Patriarchate, Affiliated Organisations Continue to Serve in Pandemic Humanitarian Crisis

By Jean DuBois

FIRENZE-NUOVA ROMA 12 February 2021 (NRom)

From the very beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Anglican Patriarchate, Stato Pontificio (Pontifical States) was there to help those in need. The Patriarchate was already on the cutting edge of technology use as a force multiplier in the ministry, and other jurisdictions quickly followed. Meanwhile our chaplains continued to provide spiritual help and sacraments even as governments were cracking down on the rights of the Church and many churches were timidly giving in to pressure. Clergy and officials traveled to where they were needed. Even ordinations took place as scheduled. 

As governments locked down their nations, plunging their people into chaos, poverty, and despair, the Pontifical States (Anglican Patriarchate), secular heir to St. Peter the Apostle, remained a beacon of light and hope for the world. As governments and many institutions opted to let the virus and the prevention of that virus dictate policy and rule their lives, the Church continued firm in the wisdom of the faith of Christ.  

The members of our humanitarian wing, the Walsingham Guard, and other affiliated organizations around the world were at the forefront of pandemic service. That includes medical service and support, COVID testing, humanitarian aid, policy work, advocacy for the poor and vulnerable, and more. Those efforts are ongoing as the economic, social, and broad health fallout from the pandemic and government responses to the pandemic continue to rage on. 

And, as the pandemic has resulted in religious leaders caving in to modern social trends and the socialist oligarchs threatening the world with a new Marxism through their "Great Reset," the Patriarchate continues to promote traditional Catholicism as unwavering guardians of the faith. The Stato Pontificio (Pontifical States) have over 1000 years of history dedicated to service to God, the Holy Church, and all humanity. Following the words of Christ Ut unum sint (that they may all be one), it is not only the historic representative of over 400 million people globally, but is one of the most authentically diverse organizations in the modern world. The dedicated work of each and every cleric, lay official, and member around the world follows the example of Christ in humble, servant leadership to those in need. 

www.statopontificio.org

USCCB Bishops Take Pandemic Funds -- Archfather Comments

FIRENZE-NUOVA ROMA 9 February 2021 (NRom)

Recent reports have shown that Bishops of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops have taken U.S. pandemic relief funds despite substantial financial endowments, thereby taking cash for closing their church doors to those in need. His Holiness and Eminence the Archfather made the following statement earlier today. 

___________________________

Throughout the COVID-19 humanitarian crisis, We have consistently admonished governments against policies that select winners and losers. We have also admonished corporations that are financially well-endowed against seeking or receiving windfall gains and/or public relief support when so many are losing their businesses and livelihoods. However, We never would have expected that this would include the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops. According to credible reports, many dioceses of the Roman Communion within the United States took pandemic small business stimulus money due to lost money from closed churches, despite significant financial endowments. Church sovereignty was sold for cash. This is most troubling. 

     Indeed, governments around the world have a moral responsibility to make whole those who are harmed by their pandemic reponse policies. Even a parish or a diocese that is financially precarious and vulnerable can reasonably receive aid. Yet, those who are able to take care of themselves and are even profiting (as in the case of certain corporations) should not seek such funds. We, the Anglican Patriarchate, have neither sought nor taken such funds, instead preferring that they go to help those who are the most vulnerable and most impacted. 

     My brother Catholic Bishops in the United States would have been well-advised not to close their churches during the pandemic. That does not mean that they should not have taken appropriate precautions, but rather that Church sovereignty should have been maintained against the civil government, sacraments should have been entirely accessible by the faithful during this time of great need and suffering, and the clergy should have been completely available. That is our legacy as Catholic clergy. In this case, it was entirely abdicated – and not just abdicated, but abdicated in favour of cash. 

     Therefore, We call upon the Catholic dioceses of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops to show in detail what they are doing with the money they have received. They must show how it is being used to benefit the poor, the vulnerable, and the less fortunate. 

www.statopontificio.org

Patriarchal Letter “Come Holy Ghost” to the People of the World on Septuagesima Sunday

FIRENZE-NUOVA ROMA 31 January 2021 (NRom)

Patriarchal Letter “Come Holy Ghost”

to the People of the World

Septuagesima Sunday

31 January 2021 

RVTHERFORDVS PP. I

COME Holy Ghost, and enlighten the people of the world! As the pre-Lent season begins today with Septuagesima Sunday, the people of the world are rightly tired of the continuation of extreme pandemic measures – and they are rightly tired of corporate oligarchy that is making tremendous windfall gains the longer the pandemic measures continue. As oligarchs grow fatter, and more powerful, countless people lose their jobs, see their businesses fail, and cannot find work. Governments around the world who claim to be for the rights and welfare of mankind instead force this outcome that adds to the already swollen moneybags of massive corporations while destroying the lives, mental health, and even physical health of others – all without the promised compensation for their sacrifice. If nothing else, this pandemic has laid bare the true motivations of companies, and it has laid bare true loyalties of government. 

It has been asked “Who will pay for all of this compensation? How can we actually afford to compensate those who have lost?” Yet if it is not the massive oligarchs who have made approximately one trillion dollars since the pandemic began, and if it is not to be spread around proportionately to the entirety of taxpayers, then the only other option is to force the sacrifice upon those very people who have lost their jobs and lost their businesses. What right do governments have to pick winners and losers? That is what they are doing and what they have done during the pandemic. What right do governments have to harm certain people and demand the sacrifice from a subset of the population while others are unscathed or even thrive? It is a complete and utter abdication of their obligations under God as leaders of government. In Italy, the premier maneuvers to avoid being voted out, despite the growing vox populi. In Britain, bishops demand evidence of justification for continued church shutdowns, which has not been forthcoming. In the United States, the physical fence recently installed around the US Capitol and the White House serves as a metaphor for the continued insulation and isolation of government from the people, not just in America, but around the world. It is a sorry state of affairs. 

Yet, Holy Mother the Church was instituted by Christ for all humanity, great and small. Christ hung on the Cross for everyone, regardless of fleeting national borders and deep ethnic and cultural identity. The caring nature of Christ’s Holy Church extends to everyone, even to those who do not believe and do not profess the Christian faith. 

As the governments of the world abdicate their responsibility, for which they will answer to God and for which We earnestly hope for their reconciliation in the love of Christ, the Holy Church instead will continue to speak and advocate and work for the condition of all mankind. We do not measure victory in a popular vote count, in money, or in buildings. Rather, we count our victory as saving what souls we can and helping those whom we can help. When St. Lawrence, that great Roman Deacon and Martyr was asked to show the government officials the true treasure of the Church that they had heard was in his keeping, he agreed and showed them the poor of Rome. 

The problem is so vast, as it has always been in one way or another, that it is tempting to say that our own organisational or individual efforts are in vain. However, to do so is to abandon our faith. It is that very vastness as well that governments exploit, saying that they are the only ones, alongside their oligarch partners, who can have any hope of success. Do not fall into the trap of believing that lie. It is only God that has the power to help us with problems on such an immense scale. Let us not believe that mere human agency is sufficient, for it has never been as history plainly shows. Yes, government has an absolute responsibility to help the people in its borders and even without its borders according to its ability, using the public treasury to do so. However, it is not government that is the dispenser of good, but rather we may only consider it an instrument for helping to do the work of God. Therefore, its legitimacy only comes when it does indeed employ its resources and doing the work of God. 

Each of us likewise has the capacity to be an instrument of God, helping those whom God puts in our path. We cannot and must not be concerned with numbers or other superficialities. Rather, let us each seek every day to attempt to do God’s will in all that we do, taking opportunities to help others as they arise, ever vigilant of those who may be in need.

Rutherfordus Ap. I
Servant of the Servants of Christ

Old Roman Catholic News Service is now Il Nunzio Romano

The Patriarchal Office of Communications has authorised the changed of the name of the Old Roman Catholic News Service to Il Nunzio Romano. It continues to serve as the principle press office and news service of the Anglican Patriarchate, Stato Pontificio, Anglican Rite Roman Catholic Church. 

Archfather Responds Regarding the Right to Life

By Jean DuBois

FIRENZE-NUOVA ROMA 29 January 2021 (ORCNS)

Earlier today His Holiness and Eminence the Archfather gave an allocution in response to a recent executive order of the American president. The executive order promoted and sought to provide funding for expansion of abortions around the world. Other Catholic leaders joined in the opposition with similar statements. The complete text of the allocution is as follows:

__________________________

Archpatral Allocution on the Right to Life

regarding Recent Executive Orders

of Joseph Biden acting as

President of the United States

THE current wealth and power of the American Republic, held for what is thus far a relatively brief period in the history of world civilisation, conveys upon it tremendous responsibility in the use of both. It also makes the affairs and decisions of the United States in so many cases the business of the world, for the actions of the American government quite often have impact, even lasting impact on other nations. It is with this in mind that We, whose own nation’s history extends over twelve hundred years and involves the spreading of the saving grace and freedom of the Christian faith to all corners of the world, must and will respond to the grave and troubling orders issued recently by the American president regarding the right to life and funding for abortions, even outside of the United States political borders.

The President referred to abortion access as “…protecting women's health at home and abroad.” No one who professes the Catholic faith may in any way consider this to be legitimate, for the scourge of abortion is in no way a simple matter of healthcare. The president by that order apparently seeks to provide massive amounts of United States federal funding to organisations that provide abortions around the world. US citizens and others resident in the United States who love Christ, therefore, called by Us to petition government representatives in order to seek this order being stopped, block, or rescinded. Such is the duty of all who love Christ, for, while the First and Great Commandment is that we love the Lord our God with all our heart, all our mind, and all our spirit, the Second Great Commandment is that we love our neighbour as ourselves. It is that very love and those two commandments, from which all other commandments derive, that we see in the form of Christ pendant upon the Cross. How, then, can the Christian faithful turn a blind eye not only to the United States governmental endorsement of the wholesale murder of over one million children every year, so many of them from among the impoverished and ethnic minorities, but also to the current United States government effort to expand the work of both domestic and global murder factories?

We cannot call ourselves Christians if we profess to believe, but leave those beliefs with in the four walls of the church as we leave Sunday to go out in the world. Rather, we are all called to take that faith, flowing from the altar of God, the very Sacrifice of Christ on the Cross in which we participate during the mass, out into the world. God calls upon us to live our faith in our daily lives, in the workplace, and in our political participation. Filled with the fire of Christ, do not let your voice be silenced by anyone when you are speaking the truth of Christ.

As we fast approach the Lenten season, let us all around the world to dedicate ourselves spiritual acts against the persecutors of the church, that all may be called to repentance and reconciliation with Christ and His Holy Church.

Canonisation of Pope Saint Pius XII by Anglican Patriarchate

By Jean DuBois

FIRENZE-NUOVA ROMA 28 January 2021 (ORCNS) 

Earlier this week, on Sunday 24 January, His Holiness and Eminence the Archfather solemnly declared and defined Pope Pius XII as a confessor saint within and pertaining to the jurisdiction of the Anglican Patriarchate, the New Roman Communion, and the Stato Pontificio. The canonisation was defined in a Patriarchal Bull Nulla Dubitatio and formally proclaimed following the mass on Sunday. Quoting from the bull, "With the help and grace of God, [Pope Saint Pius XII] used his diplomatic skills to prevent giving the vile Nazi regime the excuse they needed to invade the Vatican City-State and to persecute and murder even more Catholics. Over two million Catholics died at the hands of the Nazis and the Holocaust. Yet while Pius was engaging in diplomacy, he and his network were working tirelessly and at great risk to save countless people, Catholics, Jews, escaped soldiers, and others." 

The overall efforts seeking canonisation for St. Pius XII already found a potential miracle. The Patriarchate believes this to be true. However, the act of canonisation was made by scientia certa, and thus a proven miracle was not needed. Canonisation is a solemn declaration by the church that She believes the person to be in heaven. Within the jurisdiction of the Anglican Patriarchate and New Roman Communion, the supreme authority for canonisation rests with the Archfather as successor to Pope Leo X and the temporal successor to St. Peter the Apostle.

Pope Saint Pius XII was born Eugenio Maria Giuseppe Giovanni Pacelli in a family of the so-called "Black Nobility," i.e., Italian nobility with strong ties to the papacy. His brother, Francesco Pacelli, was a lay canon lawyer who advised Pope Pius XI and helped to negotiate the Lateran Treaty with Benito Mussolini which, in 1929, established the sovereignty of the Vatican City-State that had been lost by the Savoy Kingdom of Italy's invasion of Rome. 

St. Pius XII was raised in the centre of Rome, attending school at the convent of the French Sisters of Divine Providence in the Piazza Fiammetta and worshiping at the famous Chiesa Nuova, where he served as an altar boy. He studied theology at the Almo Collegio Capranica and also studied at the Pontifical Gregorian University, the Pontifical Roman Athenaeum S. Apollinare, and the University of Rome (La Sapienza). He earned a Doctor of Sacred Theology degree. 

Pope St. Pius XII was ordained to the priesthood on Easter Sunday 1899 alone in a private chapel. His clerical career involved significant academic work and long stretches in the administration of the church government and church diplomacy. As the Papal Nuncio ( ambassador) to Bavaria, he was effectively the papal representative to the entire German Empire for the latter part of the Great War. Thereafter, he was appointed as the Apostolic Nuncio all Germany during the new Republic that followed the Great War. He played a major role in denouncing the rising Nazi ideology, describing the Nazis as "false profits with the pride of Lucifer." 

Later as Cardinal Secretary of State, having been elevated to the Secret College as Cardinal-Priest of Santi Giovanni e Paolo on December 16th, 1929, he signed a number of concordats, including the Lateran Treaty. The most controversial was that with the German States, which is in fact still valid and in force to this day. Purpose was to help safeguard the German Catholics as well as protect the sovereignty of the church.

St. Pius XII was crowned pope on 12 March 1939. He chose the name of Pius because his entire life had largely been spent on the popes with that name. It was also especially a sign of respect and gratitude for Pius XI. He removed the Italian monopoly on the Roman Curia and presided over one of the most tumultuous times in Church history, the Second World War. After the War, he invoked Papal Infallibility and defined the dogma of the Assumption of Mary, namely that she "having completed the course of her earthly life, was assumed body and soul into heavenly glory."

Pope Saint Pius XII died on 9 October 1958. His feast day has been set to that same day, with the liturgical rank of Double. The Stephenian Curia expressed a sincere desire that the Roman Pontiff will follow and define Pope Saint Pius XII as a saint for the Roman Communion.

Archfather Remembers Holocaust, Recalls Catholic Victims

By Jean DuBois 

FIRENZE-NUOVA ROMA 27 January 2021 (ORCNS)

Today His Holiness and Eminence the Archfather Rutherford I gave an address in remembrance of the Holocaust during World War II. The vast number of Catholic victims were especially recalled, including heroes like the Polish priest Saint Maximilian Kolbe and the Irish priest Monsignor O’Flaherty. Saint Maximilian took the place of a complete stranger and died in Auschwitz. Monsignor O’Flaherty helped countless Jews, soldiers, and others escape from the Nazis in Rome. His Holiness and Eminence also spoke of the continued anti-Catholic persecution in so-called free and tolerant societies today, calling on civil governments to ensure protection and progress eliminating persecution and intolerance against Catholics. The complete text is below: 

Archpatral Statement on the
Commemoration and Remembrance
of the Holocaust
27 January 2021

On this day annually we commemorate and remember the Holocaust of the mid-20th century. Approximately 2 million Catholics, 3 million Slavs, and 6 million Jews perished at the hands of the Nazis. Indeed, as is so often forgotten, many of our Catholic people, many of those being ethnic Poles, were slaughtered alongside Jews and others deemed to be “undesirable” by the Nazi regime. Many other Catholics, Slavs, and Jews, among others, who were not killed nevertheless suffered imprisonment, torture, and persecution at the hands of that group of malefactors that permeated Europe known as the Gestapo simply for being who they were. As one noteworthy example, the priest Saint Maximilian Kolbe earned the martyr’s crown when, as a prisoner in Auschwitz, he volunteered to take the place of a complete stranger in the death chamber. His canonisation was pro-claimed by another Polish priest who fared better, but still was under the shadow of the Nazis, Pope Saint John Paul II.

The Nazi ideology cast a tremendous shadow over Europe before and during the Second World War. The German people themselves were victims of the mad lunacy that controlled the government, and countless Germans suffered likewise at the hands of the Gestapo. That the Nazi leaders imposed their ideology as policy in the name of the German people was an affront to the true spirit of the German people and an insult to their long and venerable history.

Nazi domination of Eastern Europe was a policy of intended elimination of the majority of the population and enslavement of the rest. In the rest of Europe, domination still resulted in countless deaths that can only morally be deemed murder. Even when it did not involve death, it restricted basic human rights, trampled on human dignity, and imposed fear persecution. Catholics were targeted, for the Catholic faith stood in stark contrast and in defiant opposition to the Nazi regime and ideology. Pope Saint Pius XII (Pius XII was canonised earlier this year within the Anglican Patriarchate and New Roman Communion), contrary to the calumny heaped upon him, not only walked a diplomatic tightrope to avoid giving the Nazis the excuse that they wanted to invade the Vatican City and further persecute Catholics around Europe, but also engaged in many secretive activities to safeguard the lives of count-less people, including Jews, escaped soldiers, and more. The future Pope Saint Paul VI, Monsignor Montini, likewise aided in that ef-fort, as did the Irish priest attached to the Vatican, Monsignor O’Flaherty whose exploits were commemorated in the movie The Scarlet and the Black. Holy Mother the Church risked herself to feed her sheep and save all who found themselves in need of her assistance and protection.

Last year marked the 75th anniversary of the end of the Second World War, yet persecution of various groups of people, including Catholics, persists around the world – even in societies that claim freedom and tolerance. Europe and the United States are no exception. Anti-Catholic rules and regulations exist in the United King-dom. Even in the United States, blatantly anti-Catholic laws are still on the books. While it is easy to say that this is at least not on the same level of what the Nazis did, for we are not being herded together and killed, it is nevertheless the same spirit of intolerance and hatred that leads to the persecution of Catholics in ostensibly tolerant and free societies today. Its form today is often more subtle, though. Whereas the Nazis were brutal, violent, and direct, anti-Catholic persecution today often is very subdued and silent, with exploitation of laws and regulations to deny the rights of Catholics, or simply working quietly behind-the-scenes to ensure that Catholics do not advance if they openly proclaim and live their faith.

We as head of the Stato Pontificio and Anglican Patriarchate call upon, therefore, the civil governments of the world, and in particular of Europe and the Americas to do their part in ensuring an end to anti-Catholic persecution. As so many of the societies right now have initiatives to end racism and intolerance, the Catholic people are so often ignored – especially Catholic minorities. These sorts of double standards should be rooted out and likewise eliminated for the bigotry that they are.

While we work for its end, we nevertheless should offer up any such persecution that we suffer for the benefit of the poor souls in purgatory. It places us in solidarity with those who suffered so much more than most of us have suffered or even can comprehend at the hands of the Nazis. Let us then again pause to reflect and join our-selves across the years with our brethren, our fellow human beings who suffered and died in the Holocaust.