In order to understand the problem, one must take into account that Bishops are also sons of their Age; also, they have been, to some extent, victims of the influence of the System. But which are the winds that are blowing in this Age and what is the System pursuing?

After the death of Pope Pius XII, beginning with John XXIII, and especially with Paul VI, the Church effected an important and decisive Turn to the Left. The aggiornamento really was nothing but that. The causes? One can hardly help having the impression that more confidence was being placed upon Marx’s Message than upon the Message of the Gospel. It seemed as if the Church had begun to be afraid and to adhere to the belief that the victory of both the World and the Mundane Principles was inevitable.

This feeling has lasted up to the present day; even more, recent events have contributed to intensify it. The unexpected and surprising turn to the Left by the United States of America, for example, which will have unforeseeable and probably catastrophic consequences for the whole World, has contributed to propping up the situation. Some even dare to speak about the odd parallelism that exists between the doctrine of Pope Benedict XVI and that of President Obama.

At any rate, the System has been very effective in its work regarding the Church: Liberation Theology and Marxist Ideology (which, truly speaking, are the same things), approaching Protestantism, false Ecumenism, and, in general, everything implied in the neo-Modernist doctrine of the Progressive Movements. Its principal working tool has been its infiltration among the Clergy and most especially among the Hierarchy and High ranking Organisms of the Church.

The System has also found the Episcopal Conferences to be an excellent collaborating instrument. They proved themselves liable to be dominated by Pressure Groups addicted to ideologies which are alien to the Church. Hence Episcopal Conferences have been used as a means to control the Bishops, especially those who seem more reluctant to conduct themselves outside the good doctrine. One of the best jobs accomplished by the Conferences has been, undoubtedly, the one effected regarding the appointment of new Bishops. The System has deemed it necessary to choose candidates with wavering Faith or even with no Faith at all; nor did it reject those candidates endowed with a certain piety but somewhat wanting in character and easily malleable.

There was already a serious failure in the Church regarding the formation given at the Seminaries and Novitiates. In addition to not having emphasized the intellectual formation of the candidates to the Priesthood, not enough attention was given to a pressing problem: the infiltration of Marxism and Modernism in the Seminaries and Novitiates. But the origin of the problem was at the foundations, especially that which concerns the negligence in both the formation of the candidates in human virtues and the necessary demands of maturity in them. As for the Theology that is taught at the Ecclesiastical Faculties, it is under a heavy influence of Modernism. In Philosophy, most of the modern currents of thought are welcomed, most particularly those based upon Idealism and alien to the Philosophy of Being (Hegelianism, Kantism, Personalism, Blondelism, Husserlianism, etc.) The same could be said about Seminaries and Novitiates.

The result has been a good number of priests and religious without theological and philosophical knowledge, with no spiritual life, with weak character and scant human maturity. On the other hand, and due to the problem of the scarcity of priests, the level of admission to the Centers of formation has been progressively lowered (in some countries even homosexuals are being admitted); thus a vicious cycle has emerged which the Church will find difficult to get rid of. In order to fathom the gravity of the problem, we have only to consider that what has been depicted is the breeding ground where, generally speaking, many Shepherds of the Church have been educated.

With this background, which we have outlined here briefly and with broad strokes, it is not surprising that Shepherds have come into the Church about whom the least one can say is, using a generous euphemism, that they are not of highest caliber.

Perhaps one could think that they always merely act according to the wind that blows, and this may be true of some of them; unfortunately, though, the same cannot be said about others. The truth about this entire issue has to do with the fact that if the faithful knew the warp of it, many of them would be scandalized and afraid; that is why God allows the majority of them to remain in a lethargic and pious state.

What can the healthy Christian People, unfortunately not very numerous, do in this situation – apart from suffering, of course?

Two things in particular: First, and most important, we must pray to the Lord of the Harvest to send workers; He will not fail to listen.

Secondly, we must trust – in spite of the fact that the System continues to work too well and with apparent possibilities of total success. It could possibly even trim the Church down to an exiguous minority by deceiving an infinite number of souls (such as the prophecies regarding the Last Times assure us). Be that as it may, the System has forgotten something important, which will be the very thing that will ensure its final and definite defeat: Our Lord’s words affirming that the Gates of Hell will not prevail against His Church (Mt 16:18); as well as what He said at another time: heaven and earth shall pass away; but my words shall never pass away (Mk 13:31).

As for us, we can rest at peace regarding our Shepherds – with Pastoral Letters or without them; in spite of their perhaps being not very  knowledgeable of the current state of affairs; regardless of their being possibly influenced by the dominating winds, nevertheless they are undoubtedly men of good will who believe in what they say.