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Articles that have been published on Selsey Substack for the edification of the faithful and for apologia…

Be Not Deceived: The Church Does Not Change

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By the Archbishop of Selsey

The Perennial Mission
The faithful are told today to wait. To be patient. To sit down and talk. But talk is not the mission of the Church. The mission of the Church is to proclaim.

When St Peter stood before the crowds at Pentecost, he did not convene a dialogue circle. He proclaimed Christ crucified and risen, calling men to repent and be baptized.¹ When the martyrs were dragged before magistrates, they did not hedge their testimony with cautious qualifications. They confessed their Lord even unto death. Their words were clear, their witness uncompromised — and because it was clear, it was life.

The Temptation of Ambiguity
Yet now we are told something very different. We hear a voice suggesting that doctrine might change, if only attitudes first change.² This is not Catholic teaching. Truth does not follow fashion. Truth does not bow to the polls or wait upon consensus. Truth is Christ Himself — “the same yesterday, today, and forever.”³

Ambiguity may sound like compassion. It may win the world’s applause and soothe troubled ears. But ambiguity starves souls. The people of God cannot live on probabilities. They need certainties. They need the living bread of truth, not the stones of hesitation.

Unity Without Truth Is a Lie
Families who built their lives around the Mass of the saints now find the doors locked against them, told that “unity” demands their exile. Bishops invoke obedience while exiling the faithful from the very liturgy that nourished saints, martyrs, and missionaries. Unity at the expense of truth is not unity. It is choreography. It photographs well but it does not save.

The Church is not a debating society. It is the Ark of Salvation. The voice of Peter is not meant to echo the shifting winds of culture but to confirm the brethren in the faith. When Rome speaks in riddles, the sheep scatter. When pastors equivocate, wolves circle.

The Sacred Liturgy Is Not Negotiable
The liturgy is not a toy to be handed down by one generation and withdrawn by another. It is not an experiment in pastoral policy. It is the heartbeat of the Church. To suggest that its survival depends upon the decisions of committees and consultations is to treat the holy as negotiable.

The Mass of Ages has never been abrogated.⁴ It cannot be abrogated. It was sanctified by the Council of Trent, handed down through the centuries, and confirmed by Benedict XVI: “It is permissible to celebrate the Sacrifice of the Mass following the typical edition of the Roman Missal promulgated by Blessed John XXIII in 1962 and never abrogated.”⁵

This Mass is not a preference. It is a patrimony. To place it on probation is to suggest that tradition itself is provisional. But what is immemorial cannot be annulled. What sanctified the saints cannot be forbidden.

The Peril of Probability
What has been said of marriage and sexuality? That change is “highly unlikely,” at least in the “near future.” But this is the language of politicians, not of shepherds. This is the vocabulary of probability, not of proclamation.

Dogma admits of no such uncertainty. Vatican I solemnly declared: “That meaning of the sacred dogmas is ever to be maintained which has once been declared by Holy Mother Church, and there must never be a recession from that meaning under the pretext or in the name of a deeper understanding.”⁶

St Vincent of Lérins gave the true measure: the faith develops as a body grows, “strengthened with years, expanded with time, elevated with age,” yet always remaining the same.⁷ A living organism matures; it does not mutate. Doctrine may deepen, but it does not reverse. To speak of doctrine as “unlikely” to change is already to deny its immutability.

The True Unity of the Church
Unity in the Church is not built on compromise. It is not held together by committees or processes. It is not preserved by avoiding offense. The unity of the Church is the unity of faith, of sacraments, and of governance under Peter. Unity without truth is a counterfeit.

The Apostles did not keep silence to maintain appearances. They spoke boldly. St Paul withstood Peter “to his face” when clarity demanded it.⁸ The Fathers thundered against heresy, even when emperors pressed for compromise. The martyrs shed their blood rather than leave the impression that truth was negotiable.

A Call to Clarity
My dear friends, beware the soft words that mask hard betrayals. Beware the “codes” that promise continuity but deliver confusion. The bar for Catholic orthodoxy is not “better than Francis.” The bar is Christ, who said, “Let your yes be yes, and your no be no.”⁹

We are called to clarity, not choreography. To confession, not conversation. To sacrifice, not slogans. The Church does not live by “highly unlikely.” The Church lives by “Amen.”

Pray for Holy Mother Church. Pray for those in authority, that they may speak as shepherds, not as politicians. And hold fast — hold fast to the faith once delivered to the saints, the faith that does not change, because it is the faith of Christ Himself.¹⁰

For a more indepth presentation visit Nuntiatoria.org

  1. Jude 1:3.
  2. Acts 2:14–36.
  3. Crux, interview with Pope Leo XIV, September 2025.
  4. Hebrews 13:8.
  5. Council of Trent, Session XXII, Canon 9.
  6. Benedict XVI, Summorum Pontificum (2007), Art. 1.
  7. Vatican I, Dei Filius (1870), ch. 4, §13.
  8. St Vincent of Lérins, Commonitorium, ch. 23.
  9. Galatians 2:11–14.
  10. Matthew 5:37.

The Footsteps of St. Wenceslaus — A Reflection in the Cold

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By the Archbishop of Selsey

We sing of him at Christmas: “Good King Wenceslas looked out on the Feast of Stephen…” The carol offers a kindly image — a monarch braving snow to feed the poor. But the real Wenceslaus was more than a carol figure. He was a ruler, a reformer, and a martyr, slain at the threshold of the Mass. His life is not a seasonal tale but a burning witness to the truths our own age is desperate to forget.

Faith Before Throne
Born around 907, Wenceslaus was raised by his grandmother, St. Ludmila, who taught him Christian faith in a land still divided by paganism.¹ His mother, Drahomíra, resented this and arranged Ludmila’s murder — a family feud that was also a spiritual war.²

As duke, Wenceslaus built churches, fostered missionary work, and consecrated his people’s life to Christ.³ The rotunda he founded at Prague Castle in honor of St. Vitus became the heart of Bohemia’s Christian identity.⁴ Some traditions even record that he consecrated himself to virginity, seeking to reign with undivided heart.⁵

Politics and Betrayal
Surrounded by powerful enemies, he submitted tribute to King Henry I of Germany, a prudent act to spare his realm.⁶ Yet this earned him scorn from ambitious nobles and his own brother Boleslaus. On 28 September 929 (or 935), as Wenceslaus walked to Mass at Stará Boleslav, he was ambushed and slain at the church door.⁷

His people immediately honored him as a martyr. Miracles were reported at his tomb, and his relics became a focus of devotion.⁸ Though he was a duke in life, posterity hailed him as king — not by title, but by truth. He embodied the rex justus, the just ruler who governs by justice and holiness.⁹

The Carol and the Witness
Centuries later, John Mason Neale enshrined his memory in the carol “Good King Wenceslas”, setting the legend to the medieval melody Tempus adest floridum.¹⁰ Though the story is poetic invention, it reflects the enduring conviction: his authority was measured not by conquest but by charity.¹¹

Lessons for Our Time

  1. Christ the King above all kings. Pope Pius XI taught in Quas Primas (1925) that rulers must recognize Christ’s sovereignty, for “men must look for the peace of Christ in the Kingdom of Christ.”¹² Wenceslaus lived this truth: he bowed before Christ even when it cost him power and life.
  2. Martyrdom is the summit of witness. The Second Vatican Council affirmed in Lumen Gentium that martyrdom “conforms the disciple to his Master by freely accepting death for the salvation of the world.”¹³ Wenceslaus was struck down not in battle but on the way to Mass, showing that fidelity to Christ and His sacrifice is worth dying for.
  3. The Eucharist is the heart of the Church. The Council of Trent declared that the Eucharist is “the source and summit of all worship and religion.”¹⁴ Wenceslaus’s murder at the church threshold is a stark reminder: to abandon the altar is to abandon everything. Today, when the sacred liturgy is restricted, trivialized, or attacked, his witness cries out to us to defend it with our lives.
  4. Authority without sacrifice is tyranny. Wenceslaus shows that leadership is measured not by domination but by service. In an age of careerist politicians and worldly bishops, his memory challenges us: true authority kneels before the altar and steps into the storm for the poor.
  5. Hope in the saints. Legends said he sleeps beneath a mountain, ready to rise in his people’s need. This myth speaks to the deeper truth of the communion of saints: those who died in Christ intercede still. When the Church trembles under betrayal, we are not abandoned.

A Saint for the Church in Crisis
Our world grows cold with unbelief. The poor freeze in body and soul. Families fracture. Leaders falter. Bishops barter away doctrine for applause. Yet Wenceslaus speaks still. He tells rulers: serve with sacrifice. He tells shepherds: never betray the altar. He tells the faithful: Christ is King, and His Kingdom will not be shaken.

The carol may warm our homes at Christmastide. But the martyr warms the Church with his blood. His footprints in the snow still mark the way — the way of charity, the way of fidelity, the way of the Cross. If we follow them, they will lead us not to sentiment, but to sanctity; not to compromise, but to Christ the King.

For a more indepth presentation visit Nuntiatoria.org

  1. Council of Trent, Session XIII, Decree on the Eucharist, ch. 5.
  2. Wenceslas I, Prince of Bohemia – Britannica, accessed Sept. 2025.
  3. “Saint Wenceslaus” – Franciscan Media, accessed Sept. 2025.
  4. Britannica, Wenceslas I.
  5. Wikipedia, Wenceslaus I, Duke of Bohemia.
  6. Czech Center Blog, “St. Wenceslas,” 2022.
  7. Britannica, Wenceslas I.
  8. Britannica and Wikipedia, Wenceslaus I, Duke of Bohemia.
  9. Britannica, Wenceslas I.
  10. Hymnology Archive, Good King Wenceslas.
  11. Wikipedia, Good King Wenceslas.
  12. Scholastic, “Good King Wenceslas (Annotated Text).”
  13. Pius XI, Quas Primas (1925), §1, §19.
  14. Vatican II, Lumen Gentium (1964), §42.

A Defence of Truth, Liberty, and the Common Good: Oppose an official definition of Islamophobia

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By the Archbishop of Selsey

Britain stands at a crossroads. A government Working Group, chaired by the former Conservative MP Dominic Grieve, is presently preparing a definition of “Islamophobia.” This body was created by the government in February 2025 and given six months to produce its recommendations, without Parliament having a say in the matter. The public consultation has already closed, and if the Group adheres to its timetable, its recommendation—drafted in secret—will be delivered within weeks. The government intends then to roll out this definition across public bodies, urging them to embed it in speech codes, so that anyone who falls foul of the new standard can be punished¹.

The justification given for this extraordinary measure is that Britain has witnessed a rise in anti-Muslim hostility since the terrorist attack on southern Israel on 7 October 2023². But this argument is deeply flawed. Our nation already possesses robust laws that protect people from religious hatred and discrimination. These laws apply equally to Muslims, Christians, Jews, Hindus, Sikhs, and all faith communities³. The way to protect Muslims is to enforce those existing statutes, not to introduce what would amount to a Muslim blasphemy law by the back door.

As Christians, we affirm that all men and women are created in the image of God and deserve equal dignity and justice. To single out one community for special protections would be an affront to that principle. It would contradict the Scriptural command that believers should not “have respect of persons” (James 2:1). Such privileging of one faith over others risks exacerbating tensions rather than fostering harmony. Even Fiyaz Mughal, the Muslim founder of Tell MAMA, has warned that “any definition that marks out one community is going to cause major social divisions”⁴.

The dangers are not theoretical. An official definition of “Islamophobia” would have a chilling effect on free speech. Already, those who have raised legitimate concerns—for example, the disproportionate involvement of some Muslim men of Pakistani heritage in grooming gangs—have been accused of Islamophobia. Baroness Casey, in her official report, confirmed that one reason officials failed to act on the grooming scandals was fear of that very label⁵. Sarah Champion MP, one of the few politicians willing to speak honestly, was even shortlisted for “Islamophobe of the Year” by the Islamic Human Rights Commission⁶.

Britain has a storied tradition of religious tolerance. Surveys show that nine out of ten of our people are comfortable living alongside those of different religious beliefs—more than anywhere else in Europe⁷. This is a heritage of which we should be proud. To jeopardise it by elevating one faith to a privileged status would be to exchange harmony for resentment, and equality for division.

We must also remember that Britain deliberately abolished its blasphemy laws in 2008⁸. It was recognised then that in a plural society no religion should be shielded from criticism. To introduce an official definition of “Islamophobia” now would be to resurrect blasphemy law in another form, this time for the benefit of one faith alone. Such a step would undermine freedom of speech and conscience and betray the Christian heritage that shaped our liberties.

Beloved faithful, this is not a mere matter of policy but of principle. We are called to “speak the truth in love” (Ephesians 4:15). To be silenced by fear is to become complicit in falsehood. Caesar must never dictate which truths may be spoken.

Therefore, I urge you to act. Write to your Members of Parliament and to your councillors. Tell them plainly that you oppose the creation of a privileged status for Islam, that you stand for equal treatment under the law, and that you will not see Britain’s freedoms traded away. You may use the draft letter we have provided below, and you can obtain the contact details of your representatives quickly and simply via www.writetothem.com.

If we fail to speak now, we may soon find ourselves unable to speak at all. Let us not be that generation. Let us stand for truth, liberty, and the common good.

Draft_Letter_IslamophobiaDownload

Footnotes

  1. UK Government announcement, creation of the Working Group on anti-Muslim hatred, February 2025.
  2. Government rationale cited in media reports following the October 2023 Hamas attack on Israel.
  3. Equality Act 2010, Part 2 (Protected Characteristics), including religion or belief.
  4. Fiyaz Mughal, quoted in public commentary on proposed definitions of Islamophobia.
  5. Louise Casey, Independent Review into Child Sexual Exploitation in Rotherham (2015).
  6. Islamic Human Rights Commission, Islamophobia Awards 2017, shortlist included Sarah Champion MP.
  7. European Values Study, data on tolerance and acceptance of religious diversity (latest UK survey).
  8. The common law offences of blasphemy and blasphemous libel were abolished by section 79 of the Criminal Justice and Immigration Act 2008.

The Enduring Gift of Christian Sexual Ethics

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By the Archbishop of Selsey

The ordering of human love has always been decisive for the health of civilisations. At stake is not simply the happiness of individuals, but the stability of families, the nurture of children, and the vitality of culture itself. Christianity, from its beginning, proposed a vision of sexuality that was at once demanding and profoundly humane. Far from repressing joy, it elevates it—integrating passion with fidelity, openness to life, and the dignity of persons.

The Church has never been content to leave the most intimate of human acts to shifting preference. From Genesis onward, marriage is revealed as covenant: “The two shall be one flesh” (Gen. 2:24; Mt. 19:5). Christ confirmed this order, declaring: “What God hath joined together, let not man put asunder” (Mt. 19:6). Sexual intimacy belongs to marriage, marriage is permanent and faithful, chastity before marriage prepares for fidelity within it, and openness to life crowns it with fruit. Virginity and celibacy point to the higher truth that human fulfilment ultimately rests in God.

The Fathers called these principles beautiful. St. Augustine described chastity as “the beauty of the soul” which brings harmony to desire.¹ St. John Chrysostom called the Christian household “a little Church,” where fidelity mirrors the love of Christ and His Bride.² St. Jerome observed that consecrated virginity does not diminish love but ennobles it.³ Their vision was later reaffirmed by the magisterium: Pope Pius XI in Casti Connubii taught that marriage is ordered both to the procreation of children and the mutual perfection of the spouses;⁴ the Second Vatican Council in Gaudium et Spes called marriage “a covenant of irrevocable personal consent”;⁵ and St. John Paul II in Familiaris Consortio declared that “the future of humanity passes by way of the family.”⁶

What has this ethic produced in practice? The social sciences confirm what revelation declared. Decades of research show that children raised in stable, married families are healthier, better educated, and more emotionally secure. A Princeton study led by W. Bradford Wilcox concluded that intact marriages reduce child poverty, improve school performance, and lower delinquency.⁷ Anthropologists have demonstrated that monogamous marriage, historically rare, restrains elite polygamy, reduces male violence, and directs energy into family provision. Joseph Henrich called this shift “the domestication of the male,” essential for peaceful and productive societies.⁸

Where intimacy is safeguarded by fidelity, health is preserved. The Centers for Disease Control consistently note that stable, monogamous unions carry the lowest risks of disease and psychological harm.⁹ By insisting on covenantal love, Christian morality provides a natural safeguard for trust and well-being. By demanding equal fidelity from husband and wife, it elevated the dignity of women. What theology first declared, anthropology now confirms: monogamous marriage fosters greater equality between the sexes and deeper paternal investment in children.¹⁰

This vision is also life-affirming. In the ancient world, Christians distinguished themselves by refusing to expose infants, insisting that every child is a gift. Roman historians noted the peculiarity of this practice.¹¹ Today, the same openness to life challenges a culture that too often views children as burdens. In Humanae Vitae, Pope Paul VI warned prophetically that to separate love from life would lead to marital breakdown, the exploitation of women, and demographic decline.¹² His words have proven true. Nations that embraced contraception and abortion as norms now face collapsing birth rates and an uncertain future. Italy, Spain, and Japan all record fertility rates far below replacement level, leaving questions of intergenerational care and economic survival.¹³

Even psychology lends its voice. Walter Mischel’s well-known studies on delayed gratification showed that the ability to restrain desire predicted better outcomes in education, work, and health decades later.¹⁴ Christian chastity, far from being denial, is a school of virtue. It trains men and women to master desire, not be mastered by it. It is preparation for fidelity in marriage and a foundation for self-possession in all of life.

The witness of celibacy and virginity adds another dimension. St. Paul called it a gift enabling undivided devotion to God. Far from undermining society, celibate communities have enriched it: monasteries preserved learning, cultivated land, and cared for the sick; religious orders established schools and hospitals that endure to this day. As Rodney Stark has shown, the radical witness of virginity and celibacy drew many to the Church, impressed by the joy of lives wholly consecrated to Christ.¹⁵

By contrast, the world’s departure from these principles is plain. In the United States, more than 40% of children are born outside marriage.¹⁶ Researchers such as Sara McLanahan have shown that these children face higher risks of poverty and educational disadvantage.¹⁷ Across Europe, loneliness has reached record levels among young adults, often linked to unstable relationships and the decline of family bonds.¹⁸ The United Kingdom has reported the highest rates of syphilis in seventy years.¹⁹ Meanwhile, nations that suppress openness to life now face demographic winter.²⁰ And cultural observers like Mary Eberstadt have argued that the weakening of family life contributes directly to social fragmentation, as individuals seek identity in causes and ideologies when they no longer receive it from kinship and home.²¹

These are not condemnations but clarifications. They show by contrast how the Christian ethic, lived authentically, provides remedies for today’s wounds. By calling men to be faithful protectors, women to be honoured partners, and children to be cherished blessings, it nurtures harmony. By connecting intimacy with covenant, it safeguards trust. By linking love to life, it renews generations.

Christian sexual morality is not a burden but a gift—an enduring framework through which love finds its truest form. Where it is embraced, societies flourish; where it is neglected, they falter. Demanding, yes—but profoundly humane. It orders love to truth, and life to abundance. In the words of St. John Paul II: “Man cannot live without love. He remains a being that is incomprehensible to himself… if love is not revealed to him.”²²

For a more indepth presentation visit Nuntiatoria.org

¹ St. Augustine, Confessions, Book X.
² St. John Chrysostom, Homily XX on Ephesians.
³ St. Jerome, Against Jovinianus, Book I.
⁴ Pius XI, Casti Connubii (1930), §23.
⁵ Vatican II, Gaudium et Spes (1965), §48.
⁶ John Paul II, Familiaris Consortio (1981), §86.
⁷ W. Bradford Wilcox, Marriage and Child Well-Being: Research Findings (Princeton/Institute for American Values, 2011).
⁸ Joseph Henrich, Robert Boyd & Peter J. Richerson, The Puzzle of Monogamous Marriage, Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B (2012).
⁹ CDC, Sexually Transmitted Disease Surveillance Report (2023).
¹⁰ Joseph Henrich, The WEIRDest People in the World (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2020).
¹¹ Tacitus, Annals, XV, 44; cf. Athenagoras, Plea for the Christians, §35.
¹² Paul VI, Humanae Vitae (1968), §17.
¹³ UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs, World Fertility and Family Planning 2022.
¹⁴ Walter Mischel, The Marshmallow Test: Mastering Self-Control (Little, Brown, 2014).
¹⁵ Rodney Stark, The Rise of Christianity (HarperOne, 1997).
¹⁶ CDC, National Vital Statistics Reports, Vol. 72, No. 2 (2023).
¹⁷ Sara McLanahan & Isabel Sawhill, Marriage and Child Wellbeing Revisited, Future of Children 15:2 (2005).
¹⁸ European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights, Loneliness in the EU (2022).
¹⁹ UK Health Security Agency, Sexually Transmitted Infections Surveillance Data (2022).
²⁰ UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs, World Fertility and Family Planning 2022.
²¹ Mary Eberstadt, Primal Screams: How the Sexual Revolution Created Identity Politics (Templeton Press, 2019).
²² John Paul II, Redemptor Hominis (1979), §10.

The Brit Card Returns?

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A Catholic Warning on Sir Keir Starmer’s Digital ID Plans

By the Archbishop of Selsey

We are told that salvation will come by means of a card. Not the holy card that carries an image of Christ or His saints, but a digital one — cold, impersonal, glowing with the light of a screen. Prime Minister Keir Starmer assures us that this “Brit Card” will solve our immigration woes and bring order to a troubled land. Yet it is not a solution, but a mirage. It will neither stop the boats nor restore justice. What it will do is place yet another chain upon the wrists of free men and women.

The illusion of control
A digital ID cannot halt the tide of those who cross our borders unlawfully. It cannot compel deportations. It cannot restore sovereignty. It can, however, make the ordinary citizen a suspect in his own land, compelled at every step to prove his right to exist. Starmer offers us not control, but control’s shadow — a symbol without substance, a gesture that punishes the innocent while ignoring the guilty.

History’s warning
This nation has rejected ID cards before. In 1952 they were cast aside, deemed a nuisance unfit for peacetime liberty. The Lord Chief Justice himself dismissed them as an unnecessary burden¹. When Tony Blair revived the idea in 2006, the Identity Cards Act provoked outrage. The scheme was repealed in 2010, with Theresa May condemning it as “intrusive, bullying, ineffective and expensive”². The British people knew, and still know, that a free citizen does not live by papers, and that liberty dies not with a shout but with the quiet submission of one more form, one more scan, one more demand to “show your pass.”

The dignity of the person
Catholic truth tells us that man is made in the image of God. The state is not our master, but our servant. Leo XIII proclaimed that “man precedes the State” and that governments must respect the “natural and inalienable rights of the individual”³. Digital ID systems invert this order. They make rights conditional upon verification, reducing the child of God to a barcode on a screen.

We have seen where this leads. In China, identity cards and facial recognition cameras are the tools of a Social Credit System that punishes the “untrustworthy” and rewards compliance. The body may still walk free, but the soul is shackled. Pius XI warned against precisely this tyranny, a state that “absorbs the individual in the collectivity”⁴. The chains may be digital, but they are chains nonetheless.

A false solution to a real problem
Immigration is a grave matter. Justice demands that borders be secure; charity demands that the vulnerable be treated with compassion. Both are betrayed when leaders offer a false cure. Digital ID is aspirin for a cancer — a placebo for a dying patient. It gives the impression of action while the disease advances unchecked.

And let us not forget the law of unintended consequences. Big Brother Watch warns that such a system would birth a “Papers, please” society, where access to housing, banking, even a doctor’s visit, would depend on the state’s permission. Already 63% of Britons do not trust their government to guard such data safely, and tens of thousands have voiced their opposition⁵. They are right. A government that cannot patrol the Channel cannot be trusted to guard the keys to your very identity.

The choice before us
The question, then, is not one of efficiency, but of destiny. Do we still believe in man as a free creature under God, or do we bow to the idol of the state that seeks to number, catalogue, and command its subjects? For “where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty” (2 Cor 3:17). And where the Spirit is absent, liberty dies.

My brothers and sisters, Britain must not trade its soul for a digital card. This proposal is not progress but regress, not modernity but bondage. Let us recall the instinct that led our fathers to cast aside ID cards in the past: the instinct that told them a man’s word, his character, his citizenship, were worth more than any paper or plastic.

Conclusion
If we accept this scheme, we risk becoming a people who no longer trust our own freedom, who no longer trust the God who gave it, but who clutch instead at the cold comfort of bureaucracy. This is the very slavery from which Christ came to deliver us.

Britain must reject the “Brit Card.” Not out of nostalgia, not out of partisan rancour, but out of fidelity to truth and freedom. For if we forget that man is more than a number, then one day we will wake to find that the number has replaced the man.

For a more indepth presentation visit Nuntiatoria.org

  1. Big Brother Watch, Checkpoint Britain (Sept 2025), pp. 4–6.
  2. Lord Chief Justice Goddard, Willcock v Muckle (1951).
  3. Theresa May, Statement on the repeal of the Identity Cards Act, 2010.
  4. Leo XIII, Rerum Novarum (1891), §7.
  5. Pius XI, Quadragesimo Anno (1931), §78.

The Silence That Betrays

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By the Archbishop of Selsey

It was inevitable that Cardinal Cupich’s decision to bestow an award upon Senator Dick Durbin would provoke indignation. The senator’s record on abortion is no secret: he has voted to preserve and expand the destruction of the unborn for decades. That a Catholic bishop should present him with a “lifetime achievement award” in the name of the Church is not only puzzling but scandalous.¹

And thanks be to God, there are bishops with the courage to speak. Bishop Paprocki in Springfield, Durbin’s own ordinary, raised his voice immediately.² Archbishop Cordileone in San Francisco also joined him, warning that honoring a Catholic politician who defends abortion gravely undermines the Church’s witness.³ Bishop Conley of Lincoln followed soon after, calling the decision “shocking and bewildering” and urging Cardinal Cupich to reconsider.⁴ These are shepherds unafraid of wolves.

But the greater scandal lies not in Chicago’s award, but in the silence that followed it. Out of more than four hundred bishops in the United States, only three have spoken. Three voices against four hundred mute throats.

What does this silence betray?

It betrays a fear of men greater than the fear of God. It betrays the confusion of shepherds who imagine unity means inaction, and charity means complicity. It betrays a hierarchy that has grown so accustomed to ambiguity that clarity now feels like extremism.

History records that Pilate washed his hands in silence.⁵ Caiaphas tore his garments but said nothing for truth. Today, when infants are torn limb from limb in the very clinics Senator Durbin defends, silence is not neutrality but complicity.

Some will say: “But unity, Archbishop! Unity must be preserved!” Yes—but unity in what? In false witness? In collective equivocation? True unity is not built on silence but on truth. The early Church was united because Peter confessed Christ as Lord, not because he sought to appease Caesar. St. Paul did not hesitate to resist Peter “to his face” when the Gospel was endangered.⁶

Others will say: “But dialogue, Archbishop! We must keep the door open.” Dialogue is a means, not an end. If dialogue becomes a pretext for honoring those who defy God’s law, then it is no longer dialogue but betrayal. The world already applauds Senator Durbin for his politics. What he needs from the Church is not applause but correction.

A “consistent ethic of life” that forgets the unborn is not consistent at all. It is a seamless garment torn to shreds. To praise Durbin’s defense of immigrants while ignoring his contempt for the child in the womb is to strain out the gnat and swallow the camel.⁷

Bishops are not called to be managers of ambiguity. They are successors of the apostles, stewards of the mysteries of God. When they stand mute in the face of scandal, the faithful are left to wonder: do these men fear Caesar more than Christ?

St. Thomas More once observed that “qui tacet consentire videtur” — “silence is taken for consent.”⁸ And the oft-repeated warning remains true, even if its precise source is debated: that the triumph of evil requires only that good men do nothing.⁹

The faithful are watching. The world is watching. And Heaven itself bears witness. Our Lord will not ask whether we preserved institutional decorum or avoided conflict among ourselves. He will ask: Did you speak for the least of my brethren? Did you defend the child in the womb? Did you feed my sheep with truth?

The Chicago award to Senator Durbin is a scandal. But the greater scandal is the silence that has followed it. The blood of the unborn cries out to heaven, and too many shepherds pretend not to hear.

It is time for the trumpet to give a clear sound.

For a more indepth presentation visit Nuntiatoria.org

  1. Commonly attributed to Edmund Burke; no exact wording found in his works. See The Yale Book of Quotations (Yale University Press, 2006), p. 98.
  2. National Catholic Register, “Cardinal Cupich: Senator Durbin Award is About Immigration, Not Abortion,” Sept. 2025.
  3. The Pillar, “Paprocki: On Durbin award, ‘I had to say something’,” Sept. 23, 2025.
  4. America Magazine, “Paprocki, Cordileone oppose Chicago award to Durbin,” Sept. 23, 2025.
  5. LifeNews, Steven Ertelt, “Bishop Conley Joins Call For Cupich To Abandon Award For Dick Durbin,” Sept. 24, 2025.
  6. Matthew 27:24.
  7. Galatians 2:11.
  8. Matthew 23:24.
  9. Thomas More, A Dialogue Concerning Heresies (1529), bk. 2, ch. 14.

From Rhetoric to Violence: Media Distortion, Political Manipulation, and the Death of Charlie Kirk

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Media distortion and its consequences
The power of words in public life is rarely neutral. In the hands of the press, it can either clarify truth or distort it, either calm passions or inflame them. In our present climate, the mainstream media too often chooses the latter. By stripping quotes from context, amplifying the most incendiary phrasing, and presenting caricatured narratives of political opponents, it has become not a mediator of truth but an accelerant of division.

The controversy following the Charlottesville rally in 2017 illustrates this point. Donald Trump’s remarks — which explicitly condemned neo-Nazis and white supremacists — were reported as though he had praised them as “very fine people.”¹ In 2020, his clumsy speculation about disinfectants in a coronavirus press briefing was re-presented as a directive to “inject bleach.”² In 2024, his warning of a potential economic “bloodbath” in the automobile industry if tariffs were not applied was presented as a threat of political violence.³ These are not incidental errors but repeated patterns of misquotation, misdirection, and misframing.

Truth and unreality
At the root of this crisis lies a deeper philosophical shift. Once truth shifted from objective standards to “my truth,” society began living in unreality — where feelings override facts and reality itself is denied. What was once measured against the natural law or the order of creation is now measured against private perception. Hence, truth becomes less about what is, and more about what is felt. The consequences are visible everywhere: claims that contradict biology are treated as self-evident, moral absolutes are dismissed as oppressive, and even legal definitions are rewritten according to ideological preference. This disconnection from reality, compounded by sin, has produced what many Catholic thinkers, such as Fr. Chad Ripperger, describe as a pervasive psychological fragility, for the mind cannot remain healthy when it is constantly required to falsify its judgments.⁴ ⁵

The unwarranted invective against Trump
It is important to underline that much of the invective directed against Trump has been unnecessary, unwarranted, and profoundly damaging to society. Whatever one thinks of his policies or personality, the relentless caricature — presenting him as a sympathiser with neo-Nazis, a reckless promoter of drinking bleach, or a would-be dictator promising violence — has gone far beyond legitimate political critique. It has entrenched falsehoods in the public imagination, polarised citizens against one another, and eroded the basic presumption that political opponents are fellow citizens rather than existential threats. Such exaggerations do not merely wound the target; they corrode the civic fabric itself.

Conservative argument versus progressive invective
It remains an observable truth that, apart from occasional lapses into hyperbole, conservative commentators generally anchor their arguments in incidences of fact and evidence. Their discourse may be blunt, even combative, but it tends to rest on verifiable claims and concrete examples. By contrast, liberal and progressive rhetoric more often relies on twisting, exaggerating, or selectively framing events in order to create a sense of existential threat. In practice, this results in invective designed not to illuminate but to incite. Such language does not invite the citizen into reasoned judgment but instead pressures them into outrage. The difference is not merely stylistic: it marks the divide between speech that can be contested within the norms of democratic deliberation and speech that undermines those very norms by treating opponents as beyond the bounds of legitimate debate.

Progressive hypocrisy in moral judgment
Another example of progressivist hypocrisy is the habit of denigrating or impugning the character of an opponent for behaviours that liberals themselves have normalised and even celebrated in other contexts. Promiscuity, adultery, or the pursuit of sexual licence are often treated as badges of liberation when practised within the progressive milieu, but the same actions are held up as evidence of depravity when discovered in a conservative adversary. The result is not principled moral critique but opportunistic weaponisation. What is tolerated or excused for allies becomes grounds for public condemnation when committed by opponents. In this way, progressivism reveals itself not as a consistent ethic but as a strategy of partisan advantage, using moral language selectively to destroy reputations rather than to uphold virtue.

The Biden administration’s manipulative rhetoric
This pattern was not limited to the media. The Biden administration repeatedly relied on exaggerated or debunked framings that served to polarise rather than persuade. Biden invoked the claim that Trump praised white supremacists at Charlottesville, despite transcripts proving otherwise.⁶ He described Trump-supporting Republicans as “semi-fascist” and a threat to democracy,⁷ labelled Georgia’s election law “Jim Crow 2.0,”⁸ and condemned border patrol agents as guilty of “whipping” migrants before investigations showed otherwise.⁹ Even on issues such as COVID-19 vaccination, categorical overstatements — “You’re not going to get COVID if you have these vaccinations”¹⁰ — created expectations that quickly eroded public trust. Such rhetoric may have energised supporters, but it delegitimised dissent and trained citizens to see opponents as enemies rather than as fellow participants in civic life.

Media, technology, and the corrosion of discourse
This collapse of truth has been accelerated by media and technology. Sound-bites and social media have conditioned people to expect instant comprehension, reducing serious argument to slogans.¹¹ Complex truths — whether philosophical, theological, or political — require a sequence of logical steps. Yet the digital environment encourages impatience with reasoning and suspicion of anything that cannot be grasped in seconds. The effect is intellectual malformation: individuals increasingly lack the habits needed to follow an argument, test its coherence, and arrive at sound judgment. In place of reasoned persuasion comes emotional assertion, ad hominem attack, or withdrawal into curated echo chambers. Technology, which promised to connect, has instead isolated, producing a population that consumes information but rarely deliberates upon it.¹² ¹³ ¹⁴ What might once have fostered conversation has become a machinery of fragmentation.

Academia and activist rhetoric
This same dynamic is also evident in what now passes for “academic” debate in universities and activist circles. Students are often taught not the skills of critical analysis, but the slogans of ideology. In the case of progressive causes — from gender ideology to Black Lives Matter — the rhetoric itself is framed to foreclose discussion. Terms such as “attacking trans rights,” “deadnaming,” or “denying lived experience” are presented as self-evident indictments. Phrases like “your words cause suicidal ideation” function as conversation-ending weapons rather than contributions to reasoned argument. In the United Kingdom, several universities have codified such activist categories into official policies, listing “deadnaming” and “misgendering” as examples of “unacceptable behaviour,” with disciplinary consequences.¹⁵ At the same time, the regulator for higher education has fined institutions such as the University of Sussex for failing to uphold free speech protections in debates on sex and gender.¹⁶

The vulnerability of young people
The harm of such rhetoric is compounded by the audience to whom it is directed. Young people, often still forming their intellectual foundations and sense of identity, are especially vulnerable to absolutist framing. The NHS-commissioned Cass Review (2024) noted that social transition is not a neutral act but an intervention with potentially profound psychosocial consequences.¹⁷ This warning is particularly significant given the disproportionate number of autistic young people referred to gender clinics, whose suggestibility and comorbid conditions increase their vulnerability to ideological messaging.¹⁸ Similar findings in the United States show a measurable overrepresentation of autism-spectrum traits among those experiencing gender dysphoria.¹⁹

Moreover, research into the Werther effect demonstrates that sensationalist or alarmist media coverage of suicide can increase imitation, while the Papageno effect shows that constructive framing can be protective.²⁰ These findings are highly relevant to contemporary activist rhetoric: slogans equating disagreement with “causing suicide” or claiming that debate itself endangers lives are not neutral, but risk reinforcing harmful patterns among the most fragile. For young men suffering from isolation, depression, or identity struggles — including those in the so-called “incel” subculture — the danger is not hypothetical but real.

Institutional capture and the law
The same habits of overemphasis, obfuscation, and deliberate manipulative framing have also reshaped public institutions. When the UK Supreme Court recently clarified that “sex” in law means biological sex, it should have settled questions that had been ideologically clouded for years. Yet so extensive is the capture of public bodies that many local councils, agencies, and regulators have refused to correct policies which, by privileging gender ideology over statutory reality, were always unlawful.²¹ Here too, rhetoric has triumphed over reason: institutions behave as though law is plastic, policy a matter of ideological preference, and reality itself subject to redefinition. The consequences are profound, for they reveal a society in which even the most basic legal categories are subordinated to slogans.

Violence as poisoned fruit
In this respect, activist discourse, media reporting, and political rhetoric converge. All replace truth with caricature, all substitute fear for reason, and all escalate rather than resolve tensions. The result is polarisation, alienation, and, at times, violence. Just as misleading headlines foster hostility in the political arena, so too do absolutist slogans corrode the very possibility of genuine learning and dialogue in academic life.

The assassination of Charlie Kirk must be read against this backdrop. Here was a young husband and father, gunned down in front of his family after speaking in defence of free debate. It is not enough to dismiss the act as an isolated crime. It is more plausibly seen as the poisoned fruit of years of rhetoric in which conservatives have been described not as fellow citizens but as enemies to be eradicated. When such distortions are normalised in newsrooms, classrooms, and even the White House itself, it is inevitable that some will take them literally and act accordingly.

The irony of hate speech laws
This does not excuse individual culpability for violence. But it does highlight the wider responsibility borne by institutions that shape public perception and formation. Journalism, at its best, is a vocation of truth-telling and civic moderation. Education, at its best, is a discipline of reasoning, dialogue, and intellectual charity. Politics, at its best, is the careful stewardship of civic trust. At their worst, all three become instruments of propaganda. In recent years, the mainstream media, much of the academy, and the Biden administration leaned too often toward the latter, subordinating truth to ideology and accuracy to effect.

There is a profound irony in contemporary debates about so-called “hate speech.” Laws and policies restricting expression are invariably justified as protections against incitement, intolerance, and harm. Yet in practice, it is often liberal and progressive voices that resort most readily to inciteful speech and increasingly hostile behaviour. The language of “semi-fascism,” “existential threat,” or “denying existence” is not neutral description but rhetorical weaponry. This weaponisation extends even to national symbols and traditions. A country’s flag, its history, or its expressions of patriotism can be denounced as “hate” or “racism” without any evidence at all of such intent in the interlocutors themselves.²² By such methods, ordinary attachment to heritage is redefined as malice, and love of country is transmuted into a moral crime.

Thus, under the banner of curbing “hate,” a culture of genuine hostility has been cultivated — one that narrows democratic discourse, corrodes trust, and exposes society to the very violence it professes to prevent.

  1. White House, “Remarks by President Trump on Infrastructure Executive Order,” Aug 15, 2017.
  2. White House, COVID-19 Task Force Briefing Transcript, Apr 23, 2020.
  3. Associated Press, “Trump warns of auto industry ‘bloodbath’,” Mar 16, 2024.
  4. Fr. Chad Ripperger, Healing of the Person, interview, Catholic Men For Jesus Christ (July 2024).
  5. Fr. Chad Ripperger, quoted in Mountain Werks blog, “Your Emotions Disconnect You from Reality,” Apr 2023.
  6. Biden campaign launch speech, Apr 2019.
  7. Biden remarks, Aug 25, 2022; White House transcript.
  8. Biden, speech in Atlanta on voting rights, Jan 11, 2022.
  9. DHS OIG, Investigation into the Treatment of Migrants by Border Patrol Agents in Del Rio, Texas, July 2022.
  10. Biden, CNN Town Hall, July 21, 2021.
  11. The Atlantic, “The Incredible Shrinking Sound Bite,” Feb 2013.
  12. The Week, “TikTok brain may be coming for your kid’s attention span,” Nov 2024.
  13. Chiossi et al., “Short-Form Videos Degrade Our Capacity to Retain Intentions,” arXiv preprint, 2023.
  14. Cardoso-Leite et al., “Media use, attention, mental health and academic outcomes,” Pediatrics, 2021.
  15. Academic Freedom and Communications Monitoring, UCL Free Speech Report, Sept 2025.
  16. Office for Students, Free Speech in Higher Education: Enforcement Action Report, Apr 2025.
  17. Hilary Cass, Independent Review of Gender Identity Services for Children and Young People (NHS England, 2024).
  18. de Vries et al., “Autistic Features in Gender Dysphoric Adolescents,” Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 2010.
  19. Warrier et al., “Elevated Rates of Autism, Other Neurodevelopmental and Psychiatric Diagnoses in Transgender and Gender-Diverse Individuals,” Nature Communications, 2020.
  20. Niederkrotenthaler et al., “Role of Media Reports in Completed and Prevented Suicide: Werther vs. Papageno Effects,” British Journal of Psychiatry, 2010.
  21. Smith v Chief Constable of Northumbria Police [2025] UKSC (clarification of legal definition of sex).
  22. Council and institutional policies reported in the wake of the Supreme Court judgment, refusing to amend guidance despite legal clarification, 2025.

The Illusion of Liberation: Ethical Non-Monogamy and the Tragedy of the Human Heart

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Behind the mask of fleeting pleasure lies emptiness; only in the embrace of God as Father does the human heart find security and joy.

Lifestyle journalism increasingly celebrates what it calls “ethical non-monogamy.” Readers are invited into the worlds of open marriages, threesomes, swinging, and even boasts of encounters with hundreds of partners. Such practices are presented as adventurous, authentic, and even virtuous when cloaked with the language of “consent” and “honesty.”¹

Yet the sadness beneath these glossy confessions is unmistakable. The very need to insist upon “ethics” reveals the unease of those trying to sanctify what conscience knows to be disordered.² The endless “rules” of aftercare, negotiation, and constant reassurance betray not freedom but fragility. In place of security there is anxiety: fear of being replaced, fear of being less desired, fear of being left outside the circle of intimacy.³

The Fathers of the Church understood this restlessness well. St Augustine admitted in his Confessions: *“Our heart is restless until it rests in Thee.”*⁴ St John Chrysostom warned against marriage reduced to passion alone, for it debases the dignity of both spouses.⁵ And Pope Pius XI, in Casti Connubii, taught that the true purpose of matrimony is the union and mutual perfection of husband and wife, a purpose impossible in transient liaisons.⁶

Modern psychology, too, bears witness to the wounds concealed beneath the rhetoric of liberation. Studies of “consensual non-monogamy” often report higher levels of jealousy and lower relationship satisfaction compared with faithful marriages.⁷ Relationship counsellors frequently note the unequal burdens carried by so-called “unicorns” (single women invited into couples’ encounters), who often feel objectified or disposable.⁸ Clinical psychologists have highlighted the correlation between compulsive sexual novelty-seeking and underlying issues of anxiety, attachment insecurity, or trauma.⁹ What is proclaimed as exploration is often, in reality, an attempt to numb wounds or to chase validation through endless repetition.

Even those who champion these lifestyles sometimes confess the emptiness. Many speak of the need for “aftercare,” long debriefs, or even counselling following encounters. This very vocabulary suggests not fulfilment, but recovery from an ordeal. The human heart craves intimacy, not performances; belonging, not variety. The psychologist Viktor Frankl observed that man cannot be satisfied by pleasure alone, but only by meaning and purpose.¹⁰ Where the search for meaning is absent, pleasure becomes compulsive and hollow.

The tragedy is not only personal but social. Children raised in homes where relationships shift and partners come and go may adapt outwardly, but often carry deep insecurity within. Developmental psychologists consistently observe that children thrive best in environments marked by stability and predictability.¹¹ Attachment theory, pioneered by John Bowlby and Mary Ainsworth, demonstrates that secure bonds are formed when children experience consistent love and reliability.¹² When the family unit becomes fluid, with parental figures changing or introducing new partners, children may internalise the message that love is provisional and conditional.¹³

Clinical counsellors report that such children are more prone to anxiety, behavioural difficulties, and trust issues later in life, often struggling to form lasting relationships of their own.¹⁴ Adults may normalize instability as “flexibility,” yet for children, each new partner can feel like a quiet displacement, reinforcing the fear of not being truly chosen or secure.¹⁵ What society lauds as open-minded honesty, children often experience as uncertainty and confusion—an erosion of the very foundation upon which their identity and confidence are built. A culture that applauds such patterns undermines the bedrock of stability that allows not only trust and love to flourish, but also the healthy psychological development of the next generation.¹⁶

For Christians, the deepest tragedy lies in the distortion of what God created as holy. Man and woman, made in His image, are called to become His children.¹⁷ Sexual intimacy, ordered rightly, is meant to be a sign of God’s own fidelity—faithful, fruitful, exclusive, and life-giving. To scatter that sign in novelty and experimentation is to abuse the image of God within us. It is not freedom, but a travesty of love.

The Church does not gaze upon these lives with contempt but with compassion. She recognises the deep yearning that lies behind such stories: the hunger to be loved, to be seen, to be secure. These are not wrong desires, but misplaced ones. True liberation is not found in multiplying encounters, but in discovering the One in whom love is perfected. Christ offers what no encounter, no thrill, no experiment can ever grant: the adoption as sons and daughters of God, heirs to joy everlasting.¹⁸

To pity rather than condemn is to recognise the sadness behind the spectacle, the insecurity behind the bravado, the brokenness behind the smile. Only in God can the heart be healed, intimacy be secured, and love be made whole.

  1. Alice Garnett, “How threesomes and swinging went mainstream (and the rules to follow),” Telegraph, 3 Dec 2024; Carla Crivaro, “I’ve slept with nine men and one woman since my marriage break-up,” Telegraph, 8 Sept 2025.
  2. St Paul, Romans 2:15: “They show that what the law requires is written on their hearts.”
  3. Moors, A. C., & Schechinger, H. A., “Consentual Non-Monogamy: Attitudes, Desire, and Practice,” Current Opinion in Psychology 35 (2020): 76–80.
  4. Augustine, Confessions, I.1.
  5. John Chrysostom, Homilies on Colossians XII.
  6. Pius XI, Casti Connubii (1930), §23.
  7. Conley, T. D., et al., “The Fewer the Merrier? Assessing Stigma Surrounding Consensually Non-monogamous Romantic Relationships,” Analyses of Social Issues and Public Policy 13, no. 1 (2013): 1–30.
  8. Weitzman, G., “Therapy with Clients in Open Relationships,” Journal of Bisexuality 6, no. 1–2 (2006): 137–164.
  9. Grubbs, J. B., et al., “Self-reported compulsive sexual behavior: A meta-analysis of prevalence and correlates,” Journal of Behavioral Addictions 9, no. 3 (2020): 701–716.
  10. Viktor Frankl, Man’s Search for Meaning (Boston: Beacon Press, 2006), 115–118.
  11. Amato, P. R., “The impact of family formation change on the cognitive, social, and emotional well-being of the next generation,” Future of Children 15, no. 2 (2005): 75–96.
  12. John Bowlby, Attachment and Loss: Vol. 1. Attachment (New York: Basic Books, 1969); Mary Ainsworth, Patterns of Attachment (Hillsdale, NJ: Erlbaum, 1978).
  13. Osborne, C., & McLanahan, S., “Partnership instability and child well-being,” Journal of Marriage and Family 69, no. 4 (2007): 1065–1083.
  14. Cummings, E. M., & Davies, P. T., Children and Marital Conflict: The Impact of Family Dispute and Resolution (New York: Guilford Press, 2010).
  15. Hetherington, E. M., & Kelly, J., For Better or For Worse: Divorce Reconsidered (New York: Norton, 2002).
  16. Amato, P. R., “Research on divorce: Continuing trends and new developments,” Journal of Marriage and Family 72, no. 3 (2010): 650–666.
  17. Genesis 1:27; 1 John 3:1.
  18. Galatians 4:7; Romans 8:15–17.

The Priest’s Prayers at the Ablution of the Chalice: A School of Reverence, a School of the Soul

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The manner in which the priest purifies the chalice after Holy Communion in the traditional Roman Rite is no trifling detail, but a school of reverence and a daily examen of conscience. In the older form, the ablutions are solemn, careful, and doubled: the chalice is first washed with wine alone; then the thumb and forefinger that touched the Body of Christ are purified with wine and water. These actions are not performed in silence or haste but are accompanied by profound prayers, whispered by the celebrant as he consumes the ablutions.

In the modern rite, by contrast, the ablutions have been reduced to the level of functional housekeeping. The prayers are gone. The gestures are abbreviated, often postponed until after Mass, sometimes delegated to a deacon or acolyte. The priest may rinse a chalice as he chats with servers, as though dealing with ordinary tableware. And yet, at this very moment, he has just touched the Holy of Holies. What once was a moment of trembling compunction has been stripped of its meaning. The chalice is clean, but the soul of the celebrant may remain untouched. This is no minor alteration: it is emblematic of the desacralisation of the priesthood itself.

The First Ablution: A Dialogue with God
After Communion, the priest pours wine into the chalice and consumes it, praying: Quod ore sumpsimus, Domine, pura mente capiamus: et de munere temporali fiat nobis remedium sempiternum — “Grant, O Lord, that what we have taken with our mouth we may receive with a pure mind, and that from a temporal gift it may become for us an eternal remedy.”¹

This prayer is brief, but it pierces the conscience. The priest acknowledges that the Sacrament he has dared to consume is no mere food but a remedy against eternal death. He has touched Christ; he must beg that this not turn to his condemnation, but to his healing. Adrian Crogan, in his Liturgical Commentary on the Mass, explains that these hidden prayers of the priest are “an intimate dialogue with God, hidden from the congregation, which safeguards the reality of the Presence in every particle and deepens the priest’s own assimilation of the mystery.”² Even in purifying the chalice, the priest is being purified.

The Second Ablution: A Fire that Clings
The rite continues. The priest purifies the thumb and forefinger with wine and then water, saying: Corpus tuum, Domine, quod sumpsi, et Sanguis quem potavi, adhaereat visceribus meis: et praesta; ut in me non remaneat scelerum macula, quem pura et sancta refecerunt sacramenta — “May Thy Body, O Lord, which I have received, and Thy Blood which I have drunk, cleave to my inmost being; and grant that no stain of sin may remain in me, whom these pure and holy Sacraments have refreshed.”³

The prayer does not deny the cleansing power of the Sacrament, for by Holy Communion the priest has been touched and sanctified in both soul and body. In an incarnational sense, he has been made whole: the divine Food heals, elevates, and divinises. And yet, the priest acknowledges that the mystery of sin is not simply a matter of external acts, but of internal dispositions. Sin lurks most insidiously in the heart — in the tangled motivations of pride, vainglory, or negligence. He has received Christ, yes; but has he received Him with singleness of purpose? Has he offered the Sacrifice for the glory of God, or with self in view?

Peter Chaignon, SJ, in his The Sacrifice of the Mass Worthily Celebrated, warned that “every rite, every prayer is given to you that you may sanctify yourself even as you handle the Holy.”⁴ The ablutions are thus a merciful trap: the priest cannot pass them without being forced to ask whether his motives are pure.

Doctrine Confirmed by Miracle
The De defectibus in the Missal insists that every fragment, however small, must be treated with utmost care, for Christ whole and entire is present in every particle of the Host.⁵ The Eucharistic Miracle of Lanciano confirmed this doctrine. In the eighth century, the consecrated wine coagulated into five globules of blood, unequal in size yet equal in weight whether weighed singly or together.⁶ Later forensic study confirmed the Flesh as myocardium and the Blood as human type AB, remarkably preserved across twelve centuries.⁷ Laurence Hemming has argued that Catholic worship is “tangible theology, a live epiphany of God’s self-disclosure.”⁸ The miracle of Lanciano was precisely such an epiphany. The ablution prayers are another: outward acts that disclose divine truth.

The Fathers: Medicine, Fire, Transformation
The Fathers proclaimed the same truths. St Ignatius of Antioch called the Eucharist “the medicine of immortality.”⁹ St Augustine declared that unlike ordinary food, which the body assimilates, in the Eucharist it is we who are assimilated to God.¹⁰ St John Chrysostom urged that those who receive the Body of Christ should go forth “like lions breathing fire.”¹¹ The ablution prayers, whispered at the altar, echo these patristic themes. The priest begs that the medicine truly heal, that the fire truly burn, that the transformation be real.

For the Modern Celebrant: A Severe Admonition
The absence of these prayers in the reformed liturgy has had grave consequences. The chalice is rinsed, but the conscience is unexamined. The vessels are set aside, but the heart may remain unpurified. No prayer compels the modern celebrant to ask whether he has celebrated for the glory of God alone, or with pride, routine, or self-interest.

The Fathers would not have been silent. Chrysostom warned: “If anyone unworthily draw near, he perishes.”¹² Ambrose declared that the impure celebrant “draws down not grace but judgment upon himself.”¹³ Durandus explained that the washing of fingers signified the need for purity of intention.¹⁴ Aquinas taught that although the sacrament itself cannot be corrupted by the minister’s unworthiness, it may bring his condemnation.¹⁵ The Council of Trent confirmed this with anathema: “If anyone says that it is not necessary for one receiving the holy Eucharist to confess his sins beforehand when he is conscious of mortal sin… let him be anathema.”¹⁶

Here, then, is the tragedy: priests today who treat the Host as though it were a wafer, who neglect to genuflect, who chat idly while purifying vessels, who tolerate sacrilege in Communion lines. The chalice may be polished, but their motives remain tarnished. The outward act may be tidy, but the inward reality is neglected.

If the modern celebrant would recover reverence, he must recover these prayers — not as antiquarian curiosities, but as the medicine of his soul. For it is not the rinsing of chalices that saves, but the cleansing of the heart; not the outward order of vessels, but the inward ordering of love. Without them, the priest risks standing at the altar with vessels purified but heart defiled, lips sanctified but motives corrupt. And what then has he gained? Only this: to have touched the Fire of God, and to have let it pass him by unheeded.

Footnotes

  1. Missale Romanum (1962), Orationes post Communionem.
  2. Adrian Crogan, The Mass: A Liturgical Commentary (London, 1948), p. 219.
  3. Missale Romanum (1962), ibid.
  4. Peter Chaignon, SJ, The Sacrifice of the Mass Worthily Celebrated (Paris, 1859), p. 143.
  5. De defectibus in celebratione Missae, X.5.
  6. Inscription, Church of St Francis, Lanciano, 1574 investigation.
  7. Odoardo Linoli, Quaderni Sclavo di Diagnostica Clinica e di Laboratori (1971).
  8. Laurence Hemming, Worship as Revelation (London: T&T Clark, 2008), p. 67.
  9. St Ignatius of Antioch, Epistula ad Ephesios 20.
  10. St Augustine, Confessiones VII.10.
  11. St John Chrysostom, Homiliae in Matthaeum 82.5.
  12. Ibid.
  13. St Ambrose, De Sacramentis IV.4.
  14. William Durandus, Rationale Divinorum Officiorum IV.54.
  15. St Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologiae III, q. 82, a. 5.
  16. Council of Trent, Session XIII, Canon 11 (Denzinger 1661).

Flags and Ironies: National Identity, Ideological Symbols, and the Battle for Public Space

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The United Kingdom today finds itself in a paradoxical struggle over symbols. The Pride Progress flag, widely promoted as an emblem of inclusivity, has been adopted by councils, schools, and even police forces, while the Cross of St George and the Union Flag—historic banners of national unity—are increasingly treated with suspicion. The irony is stark: national flags are the rightful and legally protected emblems of shared belonging, yet they are sidelined, while a partisan movement flag is raised in their place.

Civic Neutrality and the Law

In Smith v Chief Constable of Northumbria Police [2025] EWHC 1805 (Admin), the High Court ruled that Northumbria Police acted unlawfully by marching in uniform at Newcastle Pride 2024 while displaying the Progress Pride flag. The judgment concluded that this was not a neutral act of civic engagement but a partisan endorsement of a politically contested ideology.¹ The ruling is a landmark: it confirms that public authorities must maintain impartiality and refrain from appearing to endorse controversial causes, echoing the long-standing prohibitions of the Local Government Act 1986.

A Movement to Reclaim the Flags

Amid this debate, the grassroots campaign Operation Raise the Colours has sought to normalise the everyday display of the Cross of St George and the Union Flag from homes, businesses, and civic spaces. Its aim is straightforward: to restore the ordinary, unifying presence of national flags in daily life, free from the unfair stigma of extremism or xenophobia with which they have been associated. It is, at heart, about reclaiming our flags. Yet it is a sad commentary on our times that cynicism and bigotry so often obscure this purpose. Critics denounce the campaign as divisive, even while unthinkingly cheering the same national colours at sporting events.²

Controversies Over the Pride Flag

By contrast, public enthusiasm for the Pride Progress flag has embroiled councils and institutions in bitter disputes:

  • In Matlock, Derbyshire, a Pride flag was removed after Christian complaints, only to be reinstalled by order of the town council.³
  • Warwickshire County Council witnessed internal conflict when its Reform UK leadership ordered Pride flags down, but the chief executive insisted such decisions were administrative, not political.⁴
  • The county’s planning authority went further, noting that the Pride Progress flag requires advertising consent to be lawfully displayed, unlike national flags.⁵
  • In Camden, a judicial review challenge has been launched against a transgender-coloured road crossing, with the claimant arguing that local authorities must not promote partisan causes under the 1986 Act.⁶

These incidents underscore the ideological preference given to movement banners over the neutral emblems of civic identity.

The Double Standard

Government guidance makes plain that national flags—including the Union Flag and St George’s Cross—are legally privileged: they do not require planning consent and enjoy protected status.⁷ Yet national banners are often criticised as “provocative” or “exclusionary.” A Reuters report on Operation Raise the Colours suggested that widespread flag-flying might embolden far-right groups, casting suspicion on what was once the ordinary language of civic unity.⁸

This double standard reveals a deeper malaise in public life. National flags have historically served as rallying points in times of joy and grief alike, whether at coronations, jubilees, or memorials. They speak not of one party, ideology, or faction, but of a people bound together in a shared story. To stigmatise them while championing movement flags is to turn reality on its head: it is to call “inclusive” what is divisive, and to call “divisive” what is unifying. The result is cultural disorientation, where loyalty to nation and heritage is mistrusted, while allegiance to fluid and transient causes is celebrated.

The irony becomes sharper when one recalls that even the Pride Progress flag itself is not stable but constantly altered to reflect the ever-shifting politics of identity. By contrast, the Cross of St George and the Union Flag remain fixed symbols, transcending ephemeral trends. The selective suspicion directed against them, then, is not about design or visibility but about the deeper rejection of national identity in favour of ideology.

Conclusion: The Banner of the Cross

The High Court has reminded public institutions that neutrality is a constitutional duty. Yet neutrality is persistently undermined by the preferential treatment of ideological symbols over national ones. The task of Operation Raise the Colours is, therefore, not merely aesthetic but civic and cultural: to reclaim the ordinary right of citizens to take pride in their flags without fear of stigma.

This is not only about patriotism but about principle. If public space is surrendered to partisan banners, the state itself becomes captive to ideology. National flags stand for all citizens equally—believer and unbeliever, traditionalist and progressive, immigrant and native-born. The Progress flag, by contrast, stands only for those willing to assent to a contested worldview. To elevate it above the Union Flag or the Cross of St George is not inclusivity—it is exclusion.

For Christians, the deeper lesson is clear. The Cross, borne on the banner of St George, is the truest and most universal standard of unity, for it signifies not transient politics but eternal salvation. Scripture itself declares: “Vexilla Regis prodeunt”—“the banners of the King go forth.”⁹ St Augustine contrasted the two cities: the City of Man, marked by pride and self-assertion, and the City of God, gathered under the standard of the Cross.¹⁰ And Pope Pius XI, in Quas Primas, reminded the world that “nations will be reminded by the annual celebration of this feast that rulers and princes are bound to give public honour and obedience to Christ.”¹¹

To reclaim our national flags, then, is more than an act of civic assertion; it is a reminder that no people can endure without symbols of common belonging, and that the highest of these is the banner of the Crucified King. To despise that heritage while enthroning ideological emblems is not only civic folly but spiritual blindness. True unity will not be found beneath the shifting colours of identity politics, but beneath the immovable standard of the Cross. For in Christ, patriotism is purified of faction, and love of country becomes an act of justice: pro patria et pro Deo, for country and for God, in whom all citizens may rediscover their common home and higher unity.

  1. Smith v Chief Constable of Northumbria Police [2025] EWHC 1805 (Admin); The Guardian, “Uniformed police officers were wrong to march in Pride event, high court rules,” 16 July 2025.
  2. The Sun, “Reform councils ban LGBT Pride flags from flying on council buildings,” 17 July 2025.
  3. The Guardian, “Dismay as council removes Pride flag in Derbyshire after Christians complain,” 19 June 2025.
  4. Local Government Lawyer, “Warwickshire chief exec defies Reform council leader’s request to remove Pride flag,” 21 June 2025.
  5. Local Government Lawyer, “Flying Pride flag needs advertising consent, says planning authority in Warwickshire row,” 21 June 2025.
  6. Local Government Lawyer, “London borough facing judicial review threat over road crossing painted in colours of Transgender Pride flag,” 24 June 2025.
  7. UK Government, Flying Flags: A Plain English Guide (updated 2023).
  8. Reuters, “England flags spark pride and concern amid anti-immigration protests,” 27 August 2025.
  9. Hymn of Venantius Fortunatus, Vexilla Regis prodeunt (6th century).
  10. St Augustine, De Civitate Dei, Book XIV.
  11. Pius XI, Quas Primas (1925), §32.