Video discussion on Kokx News…
The Church’s Mystical Passion: What It Is (and Isn’t)
More and more people are adopting the idea that the profound changes to the Roman Catholic religion that have occurred since roughly the time of the Second Vatican Council (1962-65) can only be explained by positing that the Catholic Church has been sharing mystically in the Passion of her Divine Founder.
The Church being the Mystical Body of Christ, it is rather fitting that she should resemble her Invisible Head in all things, not excluding a period of intense suffering, persecution, and (at least apparent) ‘death’ before He returns to judge the living and the dead. She should undergo, in other words, her very own Mystical Passion.
In his 1943 encyclical letter on the Church, Pope Pius XII taught:
It is the will of Jesus Christ that the whole body of the Church, no less than the individual members, should resemble Him. And we see this realized when, following in the footsteps of her Founder, the Church teaches, governs, and offers the divine Sacrifice. When she embraces the evangelical counsels she reflects the Redeemer’s poverty, obedience, and virginal purity. Adorned with institutes of many different kinds as with so many precious jewels, she represents Christ deep in prayer on the mountain, or preaching to the people, or healing the sick and wounded and bringing sinners back to the path of virtue — in a word, doing good to all. What wonder then, if, while on this earth she, like Christ, suffer persecutions, insults and sorrows.
(Pope Pius XII, Encyclical Mystici Corporis, n. 47)
Just as the Son of God was persecuted and had to endure the greatest sufferings in His Natural Body, so it must be for the Church, His Mystical Body, as St. Paul indicated: “Who now rejoice in my sufferings for you, and fill up those things that are wanting of the sufferings of Christ, in my flesh, for his body, which is the church” (Col 1:24).
But this means that, like her Divine Lord, the Church is the victim of the Passion, not its perpetrator. She suffers the Passion; she does not inflict it. And if the Church herself suffers the Passion because she is like to Christ, then no one will suffer it more intensely in his own person than the Pope, for he is the Vicar of Christ, the visible head of Christ’s Mystical Body.
Yet, who or what is responsible for this great apostasy currently afflicting souls under the banner of Catholicism? It is the putative Popes after Pius XII (i.e. since 1958) and the strange new ‘Conciliar Church’ they have set up!
What follows from these considerations?
On Apr. 10, 2026, yours truly (Mario Derksen) joined podcaster Stephen Kokx to discuss this very topic at some length: the Mystical Passion of the Catholic Church. The show was broadcast live and ended up being 97 minutes long. You can access it here directly on YouTube or watch it in the player below:
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The following links to related posts will shine more light on this intriguing subject:
- The Mystical Passion of the Church: Dreadful Reality vs. Delusive Counterfeit (2024)
- Sedevacantism and the Mystery of the Church’s Passion: Reply to Robert Morrison (2023)
- The True and the False Passion of the Church: Comments on a Public Prayer Event against Bergoglianism (2019)
- The Papacy and the Passion of the Church (Oct. 2016)
- On that ‘Passion of the Church’ Argument (Feb. 2016)
In 1861, Cardinal Henry Edward Manning explained at length what Catholic Tradition says about the end of days, about the persecution of the Church, about the Great Apostasy, and about the role of the Pope on the one hand and that of the Antichrist on the other. Readers who have not already done so are strongly encouraged to read the post we have published presenting salient excerpts of Cardinal Manning’s lectures on this topic:
Sedevacantists are often accused of being unfaithful to Christ and His Church because they are, so it is claimed, too scandalized to behold the Body of Christ, all disfigured from maltreatment and suffering, nailed to the Cross. However, such an accusation reflects a flawed understanding of the true nature of the Mystical Passion and the sedevacantist reaction to it.
The truth is that although we are bewildered and perplexed by what has happened, and may have numerous questions to which we have not yet found certain answers, nevertheless we remain faithful, saying with St. Mary Magdalene: “…they have taken away my Lord; and I know not where they have laid him” (John 20:13). The recognize-and-resist traditionalists, by contrast, would rather choose Barabbas instead, because he is quite visible, they know where to find him, and they figure they can always resist him when he teaches them something they deem to be false.
The Passion of the Church is a most intriguing topic, but it is important to understand what it is and isn’t, so we are not misled, in accordance with St. Paul’s warning: “Let no man deceive you by any means…” (2 Th 2:3).
Image source: composite with elements from Shutterstock (Romolo Tavani and Oldrich and David Carillet)
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