Society of St. Pius X

SSPX, 2018?

SSPX, 2018? on January 6, 2018

As the world plunges downhill, more and more people are opening their eyes and are wondering where it will end. As the Catholic Church is led resolutely downhill by a pope who seems intent only on rubbing out the last traces of the pre-Conciliar Church, more and more Catholics are opening their eyes and are driven to wondering if the Council (1962–1965) was not some kind of problem for the true Catholic Church. Then they look towards the Society of St Pius X, because it was founded in 1970 by Archbishop Lefebvre precisely to ensure the continuation of the pre-Conciliar Church, and what do they find? A group of priests more and more sympathetic to the post-conciliar Church, less and less clear on Vatican II, and sliding into the arms of the Conciliar Romans. Result? Many of these souls looking for the Truth are more confused than ever. So where are the Church and the Society of St Pius X headed in 2018?

Souls looking for the Truth must read (for instance Ralph Wiltgen’s The Rhine flows into the Tiber, or Archbishop Lefebvre’s Letter to Confused Catholics). That is how many Catholics found their way in the 1970’s and 1980’s towards the Traditional movement where they found again the true Church which they knew they had lost after the Council’s “renewal.” And in Archbishop Lefebvre (1905–1991) they found a leader with a clear and Catholic vision of what had happened at the Council – it had taken place under pressure from the modern world to conform to the world, whereas from the beginning of the Church through to the 20th century, it was always the Church that had put the world under pressure to conform itself to God. In this perspective, Vatican II represented an upheaval, a turning upside down, without precedent in all Church history, but the Council Fathers were nearly all more or less beglamoured by the modern world. It is this upheaval which set the course of the official Church from the Council until today. And given that the enemies of God and man were behind the modern world and behind Vatican II, and given that by a just punishment of God they are now deeply entrenched within the offices of the Vatican, then in 2018, short of a miracle or of grave events intervening, the official Church will continue on its downward plunge.

And the Society of St Pius X in 2018? At the beginning of July, in six months’ time, the SSPX holds its elections for those who are to be for the following 12 years its three senior officials, the Superior General and his two Assistants. If the 40 leading priests of the Society who vote in those elections wish to continue the Society’s slide into the arms of Conciliar Rome, i.e. the official Church, then no doubt they will vote for Bishop Fellay to be Superior General so that he can finish the work of replacing the Archbishop’s clear vision of the need to resist Vatican II with his own confused vision of blending Catholic Tradition with Vatican II, which is like blending fire with water. For just as Paul VI (1963–1978) dreamt of saving both Church and modern world by blending them in Vatican II, and almost crushed the life out of the Church by his tyrannical dream, so Bishop Fellay has drained the life out of the Society by clamping upon it his parallel dream of saving both Tradition and Council in a messianic reconciliation of his own making. The vision is quite different from the Archbishop’s. Then how will the 40 priests vote? Upon their vote depends how the Society will develop in 2018, at least from July onwards.

However, there was a reason for Vatican II, and that was the ever widening gulf between God’s true Church and modern man. The strain of holding them together became unbearable, and the Council Fathers snapped. Archbishop Lefebvre stood his Catholic ground and founded the Society, but his successors at its head have in turn snapped under the strain. Today’s godless world surrounds all of us, and its siren charms are highly seductive. Catholics must “watch and pray” – they need to read, and to continue reading, and they must have a strong prayer life by which to cleave to God – 15 Mysteries of the Holy Rosary, every day.

Kyrie eleison.

How Discern? – II

How Discern? – II on November 25, 2017

After Joseph’s first question concerning confusion in the Church in general (cf. these “Comments” of last week), his second question concerned the Society of St Pius X in particular. Here it is:—

You wrote last week that judged by their fruits, Vatican II was not Catholic, while Archbishop Lefebvre was. However, in the Society of St Pius X which he founded, there seems to have arisen a new way of thinking which one might articulate in a series of propositions. For example –

1 However badly the Pope and bishops behave, they are still the valid authorities of the Church.

2 Pope Francis may be a modernist, but he still has the power to bring the SSPX back into the Church.

3 The Conciliar bishops are not all bad. They can have Christian reactions, show awareness of the Church crisis, defend Catholic morals in public, call for respect for God in the liturgy, show devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary, and so on.

4 An agreement with Rome can be envisaged as long as we are “accepted as we are.”

5 We are at fault if we are systematically refusing any agreement whatsoever with Rome.

6 It is more useful to speak of Archbishop Lefebvre’s piety than of his opposition to the Council.

7 Better to be on good terms with the SSPX than to get on bad terms for the sake of fallible opinions.

8 Conciliarists are indisciplined and disobedient. SSPXers need to be disciplined and obedient.

In conclusion, given the complexity of the situation in which Catholics find themselves today, can members or followers of the Society be blamed for thinking along the lines of these propositions?

Answer, it all depends on how much those members or followers know. For instance, older SSPXers knew that the Council was a new religion, and that therefore the Archbishop’s opposition to it was a matter of Faith, intrinsically more important than piety, because how can there be piety without faith? Those veterans of the Society are much to blame (unless and until at last they react in public), because they are allowing what Joseph above calls “the new way of thinking” to take over the Archbishop’s Society, so that Society youngsters have that much less chance of grasping what is wrong with the eight propositions above. A new generation of Society priests is as pious as one could wish, but (always with exceptions) it is clueless as to the crisis now devastating the Church for more than half a century:—

1 True, the Pope and bishops, according to appearances, seem to be the valid authorities of the Church, but their behaviour as to the Faith is so bad that many serious Catholics call in question that validity.

2 Into what Church would the Pope bring the Newsociety? Into the Newchurch? “They have expelled me from the Newchurch?” said the “excommunicated” Archbishop – “So what? I never belonged to it!”

3 Indeed the Conciliar bishops are not all bad, but they are nearly all modernists, which means that many of them have lost their Catholic faith without even realising it. Modern man is so corrupt that when his Catholic religion is made to fit his modernity, he does not even realise that it is no longer Catholic.

4 “Accepted as we are” was for the SSPX one thing in, say, 1987. It is quite another thing in 2017!

5 If only Rome were to come back to the true Faith, there would be no further need for any agreement.

6 Thanks be to God for the Archbishop’s piety also, but by far his most important quality was his faith.

7 “Fallible opinions”? There is such a thing as truth! Has anybody of any importance in the Newsociety actually studied the documents of Vatican II? Do they deny it represents a new religion?

8 SSPXers must be disciplined and obedient to what? To the new Conciliar man-centred religion?

The problem with all of these propositions is that the SSPX was born in the thick of the great war being waged by the modern world on God, but since the Archbishop’s death in 1991, its leaders have lost all effective grip on who is waging that war, and how and why. Joseph, read “Pascendi,” again and again, until you fully grasp it!

Kyrie eleison.

How Discern? – I

How Discern? – I on November 18, 2017

A young man with a good mind is asking a good question about the crisis in the Church, and another good question about the crisis in the Society of St Pius X. Here is how Joseph frames his first question:—

On the one hand the Conciliar crisis was one is a series of crises afflicting the Church, such as Protestantism, Liberalism, and Revolutions, with two World Wars, and therefore errors made their way at the Council which were clearly condemned by the Church before Vatican II. And after the Council its novelties were applauded by classical enemies of the Church, such as Freemasons and Socialists, while the Church’s missionary spirit has clearly been extinguished. On the other hand the ideas of the Council are the work of highly intelligent and supposedly Catholic churchmen, and one cannot all the time say that the Pope is not Pope, or that the majority of modernist Bishops are invalidly consecrated. Therefore can one say that the Conciliar crisis involves shadowed areas which still make it difficult to see clear? And if we cannot arrive at definite conclusions, can we be sure we are holding onto the true Faith?

The best reply comes from Our Lord Himself, speaking in the Sermon on the Mount (Mt. VII, 15–20) – “By their fruits ye shall know them.” Obviously Our Lord knew that there would be constant attacks on His Church with repeated attempts of the Devil to sow confusion in His followers’ minds. The confusion that has followed on Vatican II is not different in kind from previous crises in Church history, even if by the defection of the churchmen at Vatican II the confusion today is unprecedented in degree – never before have the mass of Catholic shepherds been so lost, nor therefore the Catholic sheep.

Nevertheless, to find one’s way out of the confusion, the same infallible principle still applies: actions speak louder than words, and the fruits of a man’s actions are the surest guide to who he is and what he really intends. Especially in the case of modernism a man can be deceiving himself as to what he wants or intends, because nobody is so deeply detached from reality as a modernist. “The end of the world will be characterised by men doing evil while thinking they are doing good,” said Fr Faber in mid-19th century. In the 21st century we are at the wrong end of this centuries-long process of mankind deceiving itself as it has turned away from God. Then would God be leaving His sheep defenceless against such unprecedented wolves in sheep’s clothing as modernists are? No, because to judge by the fruits is something that anybody can do, with a minimum of common sense and upright will.

Therefore, Joseph, you observe that today’s Church authorities are highly intelligent men and supposedly Catholic, and you quite reasonably assume that they are the valid authorities of the Church, because even if you know that their fruits are so little Catholic as to make many a Catholic dispute that validity, notwithstanding who else is there who is authorised to speak and act for the Universal Church? But at the same time you observe that their ideas are in line with grave anti-Catholic errors from the past, and that they are now applauded by classic enemies of the Church, such as Freemasons. Arguments on one side and on the other. Doubts and shadows. How do you resolve the confusion?

Answer, by your own further observation that the missionary spirit has disappeared from the Church since Vatican II. Here are the fruits. The Council preached ecumenism ( Unitatis Redintegratio ), religious liberty ( Dignitatis Humanae ) and the relative acceptability of false religions such as Hinduism, Islam and Judaism ( Nostra Aetate ) – how could the Catholic missionary spirit not collapse after the Council? And have not countless monasteries, seminaries, convents, dioceses and parishes also emptied out and closed down since Vatican II? Did new ones open anywhere? Yes, under the leadership of the one Catholic bishop worldwide who from the beginning repudiated openly the Council and all its works, Archbishop Lefebvre. Here were the selfsame fruits of the selfsame Catholic principles, faithfully applied in defiance of Vatican II. Joseph, you need look no further.

Kyrie eleison.

Menzingen Commands

Menzingen Commands on November 11, 2017

By no means all readers of these “Comments” are in favour of criticism of the words and deeds of the Headquarters at Menzingen of the Newsociety of St Pius X. However, there are many who see that just as Archbishop Lefebvre was, for the good of the Catholic Church, fully justified in taking his fruitful stand against its being wrecked by the Second Vatican Council, so one is fully justified, for the same salvation of souls, to criticise in public the slide of that Newsociety into the arms of Rome’s Conciliar officials. The June issue of Menzingen’s in-house journal for Society priests, “Cor Unum,” published yet another hard-hitting justification of that slide. Menzingen is obdurate. Menzingen must be corrected, in public.

There follows in italics a fair summary of some of the main arguments, which can be checked (in French) on the Internet at the website Résistance catholique francophone:: Cor Unum juin 2017

Archbishop Lefebvre made Society relations with Rome the concern of the Superior General (SG) alone.

That was because he knew that his own priests under him could not be relied upon to understand the extreme need for prudence in dealing with the Roman officials. The present SG proves how right he was.

The General Chapter of 2006 entitled the Society authorities to dismiss from the Society any priest disagreeing with their policies in public – “This warning is to be taken seriously.”

That is just how Paul VI “dismissed” Archbishop Lefebvre. Does Menzingen see who it is imitating? And did the priests voting in 2006 foresee where their authorising such dismissals was going to lead?

No matter how good are the dissenting arguments, public dissent always harms the common good.

Did Archbishop Lefebvre harm the (true) Church’s common good by his two decades of dissent? Truth is the ultimate measure of authority, especially in the Catholic Church, and not the other way round!

Archbishop Lefebvre saved the Church by forming priests in accordance with Catholic Tradition.

Not exactly. Forming good priests was his way of saving the Catholic Faith. But priests now being formed by Menzingen to go along with Conciliar Romans risk saving neither Faith nor Church.

The Archbishop always recognized, and wanted Society priests to recognize, the Church authorities in place, both before and after he consecrated four bishops in 1988.

Yes, but in 1988, after the Romans had once and for all proved that they would not look after the Faith, his attitude towards them changed radically: “Up till now, diplomacy, but from now on doctrine,” he said, as Menzingen well knows, but Menzingen just does not see doctrine’s importance as the Archbishop did.

Exactly. Dissenters from Menzingen are making questions of prudence into matters of Faith.

No. To submit believing Catholics to Conciliar – i.e. disbelieving – Romans, is directly a matter of Faith.

But how can such Romans be converted if the Society’s believing Catholics refuse all contact with them?

How can Catholics keep the Faith if they submit to contagious, even innocently dangerous, modernists?

But not everything in today’s mainstream Church is Conciliar. It includes conservatives, who like us.

But the conservatives have no power. All power in Rome is in the hands of Freemasons who are bitter and resolute enemies of Catholic Tradition, of Our Lord’s Church, of Our Lord and of God. And everything in the mainstream Church is being taken ultimately in the Conciliar direction, especially by Pope Francis.

Kyrie eleison.

Why “Resistance”?

Why “Resistance”? on August 26, 2017

Following on “Why Tradition?,” let Fr Patrick Girouard, presently ministering to a “Resistance” parish in Western Canada, explain the need not only for Catholics to be Traditional, but also for Traditional Catholics to “Resist.” The following “Mission Statement” he wrote in June of 2013, precisely to explain why he and a few dozen SSPX parishioners were getting out from under the SSPX. Alas, the “Statement” has had to be cruelly shortened. For the full text, contact Fr Girouard at thebastion.faith.

If I, Father Girouard, and about a third of the Langley parish, have decided to start a new parish, it was because our beloved Society is being destroyed by its management, and we could no longer stand the constant propaganda favouring that destruction. Having studied carefully the documents that shed light on it, we were able to understand what happened. If we then remained silent and inactive, not only would we be putting ourselves in harm’s way, but we would also be contributing to the destruction of the Traditional movement. May our taking action encourage more priests and faithful to do likewise!

For all practical purposes, the Society of St. Pius X has joined the Conciliar Church. Even if the deal with Rome has not yet been signed, nevertheless it was accepted in principle at the Society’s July 2012 General Chapter, which was the Revolution inside the Society: the Chapter took the decision that from now on the Society can sign a pact with the relentless destroyers of the Catholic Church.

But how can any Catholic worthy of the name go along with such a decision? How can we say that we are Catholic, if we accept to make a deal with those who are facilitating, by their actions or their silence, the damnation of countless souls for which Our Lord gave His life? How can we even sit down to talk with people who promote that abomination to God, the Novus Ordo Missae? I can remember Archbishop Lefebvre quoting the Prophet Malachy against the New Mass: “To you O priests, that despise my name, and have said: ‘Wherein have we despised thy name?’ You offer polluted bread upon my altar, and you say: ‘Wherein have we polluted thee?’ saith the Lord of hosts” (I, 7).

The mission of the SSPX has never been to enter into the structure of the Conciliar Church so as to “transform” it from within. Such an illusion was condemned by Archbishop Lefebvre after the 1988 Consecrations. The Society’s mission is to train priests who will preach the Truth and fight vigorously against error, without “talks” or “dialogue,” or “negotiations.” Like a beacon, that little remnant will then attract souls of good will. But the present Society leaders have betrayed that mission, nor do they tolerate dissent or critics, so the only way for us to hold to the Truth is to separate ourselves from the Neo-society. We must pray hard for a solution to the crisis, and for ourselves to persevere.

You may ask me: when will be the time to join Rome? How will we ever know if we have a good Pope? The answer is simple: when the Pope publicly condemns the New Mass and forbids its celebration under pain of excommunication; when he publicly condemns and rejects the whole of the Second Vatican Council; in brief, when we see him taking effective action to clean up the mess. Similarly, when can we go back and trust the SSPX again? Answer: When Bishop Fellay and all the priests of the Society promoting the new line will be dismissed, and barred from any future office; when the texts of the Chapter will be officially repudiated; when the faithful priests will be vindicated, and so on.

Impossible, you say? I reply quite simply: So what? What’s the problem? We just do our duty, give glory to God, and leave Him to deal with the destroyers. Let us pray and sacrifice for their conversion, and remain united in prayer, for sure. But let us compromise and put ourselves in harm’s way? – Never!

Kyrie eleison.

Clash Evolving

Clash Evolving on August 12, 2017

How is the Society of St Pius X evolving since the spring and early summer when strong tensions arose in it over the participation of Conciliar priests as official witnesses in Society marriages? In brief, relations continue to be strained between Society leaders favouring that participation and those Society priests and laity that condemn it. One can even foresee the Society splitting between the followers of Archbishop Lefebvre and the followers of Bishop Fellay. Such a split was inevitable from the day when Bishop Fellay began leading the Archbishop’s Society in a different direction from the Archbishop himself.

But nothing shakes the determination of Bishop Fellay’s Menzingen to steer away from the line traced by the Archbishop and towards the line of Conciliar Rome. Just recently it is reported that in France a Society couple engaged to be married refused to have anything to do with the Conciliar authorities, whereupon their SSPX priest refused to marry them. Obviously he had his Superiors’ support. Does this insistence upon dismantling the Archbishop’s Society have any rational explanation? Three factors may be at work, amongst others.

Firstly, Providence chose Switzerland to serve as the Society’s first geographical base, and Switzerland has enjoyed ever since a corresponding importance and prestige within the SSPX. Thus its top two officials at present, and many of its priests, are Swiss citizens. Now Switzerland is a country of order which is famous, for example, for how its trains run on time, whereas the lack of official recognition for a truly Catholic Congregation is normally a disorder that will be the more keenly felt by an orderly people. Secondly, SSPX priests can be dreaming of how large an apostolate will open up to the Society if only it can be recognised by Rome. And thirdly, there can seem to be no other solution to the Society’s serious internal strains than its putting itself under the authority of Conciliar Rome – Bishop Fellay does not want to hear of apocalyptic solutions like an intervention of God.

But firstly, the supreme order for Catholics is not the order of the State, however desirable that may be, but the order of God, trampled underfoot by Vatican II. Secondly, modernists by their nature can give every appearance of being “converted” because they see no problem in their own subjectivism. But it is so comfortable that few have any intention of quitting it for any objective conversion involving the Cross. As Fr Vallet said, liberals do not convert. And thirdly, to think that the only solution to the unprecedented problems of today’s world and Church is to go along with the lies, betrays a serious lack of faith, however triumphant those lies may seem. Do we really think that God’s arm is shortened because we men are wicked (Isaiah L, 2; LIX, 1)? God knows exactly how He will deal with the unprecedented lies, as we need only wait to see, but in the meantime He does not want us to be going along with them!

However, there is also good news – some priests and laity refusing to go along with the lies are also resolute. A reader in France tells me that a number of SSPX priests have been woken up by the concrete problem over marriages. The best of the SSPX priests are not resorting to Conciliar witnesses for Society marriages, much to the annoyance of their Superiors. Three of the demoted Deans have written strongly against Conciliar marriage witnesses even after their own demotion, and one has just spoken out strongly against the Personal Prelature, because it is by no means out of the question, even since Cardinal Müller’s damning Declaration of late June. We are by no means “back to Square one,” as Bishop Fellay claimed at that time. “Like a bad business manager at bay,” says this reader, “he has forfeited all trust from any colleagues with a brain in their head, even the most respectful.” What matters now, the reader concludes, is not to save the SSPX as a whole, because that would take a miracle, but to save as many priests and laity as possible from the downward slide of the SSPX.

Kyrie eleison.