Public Sin Demands Public Reparation

Join in public reparation for the sins of perversion that are celebrated during the month dedicated to the Sacred Heart, June, or "Pride Month".

From One Peter Five

By Jesse Evans

Defending the Sacred Heart: Christ’s Kingship in an Age of Pride

The Pride of Man vs. the Rights of God

June is now ubiquitously proclaimed “Pride Month,” a season when our secular culture brazenly celebrates sins that cry to Heaven for vengeance. In cities like Cincinnati – historically conservative and Catholic – tens of thousands flock to Pride parades in a blatant public celebration of vice. Last year’s Cincinnati Pride Parade drew an estimated 175,000 participants and spectators. To say that the Pride Movement has “captured our culture” would be an understatement. What’s worse, this carnival of degeneracy isn’t confined to fringe radicals. Alongside drag queens, half-clothed fetishists, and the blasphemous “Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence,” one sees “normal” suburban parents parading their children in rainbow attire. Many of these parents likely consider themselves upright citizens – even church-goers – believing they are supporting a righteous cause. Yet in reality they are sacrificing their children to the Satanic forces within the Pride Movement, corrupting innocent souls by exposing them to perversion and blasphemy. This is not just a “celebration of identity” – it is a direct affront to God’s law, a public exaltation of sinful pride against the sovereignty of Our Lord.

As faithful Catholics, we recognize that what underlies this movement is the age-old rebellion of Lucifer: non serviam – “I will not serve.” The modern Liberal notion of the “rights of man” divorced from the rights of God fuels the Pride movement and its demand that society not only tolerate, but celebrate immorality. Our elites speak endlessly of “human rights” detached from any objective truth, while trampling the divine order. Pope Leo XIII warned over a century ago that “the world has heard enough of the so-called ‘rights of man.’ Let it hear something of the rights of God.” When civil authorities proclaim a “right” to practices that God calls gravely sinful, they usurp God’s sovereignty. Genuine rights come from God and are ordered to the good; there can be no “right” to do evil. Christ the King – to whom all authority in Heaven and Earth has been given – demands that nations honor His law. When society instead glorifies disordered passions, it declares war on Christ’s reign. The “pride” in these celebrations is nothing less than man’s prideful assertion that my will be done, not God’s. It is the modern echo of the Revolution’s anti-God manifesto, the Declaration of the Rights of Man, which Cardinal Pie aptly called “the formal negation of the Rights of God”. In these “Pride” parades, we see the creature raising a clenched fist against the Creator – an open contest of the Pride of Man vs. the Rights of God.

But our God is not mocked. The Sacred Heart of Jesus, Which so loved mankind even unto death, is gravely offended by this mass apostasy and public immorality. In Scripture we read that “God resists the proud, but gives grace to the humble.” Holy Mother Church has always taught that pride – especially pride in sin – is the foremost of the Seven Deadly Sins, the vice that drove Satan and his minions out of Heaven. By enthroning pride as a public virtue, our society enthrones the very sin that blinds souls to truth. We must respond not with cowardice or half-measures, but with the militant zeal of true disciples. This is an age of spiritual warfare, a battle “not against flesh and blood, but against principalities and powers… the rulers of the darkness of this world” (Eph 6:12). Either Christ is King, or chaos reigns. The moral anarchy on display in June’s Pride festivities is the direct consequence of rejecting Christ’s Social Kingship. Over a hundred years ago, Pope Pius XI saw this coming: “The rebellion of individuals and states against the authority of Christ has produced deplorable consequences… society in a word, shaken to its foundations and on the way to ruin.” His words ring prophetic as we watch the foundations of our culture – the family, the innocence of children, basic natural law – crumble under the weight of unbridled lust and egotism. When man will not submit to God’s rule, he inevitably becomes a slave to his own passions.

Christ’s Social Kingship Demands Our Zeal

In stark contrast to the gaudy Pride flag waving on our city streets stands the Royal Standard of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. Devotion to the Sacred Heart – with its emphasis on Christ’s burning love, mercy, and kingship over human hearts and societies – arose as an antidote to the evils of modern secularism. Christ is not only the King of our souls privately; He is King of all creation, including nations and public life. Pope Pius XI, in instituting the Feast of Christ the King in 1925, taught clearly that Christ’s reign is absolute and universal: Christ has a right to reign “in the hearts of men… in their wills… [and] over all things created”. He decried how many in recent times “thought they could dispense with God” and instead enthroned man in God’s place. The result, as he observed, was worldwide strife: “Seeds of discord sown far and wide… the unity and stability of the family undermined… society… on the way to ruin”. Does this not describe our situation today? In 1925, Pius XI established Christ the King’s feast to remedy the world’s ills by reaffirming the rights of God in the face of human arrogance. He consecrated the entire human race to the Sacred Heart of Jesus in 1925 (renewing Pope Leo XIII’s 1900 consecration), declaring that only when individuals and societies submit to Christ’s sweet yoke will there be true peace and order.

Today, we faithful Catholics must carry forward that mission with even greater urgency. Christ’s Social Kingship is not an antiquated ideal – it is the only answer to the moral anarchy of our times. Either Christ reigns over our culture, or Satan does. We see vividly in “Pride Month” what happens when Christ’s kingship is rejected: public blasphemies, inversion of virtue and vice, and even children scandalized in the streets. Against this onslaught, polite silence or mere “dialogue” is woefully inadequate. Too often, Christians have succumbed to what one commentator calls “The Nice Rule,” imagining that being amiable and avoiding offense will somehow convert the enemies of the Faith. But those days are over. As that writer rightly notes, our opponents “don’t want to sit at a table with us; they want to crush us.” There is no neutrality in this spiritual war. Lukewarmness and timidity among good people only embolden the agents of evil. We must shake off the “slowness and timidity” that Pius XI lamented in too many Catholics. Now is the time for what he urged: “fight courageously under the banner of Christ the King,” fired with apostolic zeal, to win souls and “valiantly defend His rights.” If governments and corporations insult our Redeemer by suppressing His Name, we must “all the more loudly proclaim His kingly dignity and power” and “universally affirm His rights”. Every baptized Catholic is called to be a soldier of Christ, militant in charity and truth, willing to stand publicly with Jesus even when it means standing against the spirit of the age.

Crucially, our militancy is not of this world – it is spiritual and moral, marked by humility and love, not hate. The Sacred Heart of our King is “meek and humble of heart,” even as it burns with zeal for the glory of God and the salvation of souls. Our weapons are prayer, penance, and proclamation of truth; our banner is the Cross and the Sacred Heart – not the sword of worldly violence. We fight for the true good of those lost in sin, not out of malice. In opposing the Pride agenda, we do not seek to harm sinners but to save them. As lovers of Christ, we cannot be indifferent while our neighbors celebrate their own spiritual destruction. True charity compels us to admonish the sinner and call him to conversion, even if the world calls us “intolerant” for doing so. In an age of self-idolatry – when man puts his disordered desires on a pedestal – the only authentic Christian response is a bold display of humility, love of God, and zeal for souls. Humility, to acknowledge God’s rights and our own nothingness without Him; love of God, to prefer His honor to all else; and zeal for souls, to work and sacrifice for the conversion and salvation of our brethren. These virtues are the antidotes to pride. They shone brilliantly in the lives of saints who confronted pagan Rome, Islamic invaders, or anti-Catholic tyrannies – and they must shine in us today. We think of the early Christians who refused to burn incense to Caesar, or the Vendée martyrs who wore the Sacred Heart on their chests as they resisted godless revolution. Their spirit must become ours. The Sacred Heart of Jesus, crowned with thorns and aflame with love, should embolden us: it is both an image of Christ’s kingship (the crown) and His burning charity (the flame). It reminds us that Christ conquers not by catering to pride, but by the power of sacrificial love and truth.

Public Reparation: A Necessary Catholic Response

When sin is paraded publicly, mere private disapproval is not enough. Public sin demands public reparation. In the face of Pride events that openly defy God’s law, Catholics of tradition are rising to the challenge with acts of prayer and penance in the public square. This past summer in Cincinnati, a group of courageous Catholics put this principle into action. On June 22 2024, as the city’s Pride festivities continued to revel in depravity, Christ is King Action Ministries – a local men’s Catholic action group – led a public Rosary rally on the sidewalk in front of the Cathedral Basilica of St. Peter in Chains. It is no coincidence that Cincinnati’s Pride Parade route begins at the very doorstep of this historic cathedral. In fact, one Catholic leader at the rally noted the “demonic coincidence” that the Pride Parade kicks off “right next to our Cathedral.” Joined by “150+ Catholic men” on the cathedral steps praying the Rosary, it was a powerful witness of light confronting darkness. While tacky decorated floats blared their music and revelers cheered for ungodly “pride,” these Catholic men knelt, clutching rosaries and intoning Hail Marys in reparation to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. They held high banners and images of the Sacred Heart – the red and white standard of Christ the King – declaring His sovereignty over that space being usurped by false “pride.” They prayed the Rosary and the Litany of the Sacred Heart continuously from 10:00 AM until the parade had passed by out of sight. The cacophony of the parade was met with the steady cadence of prayers and the singing of hymns. Some in the parade jeered or hurled insults at the praying men; others looked on in curiosity or even respect.

The symbolism could not be more striking: the Cathedral of St. Peter in Chains, a shrine to the Apostle miraculously freed from earthly bonds, now stood as a bulwark of Faith amid a city chaining itself in sin. Under those stone towers, the Social Kingship of Christ was being proclaimed in deed and word, even as the world outside pretended to cast off Christ’s “chains” and celebrate license. What the secularists call “liberation” – moral anarchy and slavery to lust – the Church knows to be a path back into chains of the evil one. True freedom is found only in serving Christ the King, whose yoke is easy and burden light. Thus the Rosary rally was an act of true liberation – invoking Christ’s reign and Our Lady’s maternal mediation to break the shackles of sin enslaving so many souls.

The faithful who stood at the Cathedral did so knowing full well that all have sinned and fall short of God’s glory – and that includes each one of us. We perform reparation first and foremost for our own sins and the sins of the Church, in union with the infinite merits of Christ’s Passion. In this way we console the Sacred Heart of Jesus, which is grievously wounded by the sins of mankind, including the outrages of Pride Month. They responded to public sin with public prayer.

In city after city, groups of the faithful are taking to the streets – some processing with statues of Our Lady or images of the Sacred Heart, others holding banners declaring “Christ is King” – all united in the conviction that silence in the face of blasphemy is not an option. We owe God public adoration and reparation, especially when He is publicly insulted. The Social Reign of Christ the King must be asserted precisely where it is denied.

And this year, the men of Cincinnati will once again rise to that call: on Saturday, June 28th, 2025, another public act of reparation will take place on the steps of the Cathedral Basilica at 10:00 AM. All faithful men are encouraged to join in this holy stand for the Sacred Heart and the Kingship of Christ.

Under the Banner of the Sacred Heart: Victory through Reparation

It is easy to become disheartened as we witness the near total absence of Christian morality in our society. But we must remember that Christ has already defeated the powers of hell – “I have overcome the world” (John 16:33). He now asks us, His Church Militant on earth, to share in His victory by fighting the good fight for souls. Our confidence is not in numbers or worldly power, but in the power of the Sacred Heart and the Immaculate Heart.

Nineveh was spared when its people did penance; Sodom would have been spared for the sake of ten just men. At Fatima, Our Lady pleaded for prayer and penance to avert chastisements and convert sinners. She promised, “In the end, my Immaculate Heart will triumph.” The Sacred Heart of Jesus likewise promised to St. Margaret Mary that His Heart would reign, despite Satan’s efforts – “It will reign in spite of His enemies,” Jesus said, “and all those whom He has destined for it will know His love and peace.” We take courage in these promises. Every Rosary rally, every act of reparation, every time we loudly profess “Christ is King” in the public square, we are hastening the day when Christ’s Social Kingship will be universally acknowledged. We may not live to see the full triumph, but our duty is to plant the standard of Christ the King wherever we can, especially in the public realm. As Pius XI encouraged the faithful, celebrating Christ’s Kingship publicly “will also do much to remedy” the evils of secularism. While governments and corporations expunge the Holy Name from public life, we must exalt it ever more. While the world raises the rainbow flag, we raise higher the banner of the Sacred Heart.

The contrast between the two banners could not be more profound. The rainbow flag represents a direct rebellion against the natural and divine law – a humanistic promise that man can find “pride” and peace by indulging his desires and asserting absolute autonomy. It is the banner of self-worship, under which march the agents of the “culture of death” (to use St. John Paul II’s term) – a culture that leads to spiritual death and social chaos. The banner of the Sacred Heart, by contrast, represents the reign of Jesus Christ – a reign of true charity, order, and peace. The white and red on the image of the Sacred Heart recall the water and blood that flowed from Christ’s side, the life-giving Sacraments of Baptism and Eucharist by which souls are reborn and nourished. This banner proclaims that Christ conquered sin and death by His humility and sacrifice, not by flaunting pride. Under the Sacred Heart, the faithful find the grace to repent, to live chastely according to God’s commandments, and to build a civilization of love in accord with truth. One banner exalts ego and lust; the other exalts the love and mercy of God. One leads to enslavement, the other to liberation.

Thus, we urge all Catholics: choose your banner and rally to it. There can be no sidelines in this war. If we do not make public acts of faith, the void will be filled by public acts of blasphemy. If we do not proclaim Christ’s kingship, the world will continue crowning Satan as prince. Now is the time for intentional, public Catholic witness. This can take many forms: joining local Rosary rallies of reparation, organizing a Eucharistic procession through your city’s streets, putting up images of the Sacred Heart on your front door and in public spaces, prayer and fasting in reparation for specific public sins, and speaking boldly in your own social circles about the truth of the Gospel. Each of us can do something to nail the colors of Christ the King to the mast, so to speak.

Let us not shy away from the militant language our Holy Mother the Catholic church has taught us to use: we are the Church Militant, called to “fight the good fight of faith” (1 Tim 6:12). In the words of Pope Leo XIII, “Christians are born for combat” – we must then, as long as evil exists, oppose it. This holy militancy is not fanatical or hateful; it is the zeal of saints, born of love for God’s honor and souls’ salvation. When St. Louis IX of France heard blasphemy, he would remove his crown and kneel in reparation. When faced with a public parade of sin, we too must publicly profess our loyalty to Christ the King. The month of June – which the Church dedicates to the Most Sacred Heart – ought to be reclaimed by Catholics as a month of fervent devotion, reparation, and evangelization. Instead of ceding the public square to the prophets of pride, let us flood the public square with images of the Sacred Heart, public rosaries, and processions. As the editor of Crisis exhorted during the last Pride parade, we need “confrontational Catholicism” – not in the sense of violence, but a willingness to confront lies with truth, and sin with sanctity, boldly and unapologetically.

We stand at a pivotal moment. The Social Kingship of Christ is either going to be reasserted through the efforts of faithful souls, or we will see our society continue to plunge into a new dark age of unbelief and depravity. Each of us must decide where we stand. Indifference is complicity in the face of such clear offense to God. If we truly love God, we will feel righteous anger and sorrow at seeing Him publicly insulted – and we will be moved to make acts of reparation. If we truly love our neighbor, we will not condone or stay silent about behavior that leads souls to hell, but rather witness to the truth that sets us free. True love is willing to suffer for the beloved; are we willing to suffer the world’s scorn so that even a few souls might be saved?

Every knee will bow – either willingly now, or by compulsion at the Judgment. We want to bring as many souls as possible to bow willingly in love before Christ’s kingship before it is too late. So we pray and we act. Most Sacred Heart of Jesus, have mercy on us! We consecrate ourselves to Thee without reserve. Reign in our hearts, our homes, and our society. Christus vincit, Christus regnat, Christus imperat! In that divine Kingship we place all our hope. Armed with the Holy Rosary in one hand and the standard of the Holy Cross and Sacred Heart in the other, we march forward into battle – not with fear, but with faith. In the victory of that Faith, we will echo the words of St. Paul: “We are more than conquerors through Him who loved us” (Rom 8:37). Long live Christ the King! To Him alone be the glory, forever and ever. Amen.

Join Us in Public Reparation – June 28th, 2025

Catholic men are once again called to stand publicly for the Sacred Heart of Jesus and the Kingship of Christ.

A men’s-only act of reparation will take place on Saturday, June 28th, 2025, at 10:00 AM on the steps of the Cathedral Basilica of St. Peter in Chains in Cincinnati, Ohio, in response to the city’s Pride Parade.

The public Rosary and prayers of reparation will last 2 to 3 hours.

We ask that all participants:

Are men only (please no women or children)

Dress in Mass attire (no casual clothing—collared shirts, dress pants, etc.)

Bring others—invite your brothers, friends, and sons

Bring appropriate Catholic flags and banners (see TradFlags.com for examples and to support a faithful local Catholic family business)

Come in a true spirit of reparation, humility, and Catholic charity

This is not a protest—it is a solemn act of love for God and neighbor, reparation to the Sacred Heart, and a public witness to the Kingship of Christ.

For more information, updates and to RSVP for the event, visit: ctkrules.org.

Can’t Attend? Here’s How You Can Still Take a Stand:

If you’re unable to join us in Cincinnati on June 28th, consider these ways to unite spiritually and take meaningful action in your own region:

1. Ask Yourself: Why Not Here?

If no similar public act of reparation exists in your area, ask yourself what’s stopping you from starting one. Even a handful of faithful men praying the Rosary publicly is a powerful witness. Begin where you are.

2. Find Others Taking Action.

There are other groups across the country organizing public Rosaries, processions, and acts of reparation. Seek them out, support their efforts, and consider joining or collaborating.

3. Make the Faith Visible.

One simple but bold way to proclaim Christ’s Kingship is to fly a Catholic flag at your home, church, or business. We recommend purchasing from TradFlags.com, a faithful local Catholic family business. Display your flag proudly during the month of June in honor of the Sacred Heart—and ideally year-round.

4. Inspire Others.

Public witness leads to public conversion. Encourage your family, friends, and fellow Catholics to make the faith visible and unashamed, especially in times when society aggressively promotes sin.

5. Live the Question.

Each of us should ask: How can I more visibly live and proclaim my Catholic faith in a culture collapsing into apostasy? The answer begins with action.

For more information or to get involved, visit: ctkrules.org