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Thanks in part, no doubt, to readers’ prayers, the two Consecrations, of Bishop Zendejas and of Russia, took place successfully in Vienna, Virginia, USA, on May 11 and 12 respectively. The weather was not good on May 11, because the rain poured down, but the outdoor tent was watertight and accommodated perfectly a congregation of around 500 people coming from all over the United States, and a few from even further afield. The weather was a little better on May 12 for the new bishop’s first Pontifical Mass with the Consecration of Russia, and with a congregation only a little smaller than on the previous day.

Special thanks went to Fr Ronald Ringrose, Traditional parish priest of Vienna, on whose Rectory grounds the double Consecration took place. He has maintained the parish of St Athanasius as a bastion of Catholic Tradition within easy striking distance of the capital city of the United States for well over 30 years, which is a considerable achievement in these troubled times for the Catholic Church. “Ad multos annos” says Mother Church to her devoted servants – may Fr Ringrose thrive for many years yet.

As for the purpose and scope of the two Consecrations, it is necessary to be both modest and clear. Ever since Vatican II (1962–1965) when the mass of Catholic churchmen surrendered to liberalism (the worship of liberty) and to modernism (the adaptation of God’s Church to the godless modern world), the Church has been in serious trouble. In 1970 Archbishop Lefebvre created the Society of St Pius X to act as an emergency lighting system for the mainstream Church going dark, but his successors at the head of the Society are doing all they can to make the emergency lighting go dark. Let us then compare Bishop Zendejas’ Consecration to a candle being lit, or a match being struck, in the increasing darkness. It has no ambition either to save or to convert either the Newchurch or the Newsociety.

What it should do is contribute to the saving of that Oldtruth, so to speak, which is at the heart of the true Church and the true Society. Working mostly in the USA, but with no territorial jurisdiction of any official kind, Bishop Zendejas will help to look after many souls in the USA that have the true Faith, and want to keep it. Accessible by car or train from anywhere in North America if anything happens to ground the aeroplanes, he is a relatively young bishop with the fullness of certainly valid Holy Orders, able to Confirm or Ordain, with or without condition, and who is by the grace of God, at least for the moment, sensible and sane – in English the word “sanity” is three quarters of the word “sanctity.” Let us lend him our prayers that he may stay sane for many years to come, or at least until a truly Catholic Pope turns on the lighting once more. At that moment Bishop Zendejas puts his episcopacy back in the hands of Catholic Rome, for the Pope to do with as he wishes. Meanwhile may the new bishop be a candle lit in the darkness, a point of reference for any soul seeking the complete and uncontaminated Truth.

As for the Consecration of Russia led by all four bishops present on the eve of the first of Our Lady’s great apparitions in Fatima, there was not the remotest pretence that their Consecration could replace that of the Pope with the bishops of the entire world, which is what Our Lady requested. There was merely the hope that by doing what lay in their power, with the support of all the congregation present, they might help to obtain from Heaven the graces necessary for the Pope to perform at last the Consecration of Russia, exactly as Our Lady requested so long ago. That Consecration will eventually take place because Our Lord said so in 1931, and then begins the Triumph of the Immaculate Heart, so necessary and so long delayed.

Kyrie eleison.