EWTN News reports that a federal judge has ruled the U.S. government may deposit $183,071 to seize land belonging to the Diocese of Las Cruces, New Mexico, for border fencing along the U.S.-Mexico border. The diocese had sought to block the deposit while it contests the government’s use of eminent domain to take the land, which lies at the base of Mount Cristo Rey, site of a 29-foot statue of Christ and annual pilgrimages. Judge Kenneth Gonzales ruled the deposit would not prejudice the diocese’s right to challenge the taking. The diocese argued the seizure would “constitute a significant infringement on religious freedom and the rights of worship.”
The reporting, while framed as a story of religious persecution, reveals the utter theological and spiritual bankruptcy of a conciliar diocese that has already surrendered the Church’s sovereign rights in practice while merely protesting the financial terms.
The Church’s Divine Independence From Secular Power
The very framing of this dispute reveals a diocese that has accepted the fundamental premise of the secularist error condemned by Pope Pius IX in the Syllabus of Errors. Error 19 declared: “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, and the limits within which she may exercise those rights.” Error 20 further stated: “The ecclesiastical power ought not to exercise its authority without the permission and assent of the civil government.”
The Diocese of Las Cruces, a creature of the post-conciliar sect, operates entirely within this condemned framework. It does not assert the Church’s inherent, divinely instituted sovereignty and independence from civil authority. Instead, it merely contests the procedural and financial aspects of the land seizure in a secular court, thereby implicitly acknowledging the government’s ultimate jurisdiction over Church property. This is the very definition of the servitude Pius IX warned against.
Pope Pius XI, in Quas Primas, was unequivocal: “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.” The Las Cruces diocese, by seeking relief from a federal judge rather than asserting the Church’s divine right, has already conceded the most important point: that the secular state has authority over the Church’s temporal goods.
The Shrinking of Religious Freedom to Mere “Worship”
The diocese’s argument that the land seizure would “constitute a significant infringement on religious freedom and the rights of worship” is itself a symptom of the post-conciliar reduction of Catholic teaching. The conciliar document Dignitatis Humanae reduced religious freedom to a subjective right of individuals and communities to worship freely, a concept utterly foreign to the perennial teaching of the Church.
Pope Leo XIII, in Immortale Dei, taught that the Church has the right to exercise her authority without interference from the civil power, and that the state has a duty to recognize the true religion. The Las Cruces diocese, by framing its protest solely in terms of “religious freedom” and “rights of worship,” adopts the very language of the Modernist revolution. It does not assert the Church’s right to govern her own property free from state interference as a matter of divine law, but rather pleads for the protection of its “worship” — a concept reduced to the private, internal sphere.
This is the fruit of the conciliar revolution: a Church that no longer claims sovereignty but begs for tolerance.
The Statue of Christ the King and the Abdication of His Reign
The most bitter irony of this affair lies in the geography itself. The disputed land sits at the base of Mount Cristo Rey, crowned by a 29-foot statue of Christ. The very name — “Christ the King” — should be a proclamation of the truth Pius XI enshrined in Quas Primas: that Christ’s reign extends over all nations, all societies, and all aspects of public life, including the governance of borders and the administration of justice.
Yet the diocese at the foot of this mountain does not invoke the Kingship of Christ as a basis for asserting the Church’s sovereignty. It does not proclaim that the land belongs to Christ through His Church, and that no secular power has the right to seize it. Instead, it argues in terms of “religious freedom” and “infringement on worship” — language that implicitly accepts the legitimacy of secular authority over the Church’s temporal affairs.
Pius XI declared: “The state is happy not by one means, and man by another; for the state is nothing else than a harmonious association of men.” He further taught that rulers who refuse public veneration to Christ cannot maintain their authority inviolate. The Las Cruces diocese, by failing to invoke the Kingship of Christ in this dispute, reveals that it does not truly believe in the social reign of Christ — or if it does, it is unwilling to proclaim it when it matters.
The Spiritual Bankruptcy of the Conciliar Sect
This episode is a microcosm of the broader apostasy of the post-conciliar church. A diocese that has accepted the conciliar revolution — with its false ecumenism, its religious liberty, its dialogue with the world — cannot consistently assert the Church’s divine rights when those rights conflict with secular power. Having accepted the premises of Modernism, the conciliar structures are left with no theological basis for resistance.
The true Church, the Church of all centuries, would assert her rights with the firmness of Pius IX, who declared laws contrary to the divine constitution of the Church to be “null and void.” The true Church would not beg a secular judge for the right to keep her own property; she would proclaim that the property belongs to Christ and that no earthly power can take it without committing an act of injustice.
The Diocese of Las Cruces, by contrast, merely argues about the deposit amount and the procedural right to challenge the taking. This is the behavior of a defeated institution, not the Church of Christ. It is the inevitable fruit of the conciliar revolution: a church that has surrendered its divine commission and now pleads for crumbs from the table of secular power.
Conclusion: The Wages of Apostasy
The Mount Cristo Rey land dispute is not merely a legal quarrel over property. It is a revelation of the spiritual state of the post-conciliar diocese. The statue of Christ the King looks down upon a diocese that does not invoke His Kingship, a church that does not assert its divine independence, and a clergy that argues about deposit amounts instead of proclaiming the rights of God.
This is the inevitable consequence of the conciliar revolution. A church that has abandoned the integral Catholic faith cannot defend itself against the encroachments of secular power, because it has already surrendered the theological foundation upon which such defense must rest. The Diocese of Las Cruces is not being persecuted for the faith; it is reaping the wages of its own apostasy.
As Pius XI warned: “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 Las Cruces diocese, by removing Christ from its public witness and reducing its claims to the language of secular rights, has destroyed its own foundation. The statue on the mountain stands as a silent rebuke to the diocese below — a proclamation of the Kingship that the conciliar church has abandoned.
Source:
Federal judge says government can deposit money to seize diocesan land for border fencing (ewtnnews.com)
Date: 18.06.2026