By Maike Hickson
May 12, 2026
Earlier this year, Catholics for Catholics (CforC) was honored to publish the book, “The Trojan Horse in the Catholic Church,” written by a priest under the pseudonym Father Enoch. The book sounded the alarm on the Synod on Synodality as a concerted attempt to invert the Bride of Christ’s hierarchy and moral order.
Father Enoch’s book The Trojan Horse, as well as Catholics for Catholics’ campaign to spread his critique of the ongoing Synod on Synodality among bishops in the United States, must have made an impact. Otherwise, Bishop Peter Dai Bui, the recently ordained auxiliary bishop of the Diocese of Phoenix, would not have deemed it necessary to write a reply and critique, also aiming at Cardinal Gerhard Ludwig Müller, who contributed a preface to the book.
Of all places, he chose to publish his critique of CforC’s attempt at stopping the Synod on Synodality that threatens the very core of the Catholic Church in her hierarchical structure and her moral teaching in the leftist Catholic newspaper National Catholic Reporter. The NCR is known for its promotion of heterodoxy; thus, his choice of this newspaper is already undercutting his trustworthiness as a witness and defender of the synodal process that is currently taking place in the entire Church.
Both Father Enoch and John Yep, president of Catholics for Catholics, have responded to Bishop Bui’s rebuke.
“Fear is not theology: A bishop’s response to the campaign against the synodal church,” is the title of Bishop Bui’s article, which aims to diffuse any concern about the synodal process. It addresses the fact that Cardinal Müller endorsed The Trojan Horse (see here the foreword), yet shies away from even mentioning the cardinal’s name. Bishop Bui writes: “The book’s foreword lends a prestige worth examining carefully. Its author, a senior churchman who attended both sessions of the synod on synodality at the Vatican as a voting participant in 2023 and 2024, describes a process manipulated to produce predetermined outcomes.”
About Catholics for Catholics, the bishop born in Vietnam says that it is “not a theological institute and it holds no magisterial standing,” adding that it is a “political-religious activist organization.”
John Yep responds to Bishop Bui’s charge against Catholics for Catholics by pointing out that the very Synod on Synodality he is defending insists on listening to lay people’s insights. “Why is the Bishop reprimanding us as lay Catholics trying to defend the Faith while remaining silent as the scandalous testimony of homosexual men is given full exposure in the Vatican’s Synodal Reports?” Moreover, he adds, “while Catholics for Catholics may not be a ‘theological institute,’ the former head of the Doctrine of the Faith, Cardinal Gerhard Müller, as well as its very accomplished author, would most definitely qualify as theologians who carry weight.”
In his article, Bishop Bui tries to refute the arguments of Fr. Enoch and Catholics for Catholics that the Synod on Synodality is a process that undermines the Church’s hierarchical structure and attacks the Church’s moral teaching, especially on homosexuality. To do this, Bishop Bui uses the story of the disciples meeting Jesus on the road to Emmaus as a sort of proof from Scripture that the Church has always been “Synodal.” For sure, the shepherds have from the beginning listened to the sheep, but there is a fundamental difference between what happened in Emmaus and the “synodal circles” today.
To give an example, just a few days ago the latest Synod Report asked whether homosexual “relationships” can be thought of as equal “to heterosexual conjugal union,” despite “the evident impossibility of procreation.” The blatant scandal of this almost makes the “Synodal Way” not so much a hidden Trojan Horse but an open attack on the Church.
Following the Bishop’s reference to the story of Emmaus, John Yep commented, saying, “If Jesus Christ would have received that ‘Synod Report’ on the road to Emmaus, he would have said the same thing…or worse than what he told the two disciples when they erred in their understanding. ‘O Stulti!,’ Christ said, which literally means ‘O Stupid or Foolish Ones.’ I wonder if Christ would say the same thing today to any bishop promoting this new ‘synodal Church.’”
This leads us to Bishop Bui’s own stance in this matter. Not only does he publish his own critique of The Trojan Horse at the NCR, but his own bishop, John Dolan, has a very strong pro-LGBT stance and is hailed by LGBT groups as “LGBT positive.” In an article published on the pro-LGBT website Outreach, the prelate had the following to say about the question of LGBT: “To Catholics within the LGBTQ community, I wish to reaffirm your sacred identity. You are Christian—not just in name, but in fact. This ‘being Christian’ begins with the Spirit of God, who has been poured out on you through faith and baptism. You have been configured to Christ and branded as Christian, even though some would like to re-brand you and consider you as objects to be discarded, rather than as beloved communal members of the Body of Christ.”
John Yep went on to say, “Perhaps, one of the greatest signs that this new ‘listening Church’ is not really what it says it is, is the fact that the priest who wrote the book has to remain anonymous. If his name were to become public, he would be escorted down the ‘synodal path’ of cancellation and removal from ministry as has happened to other priests and bishops who dare to speak up. The reality on the ground is that this new “Synodal Church,” in the image of Pope Francis, was not made to truly ‘listen’ to all sides.”
Against these voices stand not only Cardinal Müller, as Father Enoch points out in his statement, but also Cardinal Raymond Burke, who stated that “Synodality and its adjective, synodal, have become slogans behind which a revolution is at work to change radically the Church’s self-understanding, in accord with a contemporary ideology which denies much of what the Church has always taught and practiced.”
Finally, we can also quote here Cardinal Joseph Zen—who fears that the Church is here “committing suicide”—and Bishop Joseph Strickland. The latter just came out with a strong critique of the newest synodal document endorsing homosexuality, saying: “The recent report issued by Study Group 9 of the Synod on Synodality is deeply alarming and stands in direct contradiction to the constant teaching of the Catholic Church regarding human sexuality, sin, marriage, and the moral law.”
Bishop Bui mentions that Catholics for Catholics has been able to send a copy of this book to every bishop in America. Commenting on this, John Yep said, “We are excited to announce that we have now collected enough support and have mailed this book to over 25% of the pastors in the United States, a stunning tribute to the ‘Sensus Fidelium’ of the lay faithful who understand that Synodality is a Trojan Horse in the Church. Bishop Bui’s latest effort to defend Synodality and the open questioning of fundamental Church teachings has resulted in more support for us to mail to more priests. For that, we are grateful.”
The campaign can be supported here >
“Official Response to Bishop Bui from Father Enoch”
