Top Catholic archbishop urges three-day fast for Jan. 6 defendants

Catholic Archbishop Carlo Maria Vigano, who has served in several high-level Vatican roles, said he encourages a three-day fast to bring "heavenly protection" for defendants charged in the Jan. 6 Capitol riot and for the nation as a whole "against the subversive attack of the deep state."

Vigano, ex-Vatican secretary-general and former Holy See diplomat to the United States, called for a fast from Jan. 3 to 5, in a letter Saturday to Joseph McBride, an attorney for multiple Jan. 6 defendants. 

"In your message you tell me about your initiative to announce three days of fasting to propitiate heavenly protection to the United States of America against the subversive attack of the deep state," Vigano wrote to McBride. "I can only encourage and bless this commendable gesture of penance, to be accompanied by prayer – above all the Holy Rosary."

The archbishop concluded his letter by giving his "greatest and paternal Blessing" to those who defend Catholicism.

McBride told The Epoch Times on Monday: "I wrote the archbishop because he embodies the outspoken protective spirit of St. Michael the Archangel and is renowned for his condemnation of both the Deep State and the Deep Church."

People participating in the fast will consume only liquids from 12 a.m. through 6 p.m., consume one meal a day, practice abstinence and pray, McBride said.

Rabbi Yehuda Levin, leader of Jews for Morality, commended the archbishop's statement and called for Jews to fast as already required on the 10th of Tevet, which corresponded to Jan. 3. In addition to mourning the events leading to the destruction of the Temple, Rabbi Levin asked Jews to also "have in mind all those American citizens who are political prisoners and otherwise victims of malicious prosecution and persecution by the deep state and the corrupt judiciary."