Pontifical Alchemy Doesn’t Work

'Of old, alchemists tried to turn lead into gold and failed. Now, Francis tried to turn the Latin Mass movement into an already antiquated version of the Spirit of Vatican II. Or was this an attempt to turn gold into lead?'

From Crisis

By Julian Kwasniewski

The desire to transform or otherwise unnaturally change aspects of the Church into something supposedly more valuable, or at least more appropriate for our times, is doomed to failure.

I don’t get angry for fun. I wouldn’t say I get angry easily. When it comes to Pope Francis, I don’t delve deeply into Church politics. I know enough to know it’s consistently bad; I only try to have a general idea of the biggest doings. 

I tend to wonder how the hierarchy can be sincere. How can they have any sense of internal personal integrity? Is the Faith a thing to be believed and lived? Their actions too often suggest it is not.

There are three events, however, that made my muscles (such as they are) tighten with indignation. I felt the blood ripple in my veins. 

I share them today not to encourage the clouding of vision through the passion of anger but for the furthering of clear vision itself—to put us in mind of the first pope’s words “be sober and watchful” on account of the prowling forces of darkness, the “spiritual wickedness in high places” of which St. Paul speaks.

When Traditionis Custodes was published, I was discerning a vocation with a traditional monastic community. I often devoted six hours a day to the celebration of traditional services. The chants, prayers, and all the rest were supposed to be our daily bread. 

The publication of Traditionis Custodes made it feel as if one had spent years studying for an important exam and then, showing up, is told he had studied for the wrong test. As if the professor had said: “Nevermind! You’re in the ancient history department, everyone is being tested for the microbiology degree. History doesn’t matter. In fact, the only unique expression of being a student here is being a microbiologist.” And you wonder what happened to the other thirty departments. 

For the Holy Father to state that the Novus Ordo is “the unique expression of the lex orandi of the Roman Rite” is kind of like saying that the moon is the unique source of light to the Earth. It doesn’t make sense to anyone who has ever been outside—not only because they’d have seen the sun but because (supposing they only went out at night) there are also stars, northern lights, comets, shooting stars, and the belt of the Milky Way filling the sky.

In the days following the document’s publication, I processed the shock by writing a letter to the pope. I never intended to send it, of course, but it was a sort of therapeutic freewrite. 

I also sketched a satirical comic on the topic. Titled “The 3 Stages of TC Implementation,” it first depicted a priest in a cassock kneeling before the pope, begging for mercy, while the pontiff ordered him to the exit. The caption? “Mercy.” In the second square, militant-looking guards, jailkeepers (custodes) of traditionalists, arrest—I mean, accompany—a priest. The final scene is the result of merciful accompaniment: unity. Of course, unity! United in a prison cell are religious in traditional habits, praying; these other “keepers of tradition” have figures representative of the clergy, monastic orders, and female religious orders.

It seemed like we had simply been living our life in the same manner as countless monks—actually, all Catholics to some extent—had lived it before, doing our best to bake the bread of God’s service in the use of the Latin Mass and traditional monastic office. The faithful wanted it. Priests and religious wanted it. Bishops wanted it. Popes John Paul II and Benedict XVI wanted it. And then the blaring speakers of the Vatican switched on; and humble, minding-their-own-business Catholics around the world heard: “Bakers no longer wanted. Stones preferred for breakfast.”

This was the first instance of what I’ll call “Pontifical Alchemy”: the desire to transform or otherwise unnaturally change aspects of the Church into something supposedly more valuable, or at least more appropriate for our times. Of old, alchemists tried to turn lead into gold and failed. Now, Francis tried to turn the Latin Mass movement into an already antiquated version of the Spirit of Vatican II. Or was this an attempt to turn gold into lead?

My second anecdote flows directly from this. I had discerned out of the community previously mentioned. The November after, All Souls’ Day rolled around. The regularly celebrated Latin Mass where I lived had been quashed. For the first time in a decade, I couldn’t attend that supreme work of tender piety, devotion, and art which is the Requiem Mass.

I was always fond of the Requiem, but I didn’t realize just how fond until that moment. I can’t remember if tears came, but I felt I had been wronged right in the pit of my stomach, deep down, and it hurt. Here I was, just a simple layman looking for that most basic element for the provision of which each priest and diocese exists—the daily bread of Mass—and the closest was six hours away, in another diocese. What sort of a Church did I belong to where the daily bread in the venerable form we had always had was simply refused to us? To deny this prayer both to the living and to the dead!

My final experience came while reading reports of the Rupnik affair. What immediately hit me, in the pit of my stomach, was the thought of the two women in my life I’m closest to: my younger sister, and my now fiancée. I value each of these ladies’ well-being. Their happiness, security, and spiritual freedom are close to my heart. I have listened long and hard to them, given them hugs, and gotten them coffee. I try to live such that I would not hesitate to sacrifice my life for them if necessary. I would hope every other father, brother, and husband does or wishes to do the same.

Meanwhile, as I and countless other Catholic men fight for our women, the pope flicks a finger and protects a serial abuser of twenty women. Rupnik is still listed as a consultant to the Vatican in the 2024 Pontifical Yearbook. He continues to be defended at the Vatican. I wonder what sort of advice he’s giving?

The dark science of this pontificate’s alchemy doesn’t work. We are still being given stones instead of bread, lead instead of the gold of tradition.