Father Peregrino's text offers a scathing and traditionalist analysis of the origins of the decadence of the Society of Jesus, based on the article "The Original Downfall of the Jesuits". The author argues that their ruin did not begin with the Second Vatican Council, but that the seeds of modernism were planted much earlier, in the late 19th century. Regarding the Jesuits as the greatest religious order in the entire history of the Church, the author seeks to answer the fundamental question of what the first signs of instability were before everything crashed into modernism. The main source for this investigation is the work "The Jesuits" by the late Father Malachi Martin, S.J., whom the author considers a precursor to Dr. Taylor Marshall's book "Infiltration," suggesting that the infiltration process in the Church at large mirrored what occurred first within the Jesuit order. The perspective is that the Jesuits always functioned as the thermostat, not the thermometer, for the Catholic Church in general, and therefore, understanding their fall is understanding the broader crisis of the Church.
🧪 The Beginning of the Fissure: The False Dichotomy between Science and FaithThe first crack in Jesuit orthodoxy appeared in the late 19th century with a very small minority of Jesuits who began to perceive an irreconcilable conflict between science and religion. The text points out the irony that this position, now held by the liberal left, also finds echoes in some traditionalists who fear the natural sciences. However, the real problem was not science itself, but the Society's strategic decision to specialize its young men in new fields of secular knowledge. Citing Malachi Martin, the text points out that the Society decided to specialize in areas such as Assyriology, Oriental religions, Egyptology, sociology, and biology. This immersion in secular studies, especially in fields like paleontology, anthropology, and historical research on the Near East, became the fertile ground for doctrinal deviation. The fatal error was not the pursuit of knowledge, but rather a great arrogance with a little education that allowed a minority to influence the entire order.
🧠 Intellectual Corruption and the Secret Brotherhood
The direct consequence of this academic specialization was the formation of a close-knit, though never vocalized, brotherhood of highly trained academic specialists. These Jesuits, in collaborating with non-Catholic scholars, began to assimilate their viewpoint, which was almost without exception anti-Catholic and theologically modernist. Malachi Martin's text is clear in stating that these experts found it increasingly difficult to reconcile the data of their scientific and scholarly training with the traditional doctrines and morals proposed by the Roman Catholic Church. Instead of using their knowledge for conversion, as St. Ignatius wished when encouraging the study of other religions, these proto-modernists fell into the grips of the East and Marxism, allowing secular knowledge to corrupt their supernatural faith.
🇻🇦 Pius XII's Ignored Warning and Doctrinal Double Bookkeeping
In the 1940s, Pope Pius XII already perceived this growing lack of orthodoxy infiltrating the Society. In a speech described as stern and firm, he rebuked the Jesuits, demanding a return to doctrinal orthodoxy and faithful obedience to the Holy See and their own constitutions. The reaction of the majority of the Jesuit delegates was denial, considering that the Pope was speaking of an unreality. However, corruption was already institutionalized to the point where a practice of double bookkeeping existed in Jesuit theological schools. Professors in France and Germany had one set of notes to show Roman authorities as the substance of their lectures, and another set of notes for actual use in the classroom. This deliberate deception demonstrated a profound contempt for papal authority and a growing alienation, where Rome, along with its Pope and Vatican bureaucracy, seemed anchored in a mentality that no longer existed outside the Church at large. For many Jesuits, Rome and Romanism became something alien.
⚖️ Legalism as the Heart of Modernism and the Final Prophecy
The author concludes with the thesis that legalism is the heart of modernism. By abandoning genuine devotion and love for the Sacred Heart of Jesus, many 20th-century Jesuits began to act like the Pharisees, looking for loopholes of legalism to bypass true orthodoxy. This legalistic and deceptive mentality was the culmination of a process that began with the intellectual pride of the 19th century. To reinforce the apocalyptic tone and the gravity of the situation, the text ends with a quote attributed to Father Paul Kramer, who recounts a personal confirmation from Malachi Martin in 1997, stating that the pope who will lead the apostasy in the Church will be a heretic and an anti-pope. This final note serves as a somber warning, linking the original fall of the Jesuits to the crisis prophesied for the apex of the Church.