To the keepers of the truth faith, greetings from Rome, circa 2000 A.D.: Grace from God the Father, the Lord Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit.

Oh, what dismal tidings do I bear! Not the hubbub of the hour--that clerics practice pedophilia. Never mind the pedophiles. Lechery--like sloth, gluttony, and the poor--will always be with us. My news is of a darker dye.

A spiritual malaise infects the Bride of Christ. The quest for ecumenical dominion languishes. Pagan religions flourish. Schisms proliferate unchecked. Faith is flaccid. Tolerance spreads.

The true doctrine is imperiled by a thousand noxious creeds: Jewish, Buddhist, Hindu, Sikh, Baha’i, Jain, Shinto, Parsee, Mandean, Muslim, Mormon, Anglican, Episcopalian, Presbyterian, Unitarian, Methodist, Baptist, Assembly of God, Church of God, Nazarene, Jehovah’s Witness, Secular Humanism–a vile menagerie of falsehood.

Within the Church, the laity is abysmally unedified. They confound begotten and made, substance and person, ousia and hypostases, homoousion and homoiousion, the anthropic and anthropotheic, transubstantiation and consubstantiation, Real Presence and Surreal Presence.

They misdirect inquiries because they muddle the purviews of secular tertiaries, regular tertiaries minor clerks regular, canonesses regular, prioresses, abbesses, friars minor, conventual friars minor, lay brothers, itinerant clergy, superiors-general, chaplains-general, chaplains-palatine, inquisitors-general, vicars-general, apostolic vicars, apostolic nuncios, ecclesiastical chamberlains, ecclesiastical judges, directors of pontifical taxes, penitentiaries of the diocese, prebendaries, legates, prelates, metropolitans, primates of the realm, novice masters, deacons, subdeacons, choir monks, lectors, secular priests, provincials, pastors, oblates, curates, procurators, almoners, sacristans, cantors, coadjutors, oratorians, refractories, suffragans, infirmarians, hospittalers, ostiaries, and other holy offices.

Even illustrious saints are forgotten: Poppo, Bodo, Odo, Bruno, Dodo, Little Anthony, Gomer, Lucifer, Pudentiana, Lucy, Linus.

Without the infinite mercies of Our Lord, mediated by His earthly vicars, the flock would surely perish.

Shepherds, too. Priests prefer comfort to the cross. No exemplars of austerity inspire the multitude. No Simeon Stylites sups on maggots while poised atop a sixty-foot pillar. No Amatus dwells in a deep crevice, his meager ration of barley and water lowered on a rope. No Adolph daily lashes himself until he bleeds. No Conrad rolls in thorns to rout the demons of carnal temptation. Where is the monk who hourly immerses himself in freezing water and bangs his head against a rock? Where are the true penitents?

The present heir to the apostolic succession is a decrepit parlor soldier, discomfited by the spurting blood that nourishes Truth. He squirmed when I recounted the sanguinary measures the Church adopted to squelch Arianism, Pelagianism, Semipelagianism, Manichaeism, Donatism, Montanism, Albigensianism, Catharism, Waldensianism, Modalism, Rigourism, Monothelitism, Nestorianism, Eutychianism--heresies that threatened the immortal souls of hapless proselytes.

Now, heresies flourish like weeds. The squeamish bishop of Rome doubts the efficacy of rack and screw, boiling cauldron, and glowing tong. He maunders on about peaceful co-existence.

Co-existence with darkness! My brethren, lift me up with your prayers.

I shall again seek the papacy, which the ailing bishop must soon surrender.