflict; it is the tranquillity of order (St. Augustine), which can only exist when individuals, families, and states submit to the authority of Christ and His Church. Massa’s statement, by omitting any reference to Christ the King, to the necessity of conversion, and to the Church’s exclusive mission of salvation, reveals that the USCCB’s vision of “peace” is indistinguishable from the secular humanist ideal of the United Nations—a peace without Christ, without grace, and without the Cross.
The Catechism of the Catholic Church: A Modernist Instrument
Massa’s appeal to the Catechism of the Catholic Church (1992) as an authoritative source is itself a damning indictment of his theological competence—or, more accurately, of the conciliar sect’s systematic replacement of authentic Catholic teaching with modernist counterfeits. The 1992 Catechism was promulgated by John Paul II, a manifest heretic, and was compiled under the direction of Joseph Ratzinger, whose entire theological career was dedicated to the subversion of Catholic doctrine through the “hermeneutics of continuity.” The Catechism’s treatment of war and peace (nos. 2302-2317) is a carefully crafted document that, while containing fragments of traditional teaching, systematically omits or obscures the Church’s teaching on the social reign of Christ, the duty of states to profess the Catholic faith, and the exclusive salvific mission of the Church.
By citing this document as the authoritative expression of “the consistent teaching of the Church,” Massa demonstrates that the USCCB has fully embraced the modernist project of replacing the immutable Magisterium with a “living” and “developing” body of doctrine that can be reinterpreted at will by each successive antipope. This is precisely the error condemned by Pope St. Pius X in Pascendi Dominici Gregis: “The Church listening cooperates in such a way with the Church teaching in defining truths of faith, that the Church teaching should only approve the common opinions of the Church listening” (Proposition 6, Lamentabili). The Catechism is not a rule of faith; it is a modernist instrument designed to facilitate the evolution of dogma and the democratization of the Church.
The Silence on the Supernatural: The Gravest Accusation
The most profound deficiency of Massa’s statement—and the one that most clearly reveals its modernist character—is its complete silence on the supernatural dimension of war and peace. There is no mention of the state of grace, no mention of the necessity of sacramental confession and Holy Communion for soldiers, no mention of the Most Holy Sacrifice of the Mass as the supreme means of obtaining God’s blessings upon a nation at war, and no mention of the final judgment, in which every nation and every ruler will be judged according to their fidelity to Christ the King.
This silence is not an oversight. It is the defining characteristic of the conciliar sect’s moral teaching: the reduction of Catholic doctrine to naturalistic humanism, stripped of all supernatural content and indistinguishable from the ethical pronouncements of any secular institution. Pope Pius IX, in the Syllabus of Errors, condemned the proposition that “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” (Proposition 56). Massa’s statement, by omitting any reference to divine law, the sacraments, or the supernatural order, falls squarely under this condemnation.
The authentic Catholic teaching on war and peace is inseparable from the supernatural mission of the Church. War is not merely a political or military problem; it is a spiritual crisis that demands supernatural remedies: prayer, penance, the Mass, and the intercession of the Blessed Virgin Mary and the saints. A bishop who speaks of war without mentioning these things is not a shepherd of souls; he is a bureaucrat managing a human institution. Massa’s statement confirms what the faithful have long known: the USCCB is not a Catholic body but a modernist organization that has abandoned the supernatural mission of the Church in service of the world.
Conclusion: The Bankruptcy of the Conciliar Sect
Bishop James Massa’s statement on behalf of the USCCB is not a defense of Catholic teaching on war and peace. It is a manifesto of the conciliar sect’s complete capitulation to modernism. By invoking the authority of a manifest heretic as “Vicar of Christ,” by reducing the just war doctrine to a single conditional principle, by employing the language of religious indifferentism, by citing a modernist Catechism as authoritative, and by omitting all reference to the supernatural order, Massa has demonstrated that the USCCB has nothing to offer the faithful but the empty husk of Catholic language filled with modernist content.
The faithful must reject this statement and all like it. They must return to the immutable teaching of the pre-conciliar Magisterium: the social reign of Christ the King, the exclusive salvific mission of the Catholic Church, the binding force of divine law upon all nations and all men, and the necessity of the supernatural means of grace for the attainment of true peace. As Pope Pius XI taught in Quas Primas: “When God and Jesus Christ—as we lamented—were removed from laws and states and when authority was derived not from God but from men, the foundations of that authority were destroyed.” The USCCB, by removing Christ from its teaching on war and peace, has destroyed the very foundation of its authority. It is not a Catholic body. It is a modernist sect. And its statements deserve not obedience but contempt.
Source:
US Bishop’s chairman on Doctrine clarifies Just War Theory (vaticannews.va)
Date: 15.04.2026