Faith and Reason

The photograph is undeniable: a young Robert Prevost—now Pope Leo XIV—kneeling in a Pachamama ritual. The same earth deity venerated in the Vatican Gardens in 2019, processed into St. Peter's, and placed before the tomb of the Apostle. The same idol Francis's cardinals condemned as "demonic," "apostasy," and "a crime against divine law."Now the man in the photo sits on the Throne of Peter. And the cardinals who condemned Pachamama are silent.Fr. James Altman and Liz Yore join to react to the evidence that has reignited the controversy. They argue this is not ancient history—it is a window into the syncretism that has infected the highest levels of the Church. The blending of Catholicism with pagan ritual is not a pastoral accommodation. It is a betrayal of the First Commandment. And when bishops refuse to speak, silence becomes complicity.HELP SUPPORT WORK LIKE THIS: https://give.lifesitenews.com/?utm_source=SOCIAL U.S. residents! Create a will with LifeSiteNews: https://www.mylegacywill.com/lifesitenews ****PROTECT Your Wealth with gold, silver, and precious metals: https://sjp.stjosephpartners.com/lifesitenews +++SHOP ALL YOUR FUN AND FAVORITE LIFESITE MERCH! https://shop.lifesitenews.com/   ****Download the all-new LSNTV App now, available on iPhone and Android!LSNTV Apple Store: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/lsntv/id6469105564 LSNTV Google Play: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.lifesitenews.app +++Connect with John-Henry Westen and all of LifeSiteNews on social media:LifeSite: https://linktr.ee/lifesitenewsJohn-Henry Westen: https://linktr.ee/jhwesten

A photograph buried for decades has surfaced. It shows a young Augustinian priest, Robert Prevost, now Pope Leo XIV, kneeling in a circle, participating in a ritual explicitly labeled a "rite of Pachamama." Multiple Augustinian witnesses have confirmed his identity. The year is 1995. The location is a symposium in South America. The ceremony is indigenous agricultural worship.The panel on Faith and Reason presents this as explosive evidence, not of youthful indiscretion, but of a pattern. The same earth deity venerated in the Vatican Gardens in 2019, processed into St. Peter's, and placed before the tomb of the Apostle, was honored decades earlier by the man who now sits on the Throne of Peter.Cardinals and bishops who condemned the 2019 Pachamama controversy as outright idolatry have not spoken. The double standard writes itself: traditional Catholics are barred from kneeling for Communion, but a future Pope can kneel to Pachamama.HELP SUPPORT WORK LIKE THIS: https://give.lifesitenews.com/?utm_source=SOCIAL U.S. residents! Create a will with LifeSiteNews: https://www.mylegacywill.com/lifesitenews ****PROTECT Your Wealth with gold, silver, and precious metals: https://sjp.stjosephpartners.com/lifesitenews +++SHOP ALL YOUR FUN AND FAVORITE LIFESITE MERCH! https://shop.lifesitenews.com/   ****Download the all-new LSNTV App now, available on iPhone and Android!LSNTV Apple Store: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/lsntv/id6469105564 LSNTV Google Play: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.lifesitenews.app +++Connect with John-Henry Westen and all of LifeSiteNews on social media:LifeSite: https://linktr.ee/lifesitenewsJohn-Henry Westen: https://linktr.ee/jhwesten

Cardinal against cardinal. Bishop against bishop. The unity of the Church's hierarchy is fracturing in real time, and the fault lines are everywhere.At the center stands the SSPX's planned July consecrations—and a canonical firestorm over whether excommunication would even be valid. Bishop Schneider says no schismatic intent means no schismatic act. Bishop Eleganti says acting without papal mandate is objectively schismatic regardless of intention. Two bishops, same faith, opposite conclusions.Behind them, cardinals choose sides or remain silent. Figures like Viganò and Zen warn of corruption at the top. Exorcists like Fr. Ripperger speak of spiritual crisis masquerading as governance. And beneath it all, the unresolved questions of Vatican II, the loss of the old Mass, and the slow erosion of moral teaching continue dividing what once held together.This is not a dispute over discipline. It is the hierarchy consuming itself, and the faithful watching, wondering who still speaks for the Church.HELP SUPPORT WORK LIKE THIS: https://give.lifesitenews.com/?utm_source=SOCIAL U.S. residents! Create a will with LifeSiteNews: https://www.mylegacywill.com/lifesitenews ****PROTECT Your Wealth with gold, silver, and precious metals: https://sjp.stjosephpartners.com/lifesitenews +++SHOP ALL YOUR FUN AND FAVORITE LIFESITE MERCH! https://shop.lifesitenews.com/   ****Download the all-new LSNTV App now, available on iPhone and Android!LSNTV Apple Store: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/lsntv/id6469105564 LSNTV Google Play: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.lifesitenews.app +++Connect with John-Henry Westen and all of LifeSiteNews on social media:LifeSite: https://linktr.ee/lifesitenewsJohn-Henry Westen: https://linktr.ee/jhwesten

The conflict with Iran is not a distant skirmish. It is a preemptive war launched without an imminent threat, against intelligence assessments, and with consequences already spiraling beyond control.Military losses are mounting. The Strait of Hormuz is disrupted. Regional powers like Turkey are being drawn in. NATO is fracturing. The United States is more diplomatically isolated than at any point in decades. The question is no longer whether this escalates, but how fast, and who gets pulled in next.HELP SUPPORT WORK LIKE THIS: https://give.lifesitenews.com/?utm_source=SOCIAL U.S. residents! Create a will with LifeSiteNews: https://www.mylegacywill.com/lifesitenews ****PROTECT Your Wealth with gold, silver, and precious metals: https://sjp.stjosephpartners.com/lifesitenews +++SHOP ALL YOUR FUN AND FAVORITE LIFESITE MERCH! https://shop.lifesitenews.com/   ****Download the all-new LSNTV App now, available on iPhone and Android!LSNTV Apple Store: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/lsntv/id6469105564 LSNTV Google Play: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.lifesitenews.app +++Connect with John-Henry Westen and all of LifeSiteNews on social media:LifeSite: https://linktr.ee/lifesitenewsJohn-Henry Westen: https://linktr.ee/jhwesten

The SSPX has announced it will proceed with episcopal consecrations on July 1, defying Vatican objections and declaring the Church in a state of emergency. Cardinal Sarah and Cardinal Brandmüller have issued public rebukes, demanding obedience to Pope Leo. Bishop Schneider has offered support. The battle lines are drawn, not over rebellion, but over whether the crisis within the Church justifies extraordinary measures to preserve the priesthood and the faith.Pope Leo's recent episcopal appointments have placed men supportive of same-sex blessings into positions of authority, elevated figures entangled in Freemasonry controversies, and advanced leaders shaped by Germany's Synodal Way. The pattern is not accidental. It is a deliberate reshaping of the hierarchy in Rome's own image.This is not a dispute over discipline. It is a fracture over what the Catholic Church actually teaches, and whether those tasked with guarding it still believe what they were ordained to protect.HELP SUPPORT WORK LIKE THIS: https://give.lifesitenews.com/?utm_source=SOCIAL U.S. residents! Create a will with LifeSiteNews: https://www.mylegacywill.com/lifesitenews ****PROTECT Your Wealth with gold, silver, and precious metals: https://sjp.stjosephpartners.com/lifesitenews +++SHOP ALL YOUR FUN AND FAVORITE LIFESITE MERCH! https://shop.lifesitenews.com/   ****Download the all-new LSNTV App now, available on iPhone and Android!LSNTV Apple Store: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/lsntv/id6469105564 LSNTV Google Play: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.lifesitenews.app +++Connect with John-Henry Westen and all of LifeSiteNews on social media:LifeSite: https://linktr.ee/lifesitenewsJohn-Henry Westen: https://linktr.ee/jhwesten

Pope Leo XIV has advanced the beatification cause of Bishop Alphonsus Verwimp, a missionary whose personal diaries describe sharing a bed naked with a young man and engaging in deeply disturbing behavior with indigenous youth. The writings, which read as admissions of abuse, are now being overlooked in Rome's push to raise this bishop to the altars—a decision critics call a catastrophic failure of moral discernment at a time when the Church should be purging corruption, not canonizing it.The controversy over Verwimp's cause is joined by other troubling signals from the Vatican: Pope Leo's use of altar girls at a parish Mass, widely seen as a step toward normalizing women's ordination; the Holy See's refusal to join President Trump's proposed peace initiative, interpreted as open hostility toward the United States; and continued Vatican cooperation with Communist China, where state-approved bishops are now enforcing restrictions against unregistered Catholics, effectively handing the persecution of the faithful over to Beijing's political apparatus.HELP SUPPORT WORK LIKE THIS: https://give.lifesitenews.com/?utm_source=SOCIAL U.S. residents! Create a will with LifeSiteNews: https://www.mylegacywill.com/lifesitenews ****PROTECT Your Wealth with gold, silver, and precious metals: https://sjp.stjosephpartners.com/lifesitenews +++SHOP ALL YOUR FUN AND FAVORITE LIFESITE MERCH! https://shop.lifesitenews.com/   ****Download the all-new LSNTV App now, available on iPhone and Android!LSNTV Apple Store: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/lsntv/id6469105564 LSNTV Google Play: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.lifesitenews.app +++Connect with John-Henry Westen and all of LifeSiteNews on social media:LifeSite: https://linktr.ee/lifesitenewsJohn-Henry Westen: https://linktr.ee/jhwesten  

The Vatican's newly promulgated statutes for the Pontifical International Marian Academy warn against Marian "maximalism", language critics argue is a thinly veiled continuation of efforts to downplay traditional teaching on the Blessed Virgin. See why Rome is discouraging strong expressions of Marian piety signals a deeper doctrinal drift, and what it means for the faithful who have long looked to Our Lady as Co-Redemptrix and Mediatrix of all graces.Also, the Vatican's conspicuous silence as Catholic publisher Jimmy Lai receives a harsh prison sentence in Hong Kong, raising renewed questions about the Vatican-China deal and the Church's posture before communist power. In the United States, the removal of Carrie Prejean Boller from the White House Religious Liberty Commission for questioning whether anti-Zionism should be equated with anti-Semitism is met with alarm.HELP SUPPORT WORK LIKE THIS: https://give.lifesitenews.com/?utm_source=SOCIAL U.S. residents! Create a will with LifeSiteNews: https://www.mylegacywill.com/lifesitenews ****PROTECT Your Wealth with gold, silver, and precious metals: https://sjp.stjosephpartners.com/lifesitenews +++SHOP ALL YOUR FUN AND FAVORITE LIFESITE MERCH! https://shop.lifesitenews.com/   ****Download the all-new LSNTV App now, available on iPhone and Android!LSNTV Apple Store: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/lsntv/id6469105564 LSNTV Google Play: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.lifesitenews.app +++Connect with John-Henry Westen and all of LifeSiteNews on social media:LifeSite: https://linktr.ee/lifesitenewsJohn-Henry Westen: https://linktr.ee/jhwesten

Two decisive events are reshaping the Catholic landscape, exposing deep fractures within the Church. The SSPX's defiant plan to consecrate bishops without Vatican approval has reignited the specter of schism, splitting conservative leadership and revealing a total breakdown of dialogue with Rome. Simultaneously, Pope Leo XIV's public support for a document that strips the Virgin Mary of her historic titles signals a profound doctrinal shift, undermining a cornerstone of traditional Catholic devotion. These parallel crises, one of authority, the other of doctrine, point to a Church at a crossroads. Against this, Bishop Strickland's viral warning for bishops to break their silence becomes a crucial rallying cry for the faithful seeking clarity amid the confusion.HELP SUPPORT WORK LIKE THIS: https://give.lifesitenews.com/?utm_source=SOCIAL U.S. residents! Create a will with LifeSiteNews: https://www.mylegacywill.com/lifesitenews ****PROTECT Your Wealth with gold, silver, and precious metals: https://sjp.stjosephpartners.com/lifesitenews +++SHOP ALL YOUR FUN AND FAVORITE LIFESITE MERCH! https://shop.lifesitenews.com/   ****Download the all-new LSNTV App now, available on iPhone and Android!LSNTV Apple Store: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/lsntv/id6469105564 LSNTV Google Play: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.lifesitenews.app +++Connect with John-Henry Westen and all of LifeSiteNews on social media:LifeSite: https://linktr.ee/lifesitenewsJohn-Henry Westen: https://linktr.ee/jhwesten