Eleison Comments

Bishops’ Declaration – I

Bishops’ Declaration – I on April 23, 2016

On March 19 a little over one month ago Dom Thomas Aquinas was quietly consecrated bishop for the benefit of souls all over the world wishing to keep the true Catholic faith. As when Bishop Faure was consecrated just one year before, the ceremony was beautifully organised by the monks of the Monastery of the Holy Cross in the mountains behind Rio de Janeiro, in the Monastery’s steel barn cathedral, handsomely decorated for the occasion as last year. The weather was dry and warm without being too warm. St Joseph made everything run smoothly. We owe him great thanks.

There were slightly more people attending than last year, but more of them were from nearby in Brazil. There were no journalists present and the event passed with barely a mention even in Traditional Catholic news sources. Was there a conspiracy of silence? Had a word gone out to pay no attention? It does not matter. What does matter is what Almighty God may be suggesting, namely the survival of the Faith is not right now calling for publicity or for making oneself known but rather perhaps for sliding into the shadows, from which the Church can gently lower itself into the catacombs to wait for its resurrection after the storm in the world, which promises to be humanly terrible, has played itself out.

In any case we have now another bishop, firmly in the line of Archbishop Lefebvre, and on the western side of the Atlantic. Like Bishop Faure he knew the Archbishop well and was a confidant of his. Bishop Thomas Aquinas never worked with the Archbishop directly from within the SSPX, but because he was not a member of the Society, the Archbishop may have felt that much more free to share his thoughts and ideas with him. Certainly he gave to the young monk invaluable advice on more than one occasion, which Bishop Thomas has never forgotten. Believing Catholics are not mistaken – there have been few exceptions to their overwhelmingly positive reaction to God’s gift of another true shepherd of souls.

At the time of the consecration the two consecrating bishops made a Declaration which has not yet had much publicity. It gives the in-depth background of the consecration, showing how such an apparently strange event is not really strange at all, but quite natural in the circumstances. Here is the first part of the Declaration. The second part will have to follow in next week’s “Eleison Comments.”

Our Lord Jesus Christ having warned us that at his Second Coming the faith will almost have disappeared from the face of the earth (Lk. XVIII, 8), it follows that from the Church’s triumph in the Middle Ages onwards it could only experience a long decline down to the end of the world. Three upheavals in particular marked out stages of this decline: Protestantism refusing the Church in the 16th century; Liberalism refusing Jesus Christ in the 18th century; and Communism refusing God altogether in the 20th century.

Worst of all, however, was when this Revolution by stages managed to penetrate inside the Church, thanks to the Second Vatican Council (1962–1965). Wishing to bring the Church back in contact with the modern world that had moved so far away from it, Paul VI succeeded in getting the Council Fathers to adopt “the values of 200 years of liberal culture” (Cardinal Ratzinger).

What the Fathers adopted was the triple ideal of the French Revolution in particular: liberty, equality and fraternity, in the triple form of religious liberty whose emphasis on human dignity implied lifting man above God; collegiality whose promotion of democracy undermined and levelled down all authority within the Church; and ecumenism whose praise of false religions implied the denial of the divinity of Our Lord Jesus Christ. And in the half-century following Vatican II the deadly consequences for the Church of adopting the Revolutionary “values” have become only more and more obvious, culminating in the appalling scandals disgracing almost day by day the pontificate of the reigning Pope.

Kyrie eleison.

Erroneous Vision

Erroneous Vision on April 16, 2016

Fr. Franz Schmidberger, former Superior General of the Society of St Pius X from 1982 to 1994 and present Rector of the Society’s German Seminary in Zaitzkofen, Bavaria, has recently put into circulation “Considerations on the Church and on the Society’s position within the Church.” In three pages firmly promoting the acceptance by the Society from Pope Francis of a Personal Prelature which would bring the Society back into the official Church underneath the Pope, Fr Schmidberger shows a very inadequate grasp of the problem in Conciliar Rome, hardly mentioning Vatican II.

He begins by presenting the Catholic Church as containing human and fallible elements which required Archbishop Lefebvre to found in 1970 the SSPX to save the priesthood, the Mass and the Social Kingship of Christ the King. In 1975 the SSPX was condemned by the official Church, but it thrived. The consecration of four Society bishops in 1988 manifested the contradiction between Rome and the SSPX, but the Archbishop still strove, after as before, for a solution. From 2000 Romans, honest or dishonest, also sought for a solution. Now in 2016 they are easing up on their demands for the SSPX to accept the Council and the New Mass.

COMMENT: This is a relatively superficial view of the utterly radical attack launched against the Faith and Truth itself by Freemasonic churchmen during and after Vatican II. Fr. Schmidberger sees merely misguided Roman churchmen whose coming to their Catholic senses can be seriously helped forward if only the SSPX is officially recognized. Does he have any idea of that leprosy of the modernist mind which the SSPX would much more likely catch than cure if it went in with these Romans?

Secondly, Fr Schmidberger presents half a dozen arguments in favour of accepting the Personal Prelature. The SSPX must regain normality. It must not by its present “exile” lose the sense of the Church. Doors would open in Rome. The SSPX urgently needs Rome’s permission to consecrate more bishops. A good sign is the anxiety of some modernists at the prospect of the SSPX’s normalisation. And finally, how else can the Church’s present crisis be solved than by the SSPX coming out of its “exile” and converting the Romans?

COMMENT: The SSPX convert these Romans? What an illusion! Again, Fr Schmidberger has little to no idea of the deep perversion of modernism which he is up against. It is not “normal” for Catholics to submit to modernists. “Exile” need not mean loss of the sense of the Church. No important doors would open in Rome. The Faith does not need bishops approved by modernists. Any anxious modernists are naive – the real modernists know that they will convert the Society and not the other way round, once they can close the trap. And finally the Church crisis will certainly not be solved by a deluded SSPX joining Rome, but only by God, whose arm is not shortened by the wickedness of men (Isaiah, LIX, 1).

Finally, Fr Schmidberger answers some objections: Pope Francis may not be a good Pope, but he has the jurisdiction to normalize the SSPX. The opinion of the “Resistance” does not matter since it has no sense of the Church and is divided. The SSPX will not be muzzled because Rome will “accept it as it is” (illusion), nor will it lose its identity, because with God’s help it will convert Rome (illusion). Nor will it fail to resist like all other Traditional Congregations have failed that have gone in with Rome, because it is Rome that is begging while the SSPX is choosing (illusion), and because the SSPX has resistant bishops (illusion), and because it will be given a Personal Prelature (to bring it under modernists).

COMMENT: In other words the Roman trap will be lined with cushions. What a series of illusions! Poor SSPX! Let us pray for the saving of whatever can still be saved of it.

Kyrie eleison.

Divine Solution

Divine Solution on April 9, 2016

The last two issues of these “Comments” concluded that in today’s confusion in the Universal Church, descending from Popes possessed by Revolutionary ideals, Catholics should turn to God for God’s own solution, because he cannot abandon souls that have not first abandoned him. This solution exists, not complicated, accessible to all, guaranteeing eternal salvation, requiring only a little faith, humility and effort. It is the Devotion to the Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart of Mary by the practice of the Five First Saturdays, in a spirit of reparation for the insults, blasphemies and outrages committed against the Mother of God.

Why reparation to the Blessed Virgin Mary? Because God, knowing from eternity how perverse the world would become towards its end, gave to his Mother, as St Grignion de Montfort foresaw in the 18th century, a special motherly part to play from the upheaval of the French Revolution (1789) onwards. Through the 19th century she was indeed able, for instance through Lourdes, to reach a multitude of souls that liberalism and scientism could otherwise have damned, but by the 20th century too many souls were spurning even her motherly care. So as God had given to his Church in the 17th century the Devotion to his own Sacred Heart, so in the 20th century he gave the Devotion to his Mother’s Immaculate Heart, with the warning to mankind that this would be his last such gift before world’s end. And insults being for him worse to his Mother than to himself, then men’s spurning of her special efforts to save them called for special reparation.

She herself from May to October of 1917 in Fatima, Portugal, presented her Heart as the remedy for the ills of mankind which were about to be made much worse by the outbreak of the Russian Revolution that same October. And as the world plunged downhill in the 1920’s, to the point where today countless Catholics are holding onto their faith only by their fingertips, she gave to any soul a sure and easy means of ensuring its eternal salvation if only it will take, for once in its life, a little trouble on her behalf: to make reparation on five first Saturdays of the month successively for outrages against 1) her Immaculate Conception, 2) her perpetual Virginity, 3) her universal spiritual Motherhood, 4) her images and statues and 5) the little children being cut off from access to her. Press HERE to see the attached flyer for precise details.

The offer of so much in exchange for so relatively little is incredible, but as the flyer says, it makes sense. God has known from eternity all the chaos now closing in on us in which the Fifth Age of the Church is drawing to its close. We are losing our health, our families, our freedom, our countries, our priests, our sacraments, our Church, and soon very possibly our lives. Our world is sinking into a chaos organized by the enemies of God to wipe out the last traces of him. All this of course he knows, and the growing difficulty, even seeming impossibility, of leading Catholic lives. Therefore he offers us the guarantee of salvation if we will make just a little effort to make reparation to his Mother. Thereafter we may go crazy, go to prison, go to our deaths, even lose the faith, but at the moment of death we have God’s promise that she will be there with all graces necessary for salvation. How can any believing Catholic not take up on the offer? There are certainly priests in all parts of the Church who will do their best to help.

But the least we can do for our part is fulfil exactly what Heaven requests, notably the five distinct intentions of reparation, and here is where the flyer must help. Ordered in bulk on paper from the Fatima Centre in Canada, or downloaded on paper, it presents 20 little boxes to tick for the diagonal climb from modern storm to Heavenly calm. Children love ticking boxes. It does no harm to adults. All aboard for Heaven!

Kyrie eleison.

Archbishop’s Legacy – II

Archbishop’s Legacy – II on April 2, 2016

In 2012 the Archbishop’s successors at the head of his Society of St Pius X, having failed to understand his fundamental putting of Catholic Truth before Catholic Authority, claimed falsely to be following his example when at the Society’s General Chapter of that summer they prepared to put Truth back under Authority by opening the door to some political and non-doctrinal agreement with the liars of Rome – “Catholicism is Revolutionary” is a monstrous lie. For years now these successors have been spreading rumours that the agreement is imminent, but Rome has them where it wants them, by their own fault, and risks continuing to extract concessions such as, possibly, the disastrous interview of March 2 granted by the Superior General to a professional predator. Conciliar Rome never forgets what the SSPX seems no longer to want to remember – Catholic Tradition and Vatican II are absolutely irreconcilable.

However, the Archbishop has disciples who have not forgotten this. They are going under the name of the “Resistance,” which is a movement rather than an organization, as is only logical. Clinging to Truth against the false Authority both of Rome and now of the SSPX, any internal authority amongst them can at best be supplied, i.e. an abnormal authority supplied invisibly by the Church in case of emergency for the salvation of souls. But such authority, by the invisibility of its transmission (contrast the visible ceremonies by which many kinds of authority amongst men are transmitted), is that much weaker and more contestable than normal authority in the Church, which descends always, ultimately, from the Pope. Therefore the “Resistance” has the strength of Truth but a weakness of Authority normally essential to protect Catholic Truth.

Surely resistant Catholics, inside or outside of Tradition, have to take into account the many consequences of this split between Truth and Authority, imposed by Vatican II on the entire Church. God’s Supreme Shepherd being supremely struck by Conciliar folly, how can God’s sheep not be supremely scattered (cf. Zach. XIII, 7: Mt. XXVI, 31)? Not to be suffering, Catholics would have to not belong to the Catholic Church. Is that what they want? Then Catholics for the time being should be neither surprised by betrayals nor disappointed by divisions. The Devil is being given for the moment almost a free hand to cause divisions (“diabolein” in Greek), and when Catholics are all fighting for eternal salvation the divisions are frequently bitter. Patience.

Next, from Conciliar Popes there can no longer be the lifeblood of true Catholic Authority flowing down into Catholic institutions, and so Catholic persons can no longer depend upon Catholic institutions like they should normally be able to do. Rather, any such institutions have to depend for Truth upon the persons, as we have seen the SSPX depending on Archbishop Lefebvre. But persons without institutional backing or control are always liable to be fallible, and so it seems unwise to expect that any grouping of Catholics today for Truth is going to attract large numbers. Catholics may naturally long for structure, hierarchy, Superiors and obedience, but these cannot be fabricated out of thin air. Surely remnants are the order of the day. Patience.

In conclusion, Catholics striving to keep the Faith must take their well-deserved punishment, renounce all human illusions and fabrications, and beg in prayer for Almighty God to intervene. When enough souls turn to him for his solution instead of theirs, they will recognize that his Providence provided it for them in the form of the Devotion of the First Saturdays of the month, to make reparation to his Mother. For when enough reparation is made, then he will give to his Vicar on earth the grace to Consecrate Russia to her Immaculate Heart, and then order begins to be restored, as he has promised. For the practice of that Devotion, do not miss next week’s “Comments.”

Kyrie eleison.

Archbishop’s Legacy – I

Archbishop’s Legacy – I on March 26, 2016

Yesterday, March 25, was the 25th anniversary of the death of a great man of God, Archbishop Lefebvre, to whom so many Catholics keeping the Faith today have such a great debt. When in the 1960’s the Revolutionary demons of the modern world succeeded in bringing under their yoke the mass of Catholic churchmen either during or after the Second Vatican Council (1962–1965), it was the Archbishop who almost single-handed stood by that Catholic Truth which Catholic Authority, blinded or cowed, was abandoning. For indeed to obey that Authority given over to the principles of the Revolution, Catholics had to abandon the Truth of the Church’s unchanging Tradition. Or else, to remain faithful to that Truth, they had to enter into “disobedience” to the Church Authorities.

Of course neither the Archbishop nor the Society of St Pius X which he founded in 1970 were in real disobedience, because Catholic Authority is the indispensable servant of Catholic Truth: indispensable, becaue Truth without Authority is torn to pieces amid the warring opinions of fallible men, but servant, because Authority is a means and not an end, the means of protecting and preserving that infallible Truth of Christ which alone can save souls. To this immutable Church Tradition Archbishop Lefebvre remained faithful to the end, yet without scorning or defying those Church Authorities which condemned him to the end. On the contrary he did all he could have done, in fact at a given moment, on his own admission, even more than he should have done, to help them to see the Truth and serve it, for the good of the whole Church, but in vain.

That is when, to ensure the survival of the Truth of salvation, in June of 1988 he consecrated four bishops without that permission of Church Authorities which is normally necessary. They must have hoped that his proceeding without their permission would spell the ruin of his Society, but on the contrary it flourished, because by now a significant number of souls had climbed out of their pre-Conciliar “obedience” to understand that Truth has to come first, and that truthful bishops are essential to the survival of the Church’s Truth.

But what happened to the Society which he left behind him when he died two and a half years later? His Catholic wisdom and personal charisma were no longer there to protect them from the magnetic pull of pre-Conciliar “obedience,” which took the form of seemingly reasonable propositions of a diplomatic compromise between Conciliar Authority and Catholic Tradition. False “obedience,” preferring Authority to Truth, now crept back at the top of the Society from which the Archbishop had exorcised it, and within a few more years his Society was hardly recognisable as its misleaders went to Rome, cap in hand, begging for official recognition from the Church Authorities.

Now Truth has no right to put itself in a position of begging for anything from a group of liars – “Catholicism is Revolutionary” is a dreadful lie – but the Society’s misleaders, then and now, justified their humiliating of Truth by appealing to the Archbishop’s example. For years, they said, he went down to Rome seeking official approval of the Society, and they were doing nothing else. But what might have seemed similar was in reality quite different. While they were going down to Rome in pursuit of some political agreement, by which, as became clear at the latest in the spring of 2012, they were ready to compromise doctrine, on the contrary the Archbishop only ever went down to Rome for the good of the Faith and the Church. For him the offical approval of the Society by Church Authority was only ever a means to help that Authority back towards Tradition and Truth, and when that Authority in the spring of 1988 demonstrated once and for all its refusal to look after Tradition, then the Archbishop broke off all negotiations and diplomatic contacts, and roundly declared that they would only resume when Rome returned to doctrinal Truth. In fact the Archbishop’s successors had never understood him. And today? See next week’s “Comments.”

Kyrie eleison.

Third Bishop

Third Bishop on March 19, 2016

On the day of the consecration, please God, of Dom Thomas Aquinas as third bishop for today’s Catholic “Resistance,” it seems appropriate to reproduce the testimony of a close friend of his, Professor Carlos Nougué, now leading a House of Studies attached to Dom Thomas’ Monastery of the Holy Cross. This testimony, which many of you may not have seen, is only slightly adapted from the original, which is accessible on the excellent Mexican site, Non Possumus. Note in particular the good influence of Corção, the close connection with Archbishop Lefebvre, the refusal to approach neo-modernist Rome and the Stalinist methods of Bp Fellay.

Kyrie eleison.!

Miguel Ferreira da Costa was born in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, in 1954. Before beginning his career in the law, he studied at Saint Benedict College in Rio de Janeiro, where I had the opportunity to be his classmate for a brief while. He took part in the traditionalist and anti-modernist movement organized around Gustavo Corção and Permanencia magazine; then he began his life of “faithful warrior and veteran of the post-Conciliar war for the Faith” – he quit the law to become a monk with the name of Thomas Aquinas, in the French monastery of le Barroux, where Dom Gérard was Prior at that time, and he was ordained priest in 1980, in Écône, by Archbishop Lefebvre. There he enjoyed the friendship, the example and the teaching of the SSPX’s Founder.

In 1987 he came to Brazil with a group of monks from le Barroux to found the Monastery of the Holy Cross in Nova Friburgo, up in the hills behind Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. But in the meantime Dom Gérard, despite the grave warnings of the Archbishop, was advancing towards an agreement with Conciliar Rome, to which Dom Thomas Aquinas was also opposed. A split was inevitable. The Monastery of the Holy Cross, with Archbishop Lefebvre’s support, became independent in 1988, while retaining good relations with the SSPX. However, upon written advice of the Archbishop, the SSPX was not to have jurisdiction over him, because as Prior of the Monastery he needed autonomy.

Providential advice, because relations between the SSPX and the Monastery were deteriorating, especially with the approach of the SSPX to neo-modernist Rome. Dom Thomas refused to sing at Sunday Mass the Te Deum asked for by Bp. Fellay to celebrate Benedict XVI’s Motu Proprio on the Mass. Similarly, for the “lifting of the excommunications” by the same Pope, Dom Thomas wrote to Bp. Fellay a letter refusing to follow him towards an agreement with Conciliar Rome. Thereupon I myself saw Bp. De Galarreta and Fr. Bouchacourt when they came to the Monastery to tell Dom Thomas that he had 15 days to leave the Monastery if he wanted the Monastery to continue receiving help and the sacraments (including Ordinations) from the SSPX.

I wrote to Bp. Fellay to complain about this injustice. He answered me that Dom Thomas had a mental problem, and as long as he did not leave the Monastery, it would not receive the Society’s help. I replied: “Then I should have the same mental problem, because I have known him for twelve years and I never realized.” It was truly like Stalinism, with its psychiatric hospitals for opponents of the Stalinist regime. But Dom Thomas hesitated: if he left the Monastery, that would be its ruin regarding the Faith, but if he stayed, he would deprive it of needed help. Then Bp. Williamson wrote to Dom Thomas promising the Monastery all the sacraments it would need. This meant Dom Thomas could stay.

This was enough for all of us to start reacting: it was the beginning of what is now known as the Resistance, which had as its first organ the website called SPES, no longer on line. The Monastery then became a reception center for refugee priests from the SSPX with nowhere to live. It was where Bp. Faure was consecrated, and now it is where Dom Thomas Aquino Ferreira da Costa himself will be consecrated, my spiritual father and the closest friend that God could have given to me.