On Wednesday, Leo XIV received a delegation of Lutheran bishops to the Vatican that included several female clerics.
In his address, Leo made at least one striking remark. Importantly in the context of recognizing a “common baptism” and invoking Our Lord’s prayer that His followers would be one, Leo told the group that they, along with him, have a “shared mission in the world” and that “I pray that we may always grow together in our service to the promotion of peace and justice.”
This is not the first time Leo has made overt gestures to female clerics motivated by an objective, false ecumenism. In March, he congratulated Dame Sarah Mullaly after she was elected Archbishop of Canterbury for the Anglican Church born from Henry VIII’s schism in 1534.
“With this assurance of God’s abiding presence, I send prayerful greetings to Your Grace on the occasion of your Installation as Archbishop of Canterbury,” Leo wrote to her, unafraid of calling a female Anglican cleric “Your Grace.”
Then, after asking “the Lord” to strengthen Mullaly with wisdom, Leo implicitly approved of her supposed mission by telling her, “I pray that you may be guided by the Holy Spirit in serving your communities.”
One month later, Leo officially received Mullaly at the Vatican. No less scandalously, he announced that “we must not allow these continuing challenges to prevent us from using every possible opportunity to proclaim Christ to the world together” (emphasis added).
Given that Our Lord entrusted a single mission to the Catholic Church, exclusive of all other false societies and their heads, it is hard to see how these remarks can be reconciled with Catholic doctrine.
Francis and Benedict XVI also practiced false ecumenism with female clerics
In December of 2024, Francis welcomed the World Methodist Council and its head, Debra Wallace-Padgett, to the Vatican in anticipation of the 1700th anniversary of the Council of Nicaea.
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Aside from the obvious scandal of receiving a female cleric and treating her as such — a woman is simply incapable of being ordained, even supposing Methodist orders were valid which they are not — Francis invoked Vatican II to claim that traditional Catholic attitudes have been overcome.
“For a long period of time Methodists and Catholics were estranged and also wary of each other. Today, however, we can thank God that, for almost sixty years, we have been progressing together in reciprocal knowledge, understanding and, above all, love,” Francis told the delegation. “This helps to deepen our mutual communion (emphasis added).”
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Francis concluded the address with what can only seen as an objective denial of the unity of Faith. “This occasion reminds us that we profess the same faith” (emphasis added), he misleadingly said. Catholics and Methodists , he added, “have the same responsibility of offering signs of hope that bear witness to God’s presence in the world.”
An even less well known case of this kind of false ecumenism was on display during Benedict XVI’s historic trip to Germany in September of 2011.
In an evangelical Lutheran church, he actively participated in a religious service with Rev. Nikolaus Schneider, which included a joint-prayer led by female bishop, Ilse Junkerman.
This kind of religious participation is objectively illicit, as it falls under communicatio in sacris, to say nothing of the tremendous scandal it gives and indifferentism it fosters. The 1917 Code of Canon Law (can. 1258) condemns the activity as follows:
§ 1. It is not licit for the faithful by any manner to assist actively or to have a part in the sacred [rites] of non-Catholics.
In the video from above, as he exits the building, Benedict XVI also can be seen genuflecting to the Lutheran altar, entirely devoid of the presence of Christ.
Lest Leo XIV be known simply as “Francis 2.0,” the historical record indicates that he is following in the footsteps of Benedict XIV as well.
