Vatican permits Coptic Orthodox Mass in Catholic Basilica

Heretics worship at St. Paul’s-Outside-the-Walls in Rome…

Vatican permits Coptic Orthodox Mass in Catholic Basilica

Heretical-schismatic bishop Tawadros II enthroned in a Catholic basilica
(click image to enlarge)

[UPDATE 21-JUL-2018 06:37 UTC: Some say that the Copts have renounced their Monophysitism, pointing to an alleged 1988 common declaration with the Novus Ordo Sect. Apparently they claim to be “Miaphysites” instead. We apologize if we have unwittingly distorted precisely what Copts believe, but the main point of this article remains valid: The Vatican has permitted a heretical-schismatic sect to conduct its public worship in a Catholic basilica, and that is a grave affront to Almighty God and a scandal to souls. Whether or not the Copts are still Monophysites, they are definitely not Catholic, as they deny the dogma of papal primacy, for example.]

The apostasy of the post-Catholic Vatican is becoming more and more obvious by the day. Although the Modernists have long defiled our Catholic churches with their dreadful Novus Ordo worship service, they have always done so under the label of “Catholic.” But now the time has come when even worship that explicitly calls itself something other than Catholic (namely, “Coptic Orthodox”) is being permitted in (formerly) Catholic churches.

This past July 8, with the full permission of the Vatican under “Pope” Francis, the head of the so-called Coptic Orthodox Church, “Pope” Tawadros II of Alexandria, offered Holy Mass in the historic Basilica of St. Paul’s-Outside-the-Walls in Rome. This had been announced beforehand but apparently didn’t raise a single eyebrow.

And why should it, after Francis ordered an Evangelical-Episcopal layman buried as a Catholic bishop? Why should it, after the “Pope” said Catholics could go to Anglican “Masses” whenever no Catholic Masses are available? Why should it, after Anglicans were permitted to have a Vespers service (“Evensong”) in St. Peter’s Basilica in Vatican City last year?

Reports of the Coptic Mass at St. Paul’s Basilica have been sparse to non-existent. Perhaps it is because many Vatican journalists are on vacation, finally trying to get some rest from the nonstop Bergoglian news cycle. In any case, the Vatican’s official newspaper, Osservatore Romano, did publish a blurb on it (see p. 6).

(click image to enlarge)

Sundry photos of the event, such as the ones above, were posted on the Facebook page of the US-International Coptic Media Center. As far as video footage goes, the following poor-quality recording of the 4-hour celebration seems to be the only one available online thus far:

As is evident from the photos and video, this heretical worship did indeed take place at the beautiful Basilica of St. Paul’s in Rome (of which you can take a photo tour here).

Yes, we may assume the Mass was a valid (in the East, Mass is typically called “Divine Liturgy”, by the way). Even the rite used may not have contained anything doctrinally objectionable. The problem is: It was offered by people who are heretics and schismatics; it was the worship of non-Catholics. Francis gave permission for a Catholic basilica to be profaned by the public liturgy of a heretico-schismatic church.

The Coptic Orthodox religion adheres to the heresy of Monophysitism, which is sometimes called Eutychianism. Monophysitism comes with different nuances but essentially holds that there is only one nature in Christ, a divine one, and that His human nature was entirely absorbed in the divine one. The truth that God has revealed, however, is that there are two natures in the one divine Person of Jesus, namely, one human and one divine. This means, in other words, that Monophysites believe that Christ was not truly man.

In 451, the Council of Chalcedon condemned the Monophysite heresy and declared:

Therefore, following the holy fathers, we all teach that with one accord we confess one and the same Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, the same perfect in human nature, truly God and the same with a rational soul and a body truly man, consubstantial with the Father according to divinity, and consubstantial with us according to human nature, like unto us in all things except sin, [cf. Heb. 4:15]; indeed born of the Father before the ages according to divine nature, but in the last days the same born of the virgin Mary, Mother of God according to human nature; for us and for our deliverance, one and the same Christ only begotten Son, our Lord, acknowledged in two natures,’ without mingling, without change, indivisibly, undividedly, the distinction of the natures nowhere removed on account of the union but rather the peculiarity of each nature being kept, and uniting in one person and substance, not divided or separated into two persons, but one and the same Son only begotten God Word, Lord Jesus Christ, just as from the beginning the prophets taught about Him and the Lord Jesus Himself taught us, and the creed of our fathers has handed down to us.

(Council of Chalcedon, Definition of the Faith; Denz. 148)

The logical consequences of Monophysitism are too frightful and numerous to contemplate. Not only does this heresy denying the Sacred Humanity of Christ destroy the doctrine of the Atonement, it also has repercussions, for example, for the nature of the Church, which is the Mystical Body of Christ:

The Church is not something dead: it is the body of Christ endowed with supernatural life. As Christ, the Head and Exemplar, is not wholly in His visible human nature, which Photinians and Nestorians assert, nor wholly in the invisible divine nature, as the Monophysites hold, but is one, from and in both natures, visible and invisible; so the mystical body of Christ is the true Church, only because its visible parts draw life and power from the supernatural gifts and other things whence spring their very nature and essence. But since the Church is such by divine will and constitution, such it must uniformly remain to the end of time. If it did not, then it would not have been founded as perpetual, and the end set before it would have been limited to some certain place and to some certain period of time; both of which are contrary to the truth. The union consequently of visible and invisible elements because it harmonizes with the natural order and by God’s will belongs to the very essence of the Church, must necessarily remain so long as the Church itself shall endure.

(Pope Leo XIII, Encyclical Satis Cognitum, n. 3)

So now the Vatican has officially permitted Coptic Monophysites to offer their public worship in a Catholic church. It is a monstrous scandal!

That a good number of Coptic heretics in our day are probably in good faith about their false religion — meaning, they adhere to it innocently, being sincerely convinced that it is the true religion — may very well be true, but it is simply not relevant to the issue at hand. The fact remains that the public worship of Monophysites in a Catholic church is an objective sacrilege and a great scandal.

It is also clear that the impression being given is one of Indifferentism, that it doesn’t really matter what religion one belongs to, at least as long as it’s a “Christian” one. This too is false, and very dangerously so: “Whosoever revolteth, and continueth not in the doctrine of Christ, hath not God. He that continueth in the doctrine, the same hath both the Father and the Son” (2 Jn 9). Pope Gregory XVI also condemned this error in his landmark encyclical against Liberalism:

Now We consider another abundant source of the evils with which the Church is afflicted at present: indifferentism. This perverse opinion is spread on all sides by the fraud of the wicked who claim that it is possible to obtain the eternal salvation of the soul by the profession of any kind of religion, as long as morality is maintained. Surely, in so clear a matter, you will drive this deadly error far from the people committed to your care. With the admonition of the apostle that “there is one God, one faith, one baptism” [Eph 4:5] may those fear who contrive the notion that the safe harbor of salvation is open to persons of any religion whatever. They should consider the testimony of Christ Himself that “those who are not with Christ are against Him” [Lk 11:23], and that they disperse unhappily who do not gather with Him. Therefore “without a doubt, they will perish forever, unless they hold the Catholic faith whole and inviolate” [Symbol of St. Athanasius]. Let them hear Jerome who, while the Church was torn into three parts by schism, tells us that whenever someone tried to persuade him to join his group he always exclaimed: “He who is for the See of Peter is for me” [St. Jerome, Epistle 57]. A schismatic flatters himself falsely if he asserts that he, too, has been washed in the waters of regeneration. Indeed Augustine would reply to such a man: “The branch has the same form when it has been cut off from the vine; but of what profit for it is the form, if it does not live from the root?” [St. Augustine, in psalm. contra part. Donat.]

(Pope Gregory XVI, Encyclical Mirari Vos, n. 13)

Objectively speaking, only Catholic worship is pleasing to God because only it has been authorized by Him; and what God thinks of unauthorized worship contrary to His prescriptions or the order He has established, can be vividly seen in Num 16:1-40 (cf. Jn 4:23-24). Indeed, God can be worshipped truly only in the Church He Himself established:

Omitting other appropriate passages which are almost numberless in the writings of the Fathers, We shall praise St. Gregory the Great who expressly testifies that this indeed is the teaching of the Catholic Church. He says: “The holy universal Church teaches that it is not possible to worship God truly except in her and asserts that all who are outside of her will not be saved.”

…Therefore, they must instruct them in the true worship of God, which is unique to the Catholic religion.

(Pope Gregory XVI, Encyclical Summo Iugiter Studio, nn. 5-6)

Since the Coptic sect is not the Church established by God, the worship performed in that Coptic liturgy on July 8 in the Roman basilica was, objectively speaking, an abomination before God, a horrendous sacrilege and profanation of the house of God, and a grave scandal to souls. If this doesn’t sound very ecumenical, let this be another sign that ecumenism is a most dangerous and utterly false novelty; it is a theological invention of recent times.

In the same work of St. Gregory the Great from which Pope Gregory XVI quotes above, is found this passage:

For it is she [the Catholic Church] alone through whom God willingly accepts a sacrifice, she alone who intercedes with confidence for those who are in error. Whence also the Lord commanded concerning the sacrifice of the lamb, saying; In one house it shall be eaten, neither shall ye carry forth of the flesh thereof out of the house. [Ex. 12, 46] For the lamb is eaten in one house, because the true Sacrifice of the Redeemer is immolated in the one Catholic Church. And the Divine law orders its flesh not to he carried forth abroad, because it forbids that which is holy to be given to dogs. [Matt. 7, 6]

(Pope St. Gregory I, Morals on the Book of Job, bk. XXXV, ch. VIII, n. 13; underlining added; italics given.)

Although true Catholic teaching is not ecumenical, this does not mean, of course, that we can or should be unkind to those people who are unhappily caught up in heretical or schismatic sects:

But God forbid that the sons of the Catholic Church ever in any way be hostile to those who are not joined with us in the same bonds of faith and love; but rather they should always be zealous to seek them out and aid them, whether poor, or sick, or afflicted with any other burdens, with all the offices of Christian charity; and they should especially endeavor to snatch them from the darkness of error in which they unhappily lie, and lead them back to Catholic truth and to the most loving Mother the Church, who never ceases to stretch out her maternal hands lovingly to them, and to call them back to her bosom so that, established and firm in faith, hope, and charity, and “being fruitful in every good work” [Col 1:10], they may attain eternal salvation.

(Pope Pius IX, Encyclical Quanto Conficiamur Moerore, n. 9)

Since the defection of the Monophysite Copts, which occurred so early on in Church history, the Popes have attempted again and again to bring them back to the fold of Christ, but never with any (lasting) success.

In 1951, on the occasion of the 1500th anniversary of the Council of Chalcedon, Pope Pius XII pleaded that the erring Copts would finally return to communion with the Holy See:

Would it not be holy, salutary and in accordance with the will of God that at last all these should return to the one sheepfold of Christ?

For our part we desire that they should always bear in mind that Our thoughts are thoughts of peace and not of affliction (cf. Jer. xxix, 11). It is well known, moreover, that we have demonstrated this by our actions. If, under the pressure we boast of this, then we boast in the Lord, who is the giver of every goodwill. For we have followed in the path of our predecessors and worked diligently to facilitate the return of the Oriental peoples to the Catholic Church. We have guarded their legitimate rites. We have promoted the study of their affairs. We have promulgated beneficent laws for them. We have shown deep solicitude in our dealings with the sacred council of the Roman curia for oriental affairs. We have bestowed the Roman purple on the patriarch of the Armenians.

When the recent war was waging and producing its fruits of famine, want and disease, we made no distinction between them and those who are accustomed to call us Father, but sought everywhere to relieve the increasing misery; we strove to help widows, children, old people and the sick. We would have been happier truly had our means been equal to our desires! Let those then who, through the calamities of time, have been cut off, not be slow to pay due respect to this divinely erected and unbroken rock, this Apostolic See for whom to rule is to serve. Let them bear in mind and imitate Flavian, that second John Chrysostom, in his sufferings for justice; and the fathers of Chalcedon, those most worthy members of the Mystical Body of Christ; and Marcian, that strong, gentle and wise ruler; and Pulcheria, that resplendent lily of inviolate royal beauty. From such a return to the unity of the Church we foresee that there would flow a rich fountain of blessings unto the common good of the whole Christian world.

…

Our hope for the return of these brothers and sons separated from the Apostolic See is made stronger by this harsh crucifixion and these bloody martyrdoms of so many other brothers and sons. Let no one neglect or impede the saving work of God. To the blessings and joys of this return we exhort and urge all those who follow the erroneous doctrines of the Nestorians and the Monophysites. Let them be sure that we should think it the brightest gem in the crown of our apostolate if the opportunity were given us of treating with honor and charity those who are the more dear to us because the long period of their withdrawal has excited in us the greater desire [for their return].

(Pope Pius XII, Encyclical Sempiternus Rex, nn. 37-39,43)

Where Antipope Francis preaches a heretical “ecumenism of blood”, Pope Pius XII taught that the martyrdom of Catholics (“so many other brothers and sons”) strengthens the hope that heretics and schismatics will at last return to the one true Church, the Roman Catholic Church, under the visible head of the Church, the Vicar of Christ.

This alone must be the ultimate goal of any and all outreach to non-Catholics; there can be no other. Yet even this noble supernatural end does not justify evil, heretical, or sacrilegious means:

Even on the plea of promoting unity it is not allowed to dissemble one single dogma; for, as the Patriarch of Alexandria warns us, “although the desire of peace is a noble and excellent thing, yet we must not for its sake neglect the virtue of loyalty in Christ.” Consequently, the much desired return of erring sons to true and genuine unity in Christ will not be furthered by exclusive concentration on those doctrines which all, or most, communities glorying in the Christian name accept in common. The only successful method will be that which bases harmony and agreement among Christ’s faithful ones upon all the truths, and the whole of the truths, which God has revealed.

(Pope Pius XII, Encyclical Orientalis Ecclesiae, n. 16)

The difference between the traditional Catholic teaching on the reunion of dissidents to the one true Church and the Novus Ordo ecumenical program could not be clearer. In early 2017, the Vatican’s chief ecumenist admitted that the different ecumenical dialogue partners cannot even agree on so much as the purpose of ecumenism.

See, then, the stark contrast between the immaculate Roman Catholic Church of all true Popes through Pius XII (d. 1958), which is currently eclipsed by the “operation of error” (2 Thess 2:10); and the heretical Novus Ordo Sect, “which corrupted the earth with her fornication” (Apoc 19:2), started by Antipope John XXIII in 1958.

Only one of these two can be the true Church of Jesus Christ, “the one Church, not of heretics but the Holy Roman, Catholic, and Apostolic [Church] outside which we believe that no one is saved” (Pope Innocent III, Apostolic Letter Eius Exemplo; Denz. 423).

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