What are the “Deep State” and “Deep Church”?

Those engaged in strengthening global institutions can only be joined together by what they agree on, and that is not a vision of the good life and society based on Christianity, natural law, or any developed moral or cultural tradition.

St. Peter's Basilica, Città del Vaticano, Vatican City (Image: Sean Ang | Unsplash.com)

The phrase “deep state” has been in the news lately, mostly in connection with the extraordinary resistance within the federal government to Donald Trump. The conception is sometimes extended to to the “deep church,” which the controversial Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò portrays as a shadowy clerical network “that betrays its duties and forswears its proper commitments before God.”

What is this all about? The archbishop gives the situation a cosmic significance, as part of a battle between “the children of light and the children of darkness.” And we certainly have reason to believe that there are influential networks that put souls and nations at risk.

Even so, the cosmic perspective can be supplemented with a more purely human and institutional one. The expression “deep state” is originally Turkish, and refers to a network of military officers and others dedicated to maintaining the secular political order established by Kemal Atatürk. But the idea didn’t originate with the Turks. It’s basically an extension of old ideas such as “power behind the throne” and “imperium in imperio” to large modern bureaucratic states.

In that setting something of the sort seems inevitable. Career civil servants have their own concerns and ways of looking at things, and they believe they understand the situation, their jobs, and the proper purposes of the institution much better than the elected officials whose will they are theoretically charged with carrying out—let alone the voters who elected their superiors and pay their salaries. Also, bureaucracies are unwieldy, and people dealing with urgent problems inevitably find other less formal ways of making decisions. Put the two tendencies together and something like a deep state, a government within the government, is guaranteed.

In recent times the Church has become more like a large secular organization. Those who run her machinery have developed an understanding of their role and identity that is far less connected to Church tradition. The more managed and bureaucratic she becomes, and the more she cooperates with other large bureaucratic organizations, the more true that is.

That understanding differs from old-fashioned clericalism, which developed in a very different setting. Those who share in it include not only clerics but laity, many of them employed not by the Church but by institutions related to her. The basis of their claim to legitimacy is not divine charism but something much more modern and more like the secular conception of expertise. That is why we hear so much more about “experts,” “programs,” “educational materials,” and “best practices” in the Church than people once did.

Normally, something like a deep state isn’t all bad. Career employees do have special knowledge, and continuity of policy is important. In a system of government dealing with complex issues networks of officials can serve an important function by accumulating experience, coordinating efforts, and buffering short-term political demands. That’s one reason all governments maintain a professional civil service.

Even in the Church, it makes sense for the impulses and aspirations of a pope to be at least somewhat restrained by institutional experience and judgment. The authority given a pope means he must be circumspect in what he says and does, and the ecclesiastical equivalent of civil servants, who maintain institutional continuity, help him do so. If a pope makes an imprudent decision it is just as well if his subordinates limit its effect.

But today the situation is transformed by the growth of an interlocking professional and managerial class that runs the whole of Western society. In its upper reaches that class includes business leaders as well as judges, civil servants, lobbyists, journalists, academics, NGO officials, and members of the elite bar.

The connections among such people are symbolized by the famous “revolving door” through which high-level officials rotate among government, business, academia, and the non-profit world. These people are often married or otherwise related to each other. They increasingly go to the same schools. (Donald Trump is the first president since Ronald Reagan to attend neither Yale nor Harvard, the almae matres of all current Supreme Court justices.) The Internet has greatly increased their ability to discuss and coordinate strategy and messaging. And the most prominent meet regularly at events like the Davos and Bilderberger conferences.

In an ever-more-interconnected world, such people can hardly help becoming aware of their common interests and concerns, and of the advantages of cooperation. That awareness leads them to develop loyalties directed more toward the system as a whole than toward the particular country or institution by whom they are employed.

These tendencies are enhanced by the current emphasis on the need for common systems of governance to deal with issues such as global warming, epidemics, population growth, and the international movement of labor. That emphasis results at least in part from a general aspiration to a more integrated global order. If you want such a system for other reasons, you will likely draw attention to such dangers and the presumed need for global action to deal with them.

In recent decades Church leaders have increasingly attached themselves to such efforts. In the current papacy that tendency has become altogether dominant, as seen in efforts to downplay issues that put the Church in opposition to the secular governing consensus, emphasize interpretations of Church teachings, legitimate or not, that align with it, and generally coordinate efforts with international organizations.

That tendency appears to be supported by people within the Church—Archbishop Viganò’s “deep church”—who identify most fundamentally as part of the ruling professional and managerial class. In some cases the liberation of such people from what is specifically Catholic is evidently associated with liberation of darker tendencies within them.

But what should we make of all this? A cooperative global order that maintains peace, order, stability, and economic development doesn’t sound so bad. From that perspective, the Church’s attempt to ally herself with the emerging world order would reflect a belief that it is inevitable and desirable, and needs to be infused with Christian principles through the Church’s involvement.

But can such an effort be successful? Those engaged in strengthening global institutions can only be joined together by what they agree on, and that is not a vision of the good life and society based on Christianity, natural law, or any developed moral or cultural tradition.

Instead, it is a vision based narrowly on technology and economics that takes material well-being and security as its goals. Those goals aren’t moderated by any larger vision, and the effort aims at comprehensiveness, so all things must be subordinated to them. And that means enlisting everything in the service of the system considered uniquely suitable for advancing such things, a global technocratic order readily manageable by billionaires and bureaucrats.

So the world must be reconstructed on the model of an industrial process. With that in mind its population must be turned into components and raw materials for the machine: manageable, manipulable, and interchangeable. National, cultural, and religious traditions interfere with the transformation, so they must go. As we see around us today, history must be destroyed, monuments overturned, and even sexual distinctions, the basis of the family and therefore of society as traditionally conceived, utterly eradicated.

In such a system the Church cannot be allowed to be the Church: she would get in the way. The direction of events thus seems as alarming and even apocalyptic as Archbishop Viganò suggests.

Even so, the effort will fail through its own internal weaknesses. The technological approach to all things reduces knowledge to formal expertise, rejecting informal pattern recognition and the network of evolved expectations and understandings that makes up common sense. The result is that our rulers are losing touch with reality. At the same time, the lack of a sustaining vision of the good, and the consequent moral chaos, are increasing the influence of fear and hatred, energized and stabilized by lies, as organizing and motivating principles. The recent rioting has put that tendency on full display.

These trends do not bode well, and very likely there are stormy years to come as society becomes at once more anarchic, more tyrannical, and more incompetently run. How it all will play out is unpredictable. Even so, we know that insanity destroys itself while the principle of life endures. If the Church holds steadily to that principle she will prevail. And we are assured she will.


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About James Kalb 148 Articles
James Kalb is a lawyer, independent scholar, and Catholic convert who lives in Brooklyn, New York. He is the author of The Tyranny of Liberalism(ISI Books, 2008), Against Inclusiveness: How the Diversity Regime is Flattening America and the West and What to Do About It (Angelico Press, 2013), and, most recently, The Decomposition of Man: Identity, Technocracy, and the Church (Angelico Press, 2023).

62 Comments

  1. This fine article glaringly omitted reference to one essential concept which is “subsidiarity.” Deep State and/or Deep Church are gross violations of this most essential concept. It is why the UN, the Federal bureaucratic nightmare and the USCCB are all problematic to many of us.

    • Excellent point. It seems as if the fundamental Church teaching on subsidiarity has taken a back seat in the age of globalization.

    • The basic point of the piece is that it’s lack of subsidiarity that liberates the DS and DC from restraints and makes them such a problem.

    • Long winded academic. The deep state are the ruling powers that are unnoticed. The rockefellers, rothchilds, jpmorgan etc. Their in the limelite representives are the bushes clintons etc. The deep church are the vatican prelates who rule them. So simple do your research!.

      • Actually the elite are the tech billionaires such as Bill Gates, George Soros, Mark Zuckenberg, etc Now that we are more aware of their role to sway the election and the world this article confirms the Vigano warnings and we should be very afraid. Prayer and fasting will be the key to breaking this cycle.

    • At the same time, the lack of a sustaining vision of the good, and the consequent moral chaos, are increasing the influence of fear and hatred, energized and stabilized by lies, as organizing and motivating principles. The recent rioting has put that tendency on full display.

      My take from all of this is that I still do not feel the love of God coming from “you” as I have to go out in the street as a black nan and live as one of Gods creation. You lynch me and my sons and there is no outcry, you steal my resources (gold, oil, diamonds) and leave me impoverished then if I protest and manipulators infiltrate my protest ranks and do evil you call that out but you do not with the same passion validate my cause for concern. No preachersteps into the pulpit and brings the nation’s attention to the sin of systemic racism and in the interim we are allowed to rot in the inner cities while
      no pope dates to have an audience with the president to say that the injustices being done in his country has to stop and backs that up with the pressure needed to show that it us not mere words.
      The gospel is supposed to have transforming power if this us a Christian nation or world then come to my neighbourhood and show me Christ.

  2. “That awareness leads them to develop loyalties directed more toward the system as a whole than toward the particular country or institution by whom they are employed.”

    Having worked with and in some of these ‘deep’ organizations in the course of my career, I would further observe that at some point in the life of any specific organization, the loyalty of its participants shifts from the organization’s original purpose to preservation of the organization itself. A task force is created to do this, a commission to do that, an office to do the other thing. All well and good, but if the environment in which the organization changes, or even if the organization succeeds in doing the this, that or other thing for which it was created, it lives on, with active resistance to any suggestion of dissolution or disbanding. A coterie of individuals has been assembled whose careers are defined in terms of scheduling, organizing and conducting the organization’s meetings, creating and disseminating its communications, managing its finances, etc. “We can’t pull out of the task force/commission/office. There are other problems it address just as well.” Mission creep sets in, and for the participants that specific entity becomes “our thing” — in Italian, “la cosa nostra.”

  3. The need for trust and truth , thus the concerns raised up …
    may same also help to shed more light and its peace so that people are not led to seeing ghosts , as in the boat that was caught up in the storm ..
    ? seeing at times with own skewed lenses and wounds and do not recognize The Lord , as hinted at , in the article –
    https://frregisscanlon.com/index.php/2020/06/29/vigano-schneider-and-the-second-vatican-council/
    A Father figure who seems to have the needed trust and reverence for The Queen to whom The King has given such authority ; the SCOTUS win of the Little Sisters may be from same too and all can join to celebrate , easy to sign up , in the praise from the depths with many –

    http://littlesistersofthepoor.org/a-million-families-a-million-rosaries/

  4. As to accommodating the lords of the world, the ancient Jew in Walter M. Miller’s “A Canticle for Leibowitz” says to Dom Paulo: “The children of the world are consistent too–so I say they will soak up everything you can offer, take your job away from you, and then denounce you as a decrepit wreck. Finally, they’ll ignore you entirely.” Or worse (my own observation).

  5. Re: “In recent decades Church leaders have increasingly attached themselves to such efforts. In the current papacy that tendency has become altogether dominant…”

    Satan is clapping his hooves in glee wherever he sees “good Catholics” fomenting division in the Church rather than Praying and Offering Sacrifices for Our Holy Father and the clergy.

    • If there are problems with the direction of the Church it seems to me the obligation of the laity to raise the matter.

      • In our long Church history, “problems with the direction of the Church” that are comparable to our own might remind us of the luckily Trinitarian baptism of tribal chieftain Clovis and his western tribes at the beginning of the 6th century. And, before that, of the steadfast (“conservative”?) earlier laity in the 4th century who resisted the same Arian heresy that had claimed the vast majority of their bishops, mostly in the East. Looking back, the early 5th-century St. Jerome famously remarked “The whole world groaned and marveled at finding itself Arian.”

        Likewise, in the century following ours, perhaps a new saint of comparable heft might look back and say of us:

        “The whole world groaned and marveled at finding itself newly repaganized, less atheistic than militantly indifferent, morally betrayed into a “tyranny of relativism,” with a bipolar separation of Christian truth from practice, long-habituated to a “culture of death,” fully absorbed by virtual reality and regimented into global consumerism—with random spikes of collateral ecocide, anesthetized into boredom—somnambulist acedia over wakeful asceticism, with a narcissist fixation on alphabet soup over the vital mystery of binary human sexuality, totally fragmented into a collage of identity-politics “peripheries” then easily herded into socialist anonymity, and by the Church into middle-ground religious “pluralism,” and all this increasingly prey to engulfing Islamic cosmopolitanism—exhumed from the 7th and 8th centuries.” In a word, a totally lobotomized paradigm devoid of any curiosity about redemption. Just a bad dream, for sure.

        Yes, today the Laity might “raise the matter,” perhaps in a well-crafted memo printed on recycled paper? Or, maybe we just “didn’t get that memo,” providentially prepared already by the likes of Pope St. John Paul II and emeritus Pope Benedict XVI? For the “direction of the Church,” what if anything does Eucharistic still mean?

        • Brilliant analysis and “on spot” as today’s slang would describe. (As much as I dislike using today’s slang — sometimes it is definitive)!! The future outcome is highly predictable unless the “Deep State” in the country and the Church take colossal detours. Regrettably, I fear the money and power are firmly entrenched.

    • No…it is wrong to suggest silence in the face injustice and fraud. As Thomas Aquinas showed, to fail to be angry at injustice is immoral.

      The “Deep Church” has been lying to itself, and pretending they can serve both God and Mammon. By doing so, they have closed their ears to the warning of Jesus, who commanded that one cannot serve both Hos and Mammon. The Deep Church has by ignoring Jesus’ warning become the slave of Mammon, and live for the money it pays them, and the high life that so many Bishops and Cardinals and the easy-street that Chancery bureaucrats live on.

  6. Thank you for the thought-provoking article.

    Perhaps I missed it; did this article mention Freemasonry at all? Is this not referenced in Vigano’s letter when he writes of “solve et coagula”? I believe the “deep Church” is a reference not only to what was mentioned in the article, but also to both Masonic and Communist elements in the Church.

    Or if you dismiss this as conspiracy theory, what is your interpretation of Pope St Paul VI stating that “the smoke of Satan has entered the Church through some crack”?

    Come Holy Spirit with Your refreshing wind and blow out the infernal smoke!

    • IIRR, Rev.Fr.Ripperger mentions that it had much to do with embracing the false teachings of psychology during that time period , with its idolisation of carnality and its related atheistic roots .
      Thank God that the ministry of deliverance is given its rightful focus , our own Holy Father showing the right balance , esp. directing us to focus on the good in creation as well , that we thus do what Adam was created for , in seeing and thus living in the holiness of God , to be filled with praise , in union with The Kingdom .
      Blessings !

    • I agree. Read Infiltration, by Talor R. Marshall, if you want to understand the deep church. Bishop Athanasius Schneider wrote the forward to this book.

  7. To posit a conspiracy theory of a “deep state” out of a federal government doing its check and balance functions against the excesses, incompetence and corruption of the Trump White House is funny. This mindset is similar to their pattern of resistance to and denial of inconvenient truth about them brought to public view and call them “fake news.” Funnier is to transpose this frame of thinking into the Church. Here, it is in fact Archbishop Vigano (and his enablers who happen to be mostly long-time disrespectful and disloyal anti-Pope Francis bashers) who has launched a kind of “deep church” resistance against Pope Francis which borders on the schismatic out of personal resentment for having been mothballed and sidelined from his clerical career and ambitions as a consequence of his messing the 2015 papal visit to the U.S. when he was Nuncio.

    • It is sad how there is division in the Church, yes. And some who don’t see any good in what Pope Francis says or does are causing harm.

      What in your opinion is this smoke of Satan to which Pope Paul referred?

      There is a spiritual reality to the Church as well, and I do not think your comments adequately address the spiritual battle in which we are in.

      Let us pray for the “disagreeable ones.”

      God bless you.

    • Lan Baode, I disagree. So many of Pope Francis’s efforts break with Church teaching that it is remarkable only Abp. Vigano is speaking out. Francis’ election and intentional changes made to church practice betray the presence of a “deep church”. No conspiracy theory here, just observing how many of his actions betray Sacred Tradition. There is no need for name-calling if you respond. Simply show me how PF’s actions are really building up the Body of Christ.

    • You have spoken and stated “excesses, incompetence and corruption of the Trump White House”… could you be specific and factual? Please. I am a Cleric, and there is a “Deep Church”, that is a fact that I know personally… it is a fact.

  8. What the American ‘deep state’ actually is, and why Trump gets it wrong
    Rebecca Gordon, TomDispatch Jan 27, 2020, 11:25 AM

    You say… “(Donald Trump is the first president since Ronald Reagan to attend neither Yale nor Harvard, the almae matres of all current Supreme Court justices.) The Internet has greatly increased their ability to discuss and coordinate strategy and messaging. And the most prominent meet regularly at events like the Davos and Bilderberger conferences.”

    Trump has blown his cover. His niece Mary Trump has written a book entitled “Too Much and Never Enough” which says “Trump is a danger to the country”. He is certainly psychotic when he consistently outragedly and criminally lies to falsely defy his own medical experts regarding the Covid 19 virus. Trump did exactly that with his intelligence experts at Helsinki to favor Putin.

    His narcissm and ego play a major role when Trump “the buck stops there”, unable to say he is sorry and fierce rage expose of bipolar dysfunction.

    Trump has made up a “deep state” theory that the Democrats are clandestinely trying to remove him. False. Amazingly, after all this in broad daylight the Catholic leaders continue to reserve a compartment for Trump.

    • I’m sure there are members of your family who have a grudge against you, and I’m sure any books they might write would be – interesting. Especially if they knew that there were people out there who would happily pay them for a hatchet job.

      • If you mean me I think so, Dee. Did you ever once believe reality? Because of this dangerous administration and congress that choice may require your prescience on Mars!

    • Mary Trump’s “Mommy Dearest” attempt won’t make much difference. She’s already being debunked on her “facts”.

      • What planet do you and the Donald reside on? Mary walked the walk and now talked the talk. If her book reveals the demented state of mind her uncle displays every day on Twitter he is surely a danger to the nation. His close advisers and senator’s are enablers. They remain complicit by their silence that is not only ear piercing, they are ear shattering. Seem our religion has abandoned us, now we see our treasured GOP has been morphed into the DJT with all its’ evil trappings. As longtime Republicans we probably will note vote. We don’t want Biden in, rather Trump out.

        • Morgan, as a general rule I don’t have any faith in psychologists or psychiatrists. Nonetheless, you should really consult one or the other, because your bizarre fixation on and hatred of President Trump are unhealthy.

          You would rather vote for a man who supports abortion on demand, the mockery that is “same sex marriage” and the denial of reality that is the “transgender” movement.

          • Leslie, I try my best not to spew vitriol. You call my reference to Trump’s misdeeds a hatred. I try diligently not to HATE anyone. My charter is an old Reagan adage, “trust but verify”. As a recovering Republican trying to interpret my parties destruction at the hands of an amoral man praised by his Praetorian Guard as a savior, our search wilol endure. We will probably lose our vote in November because of not wanting Biden in, and wanting Trump out.

            Oh! My health has been fairly good because my ‘FIXATION” dwells with greatness of God, not the weakness of man.

          • “Leslie, I try my best not to spew vitriol.”

            You will have to try harder. Spewing vitriol is exactly what you do about President Trump.

          • To NOT be sporting a Harvard or Yale ring is probably a plus rather than a negative. And, as for vitriol, it’s clear that what Trump’s critics don’t like (hate) most is the fact that he simply won’t go down for the count. As in hardball athletics, it’s necessary to have a bad short-term memory about the last play. Tactics trumps strategy in today’s high visibility and backwards politics. Yes, of course a downside, but that was yesterday!

            As for the Ivy League and the culture wars–and in Trump’s short-memory politics it’s still clear that politics is downstream of culture–in the Harvard Law Review (1895) Associate Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr. set the tone for 20th- and 21st century relativistic legal and political novelties when he wrote: “. . . I often doubt whether it would not be a gain if every word of moral significance could be banished from the law altogether. . . .” Earlier, he had written: “I think that the sacredness of human life is a purely municipal idea of no validity outside the jurisdiction”. Enter stage Left: Roe v Wade, Obergefell v Hodges, and the recent Civil Rights Act Section VII v Biological Science (transgender stuff). The deep state…

    • You have only stated opinions and innuendo, emotions and feelings… no facts in what you say about President Trump! Investigated and proven false, all of those things!!! Just like those who stated opinions and innuendo about President Obama being born somewhere other than Hawaii! When people just spout stuff without being factual, their voices get silenced. The Church implores all to go down the road of “right thought” and “right thinking”… I encourage you to try that.

      • Deacon… reality does not reside with ignorance. Compartmentalization runs rampant in these response. Please pray for our innocent children that God will protect them from man’s evil ways. Trump spews vitriol daily on Twitter. His childish name calling is not becoming of a Commander-in-Chief. Ex. he calls Adam Schiff “Adam S**t Yet he “is the chosen one”.

  9. Abp Vigano is correct there is the deep state and anti-Christ heresies come out of Rome. “The worst kind of heretic is the one who, while teaching mostly true Catholic doctrine, adds a word or more of heresy like a drop of poison in a cup of water. “Pope Leo XIII Our Lady of Akita in Japan, where her statue started to shed tears, said “Satan has entered the church and there will be Cardinal against Cardinal, Bishop against Bishop.” Abp Vigano condems Vat II; wants the Church to go back to pre-VII practice. But all was not well there. The Church is a community of sinners. Many priests had affairs and fathered children, but the Church always tried to hide it and it was hushed up by everyone. Young people, seminarians and religious were leaving the church before the Council, bombarded with new forceful Atheism that tried to prove with science that God was dead and the Bible was a fairy tale. After the war a great prosperity set in and sex and rock’n roll. To the state of religious read Sister Faustina’s diary: Jesus said: “I will allow convents and churches to be destroyed. I answered, Jesus, but there are so many souls praising You in convents. The Lord answered: “That praise wounds my heart, because love has been banished from convents. Souls without love and without devotion, souls full of egoism and self-love, souls full of pride and arrogance, souls full of deceit and hypocrisy…” (1702). So much for the good old holy days. The Church will be saved by truth and love, love for Christ and love for each other. Evil forces try to destroy Christian culture by all evil means possible. They did and do try to destroy President Trump because he is pro-life, for religious liberty, for freedom and for a nation under God.

  10. I just wonder if Mr. Kalb is aware that many in the “Deep Church” were put there purposely by the Communist Party, as stated in Bella Dodd’s book “School of Darkness”. I think this gives a more sinister and anti-Catholic character to those driving the globalist trends.

    • You mention the communists, another poster mentioned the Masons.

      It’s hard to unravel the specifics of who’s doing what behind the scenes and how big a piece of the overall picture that is. If I were pope maybe I’d make inquiries but I’m not. To my mind it’s more useful for ordinary people to look at what’s publicly visible, ask whether that’s going the right way, and if it’s not propose or at least ask about what would be better.

      • You mention masons in a skeptical manner. They rule. Thats the problem u look at what they present. Which is horrifying enough. Is there a catholic journalist who even has a clue whats going on?

  11. Analogy is as persuasive as the likeness compared. Author Kalb’s Church State Deep State succeeds with high colors. “Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò perceives a cosmic battle between the children of light and the children of darkness. Globally it’s transformed by an interlocking professional and managerial class that runs the whole of Western society. Material well-being and security its goals. An Apostolic Church is an obstacle” (Kalb). I add: A Church presently aligned with the goals of secular humanism fits in perfectly. “Events that seem alarming and apocalyptic as Archbishop Viganò suggests” (Kalb). Again my addendum: If Trump is the bete noire of the Deep State Archbishop Viganò is the presumed bete noire of the Church. The latter conditionally for there are two dimensions within the Church, One that remains Apostolic and morally permanent another that is paradigmatic and accommodating. The latter perceives Viganò as antithetical to its ends, the former not so. The former empathetic aligns itself with the Archbishop’s faith, many remain uncomfortable with his modus operandi. My precise of Author Kalb’s discourse makes clear the significance of his analogy. The explanation is that it’s true. However we may vary here and there, if we hold to the revelation of Christ and find discomfort in the proposal espoused by this pontificate that this revelation is subject to paradigmatic revision, that Christ may now be perceived as mercifully accommodating to a sinful world rather than calling it to repentance – then we are apt to comprehend Archbishop Viganò’s cosmic perspective, shared by a goodly number of life and death contention between the children of light and the children of darkness.

    • Insofar as absence of subsidiarity the essential cause of deep State deep Church, “The technological approach to all things reduces knowledge to formal expertise, rejecting informal pattern recognition and the network of evolved expectations and understandings that makes up common sense. The result is that our rulers are losing touch with reality” (Kalb). That seems more pertinent to deep State politics, whereas “The lack of a sustaining vision of the good” equally pertinent to Church and State is for the Church [unlike the reasons given by Kalb for the State] determined by a purposeful policy apparent in Amazonia and the German church of fragmentation of authority with vision of a polygon Church. Subsidiarity within Catholicism has instead prior to 2013 been closely aligned with a central authority, the papacy sustaining a clear unambiguous vision of the good.

      • It does seem that a clear moral authority is necessary for subsidiarity. Otherwise there’s no principle of overall coordination other than top-down power.

        • A few words for thought James on Deep Church and subsidiarity as it relates to clear moral authority. The Pontiff we may assume has held to Apostolic Tradition in exercise of his ordinary magisterial authority never having definitively abrogated that tradition. Similarly, he has disseminated a doctrine of mercy sanctioning sacramental participation that would exclude immediate requirement of repentance [described in Amoris Laetitia as a possible first step] in a non binding context. Inclusive of the Argentine exchange of letters entered into the Acta Apostolicae Sedis, which omit a definitive pontifical declaration. A paradigm that assumes the divinity has today acquiesced in favor of his mercy rather than to inflexible justice. That this approach embraces a fallen Mankind seeking sacramental reconciliation with the proviso that it affords a pathway to eventual complete reconciliation, and if not achieved during one’s lifetime at least an invitation to practice and possible salvation. What Fr Antonio Spadaro SJ the Pontiff’s advisor describes as a calculated effort leading to a better solution. A counter argument held by some is that this calculated effort at reconciliation is accommodation of sinful behavior, the latter a position deemed ‘rigorous’ by the Pontiff. Insofar as subsidiarity the more lenient approach seems to comply with that concept. Whereas the more ‘rigorous’ position seems to comply with clear moral authority. From a justice standpoint it seems a case can be made for the pontifical position because of its adherence in principle to Apostolic Tradition, and avocation of exception for a benevolent end. As such a reasoned assessment may favor the Pontiff’s solution. Although a theological perspective that holds strictly to the revelation of Christ would demand the surrender of sinful behavior as the prerequisite to reconciliation. Furthermore mercy sans repentance even if temporarily expedient to a benevolent end remains accommodation of sin. The issue seems to rest on whether we should adhere to the suggestions of a man, the pontiff or to the permanence of the words of the Word made Flesh.

          • Concerning mercy with/versus justice, the violated line in the sand seems to be in giving access to the Eucharist–compared to the transitional alternative of Mass attendance with acts of spiritual communion. The latter path considers anguished weakness of habit or addiction and possibly mitigated culpability, or other circumstances hard to fully correct immediately, but does not wink at sacrilege AND does not serve as a wedge for a much broader agenda as we see signaled in the polygon/Germania “synodal path” subterfuge. Veritatis Splendor remains intact and on the table.

            The absolutely critical difference between accompaniment and accommodation. Comments?

          • And in agreement Peter my comment is, if a sinner will not turn away from sin under threat of condemnation, what incentive will they have to abandon that sin if they are encouraged to believe Church sanction insures they will not be condemned? Many prelates seem unwilling to address what appears a grey area, whereas that in reality is permissiveness.

          • It seems to me mercy has to involve God helping us become free from the sin that separates us from him. And that has to involve an objective standard because God is truth and a subjective standard accepts separation from truth. So I don’t like the “communion for unrepentant adulterers” initiative. It doesn’t look like mercy to me, more like an attempt to create the form of mercy and holiness without the concrete substance.

  12. I was going to write a rebuttal about the “Deep State and Fact News” not being real. I was a County Supervisor in the Republic of California. Still on the Behavioral Health Board of my County and on a advisory Board for the Health Department. If you have never held a elected position you have no idea how the Bureaucrats are running your government. You would have to have tunnel-vision not to see what the The Deep State Bureaucrats has done to our Federal to City Government. I was retired but wanted to him my Parish so I became the Admin/Business Manager. I have found out their is hardly any difference between Government of Diocese Bureaucracy. I would suggest everyone Read the book from Trent Horn; Can A Catholic Be A Socialist

  13. This article is striking for the charity it shows towards those who would do ill. A very edifying read, thank you.

  14. Brilliant analysis and “on spot” as today’s slang would describe. (As much as I dislike using today’s slang — sometimes it is definitive)!! The future outcome is highly predictable unless the “Deep State” in the country and the Church take colossal detours. Regrettably, I fear the money and power are firmly entrenched.

  15. What an amazing article James Kalb.
    You brought a lot of things together and revealed Truth. Fantastic.
    Thanks too to comments from Michael Roth, Peter D Beaulieu and Chris in Maryland. Great Truth between you.

  16. Archbishop Carlo Maria Viganò confirms what was written more than 10 years ago. See the serie of 5 books about the Anrichrist written by Robin de Ruiter and published by the world leading catholic publisher San Pablo (Mexico).

    IN English: The 13 Satanic Bloodlines – Paving the Road to Hell

  17. deep state, deep church are only possible because of secrets, secret institutions, secret societies. It is absolut depending on our how we understand God! — to serve God, … or to REPRESENT GOD!
    Since thausands of years we are trying to be like God, to play God, and this is main point.

    …just for more information, since A.Einstein developed the two important (for me personaly) inventions : Gravitation and later Entanglement(~1930’s). Since 2015 we know Gravity is a distortion of Time and Spase – LIGO , Gravitywaves. Entanglement is a fixed part of Quantum Computers, of biological use of solar energy, …, superconducting…, but it is a small step to understand, that our Universe is not made for Exceptionalists and for Competition. It is a healing and examination Universe /Mathew 12-43/. Entanglement is independent from TIME and SPACE!!! The famous german Prof. Gerald Huether – Biology of Love! The missing link in Darvin’s Evolutionary understanding, …is LOVE!!! Darvin is mentioning only a evolution of matter!!! Prof. Huether (Goettingen) is explaining that competition is not a question of Love! Competition is also not a question of Spirit. Competion is how a wild matter is fighting. Why Mindfullness is so importand? Why our FIRST PERSONS in our world do not USE MINDFULLNESS, LOVE? Gravity, is the answer.
    WHY ALL CHURCHES ARE AGAIN and again, SEPERATING THEM? THERE IS ONLY ONE GOD! So it is nonsence to write on money “in God we trust”! The same is, to write such things on a rocket, on weapons! Hitler (42 assasinations!!!)was believing in God, Eichman also. Fridrich Schiller “Walenstein” – This is the curse of every evil deed. That, propagating still, it brings forth evil.
    If we believe in God, than we have to understand, that we have to serve, and not to represent Him!
    God and money, God and weapons, God and nationalism, God and slavery is not possible! Eye for eye,… is the fundament of our Universe, but it is not for PRIVATE USE! …
    …the small port and the difficult way!
    since 40y. a destroying of balance is resulting in destroying of churches, of countries and people are more and more closed up in there IT-, and capital-made echochambers. People are more misbelieving and losing fundaments, than ever.

    Entanglement is the way how God is helping us: to meet the exact counterpart and the exact countermoment. Comunism as a example, was the counterpart of the huge tragedy of slavery, exceptionalism. Socialism is the exact counterpart of capitalism. It is not important to seek fun and money. It is important to understand balance! The same balance in our universe is the distance between Earth and Sun, Sun and center of the Milky Way/the black hole-Sagitarius A star/, the distance between Earth and Moon! Also the wunderfull balance on our planet Earth: Air, Oceans, Ilands, … Earth core, Iron!
    Our family is a entanglement Product of many, many generations, and is translation of our mistakes in a longterm examination. It is a very special examination for every person. But if we are using time the germans in 1933, than the dark side is expanding time till a self end. Today we are receiving with SARS2 a special examination with short time of decision. Misunderstanding dominates more and more. Climate changes do there rest. The devil is in the details!
    … …
    Love is the only solution.

  18. …/2nd
    since Eva privatised knowledge and Konstantin privatised God, the important mission is in a heavy distortion! The distortion of matter! The spirit have to control our body and not reverse!
    Because Gravity is the distortion of heavy matter!

    Stars ends with the creation (genesis) of iron, because there is no radiation anymore. With Iron Only Gravitation is possible!
    Than gravitation is more and more creating small rests of the stars, but with a huge gravitation. Afterwards, somewhere at the end Gold is created. And than only a BLACK HOLE is possible, where Time and Space are swallowed in the “Endless”!
    It is the same with the privatisation.
    Our today societies are Gravitation-societies, where a positiv Radiation is at a end! It is the same in a Politbureau, in Conservatism, in Liberalism.
    We are too mach following gravitations and not the only possible radiation of LOVE! We are looking al time where are the evil, like with a torch lamp. But we are not believing in the light of God.
    I wish that all churches come as soon as possible together seeing the right coordinates of God – LOVE – GIVING without conditions!
    Everyone have to be saved, everyone! Pray for everyone!

  19. …/2nd …Exceptionalism adè!
    since Eva privatised knowledge and Konstantin privatised God, the important mission is in a heavy distortion! The distortion of matter! The spirit have to control our body and not reverse!
    Because Gravity is the distortion of heavy matter!

    Stars ends with the creation (genesis) of iron, because there is no radiation anymore. With Iron Only Gravitation is possible!
    Than gravitation is more and more creating small rests of the stars, but with a huge gravitation. Afterwards, somewhere at the end Gold is created. And than only a BLACK HOLE is possible, where Time and Space are swallowed in the “Endless”!
    It is the same with the privatisation.
    Our today societies are Gravitation-societies, where a positiv Radiation is at a end! It is the same in a Politbureau, in Conservatism, in Liberalism.
    We are too mach following gravitations and not the only possible radiation of LOVE! We are looking al time where are the evil, like with a torch lamp. But we are not believing in the light of God.
    I wish that all churches come as soon as possible together seeing the right coordinates of God – LOVE – GIVING without conditions!
    Everyone have to be saved, everyone! Pray for everyone!

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