Modernist Antipope Reduces Via Crucis to Humanistic Social Drama at Colosseum

Vatican News portal reports that the antipope Leo XIV led the Good Friday Way of the Cross at Rome’s Colosseum on April 3, 2026, joined by approximately 30,000 faithful and a global audience via media. The event featured meditations by Franciscan Fr. Francesco Patton, which emphasized “incarnating” the theological virtues of faith, hope, and love “in the real world” amidst a “chaotic, distracting and noisy environment.” The antipope carried the Cross throughout the candlelit amphitheatre, following a practice begun by John Paul II. The article presents this as a spiritual pilgrimage, noting the Colosseum’s historical connection to early Christian martyrs and its later consecration as a Catholic church. The meditations focus on human experiences of power, suffering, and dignity, concluding with a call to “live our lives as a journey of ever-deepening participation in the communion of love.” This analysis exposes the event’s theological bankruptcy, revealing a deliberate omission of supernatural Catholic doctrine in favor of a naturalistic, Modernist interpretation.