The conservative and semi-trad establishment’s Stockholm Syndrome was exposed once again last week when it was revealed that an event commemorating St. Francis of Assisi will occupy St. Peter’s Basilica on the date for which the Summorum Pontificum pilgrimage had originally sought permission to celebrate its principal Mass there.
The development in the latest in the ongoing game of beg-and-reject politics being played by those helplessly seeking to negotiate a feeble existence within conciliar Rome, an entity which regularly displays its scorn for traditional Catholic liturgical norms and beliefs.
The official website of St. Peter’s Basilica announced on September 23 that a Lectio Francisci will take place at the Altar of the Chair on Saturday, October 24, beginning at 3:30 p.m. The program forms part of commemorations marking the 800th anniversary of the death of St. Francis of Assisi and likely will be a celebration of the saint as reimagined by the Synodal church.
“Saint Francis’s presence in Rome, his connection with the See of Peter and the value of fraternity in today’s multicultural context,” are listed as the emphases on the website. Speakers will include poet Davide Rondoni, Sister Simona Paolini, and Sister Simona Brambilla.
Before discussing the relevance this has for Latin Mass supporters, it is important to note Brambilla’s modernist credentials. Under Jorge Bergoglio, she became the first woman to lead a Vatican dicastery as its prefect. She has also been closely involved in the Synod on Synodality and the expansion of women’s leadership in conciliar structures under Leo. Her planned address on fraternity and multiculturalism demonstrates how the event will undermine supernatural priorities.
The timing is significant because October 24 is also the principal day of the annual Ad Petri Sedem pilgrimage, commonly known as the Summorum Pontificum pilgrimage. Its organizers had sought permission for Bishop Athanasius Schneider to celebrate the pilgrimage’s traditional pontifical mass in St. Peter’s, but permission was denied.
The Dispatch
Instead, pilgrims will process to St. Peter’s in the morning and enter the basilica for prayer at approximately 1:00 p.m. For their Mass, they will have to travel to the Basilica of St. Mary Major, where Schneider is scheduled to celebrate Mass at the high altar at 3:00 p.m.
Reporting based on a Vatican letter dated August 7 states that Archbishop Paolo Rudelli, Substitute for General Affairs of the Secretariat of State, informed the organizers that the requested celebration in St Peter’s would not be authorized “this year.”
The refusal stands in sharp contrast to the pilgrimage’s “triumphant” 2025 visit when Trad Inc. media declared “we are so back.” Cardinal Raymond Burke then celebrated the Traditional Latin Mass at the Altar of the Chair before a large congregation, and much hope was invested in the fact that Leo XIV had authorized the celebration. Since then, however, these hopes have been repeatedly dashed by Leo and his henchmen.
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While no official reason was given by the Vatican for denying permission, AdVaticanum reported that an anonymous source indicated that last year’s celebration was perceived by some officials around Leo and at St. Peter’s as “gloating” by traditionalists.
The message could not be any clearer. Instead of a Traditional Latin Mass, St. Peter’s will now host both a conference and a Eucharistic celebration, undoubtedly according to the Novus Ordo, with all the heterodox doctrinal bells and whistles to accompany it. Just another way of saying: “Your type are not welcome here.”
One can only wonder how much more proof Synodal trads need that they have overstayed their welcome in the Bergolian and now Prevostian gulag. By all available evidence, there is no undoing Traditionis Custodes or returning to the halcyon days of Summorum Pontificum. While the Catholic faith is crushed to dust by the modernist machine in Rome, compromisers can always bury their heads in the sand and place false hope in “next year.”
