This marked the beginning of organized efforts against the Catholic Church, as Freemasonry dedicated itself to spreading the right to religious freedom, especially from the Catholic Church during the French Revolution - their goal being „liberty, fraternity, equality and democracy‟: Replacing the power hierarchy of Christendom with all authority and truth coming from God with authority and truth coming from the people – i.e. „from below‟.

The Freemasons, operating with remarkable foresight, determined to destroy the Church from within. The Alta Vendita planned to spread revolutionary Masonic ideas—particularly the concepts of the French Revolution (liberty, equality, fraternity) — into Catholic seminaries and schools, creating a new generation of clergy who would think like liberals.

Their ultimate goal, as clearly stated in their secret instruction, was as follows:

The work which we have undertaken is not the work of a day, nor of a month, nor of a year. It may last many years, a century perhaps, but in our ranks the soldier dies and the fight continues.

We do not mean to win the Popes to our cause, to make them neophytes of our principles, and propagators of our ideas. That would be a ridiculous dream, no matter in what manner events may turn. Should cardinals or prelates, for example, enter, willingly or by surprise, in some manner, into a part of our secrets, it would be by no means a motive to desire their elevation to the See of Peter. That elevation would destroy us. Ambition alone would bring them to apostasy from us. The needs of power would force them to immolate us. That which we ought to demand, that which we should seek and expect, as the Jews expected the Messiah, is a Pope according to our wants.

Alta Vendita, circa 1829

They did not seek to convert Popes to their cause but rather to create conditions where eventually a Pope would be elected who already thought according to revolutionary principles. Their strategy involved not direct confrontation but patient infiltration:

We must find a Pope who convenes a council where our clergy makes the revolution in tiara and choir robe.

Alta Vendita, circa 1829

The late Empress Zita personally told my uncle, Prelate Hesse, the following: Emperor Franz Josef came to prove through the Austrian secret service that Mariano Rampolla del Tindero was a Freemason.

Dr. Hw. Gregorius Hesse  — „Zerstörung der Kirche aus dem inneren und äußeren‟, video at 13:59

However, the alleged source of the Austrian intelligence, Mgr. Jouin, only began his anti-Masonic work after 1909, years after the 1903 conclave. Second, Pope St. Pius X solemnly condemned the practice of the veto in Commissum nobis (1904), forbidding it under pain of excommunication. This action makes little sense if the veto had just saved the Church.

However, the list is demonstrably fantastical, including figures like Goethe, Nietzsche, Wagner, and even mythical figures (Merlin, King Arthur, Pan, Osiris) who died long before the O.T.O.‚s founding (c. 1904-1906). Second, Mgr. Jouin’s own Revue Internationale des Sociétés Secrètes (R.I.S.S.), when publishing the list, dismissed the inclusion of Rampolla (referred to by initials C…R…) as:

…the entirely gratuitous allegation of unscrupulous sectarians [which] cannot constitute any charge against anyone in the world.

R.I.S.S. (1 May 1929), quoted in: Sodalitium no. 62

Ricossa also notes that Rampolla’s name was later removed from the list of „saints‟ in Aleister Crowley’s Gnostic Mass canon, which closely mirrored the O.T.O. list.

The Modernist faction that was growing under the long and semi-liberal pontificate of Leo XIII was a strong and potent influence in the Church when Pius X became Pope. For example, Cardinal Rampolla was almost elected Pope instead of Cardinal Sarto and had so much power that even though St. Pius X placed him as far from the Roman Curia as he could, his influence remained so extensive that he in effect made the next Pope, Cardinal Della Chiesa (Benedict XV).

Dr. Marian T. Horvat  — TIA Objections

Evidence rather points to Rampolla’s problematic relationship with Modernism and his opposition to St. Pius X’s firm stance against it. The most credible testimony comes from the historian Ludwig von Pastor’s diary entry recording a conversation with St. Pius X himself in May 1914:

The Pope then spoke longer about Rampolla’s correspondence with his Modernist friends, which was found after the Cardinal’s death, and said: ‚You would be astonished if you were to read it’. Smiling, the Holy Father added that the catastrophe wished for in those letters (namely his own death, which one should await) had nevertheless not occurred. Seriously, His Holiness remarked that it was sad, but true, that Rampolla consisted of two different persons.

Ludwig von Pastor: Tagebücher – Briefe – Erinnerungen, p. 598  — quoted in: Sodalitium no. 62

From his powerful position, Cardinal Rampolla began strategically selecting and placing seminarians and priests in important positions. Under his protection, the Collegio Capranica in Rome became the center of modernist thought. The Italian modernist Fogazzaro, later condemned by Pius X, resided at Collegio Capranica and spread his masonic-influenced theories from there with the protection of the Secretariat of State.

No. I have not destroyed the Modernists; I have only driven them underground, where they will continue their work.

Pope Pius X  — Fr. Vincent Micelli, “The Antichrist” (cassette), see fn. 25

In Pascendi, Pius X identified the modernist plan to split the Church into „progressives and conservatives,‟ creating parties within the mystical Body of Christ. He warned that this would lead to „that dangerous doctrine raising its head which would make the laity the basis of the Church and the basis of these reforms.‟

Pope Benedict XV (Giacomo Della Chiesa, 1914-1922) had been directly associated with Rampolla for decades, since Chiesa had been Rampollas private secretary.

Giacomo Della Chiesa, the future Benedict XV, was a Capranica graduate chosen by Rampolla as his private secretary at the Nunciature in Madrid. It was to become a twenty-year relationship.

Martinez, Mary Ball: Untermining of the Catholic Church, p. 38

His election, along with Pietro Gasparri becoming Secretary of State, effectively meant that Rampolla’s influence continued despite the earlier veto:

One wonders if the very old Emperor of Austria-Hungary… was aware… that the Sicilian Cardinal, whose election his veto had prevented had, after all, mounted the papal throne in the person of his two closest assistants [Benedict XV and Gasparri].

Martinez, Mary Ball: Untermining of the Catholic Church, p. 45

Under Benedict XV, the Vatican began to subtly reverse Pius X’s anti-modernist stance. He signaled this shift early on:

[Benedict XV] urged ‘an end to contention and discord in favor of a new sense of brotherhood’. Although few of the laity… would read the encyclical, it gave teachers and preachers everywhere to understand that the war between the Vatican and the Modernists was over.

Martinez, Mary Ball: Untermining of the Catholic Church, p. 47

He also targeted traditionalist vigilance groups like the Sodalitium Pianum, eventually ordering its dissolution under pressure from Secretary Gasparri and the French government (Martínez, p. 47).

The pontificate of Pope Pius XI (Achille Ratti, 1922-1939) presented a paradox. While Pius XI himself issued strongly traditional encyclicals like Quas Primas (on the Kingship of Christ) and Mortalium Animos (condemning early ecumenism), his reign was marked by the powerful influence of his Secretaries of State—first Pietro Gasparri and later Eugenio Pacelli—both deeply connected to the Rampolla network. Martínez suggests Pius XI’s pontificate may have been „…a running battle with his successive Secretaries of State, Gasparri and Pacelli.‟ (Martínez, p. 49)

Gasparri, brought to Rome by Rampolla himself (Martínez, p. 38), wielded significant power. His actions often contradicted the Pope’s apparent traditionalism, demonstrating the entrenched influence of the „alliance.‟

Two key examples illustrate this:

In Rome in 1925 those heirs to Cardinal Rampolla and the Sillon, headed by the Vatican Secretary of State Pietro Gasparri, had long been putting pressure on Pope Pius XI to condemn Charles Maurras, whose publications were giving no peace to Freemasonry. Vatican pressure was being seconded by pressure from the French government.

Martinez, Mary Ball: Untermining of the Catholic Church, p. 53

The eventual condemnation followed a campaign potentially involving manipulated information presented to the Pope (Martínez, p. 55).

Cardinal Gasparri worked assiduously to dampen the Cristero fire. He advised members of the Mexican hierarchy to refuse encouragement to the fighters. He alerted the bishops of the United States to refuse all appeals for economic aid.

Martinez, Mary Ball: Untermining of the Catholic Church, p. 59

Ultimately, Gasparri orchestrated the Cristero surrender („los arreglos‟) through compromising bishops, bypassing those loyal to the cause and leaving the Cristeros betrayed (Martínez, pp. 60-61).

The outcome was devastating:

As Bishop Gonzalez Valencia explained in Rome to the new secretary of State, Eugenio Pacelli: ‘Gone, forever, the traditional esteem the Mexican has always had for his bishop. I see and I tell you in great sorrow that the shock of this scandal, with its obvious complicity on the part of the Vatican, touches on the Holy See itself and it is so grave that one can foresee a great loss of faith.

Martinez, Mary Ball: Untermining of the Catholic Church, pp. 183-184

Martínez concludes that Pius XI likely acted against the Cristeros only: „because of enormous pressure put on him by individuals determined to get their way. In the end those intriguers persuaded him that these ‘arreglos’… were the only way to obtain freedom for the Mexican Church.‟ (Martínez, pp. 62-63)

Pius XI reportedly wept when he finally understood the true nature of the betrayal (Martínez, p. 63).

Pius XI was succeeded by Pope Pius XII (Eugenio Pacelli, 1939-1958), the very man Rampolla had groomed and who had served under Gasparri. He prophetically told a friend: „I am the last Pope of the old Church.‟ During Pius XII’s papacy, the liturgical landscape began its transformation. The first reforms by Annibale Bugnini, the architect of the Novus Ordo, altered the Holy Week in the 1950s. Martínez notes Pius XII’s active support for Bugnini’s commission:

We enjoyed the full confidence of Pius XII who was kept informed of our work by Msgr. Montini and even more by Fr. Bea, his confessor. Thanks to these intermediaries we could arrive at remarkable results even in periods when the Pope’s illness prevented anyone else from seeing him.

Bugnini, quoted by Martínez, p. 97

A new translation of the Psalms further eroded liturgical tradition, particularly Gregorian chant (Martínez, p. 77, 95). By 1958, liturgical changes were widespread, with vernacular readings permitted and only the Canon of the Mass remaining globally untouched in Latin. The Chinese already had permission to celebrate Mass in their native language except for the Canon, and in Germany priests were allowed to read Scripture in German at the altar.

Giovanni Battista Montini (future Pope Paul VI), who had led communist Roman student youth in the 1930s and had translated Jacques Maritain’s problematic book „Integral Humanism‟ into Italian with a glowing preface, was appointed Archbishop of Milan despite his known communist sympathies.

The Council was guided by modernist Cardinals under the leadership of Eugène Tisserant and Giacomo Lercaro (who was described by those who knew his private opinions as „a second Martin Luther‟). They rejected the preparations made by the relatively traditional Roman Curia.

The Council documents were written by periti (theological experts) who had previously been suspected or condemned by the Holy Office, including Karl Rahner (expert for Cardinal König), Hans Küng (expert for Cardinal Frings), Yves Congar, and Henri de Lubac.

Thus was fulfilled the prophecy of the Alta Vendita:

You will bring yourselves as friends around the Apostolic Chair. You will have fished up a Revolution in Tiara and Cope, marching with Cross and banner—a Revolution which needs only to be spurred on a little to put the four quarters of the world on fire.

Alta Vendita, circa 1829

Pope Paul VI explicitly declared: „We must abandon the idea that Tradition is unchangeable.‟ He even proudly announced that Catholics faced a revolution shortly before publishing his new Missal.

As we survey the wreckage of post-conciliar Catholicism—empty seminaries, abandoned religious houses, liturgical chaos, and doctrinal confusion—we see the fruits of this centuries-long subversion. The revolution prophesied in the Alta Vendita documents has been accomplished with devastating efficiency. Yet Christ promised that the gates of hell would not prevail against His Church, and the true Faith cannot be extinguished.

For Catholics living amid this crisis, the clear guidance remains: hold fast to the perennial teachings and practices of the Church. The Faith is not determined by the latest papal pronouncement or theological fashion, but by what has been believed „everywhere, always, and by all‟ (St. Vincent of Lérins).

Remain faithful to what has not changed through the centuries, maintain access to valid sacraments, cultivate the supernatural life, and trust in Divine Providence for the eventual restoration of Holy Mother Church.