EWTN News portal reports that Chicago Public Schools (CPS) has reinstated funding for special education services in Catholic schools after a brief suspension, following pressure from the Archdiocese of Chicago. The archdiocese expressed gratitude to CPS leadership, while Cardinal Cupich condemned the suspension as “shocking and possibly discriminatory.” This episode reveals the fundamental degradation of the Church’s self-understanding in the post-conciliar era, where a cardinal of the so-called Church begs secular authorities for crumbs of funding while accepting the state’s supremacy over Catholic education.
The Cardinal as Supplicant: A Perfect Image of Conciliar Ecclesiology
The statement from the Archdiocese of Chicago reads like a press release from a dependent NGO, not from the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church founded by Jesus Christ with all authority in heaven and on earth. Consider the grotesque spectacle: “We appreciate the efforts of CPS CEO Dr. Macquline King and her staff to restore these important services.” A cardinal of the Church — or rather, a usurper occupying a cardinalatial seat in the conciliar sect — thanks a secular bureaucrat for permitting the Church to educate her own children. This is not merely political pragmatism; it is a public confession that the Church has no rights independent of the state, that Catholic education exists at the pleasure of secular authorities, and that the Archdiocese of Chicago has no divine mandate that transcends the budgetary decisions of Chicago Public Schools.
This stands in absolute contradiction to the perennial teaching of the Church. Pope Pius XI, in the encyclical Quas Primas (1925), which is referenced in the provided documents, proclaimed with unmistakable clarity: “The Church, established by Christ as a perfect society, demands for itself by a right belonging to it, which it cannot renounce, full freedom and independence from secular authority, and that in fulfilling the mission entrusted to it by God — to teach, govern, and lead all to eternal happiness, those who belong to the Kingdom of Christ — it cannot depend on anyone’s will.” The Chicago Archdiocese’s groveling gratitude toward CPS is a direct repudiation of this infallible teaching. The Church does not appreciate the state’s permission to function; she demands her God-given freedom as a right that no earthly power can legitimately deny.
The Silence on the Church’s Divine Constitution
What is most striking about the archdiocesan statement — and what reveals the modernist rot at its core — is the complete absence of any reference to the divine constitution of the Church, her supernatural mission, or the rights of Christ the King over education. Cardinal Cupich’s statement, while stronger in tone, frames the issue entirely in naturalistic terms: Catholic schools have “helped lift families out of poverty and produced well-prepared and civically engaged graduates” and do so “at a cost far below that of other systems.” This is the language of a secular education consultant, not a successor of the Apostles. The cardinal reduces the mission of Catholic schools to social utility and cost-effectiveness — precisely the naturalistic, horizontal vision of education condemned by Pope Pius IX in the Syllabus of Errors (1864), which anathematized the proposition that “the entire government of public schools… may and ought to appertain to the civil power” (Proposition 45) and that “Catholics may approve of the system of educating youth unconnected with Catholic faith and the power of the Church” (Proposition 48).
There is no mention in any of the archdiocesan statements that Catholic education exists primarily for the salvation of souls, that the Church has an inherent and exclusive right to educate youth in the faith, or that the state’s attempt to control or condition funding for Catholic schools constitutes an intolerable violation of divine law. Pope Pius XI was explicit: “The state must leave the same freedom to the members of Orders and Congregations, both male and female, who are indeed the most valiant helpers of the Pastors of the Church and contribute most to the expansion and establishment of Christ’s Kingdom.” The Chicago Archdiocese’s acceptance of CPS funding — and its desperate gratitude for its restoration — implicitly acknowledges the state’s authority over Catholic education, a position condemned by every pope who addressed the matter before the conciliar revolution.
The “Discrimination” Canard: Naturalism Masquerading as Justice
Cardinal Cupich’s characterization of the funding suspension as “possibly discriminatory” is revealing in its cowardice and its conceptual framework. The cardinal reaches for the language of secular civil rights law — “discrimination” — rather than the language of divine law and the Church’s inherent rights. This is not accidental; it reflects the thorough capitulation of the conciliar church to the categories of liberal modernity. The Church does not claim that she is being “discriminated against” by the state; she declares that the state has no authority whatsoever to interfere with her divine mission of education.
Pope Pius IX, in his letter to the Bishops of Prussia, vindicated for the Church “the freedom which has been trod underfoot with sacrilegious violence” and declared that laws contrary to the divine constitution of the Church are “null and void.” The Chicago Archdiocese, rather than declaring the state’s action null and void by divine law, instead frames it as a bureaucratic dispute to be resolved through negotiation with the CPS CEO. This is the ecclesiology of Vatican II’s Dignitatis Humanae — the false declaration on religious freedom — put into practice: the Church as one interest group among many, competing for state funding on equal terms with secular institutions, rather than as the supernatural society founded by God with rights that no state can legitimately infringe.
The Omission of the Supernatural: The Gravest Accusation
The most damning aspect of the entire episode is what is not said. Neither the archdiocesan statement nor Cardinal Cupich’s remarks contain a single reference to the supernatural purpose of Catholic education, the state of grace, the eternal destiny of souls, the authority of Christ the King, the rights of parents under God, or the duty of the Church to form children in the integral Catholic faith. The entire discourse is conducted on the horizontal plane of funding, services, academic support, and civic engagement.
This silence is not merely an oversight; it is the defining characteristic of the conciliar church. The post-conciliar structures have systematically emptied Catholic education of its supernatural content, reducing it to a vaguely “values-based” alternative to public schooling. The fact that the Archdiocese of Chicago can issue statements about Catholic education without once mentioning God, Christ, the faith, or the salvation of souls is proof positive that these structures are not Catholic in any meaningful sense. They are, as the provided documents on the false Fatima apparitions and sedevacantism argue, instruments of diversion from the true spiritual dangers facing the Church — modernist apostasy within — toward external, manageable conflicts with secular authorities.
The Broader Context: A Church That Has Forgotten What It Is
This episode in Chicago is not an isolated incident; it is a symptom of the systemic transformation of the Church into a naturalistic institution operating on the same plane as secular organizations. The conciliar church has embraced what Pope St. Pius X condemned as Modernism — “the synthesis of all heresies” — which reduces the supernatural to the natural, the divine to the human, and the Church to a voluntary association of believers. The Lamentabili sane exitu (1907) condemned the proposition that “the Church is not a true and perfect society, entirely free — nor is she endowed with proper and perpetual rights of her own, conferred upon her by her Divine Founder; but it appertains to the civil power to define what are the rights of the Church” (cf. Syllabus, Proposition 19). The Chicago Archdiocese’s conduct is a living embodiment of this condemned proposition.
The restoration of funding is presented as a victory. In truth, it is a further entrenchment of the Church’s dependence on the state. The Archdiocese of Chicago has learned nothing from this episode except that sufficient public pressure can extract concessions from the civil power. It has not learned — and cannot learn, given its modernist ecclesiology — that the Church’s rights do not depend on the state’s generosity, that “no power in the world, however great it can be, can deprive of the pastoral office those whom the Holy Ghost has made Bishops” (Pius IX, to the Bishops of Prussia), and that the true solution to the crisis of Catholic education is not negotiation with secular bureaucrats but a return to the full, integral Catholic faith and the uncompromising assertion of the Church’s divine rights.
The conciliar church in Chicago — and everywhere else — has made its choice. It has chosen dependence over independence, naturalism over supernaturalism, negotiation over proclamation, and the categories of liberal modernity over the perennial teaching of the Catholic Church. Until there is a radical return to the integral Catholic faith — to the social reign of Christ the King, to the Church’s full freedom from the state, and to the supernatural mission of Catholic education — episodes like this will continue to repeat themselves, each one further exposing the bankruptcy of the post-conciliar system.
TIPS: Catholic education, conciliar church, Cardinal Cupich, Chicago Archdiocese, Church and state, Pius XI Quas Primas, Syllabus of Errors, modernism, Catholic schools funding, religious freedom heresy
Source:
Special education services restored for Chicago Catholic schools following brief suspension (ewtnnews.com)
Date: 17.04.2026