Catholic hierarch: Vatican Synod is an abomination

Photo: Bishop Strickland

On November 13, 2024, in Baltimore, Bishop Joseph E. Strickland, who was removed from pastoral governance of the Diocese of Tyler, Texas, by Pope Francis, read an open letter in Baltimore, reports UCA News.

Accusing the Pope of spreading "deadly messages", Strickland asked: "what it will take for more than a few bishops to finally speak up against the false messages constantly flowing from the Vatican under the leadership of Pope Francis?"

"You gather here today, present-day apostles, as the church and, therefore, the world stand perched on the edge of a cliff," he said in a letter he read outside the hotel where the U.S. bishops were holding their annual fall plenary assembly. "And yet you who are entrusted with the keeping of souls choose to speak not a word of the spiritual danger which abounds."

Outside the Marriott Waterfront hotel, the venue for the annual Catholic conference attended by more than 200 bishops, Bishop Strickland set up a spot to address the gathering. However, he did not attend the plenary sessions of the event.

Standing at a podium with a microphone, the removed bishop read aloud his letter, warning bishops of God’s judgment on shepherds who fail to protect the Church. He accused them of "silently watching as the Synod on Synodality took place, an abomination constructed not to guard the Deposit of Faith but to dismantle it, and yet few were the cries heard from you – men who should be willing to die for Christ and His Church."

"Sadly, his (Pope Francis') actions and his policies which promote a relativized version of truth that is not truth at all propel us to a devastating conclusion: the man who occupies the Chair of St. Peter does not love the truth and seeks to reshape it in the image of man," Bishop Strickland said.

It is worth noting that Bishop Strickland was removed from office on November 11, 2023, following an apostolic visitation prompted by his social media posts in May, where he accused Pope Francis of "undermining the Deposit of Faith." Despite his removal, Bishop Strickland has remained active on social media, with an account on X (formerly Twitter) boasting over 215,000 followers.

The Pope's decision to remove Bishop Strickland followed the bishop's public address in Rome on October 31, 2023, where he read excerpts from a lengthy letter attributed to a "dear friend," in which Pope Francis was accused, among other things, of being a "usurper of the Chair of Peter." Later, the bishop himself claimed that Pope Francis supports "an attack on the sacred" emanating from the Vatican.

The U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops has not commented on the situation.

As previously reported, Bishop Strickland’s stated that unrepentant sodomites and adulterers cannot receive Communion.

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