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| St. John Fisher — Sermon Against the Pernicious Doctrine of Martin Luther |
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Posted by: Stone - 5 hours ago - Forum: The Saints
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St. John Fisher — Sermon Against the Pernicious Doctrine of Martin Luther
Bishop John Fisher, preached during the octave of Ascension (1521)
Taken from here.
![[Image: 184.jpg]](https://sensusfidelium.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/03/184.jpg)
"When the Paraclete comes, whom I will send you, the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father, he will bear witness about me" (John 15:26). These words are the words of our Savior Christ Jesus in the gospel of John and read in the service of this present Sunday.
Very often, when the day is clear and the sun is shining bright, there rises in some quarter of the heaven a thick black cloud that darkens all the face of the heaven and shadows from us the clear light of the sun and stirs up a hideous tempest and makes great lightning and thunders terribly, so that weak souls and feeble hearts are made very fearful and almost desperate for lack of comfort.
In like manner it is in the church of Christ. When the light of faith, that shines from the spiritual sun, almighty God, has been clear and bright for a good season, there has arisen many a time some black cloud of heresy and stirred such a tempest and made such lightning and so terribly thundered that many a weak soul has come to grief thereby.
Such a cloud was Arius, who stirred up so great a tempest that for many years thereafter it vexed the church of Christ. And after him came many other similar clouds, such as Macedonius, Nestorius, Eutices, Elvidius, Donatus, Jovinian, Pelagius, John Wycliffe, and many more who severely buffeted the church like tempests, every one of them in his own time. Such heretics St. Jude in his letter calls "clouds without water which are blown about by the wind" (Jude 1:12), that is to say clouds without the moisture of grace, which are moved by the blast of wicked spirits.
And now such another cloud is raised aloft, one Martin Luther, a friar, who has stirred up a mighty storm and tempest in the church and has thrown a shadow over the clear light of many Scriptures of God. And he makes issue from him a perilous lightning, that is to say, a false light of wrong understanding of Scripture which does not come from the Spirit of truth but from the spirit of error and from the spirit of this tempest of this most perilous heresy. Furthermore he terribly thunders against the pope's authority, against the general councils, against the traditions and ordinances left to us by the apostles, against the doctrine of the fathers and doctors of the church.
Our Savior Christ, therefore, foreseeing by his divine providence that many such pestilent clouds and tempests would arise to the great trouble and vexation of his church, out of the tender love and infinite charity which he bears for our mother, Holy Church, promised that after he had ascended to his Father he would send to her the Holy Spirit of God, the Spirit of truth, who would abide with her forever. He would assure her from time to time of every truth to which she and every child of hers, that is to say every true Christian, should give assured faith. Finally, he would be for her in all such storms a true comforter, according to the beginning of this gospel recounted above: "When the Paraclete comes, whom I will send you, the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father, he will bear witness about me." This holy gospel graciously offers to us four excellent instructions against these dangerous tempests of heresies, whenever they happen to arise, but especially against this most pernicious tempest that Martin Luther has now stirred up.
**First Instruction**
The first three instructions, with God's permission and the help of this Holy Spirit, shall undermine three great grounds upon which Martin founds his articles. The fourth shall answer to the defense that is made for him by his adherents, by which many a weak soul is in peril.
But before we begin the exposition of these instructions, we will make our prayer to this Holy Spirit of truth that, in this dangerous storm and perilous tempest, he will make our hearts firm with the testimony of his truth, so that we do not flounder in the Catholic doctrine of our mother, Holy Church, but firmly believe such teachings as have been handed down to us from our Savior Christ Jesus by his apostles and their successors, the holy bishops and fathers and doctors of the church. For this purpose and for the grace necessary for you and for me, every person should pray.
The first instruction is offered to us by these first words of the gospel: "When the Paraclete comes, whom I will send you, the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father." In these words we are promised the Spirit of truth to be our comfort in all doubtful opinions that may arise in Christ's church.
With regard to this instruction, I wish to do three things. First I want to show that the instructions of this holy gospel pertain to the universal church of Christ. Secondly, that the head of the universal church, by divine right, is the pope. Thirdly, that Martin Luther, who is separating himself from this head, does not have in himself the Spirit of truth.
Concerning the first point, Martin Luther cannot deny that this promise is made to the universal church, and we shall hold him to this by his own reasoning. He says in the book "On the Babylonian Captivity": "If we assert that any letter of Paul or any place of any letter does not pertain to the universal church, we take away all Paul's authority."
Now if this is true of the words of St. Paul, it is much more true of the gospels of Christ and of every place written in the same gospels. In the universal church, then, this Holy Spirit of truth dwells and will continue until the world's end. He will abide in the universal church forever and will, in every doubt, teach us the truth.
Now for the second point, in which I said that the pope, by divine right, is the head of the universal church of Christ. When you see a tree standing upright upon the ground and its branches spread abroad, full of leaves and fruit, if the sun is shining brightly, this tree makes a shadow. By this shadow you may perceive a figure of the branches, of the leaves, and of the fruit. Every thing that is in the tree has something that corresponds to it in the shadow. And the reverse is true: every part of the shadow has something corresponding to it in the tree. A person's eye may move from every part of the tree to every part of the shadow or from every part of the shadow to every part of the tree that corresponds to it. Every person may point to any particular part of the shadow and say that this is the shadow of such a branch, and this is the shadow of such a leaf, and this is the shadow of the trunk of the tree, and this is the shadow of the top of the tree.
And so it is that the Law of Moses and the governance of the synagogue of the Jews was only a shadow of the governance of the universal church of Christ. That is what St. Paul says: "The Law had a shadow of the good things to come" (Heb 10:1). And to the Corinthians, he writes: "Everything happened to them as a figure" (1 Cor 10:11).
Now then, to my purpose. In the governance, two heads were appointed, one under the other, Moses and Aaron, to lead that people through the desert to the country that was promised to them. We know that that people of the Jews was a shadow of the Christian people, and that their journey through the desert toward the country promised to them was a shadow of our journey through this wretched world to the country of heaven. But Moses and Aaron, who were the heads of that people, what are they a shadow of? Doubtless, they must be the shadow of Christ and of his vicar, St. Peter, who under Christ was also the head of the Christian people.
*(Bishop Fisher digresses from his instruction to explain how Moses and Aaron both acted as mediators between God and the people. He backs up his interpretation of the Scripture by citing St. Augustine.)*
And here I am citing only one doctor, whose testimony in the scales of any true Christian's heart I think should tip the balance against Martin Luther.
*(Fisher then cites St. Ambrose, St. Gregory, St. Jerome, and St. Cyprian to show that St. Peter is head of the apostles.)*
All these are of the Latin church, holy fathers, all men of great learning, all men of singular holiness, whose virtuous lives are confirmed by miracles done both during their lifetimes and after their deaths. We may also turn to the Greek church.
*(Fisher cites St. John Chrysostom and Origen.)*
For what possible reason could all these many testimonies, both Greeks and Latins, not outweigh one friar? I trust there is no true Christian who will not be moved by the testimony of all these, especially since they are grounded on so clear and evident a figure of the old Law and on so clear a light of the holy gospels...
But now let us return to our instruction. Thus you understand that, in the universal church of Christ, the Spirit of truth remains forever and that the head of this church, the pope, is under Christ. In conclusion, it is evident that the Spirit of Christ is not in Martin Luther. The spirit of every natural body does not give life beyond the members and parts of the same body which is naturally joined to the head. And so likewise must it be in the mystical body of our mother, Holy Church. For since this wretched man has separated himself from the head of this body, namely the vicar of Christ, how can he have in him the Spirit of this body which is the Spirit of truth, especially since he has separated himself with such pride, arrogance and presumption, which is most hateful to this Holy Spirit, and so pitilessly, so presumptuously, so maliciously despised, rejected and torn to shreds the head of Christ's church, to whom, as to his chief spiritual father, because he is a religious, he has vowed and promised obedience? How can this man have in him the Spirit of God, this Holy Spirit of truth?
**Second Instruction**
"He will bear witness about me" (John 15:26). What marvelous power, what wonderful energy is in the beams of the sun which, as we see this time of year, spread over the ground and quicken and bring to life many creatures which before appeared to be dead. Whoever saw in winter the trees when they were withered and their leaves shaken from them and all the moisture shrunk into the root and no beauty of greenness or of life appeared outwardly — if he had had no experience of this matter before, he would think it unlikely that the same trees should revive again and be so beautifully clad with leaves and flowers, as we now see them. And yet this is done by the subtle energy and secret working of the sun's beams spread over the ground.
Nevertheless not every beam of the sun has this power. It is true that the beams of the sun in winter are as bright as they are during this time of year, but that light is so faint and feeble that it gives no life. Otherwise we would have grass and trees growing as well in winter as they do this time of year. The cause of this weakness is that the sun courses so low to the ground that its beams slant over the ground and do not rebound nor double back upon themselves again toward the sun. And this is the cause of this weakness. You see that when a ball is thrown at a slant against a wall, it flies forward and does not rebound backward directly again to the thrower. But when it is thrown directly against a wall with great force, then it directly rebounds again. It is the same with the sun's beams: the closer the sun draws to us now during this time of year, the more directly its beams beat upon the ground and the more directly they rebound and return again toward the sun. And because of the nearness of beam to beam, a greater strength arises in the beam and a fuller light, because every power that is gathered together is stronger.
A single thread is not nearly as strong as a double, nor is a single beam of the sun nearly as mighty as when it is doubled back upon itself by rebounding and reflection. Furthermore, from these two (i.e. the beam from the sun and its reflection) arises a heat and warmth which is the principal worker of life in every creature. Yet we are not sure that any tree is alive until we see it putting forth buds or leaves.
This example, if you perceive it, may lead us to conceive how wonderfully the spiritual sun, almighty God, works by the spiritual and invisible beams of his light spread over the soul of a human being or over the church, both of which are called in Scripture a spiritual earth. "The Lord will give his graciousness, and our earth will yield its fruit" (Ps 84:13). The beams of almighty God, spread over our souls, quicken them and cause this life in us and the fruit of good works. First they cause the light of faith, but this is a very thin light without the rebounding of hope and the heat of charity. Faith without hope is a thin beam with little power. But join to it hope which rebounds up to God again "to what is not seen" (2 Cor 4:18), then it is much stronger than it was before. For now this is doubled back upon itself and gathered more closely into itself and made stronger and mightier than it was before. Before it was like the faith that St. Peter had when Christ bade him come to him upon the water. He believed his Maker, but he had no truly firm hope that he might walk there. He was not strong in his faith, and therefore our Savior said to him: "You of little faith, why did you doubt?" (Matt 14:31). But about the strong faith that has confidence and hope joined to it he says elsewhere: "If you had faith like a mustard seed, you would say to this mountain, Go from here, and it would go" (Matt 17:19). A mustard seed is very small, but it has a great power compact and guarded within it.
So when the beams of faith and hope are joined together in one point, then it has great power. The beams of the sun, when by reflection of a magnifying glass, are gathered together, they are so strong that they will set tinder or cloth on fire. And that is the way it is when the beams of faith and hope are compactly joined and united together. If a person had such a faith and confidence, then he might command a great mountain to move. Nevertheless, if a person had such a faith, yet did not have the heat of charity, he would be just a dead tree. For St. Paul says: "If I have all faith so as to move mountains but do not have charity, I am nothing" (1 Cor 13:2). And therefore St. James says: "Faith without works is dead" (James 2:26).
For this reason, our instruction says: "He will bear witness about me." Of whom? Of Christ. What is Christ? "The true light which enlightens every human being coming into the world" (John 1:9). Who will bear witness or give evidence about this light? The Spirit of God: "Because the charity of God is poured out in our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us" (Rom 5:5). The heat of charity gives evidence that the light is alive. No matter how much light a person has, unless he also has this heat of charity stirring his soul and bringing forth works that are alive, he is only a dead stick and like a tree without life. For as I said, no matter how brightly the natural sun shines upon a tree, if that tree has no greenness in it and does not put forth buds and leaves, that tree is not alive. So when the beams of the spiritual sun are spread over our souls, if we do not feel the heat stirring us to fruitful works, our souls are dead.
But now, what purpose does this instruction serve? It undermines one great ground of Martin Luther, which is that faith alone without works justifies a sinner. Upon this ground he builds many other erroneous articles, especially that the sacraments of Christ's church do not justify; only faith does. This is a dangerous article, which can undermine the whole order of the church.
*(Bishop Fisher refers his hearers to King Henry VIII's work which rebuts Luther's teaching on the sacraments.)*
To support this ground, Luther cites St. Paul in various places saying that a person is justified by his faith without works. Nevertheless St. Augustine says that St. Paul's words were misunderstood in the beginning of the church; that is why, as he says, the other apostles in their letters emphasized the contrary position. But some people here think that Martin Luther has little regard for St. Augustine. And that is true, yet it is foul presumption. Let him at least believe the other apostles whom without manifest heresy he cannot deny. St. James says: "By deeds a person is justified and not by faith alone" (James 2:24). St. James not only says this but proves it in various ways. One is this: "The demons believe and tremble" (James 2:19). No one may say that the demons are justified by their faith. How many people there are who live in horrible sin but who have the faith of Christ Jesus and would rather die than renounce their faith. Despite that, they will not be justified. But if faith alone justified both, then they and the demons would be justified.
The same example that St. Paul uses for the Romans to prove that faith justifies a sinner without works is used by St. James to the contrary. I am referring to the example of Abraham which appears in the same place (in James' letter). But you will say: Sir, are these apostles contrary to each other? To this, St. Augustine says: No, not at all. St. James is contradicting only what might be misconstrued and misinterpreted in St. Paul. For St. Paul means the works that come before faith, and St. James means the works that follow after faith. St. Paul means that the work of circumcision or other works of the Law did not have to go before Abraham's faith in order that he be justified; his faith without works justified him. St. James means the fruitful works that follow after faith and which give evidence of a living faith. These works justify a person, and he says if Abraham had not had these, he would not have been justified. If Abraham had not been ready to offer up his son Isaac at God's command, he would not have been justified. But because he was ready, he says: "Abraham was justified by works" (James 2:21).
Hence, St. James is not speaking against St. Paul but against the misunderstanding and misinterpretation of him. About this misinterpretation, St. Peter also speaks in his letter, saying: "In the letters of our dear brother Paul are some matters which are difficult to understand and which ignorant and unstable people twist, just as they do the other Scriptures, to their own ruin" (2 Pet 3:16). Thus you may see that various other people have misinterpreted St. Paul before this, as now Martin Luther does, to his own peril and damnation.
But on this point I marvel greatly about Martin Luther, especially that he says that in all Scripture there is no more testimony against him but this one place of St. James. Doubtless many more may be cited. First, our Savior in the gospel of Luke says: "Give alms and everything will be clean for you" (Luke 11:41). What is this cleanness but the justifying of our souls which is promised for the work of almsgiving? No matter how much I believe, if I do not relieve the poor in their need, I will not attain this cleanness.
Furthermore in the gospel of Matthew it says: "If you forgive people their offenses, your heavenly Father will forgive you. But if you do not forgive people their offenses, your Father will not forgive you yours" (Matt 6:14). Beyond this, he says in the same gospel: "Not everyone who says to me, Lord, Lord, will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father" (Matt 7:21). Besides these, it says in the same gospel: "Unless your justice is more abundant than that of the scribes and pharisees, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven" (Matt 5:20). In addition, he says: "Everyone who hears these words of mine and does not do them will be like a stupid man who built a house on sand" (Matt 7:26). And St. Paul also says: "It is not hearers of the law but doers who will be justified" (Rom 2:13). And St. James says: "Be doers of the word and not only hearers who deceive yourselves" (James 1:22). And St. Paul says again: "If you live according to the flesh, you will die. If, by the Spirit, you put to death the deeds of the flesh, you will live" (Rom 8:13). And finally, St. Paul sums up his own case and says: "Faith which works through love" (Gal 5:6). In accordance with this, St. James says: "You see that faith was at work in all his works; his faith was made perfect by his works" (James 2:22).
By all these testimonies, you may plainly see that not only faith by itself does not suffice, but love too and works are required for our souls to be justified.
**Third Instruction**
Concerning the third instruction, it follows in the gospel: "You will bear witness because you have been with me from the beginning" (John 15:27). To whom will they bear witness but to the universal church of Christ? Their witness, then, must be allowed of every true Christian.
Concerning these words and the others repeated above, it shall become clear that more testimony than only what is written in the Bible must be admitted in order that authority be sufficient. If we may establish this one thing, it will cast down a great number of Martin Luther's articles.
But for this we must consider the three Persons of whom this gospel has made mention. Though all their works be undivided and be not severed from one another and are joined to one another, yet Scripture assigns three different times to these three Persons, in which they have instructed human beings about the truth which must be believed. First, almighty God the Father instructed our elders by his prophets, as St. Paul says: "In many and various ways God once spoke to our forebears by the prophets" (Heb 1:1). St. Paul means here by "our forebears" the Jews, from whom we are spiritually descended. For Abraham who was their carnal father is also our spiritual father. Now almighty God the Father taught them by his prophets. Even though their prophesies were written in Scripture, yet there were many more things which they spoke which were not written down and which were of as great authority as what was written. The Jewish master calls these matters "cabala," which is handed down from person to person by mouth only and not by writing.
After this, the second Person, the Son of God, our Savior Christ Jesus, was sent by his Father into this world to instruct human beings both by himself and by his apostles who were with him (as the gospel says here) from the beginning. These blessed apostles left to us also many things by word of mouth which are not written in the Bible. St. Paul, who came after them and was not present when Christ said these words to them, makes this clear in the second letter to the Thessalonians: "Stand fast and hold onto the traditions which you have learned, either through word of mouth or through a letter of ours" (2 Thess 2:15). If St. Paul (who came after the other apostles to whom Christ spoke these words) wants to have his traditions observed and kept, both those which he told them by word of mouth as well as those which he wrote with his pen, why shall not likewise the traditions of all the other apostles be of similar strength to bring about faith and to bear witness to the truth?
Here you may see by the explicit writing of St. Paul that we are bound to believe many more things than are written and put in the Bible.
*(Bishop Fisher then quotes the church father, Origen, who says that certain prayer postures and gestures, certain sacramental rites and formulae were handed down by "the great pontiff Christ and by his children, the apostles.")*
Thirdly, the third Person in the Trinity, that is to say the Holy Spirit of truth, was sent from the other Two to abide with us forever. He was sent to be like a comforter continually in Christ's church when the storms and tempests of heresies arise, and against all wavering doubtfulness he was sent to teach us the certain truth in which we should dwell. After the apostles departed from us, the Holy Spirit did and does remain and will remain with us unto the world's end. By whom, I ask you, does he speak to us? By whom does he teach us any truth? By whom else than by the fathers and doctors of the church; by their mouths this Holy Spirit teaches us every truth: "It is not you who speak, but the Spirit of your Father is speaking in you" (Matt 10:20). When St. Basil was baptized, a wonderful light was seen around him which doubtless was a sensible token of the Holy Spirit. And likewise St. Ambrose, while he was interpreting the 43rd psalm, a light was seen above his head that looked like a shield which, little by little, entered into his mouth as a token of the Spirit of God. Hence it is not to be doubted that in such holy bishops and doctors of the church the Holy Spirit speaks.
But this is even more true of councils, when many of them were assembled together. For whenever the storms and tempests of heresies arose, they were at length suppressed and convicted by this Holy Spirit speaking in the mouths of the fathers and doctors of the church, sometimes by general councils and assemblies of many bishops together.
In the council of Nicea were 309 bishops in whom the Holy Spirit spoke to confute a heresy that had been troubling the church. After that, in the council of Constantinople were assembled 150 bishops, and in them the Holy Spirit spoke to destroy another heresy that had arisen in the church. In the council held in Ephesus were assembled 300 bishops in whom the Holy Spirit spoke to confound another heresy that had arisen. And so continually from time to time, whenever these clouds arose and made great tempests and began to flash lightning and show a false light of misinterpretation of the Scriptures, this Holy Spirit was ready by these fathers to inform the universal church about the certain truth.
See then, I say, what we have to confirm those things that are taught us by the church. First, the prophets who were instructed by almighty God the Father, and also their cabala, that is to say, their secret teachings not written in the Bible. Secondly, the apostles, who were instructed by our Savior Christ Jesus, and also their traditions not written in the Bible. Thirdly, the holy fathers and doctors of the church, who were informed by the Holy Spirit of truth, in their expositions of Scripture as well as by their general assemblies and councils held up to now.
If there were a fourth person in this Trinity or another Spirit to be sent to us from almighty God, we might yet be in some doubt whether Martin Luther had met with this Spirit along the road and taken him away from us. But we are assured that there are no more than three Persons in the Godhead of whom this gospel makes mention, and that every one of them has done his best to instruct us about the truth. And furthermore, there is no other Holy Spirit except the Spirit of truth who will abide with us forever and make us certain about every truth.
We may be sure that Martin Luther does not have this Spirit, since he teaches us against the truth that has been taught us by this Spirit. For he cuts away the traditions of the apostles and refuses the general councils and condemns the doctrine of the holy fathers and doctors of the church and labors to subvert all the ordinances of the church, namely the seven sacraments, and takes away the freedom of human will and affirms that everything happens by necessity, contrary to all the doctrine of Christ's church.
We may be sure, therefore, that he has some other wretched spirit, some spirit of error and not the Spirit of truth. St. Paul says: "In the last times some people will depart from the faith and pay attention to spirits of error and to the doctrines of demons" (1 Tim 4:1). Note this word, "depart," for St. Paul says in another place: "The departure will come first" (2 Thess 2:3), that is to say, before the coming of the Antichrist there will be a conspicuous departing from the faith of the church. And it is not unlikely to be caused at this very time by this most dangerous heretic.
Here Martin Luther, because of his shrewd brain, will say some distorted thing against us. He will say that the councils sometimes err and that the doctors very often disagree. And since they err and disagree at one time or in one place, so may they do in another, and therefore he says he is bound to believe none of them at all. To this may be answered that this is not a compelling argument, as we shall see.
The prophets, when left to themselves, deviated from the truth, "for the spirit of prophesy does not always illumine the minds of the prophets." Take the example of King David who intended to build the temple to almighty God. He asked the advice of the prophet Nathan, whether he should carry out his intent or not. And the prophet Nathan told him to go ahead with it and to do all that he intended in his heart. Yet Nathan was deceived; it was not as he had said. Shall we now, because of this mistake, trust no other thing that this prophet Nathan said before this? God forbid! Likewise of the apostles: St. Peter, when he said to Christ: "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God" (Matt 16:16), spoke this by revelation. Here our Savior praised him and said: "Blessed are you Peter, son of Jona" (Matt 16:17). But a little while later he tried to deter our Savior from undergoing his passion and said: "Far be it from you, Lord" (Matt 16:22), and in this he spoke wrongly. Shall we now, because he spoke wrongly this second time, not believe his first statement? That would not be reasonable.
Almighty God allowed the prophets and the apostles to err sometimes so that we might know that they were only human beings. When they spoke the truth, we should know that they had it from God, and when they spoke otherwise than truthfully, that it was coming from themselves. And so likewise I say about the doctors: though they sometimes erred, so that we might know that they were only human beings and that then they were left to themselves, we shall not therefore deny them generally. And the councils also, though some one of the latest councils which perhaps was not assembled in that gentleness and charity which was expedient, and though one of them (something which I will not affirm) was permitted in some article to be mistaken, should we therefore damn all the rest? That would not be reasonable.
**Fourth Instruction**
The fourth and the final instruction takes away the defense that may be laid for Martin Luther by his adherents, which defense also may soon overthrow weak souls when they hear it. Their defense is made up of three points.
First they say that Martin Luther is a man deeply learned in the Scriptures, grounding all his opinions upon them, and that he is a man of religious life and someone who, because of his learning and virtue, has many adherents.
Secondly they say that he has a mind fixed in God and is kept by no one's authority from speaking the truth. So much so that he has excommunicated the pope, because he thinks in his own conscience that those who do not follow his doctrine do not belong to the Catholic Church.
Thirdly, he has a marvelously fervent zeal for God, because of which he labors to convert all the world to his opinion, thinking assuredly that he renders God a special sacrifice and pleasure thereby.
When a weak soul hears this, he or she is immediately in danger of putting faith in it and of mistrusting the doctrine of the church. For who may not think that such a man is on the right path? But the rest of the Gospel that follows answers clearly: "These things I have told you beforehand, so that you may not quail in your faith, for they will put you out of their synagogues, and the time will come that everyone who murders you will think that he is doing great service to God thereby" (John 16:1–2). Some people may teach that these words pertain only to the time of the Jews, who expelled the apostles out of their synagogues, or to the time of the tyrants, who slew many Christian people in the beginning of the church. But if that were true, then these words would be no general instruction for the universal church, something which we concluded against Luther at the beginning of our sermon.
Wherefore these words pertain much more to the time of the heretics. First because this persecution continued longer than the other two, since the persecution by the Jews was soon at an end, and the persecutions by the tyrants ran its course in a season. But the heretics have persecuted the church since Christ's ascension and will do so until the coming of the Antichrist. Furthermore, the persecution by the heretics is and was much more perilous. The Jews and the tyrants were manifest enemies of Christ and abhorred his Scriptures, but these heretics pretend a special favor toward Christ and color all their heresies with his Scriptures. The Jews and the tyrants slew the bodies of Christians, yet they sent these Christians' souls to everlasting glory. But the heretics, by misconstruing the Scriptures of God by their false doctrine and erroneous opinions and pestilential heresies, slay the souls of Christian people and send them to everlasting damnation. Wherefore these words must be understood of the persecution that was made by the heretics.
Now then, O Christian, when you hear that Martin Luther is a man of great learning and is expert in the Scriptures and has a reputation for virtuous living and has many great adherents, think that there have been many such people before him in the church of Christ who by their learning and misinterpretation of the Scriptures have caused great tempests in the church before this time.
How did one great heretic, Arius, tempt the church of Christ with his heresy! How many souls did he murder! Was he not a man of great learning, of singular eloquence, of virtuous life in outward appearance? Were not all his opinions grounded upon Scripture? Did he not in this way deceive many a soul? St. Jerome says: "Arius was a spark in Alexandria, but because it was not quickly extinguished, its flame raged through the whole world." For a long time it vexed the church of Christ and overthrew innumerable souls until finally, by the Holy Spirit of truth, which is the comforter of Christ's church speaking in the mouths of the fathers and doctors of the church, this heresy was convicted and plainly put aside.
*(Bishop Fisher then recalls other heresies, which had buffeted the church.)*
And every one of these heretics grounded his heresy upon Scripture. And many of them were men of keen intelligence and deep learning, of mighty reason and of pretended virtue; they knew just how to twist and distort the Scriptures to make them support their erroneous opinions. Finally their life, learning, and treatment of the Scriptures were such that they had many great adherents and supporters, among the bishops as well as the emperors, and among other Christian princes too, whom they led astray.
Therefore it was necessary that our Savior Christ Jesus, because of his great, inestimable goodness and because of the tender love that he has for his church, should leave instruction and warning to all Christian people and to his universal church about this persecution. That is what he did when he said: "These things I have told you beforehand, so that you may not quail in your faith." What has he told us beforehand? This: that the Spirit of truth will remain in the church forever and that in all such storms and tempests he will be a comforter for us.
O Christians, hear this gracious warning of our Savior Christ. Mark well what he says: I have warned you about these things beforehand, so that when they happen, you will not be overthrown in your souls. It is as though he said: When you see the storms arise, when you behold the thick black clouds overhead that darken the whole face of heaven and shadow over the clear light of the sun and show a false glittering light that issues out of the cloud, from the spirit of the tempest, and when you hear the terrible threats of their thundering, then be confident in your faith; believe as does your mother, Holy Church, with a living faith, and put your trust in the Spirit of truth who will be your comforter until the world's end.
Secondly, when you, O Christian, hear that Martin Luther has a mind fixed on God and is kept by no one's authority from speaking the truth and thinks that all those who do not follow his doctrine are separated from the Catholic Church, so much so that he has excommunicated the pope — what astounding presumption! what intolerable madness! — then know this for certain, that all the other heretics did the same thing. They thought that they and their adherents were the only ones who belonged to the Catholic Church, and they thought that all others who did not follow their opinions were separated from the church.
*(Fisher gives other examples.)*
Nevertheless the church of Christ is but one, holy, catholic, and apostolic. This church is one, having one head, the pope, who is the Vicar of Christ, because of whom it is called "one." And even though there be many sinners in this church, yet because of the holy sacraments that renew and repair sinners daily, and because of the Holy Spirit, who continually remains in it, it is called "holy." And because it is not limited to any one nation but is common to all nations, it is called "catholic," that is to say universal. And finally, because it is derived from the apostles, and especially from the prince of the apostles, Saint Peter, it is called "apostolic."
Only this church is the spouse of Christ; all other things that resemble it that are not of this church are synagogues of Satan and councils of the devil. And therefore Christians should not be surprised that they excommunicate and separate true Christians from their synagogues. For our Savior has given us warning of it beforehand, as it says next in the Gospel: "They will excommunicate you from their synagogues" (John 16:2).
Thirdly, O Christian, when you hear that Martin Luther has so great a zeal for God and thinks in his conscience that he is bound to do what he does and thinks that in so doing he is pleasing God and is doing a special service to God and that he is recommitting to almighty God all the souls, which by his false doctrine he is slaying and murdering — yet nevertheless be strong in your faith and see that in this point our Savior has also warned the church, saying: "But the time is coming when everyone who kills you will think that he is offering service to God" (John 16:2).
*(Fisher recounts how the Arians and Donatists killed not only souls but also bodies.)*
Did not the disciples of Wycliffe do the same, even though for fear of the temporal laws they did not dare to slay anyone? Yet they introduced a bill of articles to the temporal lords in the parliament, urging them to slay their adversaries who resisted them. And what do you suppose Martin Luther and his adherents would do if he had his Holiness, the pope, and his supporters, whom he so often in derision called papistas papastros and papanos and papenses? I fear that he would treat them with no more courtesy than he did their books, that is to say, their decretals which he burned. And so likewise, I fear that he would burn them or any other Christian whom he thought might prevent his opinions from going forward. And yet in so doing he would think that he was doing a great service for God.
Thus may you see that these heretics, even though they were expert in the Scriptures and were people of keen intelligence and profound reason, and also had pretence of virtuous life and had great zeal, thinking in their conscience that they were bound to do as much as they did, yet they were deceived, and they were convicted of erroneous opinions by the holy councils and the fathers of the church.
And why may not likewise Martin Luther be deceived, as they all were before him, especially since he lacks the Spirit of truth, which they all lacked? For if they had the Spirit of truth, they would not have erred in misinterpreting the Scriptures. I attest that they were expert in the Scriptures and could turn the Scriptures around marvelously to suit their purpose and frame them cursedly to their opinions. But for lack of the Spirit of truth, they misconstrued these Scriptures. As St. Peter says, they perverted, or as St. Paul says, inverted, that is, turned the Scriptures wrong side out, following their own brain and imagination, led by the spirit of error and ignorance, as it says next: "They will do all these things to you because they have not known either the Father or me" (John 16:3). If they had had the Spirit of truth, this Spirit would have led them to the true knowledge of the Father and of the Son, that is to say, to the true knowledge of the prophets by whom almighty God the Father spoke, and to the true knowledge also of the apostles, by whom the Son, our Savior Christ Jesus, spoke. But because they did not have this Spirit of truth which was sent from the Father and from the Son, they were ignorant of them both, and by that ignorance they fell into these errors. And so likewise has Martin Luther now done.
Now then, here I make an end. I have reminded you, as I promised, of four instructions that are offered to us in this gospel. The first instruction showed that the Holy Spirit, who is the third Person in the divinity, was sent from the Father almighty God and from his Son, our Savior Christ Jesus, to be the Spirit of truth, residing forever in the church of Christ, and to be as a comforter from time to time against all storms and tempests of heresies, making us certain, in time of doubt, about the truth to which we are to hold fast.
By this instruction, I showed three things. First, that this instruction and the whole Gospel pertains to the universal church of Christ, something I proved by Luther's own words. Second, that the head of this universal church is the pope under Christ, which one point takes away one great basis of Martin Luther and shakes severely many of his erroneous articles. Third, that Martin Luther, by separating himself from the head of this body, cannot have in him this Spirit of truth.
In the second instruction, I showed that the heat of charity spread in our hearts by the Holy Spirit of God gives evidence of the lively light of faith shining upon our souls from our Savior Christ. By this instruction, another great ground of Martin Luther was undermined, namely that only faith justifies a sinner, without works.
In the third instruction I showed that the teachings left to the church by the holy apostles transmit to us testimony of the faith of Christ and what things we are to believe in his church. This instruction also dissolved another ground of Martin Luther, who admits of no other testimony than what is written in Scripture. Against him, I proved that he must receive, besides the written Scriptures, also the unwritten traditions of the apostles, in addition the general councils, in which the Holy Spirit spoke, and the interpretations of Scripture made by the holy bishops and doctors of the church, by whose mouths the third Person in the Godhead, the Spirit of truth, spoke and speaks, informing the church for this time as did the Father almighty God by his prophets before and as did the Son, the second Person, by his apostles.
In the fourth instruction I showed you that the defense which is made for Martin Luther by his adherents, whereby many weak souls are overthrown, is clearly taken away by the most loving and most gracious forewarning of our Savior Christ, as you have heard at the end of the gospel. And yet again, in his most excellent charity, he warns all his Christian people, saying and repeating: "These things I have told you, so that when their hour comes, you may remember that I told you them" (John 16:4). Anyone who is thus often warned and yet gives faith to Martin Luther or any other such heretic rather than to Christ Jesus and to the Spirit of truth who stays with the church of Christ unto the world's end, with the special purpose of informing us of the truth, such a person goes far off the straight way and will surely never enter into the port of everlasting rest, which we all desire and long to come into. To this port may he bring us, who with the Father and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns, God, for ever and ever. Amen.
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| Leo XIV adopts Francis’ ecological language in ‘Care of Creation’ message |
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Posted by: Stone - 08-21-2026, 10:39 AM - Forum: Pope Leo XIV
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Leo XIV adopts Francis’ ecological language in ‘Care of Creation’ message
Leo XIV's message for the World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation continues Pope Francis' environmental framework, linking war to ‘ecological degradation.’
![[Image: GettyImages-2270389641.jpg]](https://www.lifesitenews.com/wp-content/uploads/2026/04/GettyImages-2270389641.jpg)
Pope Leo XIV
Antonio Masiello/Getty Images
Aug 21, 2026
(LifeSiteNews) — Pope Leo XIV has called the faithful to “an authentic ecological conversion” in his message for the 2026 World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation.
On Thursday, the Holy See Press Office released Leo XIV’s message for the 11th World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation, to be observed on September 1 under the theme, “They shall beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks,” from Isaiah 2:4.
In his message, dated August 15 and published August 20, the Pope links war, poverty, and “ecological degradation,” arguing that “where hearts are renewed, new possibilities begin to open.” This renewal, according to Leo, is “the path of an authentic ecological conversion” – echoing core “green” agenda themes of the Francis pontificate, particularly those articulated in his 2015 encyclical Laudato Si’.
“Let us imagine a world in which the energies currently invested in war are directed toward integral human development, to overcoming poverty, protecting human dignity and reconciling divided peoples. Such a vision reflects faith in the coming of God’s Kingdom,” Leo wrote.
The Pope’s message presents war and “social and ecological destruction” as interconnected manifestations of a deeper disorder. “Moreover, the interaction between armed conflicts and environmental degradation often creates a vicious cycle, which destroys ecosystems, contaminates essential resources, such as air and water, and undermines food security. This fuels poverty, inequality, and new social tensions that can contribute to the emergence of further conflicts,” the Pope wrote.
Leo locates the root of these problems within “the human heart.” Referring to [Vatican II's] Gaudium et spes, he describes “violence, injustice, and ecological degradation” as symptoms of “the deeper dichotomy that is rooted in humanity itself.”
“The wounds of war and the degradation of the earth, then, are profoundly linked to the condition of the human heart.… In order to build a peaceful society, therefore, we must not only reform structures but also renew our hearts. The deep-set causes of conflict and the exploitation of creation stem from an ethical and cultural crisis, including the loss of a sense of limits, the desire for domination, the pursuit of immediate profit, and the inability to recognize the God-given dignity of each human person,” the Pope stated.
According to Traditional Catholic teaching, true peace is not simply the result of political negotiation or social compromise but the fruit of conversion to the Social Kingship of Jesus Christ, that is, to the Catholic faith. “When once men recognize, both in private and in public life, that Christ is King, society will at last receive the great blessings of real liberty, well-ordered discipline, peace and harmony,” Pope Pius XI taught (Quas Primas, n. 19).
In Catholic theology, every human activity – political, economic, or spiritual – finds its meaning only when it acknowledges Christ’s sovereignty over individuals and nations. Without this conversion, all human projects, however noble, remain fragile and ultimately doomed to fail, because they attempt to build peace apart from the Prince of Peace Himself.
Additionally, Traditional social doctrine teaches that disorder within creation is not merely the result of human-driven pollution or capitalist economics, but of the deeper wound of original sin. As St. Paul writes, “the whole creation has been groaning in travail together until now” (Romans 8:22).
Leo XIV’s message explicitly adopts modern ecological terminology strongly associated with the pontificate of Francis, citing Laudato Si’ and describing several “ecosystems” that Christians are called to safeguard: creation, human relationships, and “the human heart itself.”
The World Day of Prayer for the Care of Creation was first established in 1989 by Ecumenical Patriarch Dimitrios I of Constantinople, who invited Christians to dedicate September 1 to prayer and reflection on the environment. The initiative also draws on Jewish creation theology, as stated on the official page of the initiative.
Pope Francis extended the observance to the Catholic Church in 2015, framing it within the vision of the encyclical Laudato Si’ and calling believers to “ecological conversion.”
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| Holy Mass in New Hampshire - August 23, 2026 |
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Posted by: Stone - 08-21-2026, 08:13 AM - Forum: August 2026
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Holy Sacrifice of the Mass - Thirteenth Sunday after Pentecost
Date: Sunday, August 23, 2026
Time: Confessions - 10:00 AM
Holy Mass - 10:30 AM
Location: The Oratory of the Sorrowful Heart of Mary
66 Gove's Lane
Wentworth, NH 03282
Contact: 315-391-7575
sorrowfulheartofmaryoratory@gmail.com
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| The Recusant - Worlds Apart: Forty Years, Two SSPXs |
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Posted by: Stone - 08-20-2026, 09:22 AM - Forum: The New-Conciliar SSPX
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The following is taken from The Recusant - Issue #66 [Summer 2026]
Worlds Apart: Forty Years, Two SSPXs
In the late spring of 2026, in the run-up to the SSPX's episcopal consecrations, there appeared on one of the SSPX's youtube channels the first video of three, the second and third appearing during May and June at intervals of a few weeks. We will focus on the first one, entitled: Traditio Part 1: Becoming a Priest. It is clearly meant to be a sort of pro-SSPX propaganda effort aimed at outsiders, presenting in as sympathetic a light as possible the SSPX apostolate. As its title suggests, the first video focusses on seminarians and their journey to the priesthood, culminating in the day of their ordination.
The video as a whole is typical of what we have come to expect from the modern, toothless, inoffensive SSPX. And yet, although its defects are obvious to us, there will no doubt be many who don't remember the old SSPX, for whom they are anything but obvious. In cases such as these, a direct comparison can often be a useful aid. Was the SSPX of yore really so very different to the SSPX of today? Well, as luck would have it, forty years earlier, back in 1986, the SSPX made exactly the same sort of video. It was filmed at the SSPX's USA seminary, in those days located at Ridgefield, Connecticut. The content of each of these two video presentations is superficially very similar: they each focus on seminary life, the seminarians themselves, what it means to become a priest, and so forth. But there the similarity ends. The contrast in both style and content could not be more clear and the reader might just as well pause reading and watch the first five minutes of each video to see for himself:
The old SSPX: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6TtyDeSYB84&t=13s
The new SSPX: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V9UQYkXffG0
And what a contrast it is! Behold, the SSPX pre- and post-Archbishop Lefebvre. The most obvious difference between the two, the difference which immediately strikes the viewer, is of course the production quality. The 1986 film looks like it was shot on a primitive VHS camcorder; the sound is fuzzy and wobbly, so is the picture, the colours fade and return, the picture is occasionally unclear. A quality so poor it warms the cockles of the heart! The 2026 production value is, by contrast, like a modern Hollywood film. But that is by the by: perhaps forty years of technology is enough to explain it — what matters most is the content.
Every word in the 2026 video is there for a reason. The speech of the various interviewees is careful and calculated, there is very obviously a script and there has clearly been a lot of careful editing. The 1986 video, by contrast, seems to have been shot on the hoof, somebody just pitched up with a camera, pointed it at any seminarians who were passing by and recorded whatever happened to come out of each man's mouth!
In the SSPX's 2026 presentation, everything feels holy, everything is aesthetically pleasing, everything looks comfortable and beautiful and impressive. The 1986 film is a lesson in what the SSPX used to look and feel like, however. Everything is poor, with a make-do-and-mend feel, where material wealth and impressive external appearances are clearly not a priority. For instance, the seminary chapel in Ridgefield has a low ceiling and the altar is almost round the corner from some of the pews: clearly a converted room and the best they could do at that time. The 2026 video is unable to show viewers the seminary chapel because, despite the new seminary having been built a decade or more ago, the chapel is the only part which is still not finished. The viewer is therefore given a view of the seminary buildings with the open fourth side of the cloister, and then later on a shot of the model showing what it will look like when finished.
And it is not just a question of architecture and nice buildings. The SSPX's 2026 film seems to focus a great deal on the beauty of the liturgy. The premise appears to be that the truth needs to be presented and the Church spoken about as though it were still the 1950s, and the condemnation of error is a mere optional extra. There are lots of shots of priests wearing beautiful vestments, inside beautiful churches. In the 1986 presentation by contrast, everything is a lot more rough-and-ready but the crisis in the Church, the errors of Vatican II and the apostasy of the conciliar modernists is placed front and centre from the very start and is presented as being the reason why the SSPX exists. To give just one very obvious and easy to understand example, let us take a look at the opening words in each video:
Opening Lines
2026 SSPX:
"Modern man is bombarded constantly with new information…"
1986 SSPX:
"The smoke of Satan has entered the bosom of the Church…"
Those opening lines provide a pretty good summary of each and the difference between the two. But just in case anyone is not convinced, let us look a little closer.
The Content: A New and Inoffensive SSPX
Both films have seminarians speaking to the camera right from the start and at regular intervals throughout, as well as interviews with priests and commentary from a narrator. That is where the similarity ends. What does each one say? Well, the 1986 SSPX video is exactly as it should be, it is what one used to expect. It says that there is a crisis in the Church, that Vatican II itself is to blame due to its errors, that the problem is not merely abuses or interpretations of Vatican II, that there is a war going on and that the SSPX is on the front line sending priests into battle against the evil modern world and its ally, the conciliar church.
The 2026 SSPX video is very different. Let us break it down. A brief "Introduction" section is followed by four segments each given the title of one of the SSPX's seminaries (in order: "Écône Switzerland," "Dillwyn USA," "La Reja Argentina" and "Zaitskofen Germany") with footage from each of the respective seminaries in the background. The content of the last three is rather boring: "Dillwyn" talks about the seminary academic curriculum, "La Reja" talks about the daily timetable and "Zaitskofen" talks about the minor and major orders which lead to the priesthood.
The main problem with these three segments (as with the video as a whole) is what they don't say, what they pointedly avoid saying, no matter how badly it needs to be said. It's all so inoffensive that it includes nothing that a Fraternity of St. Peter seminarian couldn't also say. There is no hint of a crisis in the Church, no mention of the New Mass, modernism, etc. The introduction segment is equally inoffensive, and contains this little gem from a seminarian about what led him to Écône:
Quote:[08:20] "...I had always been drawn by the liturgy. Even though I very much liked what I was doing, I felt that something was missing. And it was this love of the liturgy which led me to knock at the door of the seminary."
It is true that many people were initially drawn to Tradition through the liturgy. But usually they quickly discover that it is about more than just the liturgy. The speaker is about to be ordained after almost six years at Écône, yet he doesn't say anything (or if he did, it was edited out!) about modernism, the errors of Vatican II, or even the crisis in the Church, when explaining his decision to become an SSPX priest. This gives the impression that today's SSPX is not much different to the various "Indult"/"TLM" groups approved by Rome: it's all about the beauty of the liturgy, in other words. This is unfortunate, since it reinforces what many of us have been saying about the SSPX for a while. It would be nice to be proved wrong for once!
The problem of Archbishop Lefebvre...
The first segment following the introduction ("Écône, Switzerland") is where they have front-loaded all of the "crisis in the Church" talk, because it is where they talk about Archbishop Lefebvre. Therefore they have, it seems, killed two birds with one stone. They get to tick the box so that no one can claim that they haven't mentioned the crisis or Vatican II at all, and they also get to tie it all to their long-dead founder as though it is all a historical footnote and nothing more, almost a personal issue which he had and which died with him. Then, after spending all of twelve minutes talking mostly about what a nice, spiritual man he was, they can then move on and spend the remaining fifty-odd minutes (out of seventy-five) talking as though there is no crisis in the Church.
And what they manage to say about Archbishop Lefebvre is without doubt the most insidious and misleading part of the entire video and is worth looking at more closely. What is wrong with it? Several things. So far as we can see:
1. By framing it as a historical footnote they mislead the unsuspecting viewer into thinking that this was "then but not now" or possibly "Archbishop Lefebvre but not us." That was a '60s and '70s thing, in other words — there's no hint of the same problems being even worse today!
2. They completely misrepresent the Archbishop's attitude regarding modern Rome.
3. They ignore the many things Archbishop Lefebvre said which condemn their own behaviour today and which show just how unfaithful to him they have been.
4. They leave the viewer with an overall impression of the Archbishop which is totally misleading and as inoffensive as possible, a caricature in other words. He was just a smiling old man who sat in his rocking chair handing out Werther's Originals to his little grandchildren — not the hard-as-nails Traditionalist who really existed!
Let us take a look and you can see for yourself.
Quote:[14:45] "Many had realised in the 1960s and '70s that the Church was entering a period of profound crisis. But no one had, like Archbishop Lefebvre, this particular grace, this supernatural foresight to understand deeply what the causes were and above all, to offer appropriate remedies."
This is followed immediately by the figures "1969" flashed up on the screen in very large font, as though to signal that this is all a historical issue.
So the Church was entering a profound crisis in the late-'60s and 1970s? What happened next, did the crisis pass? What did he do in the 1980s? What was the solution which he bequeathed to the SSPX by the time he died in 1991? No mention. And it is all very well saying that the Archbishop knew the answer, etc. — what was or is that answer, exactly? Again, no further details are given. This is just a '60s and '70s thing, clearly.
Quote:[16:50] "There was never, absolutely never, any idea of separating from the Church."
This is so misleading and such a misrepresentation of Archbishop Lefebvre that we will allow him to refute it in his own words:
Quote:"Such things are easy to say. To stay inside the Church, or to put oneself inside the Church — what does that mean? Firstly, what Church are we talking about? If you mean the conciliar church, then we who have struggled against the Council for twenty years because we want the Catholic Church, we would have to re-enter this conciliar church in order, supposedly, to make it Catholic. That is a complete illusion. It is not the subjects that make the superiors, but the superiors who make the subjects." ('One Year After the Consecrations' — Fideliter, July-Aug 1989)
Look at that! "The conciliar church" — when was the last time you heard that phrase from the SSPX? Here is the Archbishop again:
Quote:"Far from us be this miserable thought of separating ourselves from Rome! On the contrary, it is in order to manifest our attachment to Rome that we are performing this ceremony. It is in order to manifest our attachment to the Eternal Rome, to the Pope, and to all those who have preceded these last Popes who, unfortunately since the Second Vatican Council, have thought it their duty to adhere to grievous errors which are demolishing the Church and the Catholic Priesthood." (Consecrations Sermon, 30th June 1988)
Like the conciliar church, one no longer hears about "Eternal Rome" — again this is because the 2026 SSPX no longer distinguishes. Indeed, even concerning Vatican II, we are told:
Quote:[17:00] "Most certainly there was a reaction, a reaction against modern ideas or rather against errors, errors already condemned by the Church, which were making their way in a little before the Council but which crystalised at the time of the Council and then especially afterwards, much more clearly, in the reforms made in the name of the Council."
Got it? So there were these unspecified "errors," already there before the Council, which (coincidentally!) became worse during the very time when Vatican II took place and afterwards. Well, well! Might there be some sort of causal link? Don't expect to find an answer to that question in this video! Secondly, why not say what the errors are (or were?) — why this coyness about naming them? Religious Liberty, Ecumenism, Collegiality, the New Mass. There, I just named the main ones — it's not hard.
Lastly, notice how the errors got worse especially afterwards because of what was done "in the name of the Council." What a loaded phrase that is: it clearly implies that Vatican II was used as an excuse by unscrupulous men who took its name in vain. It wasn't really the Council's fault, in other words. Which, come to think of it, is exactly what indultists and "conservatives" have been claiming for years; Bishop Fellay too, in his infamous May 2012 CNS interview. One need hardly add that this is very much at odds with what Archbishop Lefebvre maintained, and the old SSPX too — as we shall soon see.
What about the impression of Archbishop Lefebvre which the viewer is left with? Judge for yourself:
Quote:[18:20] "I was ordained by Archbishop Lefebvre and had the great privilege of having had him throughout my seminary years and even having had him as a professor in the first year. The Archbishop taught us the acts of the Magisterium, so the encyclicals of the Popes, and made us love the Church."
Again, "the Church" — no distinction. I'm pretty sure he would have taught you to hate the conciliar church every bit as much as he taught you to love the Catholic Church of Tradition!
Quote:[18:45] "He was very fatherlike in the seminary. … [19:40] A man who was an ambassador for the Holy See, he never refused to go to Rome, even in all the difficulties which he undertook."
That last remark, made by an elderly Fr. Hogan, is factually untrue and the video's editors ought to have been more on the ball. Firstly, Archbishop Lefebvre was an ambassador for the Holy See, not to the Holy See. More importantly, it is not true that "he never refused to go to Rome, even in all the difficulties…" — as though he was at the beck and call of the modernists to the day he died. What a disservice this does to the memory of Archbishop Lefebvre!
The real Archbishop Lefebvre refutes his own caricature!
So what in fact was the Archbishop's attitude towards Rome from 1988 onwards? Did he continue to dialogue with them right up to the end of his life? As before, he is so clear that unlike the modern SSPX we can afford to let him speak for himself:
Quote:"It's over. The talks between Rome and ourselves are over. The more one thinks about it, the more one realizes their intentions are not good. ... Rome wants everything to go Vatican II, while they leave us a little bit of Tradition. … But there is no point in such meetings. It has all been talked out long ago." (Letter to the four bishops-elect, 12th June 1988)
"Yesterday evening, a visitor came, sent from the Nunciature in Berne, with an envelope containing an appeal from our Holy Father the Pope, who was putting at my disposal a car which was supposed to take me to Rome… I leave you to judge for yourselves the timeliness and wisdom of such a request." (Consecrations Sermon, 30th June 1988)
"We do not have the same outlook on a reconciliation. Cardinal Ratzinger sees it as reducing us, bringing us back to Vatican II. We see it as a return of Rome to Tradition. We don't agree; it is a dialogue of the deaf. I can't speak much of the future, mine is behind me, but if I live a little while, supposing that Rome calls for a renewed dialogue, then, I will put conditions. I shall not accept being in the position where I was put during the dialogue. No more. I will place the discussion at the doctrinal level. … If you do not accept the doctrine of your predecessors, it is useless to talk!" (Fideliter 66, Nov.-Dec. 1988)
"Humanly speaking, there is no chance of any agreement between Rome and ourselves at the moment. … However, one day they will be obliged to recognize that the Society represents a spiritual force and a strength of the Faith which is irreplaceable and which they will have, I hope, the joy and the satisfaction to make use of, but when they have come back to their Traditional Faith." (Conference to priests and seminarians, Écône, 6th Sept. 1990)
"Since the episcopal consecrations there has been no more contact with Rome … It is absolutely impossible in the current climate of Rome which is becoming worse. We must not delude ourselves. The principles which now guide the conciliar church are more and more overtly contrary to Catholic doctrine. … All the false ideas of the Council continue to develop, to be reaffirmed with ever greater clarity. They are hiding less and less. It is absolutely inconceivable that we can agree to work with such a hierarchy. … We are dealing with people who have a different philosophy to ours, a different way of seeing, who are influenced by all modern subjectivist philosophers. For them there is no fixed truth, there is no dogma. Everything is evolving. That is a totally Masonic concept. This is really the destruction of the Faith." (Fideliter 79, Jan.-Feb. 1991)
That was after June 1988 — on the other hand, prior to June 1988, while communications were still open with Rome, what was the reason and the spirit in which he "went to Rome" (to use Fr. Hogan's expression)? Once again, we will let him speak for himself:
Quote:"We have done all we could, trying to help Rome to understand that they had to come back to the attitudes of the holy Pius XII and of all his predecessors. Bishop de Castro Mayer and myself have gone to Rome, we have spoken, we have sent letters, several times to Rome. We have tried by these talks, by all these means, to succeed in making Rome understand that, since the Council and since aggiornamento, this change which has occurred in the Church is not Catholic, is not in conformity to the doctrine of all times. This ecumenism and all these errors, this collegiality — all this is contrary to the Faith of the Church and is in the process of destroying the Church… 'And why Archbishop have you stopped these discussions which seemed to have had a certain degree of success?' [Because] it is clear that the only truth that exists today for the Vatican is the conciliar truth, the spirit of the Council, the spirit of Assisi. That is the truth of today. But we will have nothing to do with this for anything in the world! That is why, taking into account the strong will of the present Roman authorities to reduce Tradition to naught, to gather the world to the spirit of Vatican II and the spirit of Assisi, we have preferred to withdraw ourselves and to say that we could not continue. It was not possible. […] I think it is my duty to provide the means of doing that which I shall call 'Operation Survival,' operation survival for Tradition. Today, this day, is Operation Survival. If I had made this deal with Rome, by continuing with the agreements we had signed and putting them into practice, I would have performed 'Operation Suicide.' There was no choice, we must live!" (Consecrations Sermon, 30th June 1988)
"'For myself, personally,' I said, 'I have no confidence in them. For years and years I have been mixing with these people and for years I have been seeing the way in which they act. I have no further confidence in them. However, I do not wish people within the Society and Traditional circles to be able to say afterwards: You could easily have tried, it would have cost you nothing to enter into discussion and dialogue.' That was the opinion of the Superior General and his assistants. They said, 'You must take into consideration the offer which is being made and not neglect it. It's still worthwhile to talk with them.' … Very soon, however, we realized that we were dealing with people who are not honest. … I nevertheless went to Rome for the conversations, but without any confidence in their success. … I wished to go as far as possible in order to show what good will we had." ('One Year After the Consecrations' Fideliter, July-Aug. 1989)
"For fifteen years we dialogued to try to put Tradition back in its place of honour, in that place in the Church which it has by right. We ran up against a continual refusal. … Our true faithful, those who have understood the problem and who have precisely helped us to continue along the straight and firm path of Tradition and the Faith, were afraid of the approaches I made towards Rome. They told me it was dangerous and that I was wasting my time. Yes, of course, I hoped until the last minute that in Rome we would witness a little bit of loyalty. I cannot be blamed for not having done the maximum." (Fideliter 79, Jan.-Feb. 1991)
Other Evidence of Softening
There were some other clangers which we spotted — there may be more. For instance, whereas the SSPX used to be an implacable opponent of the evil modern world, the 2026 SSPX seems to treat it with kid gloves. The one and only time that this comes up is when the Superior General, Fr. Davide Pagliarani, says that the problem with the modern world is that it gives people too much information which distracts them.
Quote:[11:45] "Certainly for a young man of today it is more difficult to perceive this call [to the priesthood] because a young man today is a child of today's society which has immersed him in a world of continual information, stifling, at least in part, his capacity to take a step back, to distance himself and to reflect deeply..."
And then there is a subtle but telling bit about the formation of priests and what kind of a man the SSPX are looking for. At around 11 minutes (at the start of the "Écône, Switzerland" segment) the rector of Écône, Fr. Bernard de Lacoste, tells us that, in addition to virtue and good health, he considers "SSPX priest material" to be a young man who has:
Quote:"...aptitudes which are of a psychological order: to be balanced, to have common sense, because the priest must enlighten people, give them good advice, show them the way to heaven."
Now obviously there is a sense in which this is true: nobody wants a priest who is a raving lunatic or a paranoid schizophrenic! But "balanced" — really?! The whole world is going to hell in a handcart, the "balance" throughout the whole world is tipped so heavily in favour of Christ's enemies that speaking the truth is progressively being made illegal, it is increasingly difficult for a good man to find and hold onto honest employment and it is almost impossible for parents to protect their children's innocence and shield them from immorality, perversion and degeneracy of all kinds. And you're worried about being "balanced"? Perhaps a little more of the crusader spirit is what's needed, or the spirit of the martyrs (how "balanced" were they?!). Or is it perhaps just me? I leave you to make up your own mind.
When it comes to the curriculum, the 1986 video says that the seminarians spend two years of philosophy studying St Thomas Aquinas, "...whom St. Pius X called 'the antidote for modernism'." In the 2026 video, however, (then-) Fr. Goldade describes those two years as: "The study of psychology, cosmology, logic, metaphysics." [27:30] Metaphysics is presumably their study of the Summa. Logic, OK, yes, but psychology? And the cosmology will almost certainly be Fr. Robinson's view of how Genesis has misled everyone and creation is really billions of years old. One need hardly add that that too is a serious change since 1986.
No Longer Resisting the Conciliar Church?
All this pales into insignificance, however, when compared to the fact that the conciliar church is no longer considered something distinct from the Catholic Church. And yet the Archbishop was consistent in his rejection of the conciliar church:
Quote:"I remark, first of all, that the expression 'conciliar church' comes not from me but from Mgr. Benelli who, in an official letter, asked that our priests and seminarians should submit themselves to the 'conciliar church.'" (Conference on 11th Jan., 1979)
"It is easy to think that whoever opposes the Council and its new Gospel would be considered as excommunicated, as outside communion with the Church. But one may well ask them: communion with what Church? They would answer, no doubt, with the conciliar church." (I Accuse the Council, p.xiii)
"This talk about the 'visible Church' on the part of Dom Gerard and Mr. Madiran is childish. It is incredible that anyone can talk of the 'visible Church' meaning the conciliar church as opposed to the Catholic Church which we are trying to represent and continue." ('One Year After the Consecrations' Fideliter, July-Aug. 1989)
In 1990 he wrote to Bishop de Castro Mayer that:
Quote:"...the conciliar church, having now reached everywhere, is spreading errors contrary to the Catholic Faith and, as a result of these errors, it has corrupted the sources of grace, which are the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass and the Sacraments. This false church is in an ever-deeper state of rupture with the Catholic Church."
And in a similar vein, in the preface to his 1990 book Spiritual Journey, he declares that:
Quote:"It is the strict duty of every priest [and layman! — Ed.] wishing to remain Catholic to separate himself clearly from the conciliar church, for so long as it does not profess the tradition of the Church's Magisterium and of the Catholic Faith."
One can search the 2026 SSPX in vain for any hint of recognition that the conciliar church even exists. And how can they fight against what they no longer believe exists? They can't.
And What About the SSPX of 1986?
We have quoted the man himself at some length — what about the old SSPX? After the 1988 consecrations, the leading SSPX priests wrote to Rome asking to be excommunicated too:
Quote:"We have never wished to belong to this system which calls itself the conciliar church, and defines itself with the Novus Ordo Missae, an ecumenism which leads to indifferentism and the secularisation of all society."
What a difference to the modern SSPX! And yes, in case you were wondering, the 1986 video A Sign of Hope represents that old SSPX fairly accurately. Not only do they say several things which the modern SSPX wouldn't be caught dead saying, but the overall focus is just different. You really need to watch the whole video to see exactly what I mean, but in the meantime here are a few choice extracts to try to illustrate the point:
Quote:[1:40] "The Curé of Ars showed us that it isn't many priests that we need, but just a few good ones, a few faithful, devoted priests. He was told, the Curé of Ars, by the devil when he saw him one time that if there were two other priests like him, the whole world would fall out of the devil's dominion. And there were just twelve Apostles to begin with."
[3:45] "I came to see more and more that even in Rome the teaching of the Church really isn't taught any more. …well for example, about the Gospels, that the Gospels aren't historical, that there are things there that were written just by the evangelists themselves, putting words into Our Lord's mouth that He didn't really say. … I started to look at the other side of it and see that the real explanation for the confusion, for the crisis in the Church today, is Vatican II itself, it's not abuses of Vatican II. [Narrator:] This is the reason for the founding of the Society of St Pius X…"
[4:50] [Archbishop Lefebvre:] "We cannot accept this ecumenism, bad ecumenism, false ecumenism, with Jews, with all religions, with Protestants. That is a scandal, a great scandal for our faith, for the faith of the faithful. That is a great mystery, but we cannot accept that. We must remain true Catholics, faithful to Our Lord Jesus Christ."
[7:20] "Bishop de Castro Mayer, bishop emeritus of Campos Brazil, is the only bishop who dared to speak out with Archbishop Lefebvre in opposition to the errors of Vatican II and its humanistic and ecumenical spirit."
[11:45] "In the army they call it bootcamp. If you want to make a soldier, you've got to put him through some training. And the priest is a soldier of Christ so he's got to be trained and trained properly. Otherwise he's just not going to be able to take the heat of the action. He's going to get out there at the front and the bullets are going to start flying…"
[14:50] "[The seminarians study] two years of philosophy…according to the principles of St. Thomas Aquinas, whom St. Pius X called 'the antidote for modernism.'"
[16:00] "In the name of Ecumenism, Catholics will refuse to honour Our Lady because it's not ecumenical, because it offends the Protestants. In the name of Ecumenism the Catholics will undo the sacrifice of the Mass because the Protestants don't like the notion of a sacrificial Mass, etc, etc. So in the name of Ecumenism you undo everything that's properly and distinctly Catholic and you reduce Catholicism down to the level of a common mish-mash. Which is exactly what all the other religions are doing, preparing the great one-world religion. As which Pope said in which encyclical? … St. Pius X said in his document on the Sillon, that's right."
[22:30] "The American bishops are going the way of the modern church and the modern church is going the way of the world, it's joined the world and it's abandoned our Lord Jesus Christ. … In the modern seminaries [the priest] is a kind of glorified social worker."
[24:25] "Archbishop Lefebvre has said that he could not form priests with the New Mass and I can see exactly what he means because…in the New Mass there's no notion really that it's a sacrifice."
[25:05] "Before I entered St. Thomas Aquinas seminary I spent a year in [a Novus Ordo] seminary, I stayed there for one year and the conduct of the priests and seminarians was totally different than here. Here everything's composed in a Catholic manner. When I was in the seminary the priests mostly were called by their first names by the seminarians. … In the day-to-day life there was no silence … I was told to see a psychiatrist because my religious beliefs weren't according to their standards. They felt we had to just go along with the modern world and the modern way of thinking. My rector told me he tried for a whole year to change my religious beliefs and was not able to ... I was like a Catholic going to a Protestant seminary."
[31:25] "They may not deny it explicitly but in the teaching that you get [in a Novus Ordo seminary] you're not taught that you're offering sacrifice to God. That's not taught at all, whereas here it is and that's the difference. … In Rome the new priests [often have] bitterness and cynicism because they don't have the sacrifice of the Mass."
[37:23] "[Families need] firstly to have many children. Large families are the normal seedbed of vocations because in large families the children are usually less selfish than in small families, they have to be. When the three boys are sleeping one on top of the other in bunks, you know, the bottom one can't rock all three or the other two will jump on him … pray the rosary in the home in the family every night. Mothers should pray for vocations and dedicate their children to the Mother of God when they're born."
[38:45] "[The conciliar church] is rotten, rotten to the core. … They're building their new church on sand and it's falling already it's falling severely. The Church is built on the rock, Christ is the rock and Christ gave us His Church which is Tradition. … If it's not built on that Tradition it'll fall, and it's falling. In America, in Australia, surely in the rest of the world, it's falling."
[40:25] "I wrote home to someone and said that Ridgefield is like a haven of holiness in a cesspool of sin. Because it's dreadful outside, beyond those walls, those gates, it's dreadful."
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| The Recusant: Two Very Different Responses to SSPX Communications |
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Posted by: Stone - 08-20-2026, 09:03 AM - Forum: The New-Conciliar SSPX
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The following is taken from The Recusant - Issue 66 [Summer 2026]:
In 2026, modernist Rome really hasn't changed. They at least are consistent. The day after the SSPX consecrations they issued a decree that everyone is excommunicated and schismatic, just like they did in 1988. The following day Fr. Pagliarani sent an open letter to the Holy Father and the SSPX filed a canonical appeal. They don't want the label of "schism" hung around their neck — but notice that it is, once again, self-preservation and once again purely defensive, without any attack against modernist Rome.
Below is how the SSPX responded to modernist Rome's fraudulent "excommunication" back in 1988. Read it carefully, and try to imagine any SSPX superiors saying this sort of thing today. Then compare with the wishy-washy, toothless response of 2026. What a contrast!
Two Very Different Responses:
Part 1: How the SSPX Responded to Bogus Excommunication in 1988
"An Open Letter to Cardinal Gantin, Prefect of the Congregation for Bishops"
Ecône, July 6, 1988
Eminence,
Gathered around our Superior General, the Superiors of the Districts, Seminaries and autonomous houses of the Priestly Society of Saint Pius X think it good to respectfully express to you the following reflections.
You thought it good, by your letter of July 1st, to inform Their Excellencies Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre, Bishop Antonio de Castro Mayer, and the four Bishops whom they consecrated on June 30, at Écône, of the excommunication latæ sententiæ. We let you judge for yourself the value of such a declaration, coming from an authority who, in its exercise, breaks with all its predecessors down to Pope Pius XII, in worship, teaching and government of the Church.
As for us, we are in full communion with all the Popes and bishops before the Second Vatican Council, celebrating precisely the Mass which they codified and celebrated, teaching the Catechism which they drew up, standing up against the errors which they have many times condemned in their encyclicals and pastoral letters. We let you judge on which side the rupture is to be found. We are extremely saddened by the blindness of spirit and the hardening of heart of the Roman authorities.
On the other hand, we have never wished to belong to this system which calls itself the Conciliar Church, and defines itself with the Novus Ordo Missæ, an ecumenism which leads to indifferentism and the secularisation of all society. Yes, we have no part, nullam partem habemus, with the pantheon of the religions of Assisi; our own excommunication by a decree of Your Eminence or of another Roman Congregation would only be the irrefutable proof of this. We ask for nothing better than to be declared out of communion with this adulterous spirit which has been blowing in the Church for the last 25 years; we ask for nothing better than to be declared outside of this impious communion of the ungodly. We believe in the One God, Our Lord Jesus Christ, with the Father and the Holy Ghost, and we will always remain faithful to His unique Spouse, the One Holy Catholic Apostolic and Roman Church.
To be publicly associated with this sanction which is inflicted upon the six Catholic Bishops, Defenders of the Faith in its integrity and wholeness, would be for us a mark of honour and a sign of orthodoxy before the faithful. They have indeed a strict right to know that the priests who serve them are not in communion with a counterfeit church, promoting evolution, pentecostalism and syncretism. In union with these faithful, we make ours the words of the Prophet: "Præparate corda vestra Domino et servite Illi soli: et liberabit vos de manibus inimicorum vestrorum. Convertimini ad Eum in toto corde vestro, et auferte deos alienos de medio vestri — Open your hearts to the Lord and serve Him only: and He will free you from the hands of your enemies. With all your heart return to Him, and take away from your midst any strange gods" (I Kings 7:3).
Confident in the protection of Her who has crushed all the heresies in the world, we assure Your Eminence of our dedication to Him Who is the only Way of salvation.
Fr. Franz Schmidberger, Superior General
Fr. Paul Aulagnier, District Superior, France
Fr. Franz-Josef Maessen, District Superior, Germany
Fr. Edward Black, District Superior, Great Britain
Fr. Anthony Esposito, District Superior of Italy
Fr. François Laisney, District Superior, United States
Fr. Jacques Emily, District Superior of Canada
Fr. Jean Michel Faure, District Superior of Mexico
Fr. Gerard Hogan, District Superior of Australasia
Fr. Alain Lorans, Superior, Seminary of Ecône
Fr. Jean Paul André, Superior, Seminary of France
Fr. Paul Natterer, Superior, Seminary of Germany
Fr. Andrès Morello, Superior, Seminary of Argentina
Fr. William Welsh, Superior, Seminary of Australia
Fr. Michel Simoulin, Rector, St. Pius X University
Fr. Patrice Laroche, Vice-Rector, Seminary of Ecône
Fr. Philippe François, Superior, Belgium
Fr. Roland de Mérode, Superior, Netherlands
Fr. Georg Pflüger, Superior, Austria
Fr. Guillaume Devillers, Superior, Spain
Fr. Philippe Pazat, Superior, Portugal
Fr. Daniel Couture, Superior, Ireland
Fr. Patrick Groche, Superior, Gabon
Fr. Frank Peek, Superior, Southern Africa
Part 2: How the SSPX Responds to Bogus Excommunication in 2026:
"Letter to the Holy Father Regarding the Decree of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith"
The Superior General
To His Holiness Pope Leo XIV
Écône, 3 July 2026
"Among yourselves, if a father is asked by his son for bread, will he give him a stone? Or for a fish, will he give him a snake instead of a fish? Or if he is asked for an egg, will he give him a scorpion? Why then, if you, evil as you are, know well enough how to give your children what is good for them, is not your Father much more ready to give, from heaven, his gracious Spirit to those who ask him?" (Lk XI, 11-13)
Most Holy Father,
The notification of the decision taken by the Holy See regarding the Society of Saint Pius X, signed by His Eminence Cardinal Fernández, has reached us and is now a matter of public knowledge.
It appears to us that this decision once more brings to light the profoundly tragic context in which the universal Church finds herself. What the Society of Saint Pius X has done, and will continue to do, is nothing other than an extraordinary initiative for the salvation of souls, amidst the doctrinal and moral confusion into which the Church is plunged. We in no way claim to substitute ourselves for the Church, and we have no ambition other than to remain faithful to her.
In conscience, we did not believe we could evade the moral duty we owe to souls, as we have already explained, both privately and publicly, to Your Holiness.
We had asked for bread, that is to say, a measure of understanding for a sincere case of conscience — an act of fatherhood directed not so much toward the Society of Saint Pius X as toward souls, promising You to form them into true sons of the Roman Church; unfortunately, we received a stone.
We had asked for a fish, that is to say, the possibility of temporarily obtaining the necessary means to continue forming good priests, so that they might pursue their mission of making Our Lord known to souls; unfortunately, we received a serpent.
We had asked for an egg, promising to return it as soon as possible. Indeed, the holy Tradition that we preserve within souls belongs to the Church, our Mother — and not to the Society of Saint Pius X — and we are certain that one day a Pope will wish to employ it for the good of the universal Church; unfortunately, we received a scorpion.
We had asked to be instructed and confirmed in the faith of all time; instead, we have been declared schismatic a second time.
Despite the sanctions levelled against us, the Society of Saint Pius X sincerely renews the promise it has already expressed to Your Holiness. Allow me, in this regard, to freely reiterate what I have previously stated:
Quote:"The Society promises You […] to devote all its energies to preserving Tradition and placing it at the service of the Church. In doing so, the Society of Saint Pius X does not merely maintain ancient customs; it fosters and preserves priestly vocations, religious vocations, and large, deeply Christian families — in a word, everything that manifests the vitality of the Church, of grace, and of the Catholic faith. Our intention is not to offer the Church a museum of antiquities, but rather the entirety of Tradition: fruitful, a source of spiritual life, embodied and lived out within souls. [...] I am certain that one day You yourself, or one of Your successors, will be able and willing to utilise this service, the offering of which, within the Church and for the Church, constitutes our sole reason for being." (Personal letter addressed to His Holiness on 21 November 2025)
But above all, the Society of Saint Pius X promises You today that it will not receive these new sanctions — objectively unjust and invalid — with bitterness or revolt.
These recent condemnations, like those of the past, strike at what we hold most dear: our attachment to our Mother, the Roman Church. Yet, even in this trial, all things must work together for the good of souls and of the Church herself. Therefore, these condemnations compel us to love Holy Church even more, and to provide for her needs with all our strength, now more than ever. For this very reason, the Society of Saint Pius X willingly offers up the suffering caused by these new sanctions for the good of the universal Church and of Your Holiness.
We are certain that one day You yourself, or one of Your successors, will wish to adopt the program of Saint Pius X: "To restore all things in Christ," Instaurare omnia in Christo. On that day, the Holy Father will discover in the Society of Saint Pius X not a nest of serpents and scorpions, but a small army of loyal sons, ready to do anything to sustain Him in the restoration of all things in Our Lord, and to vindicate before all mankind the imprescriptible rights of Christ the King over all souls and over all nations.
On that day, the Holy Father will discover, with great joy and profound consolation, authentically Catholic souls whose bond with the Church was never founded upon the shifting sands of an ambiguous dialogue, but upon the rock of the faith of Peter.
We ask the Most Holy Virgin Mary to hasten the dawning of that day, and we pray, above all, that Your Holiness may experience this joy and consolation as soon as possible.
In the meantime, if You are able, despite Your recent decision, bless us as Your sons. For us, nothing has changed, and nothing ever will change.
Trusting in Divine Providence, from which nothing is hidden and which reads into the depths of every man's heart,
I remain, Most Holy Father, your most devoted son in the Lord.
Don Davide Pagliarani
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| The Recusant: An Analysis of Fr. Pagliarani's Consecrations Sermon |
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Posted by: Stone - 08-20-2026, 07:37 AM - Forum: The New-Conciliar SSPX
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The following are taken from The Recusant - Issue #66 Summer 2026. As found in this issue, the Analysis of Fr. Pagliarani's sermon is preceded by Archbishop Lefebvre's Consecration sermon of 1988:
Not the first time we have printed this sermon: but it is certainly worth revisiting. Compare it to the spirit of the modern SSPX and the sermon delivered recently at Écône.
Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre:
Episcopal Consecrations Sermon
Écône, 30th June 1988
In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.
Your Excellency, dear Bishop de Castro Mayer, my most dear friends, my dear brethren,
Behold, here we are gathered for a ceremony which is certainly historic. Let me, first of all, give you some information.
The first might surprise you a little, as it did me. Yesterday evening, a visitor came, sent from the Nunciature in Berne, with an envelope containing an appeal from our Holy Father the Pope, who was putting at my disposal a car which was supposed to take me to Rome yesterday evening, so that I would not be able to perform these consecrations today. I was told neither for what reason, nor where I had to go! I leave you to judge for yourselves the timeliness and wisdom of such a request.
I went to Rome for many, many days during the past year, even for weeks; the Holy Father did not invite me to come and see him. I would certainly have been glad to see him if some agreement would have been finalized. So here you have the information. I give it to you simply, as I myself came to know it, through the letter from the Nunciature.
Now, some indications concerning the ceremony and some relevant documents regarding its significance.
The future bishops have already sworn in my hands the oath which you find in the little booklet on the ceremony of consecration which some of you have. Thus, this oath has already been pronounced, plus the Anti-Modernist Oath, as it was formerly prescribed for the consecration of bishops, plus the Profession of Faith. They have already taken these oaths and this profession in my hands after the retreat which took place at Sierre during these last days. Do not, therefore, be surprised if the ceremony begins with the interrogations on the Faith, the Faith which the Church asks from those who are to be consecrated.
I also want to let you know that, after the ceremony, you will be able to ask the blessing of the bishops and kiss their rings. It is not the custom in the Church to kiss the hands of a bishop, as one kisses the hands of a newly-ordained priest, as you did yesterday. But the faithful may ask for their blessing and kiss their ring.
Lastly, you have at your disposal at the bookstall some books and flyers which contain all the elements necessary to help you better understand why this ceremony, which is apparently done against the will of Rome, is in no way a schism. We are not schismatics! If an excommunication was pronounced against the bishops of China, who separated themselves from Rome and put themselves under the Chinese government, one very easily understands why Pope Pius XII excommunicated them. There is no question of us separating ourselves from Rome, nor of putting ourselves under a foreign government, nor of establishing a sort of parallel church as the Bishops of Palmar de Troya have done in Spain. They have even elected a pope, formed a college of cardinals... It is out of the question for us to do such things. Far from us be this miserable thought of separating ourselves from Rome!
On the contrary, it is in order to manifest our attachment to Rome that we are performing this ceremony. It is in order to manifest our attachment to Eternal Rome, to the Pope, and to all those who have preceded these last Popes who, unfortunately since the Second Vatican Council, have thought it their duty to adhere to grievous errors which are demolishing the Church and the Catholic Priesthood.
Thus you will find among these flyers which are put at your disposal, an admirable study done by Professor Georg May, President of the Seminary of Canon Law in the University of Mainz in Germany, who marvellously explains why we are in a case of necessity: necessity to come and help your souls, to help you! Your applause a while ago was, I think, not a purely temporal manifestation; it was rather a spiritual manifestation, expressing your joy to have at last Catholic bishops and priests who are dedicated to the salvation of your souls, to giving to your souls the Life of Our Lord Jesus Christ, through good doctrine, through the Sacraments, through the Faith, through the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. You need this Life of Our Lord Jesus Christ to go to heaven. This Life of Our Lord Jesus Christ is disappearing everywhere in the conciliar church. They are following roads which are not Catholic roads: they simply lead to apostasy.
This is why we do this ceremony. Far be it from me to set myself up as pope! I am simply a bishop of the Catholic Church who is continuing to transmit Catholic doctrine. I think, and this will certainly not be too far off, that you will be able to engrave on my tombstone these words of St. Paul: tradidi quod et accepi — "I have transmitted to you what I have received," nothing else. I am just the postman bringing you a letter. I did not write the letter, the message, this Word of God. God Himself wrote it; Our Lord Jesus Christ Himself gave it to us. As for us, we just handed it down, through these dear priests here present and through all those who have chosen to resist this wave of apostasy in the Church, by keeping the Eternal Faith and giving it to the faithful. We are just carriers of this Good News, of this Gospel which Our Lord Jesus Christ gave to us, as well as of the means of sanctification: the Holy Mass, the true Holy Mass, the true Sacraments which truly give the spiritual life.
It seems to me, my dear brethren, that I am hearing the voices of all these Popes since Gregory XVI, Pius IX, Leo XIII, St. Pius X, Benedict XV, Pius XI, Pius XII, telling us: "Please, we beseech you, what are you going to do with our teachings, with our preaching, with the Catholic Faith? Are you going to abandon it? Are you going to let it disappear from this earth? Please, please, continue to keep this treasure which we have given you. Do not abandon the faithful, do not abandon the Church! Continue the Church! Indeed, since the Council, what we condemned in the past the present Roman authorities have embraced and are professing. How is it possible? We have condemned them: Liberalism, Communism, Socialism, Modernism, Sillonism. All the errors which we have condemned are now professed, adopted and supported by the authorities of the Church. Is it possible? Unless you do something to continue this Tradition of the Church which we have given to you, all of it shall disappear. Souls shall be lost."
Thus, we find ourselves in a case of necessity. We have done all we could, trying to help Rome to understand that they had to come back to the attitudes of the holy Pius XII and of all his predecessors. Bishop de Castro Mayer and myself have gone to Rome, we have spoken, we have sent letters, several times to Rome. We have tried by these talks, by all these means, to succeed in making Rome understand that, since the Council and since aggiornamento, this change which has occurred in the Church is not Catholic, is not in conformity to the doctrine of all times. This ecumenism and all these errors, this collegiality — all this is contrary to the Faith of the Church, and is in the process of destroying the Church.
This is why we are convinced that, by the act of these consecrations today, we are obeying the call of these Popes and as a consequence the call of God, since they represent Our Lord Jesus Christ in the Church.
"And why, Archbishop, have you stopped these discussions which seemed to have had a certain degree of success?" Well, precisely because, at the same time that I gave my signature to the Protocol, the envoy of Cardinal Ratzinger gave me a note in which I was asked to beg pardon for my errors. But if I am in error, if I teach error, it is clear that I must be brought back to the truth in the minds of those who sent me this note to sign. "That I might recognize my errors" means that, if you recognize your errors we will help you to return to the truth.
What is this truth for them if not the truth of Vatican II, the truth of the conciliar church? Consequently, it is clear that the only truth that exists today for the Vatican is the conciliar truth, the spirit of the Council, the spirit of Assisi. That is the truth of today. But we will have nothing to do with this for anything in the world!
That is why, taking into account the strong will of the present Roman authorities to reduce Tradition to naught, to gather the world to the spirit of Vatican II and the spirit of Assisi, we have preferred to withdraw ourselves and to say that we could not continue. It was not possible. We would have evidently been under the authority of Cardinal Ratzinger, President of the Roman Commission, which would have directed us; we were putting ourselves into his hands, and consequently putting ourselves into the hands of those who wish to draw us into the spirit of the Council and the spirit of Assisi. This was simply not possible.
This is why I sent a letter to the Pope, saying to him very clearly:
"We simply cannot accept this spirit and proposals, despite all the desires which we have to be in full union with you. Given this new spirit which now rules in Rome and which you wish to communicate to us, we prefer to continue in Tradition; to keep Tradition while waiting for Tradition to regain its place at Rome, while waiting for Tradition to reassume its place in the Roman authorities, in their minds."
This will last for as long as the Good Lord has foreseen. It is not for me to know when Tradition will regain its rights at Rome, but I think it is my duty to provide the means of doing that which I shall call "Operation Survival," operation survival for Tradition. Today, this day, is Operation Survival. If I had made this deal with Rome, by continuing with the agreements we had signed, and by putting them into practice, I would have performed "Operation Suicide." There was no choice, we must live! That is why today, by consecrating these bishops, I am convinced that I am continuing to keep Tradition alive, that is to say, the Catholic Church.
You well know, my dear brethren, that there can be no priests without bishops. When God calls me — no doubt this will be before long — from whom would these seminarians receive the Sacrament of Holy Orders? From conciliar bishops, who, due to their doubtful intentions, confer doubtful sacraments? This is not possible. Who are the bishops who have truly kept Tradition and the Sacraments such as the Church has conferred them for twenty centuries until Vatican II? They are Bishop de Castro Mayer and myself. I cannot change that. That is how it is. Hence, many seminarians have entrusted themselves to us, they sensed that here was the continuity of the Church, the continuity of Tradition. And they came to our seminaries, despite all the difficulties that they have encountered, in order to receive a true ordination to the priesthood, to say the true Sacrifice of Calvary, the true Sacrifice of the Mass, and to give you the true Sacraments, true doctrine, the true catechism. This is the goal of these seminaries.
So I cannot, in good conscience, leave these seminarians orphaned. Neither can I leave you orphans by dying without providing for the future. That is not possible. It would be contrary to my duty.
This is why we have chosen, with the grace of God, priests from our Society who have seemed to us to be the most apt, whilst being in circumstances and in functions which permit them more easily to fulfil their episcopal ministry, to give Confirmation to your children, and to be able to confer ordinations in our various seminaries. Thus I believe that — with the grace of God, we, Bishop de Castro Mayer and myself, by these consecrations, will have given to Tradition the means to continue, given the means to Catholics who desire to remain within the Church of their parents, their grandparents, of their ancestors. They built churches with beautiful altars, often destroyed and replaced by a table, thus manifesting the radical change which has come about since the Council regarding the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass which is the heart of the Church and the purpose of the priesthood. Thus we wish to thank you for having come in such numbers to support us in the accomplishment of this ceremony.
We turn to the Blessed Virgin Mary. You well know, my dear brethren, one must have told you of Leo XIII's prophetic vision revealing that one day "the See of Peter would become the seat of iniquity." He said it in one of his exorcisms, called "The Exorcism of Leo XIII." Has it come about today? Is it tomorrow? I do not know. But in any case it has been foretold. Iniquity may quite simply be error. Error is iniquity: to no longer profess the Faith of all time, the Catholic Faith, is a grave error. If ever there was an iniquity, it is this. And I really believe that there has never been a greater iniquity in the Church than Assisi, which is contrary to the First Commandment of God and the First Article of the Creed. It is incredible that something like that could have ever taken place in the Church, in the eyes of the whole Church — how humiliating! We have never undergone such a humiliation! You will be able to find all of this in [Daniel] Le Roux's booklet ["Peter Lovest-Thou Me?"] which has been especially published in order to give you information on the present situation in Rome.
It was not only the good Pope Leo XIII who said these things, but Our Lady prophesied them as well. Just recently, the priest who takes care of the Society's priory of Bogota, Colombia, brought me a book concerning the apparition of Our Lady of Buon Suceso, of "Good Success," to whom a large church in Quito, Ecuador, was dedicated. They were received by a nun shortly after the Council of Trent, so you see, quite a few centuries ago. This apparition has been thoroughly recognized by Rome and the ecclesiastical authorities; a magnificent church was built for the Blessed Virgin Mary wherein the faithful of Ecuador venerate with great devotion a picture of Our Lady, whose face was made miraculously. The artist was in the process of painting it when he found the face of the Holy Virgin miraculously formed. And Our Lady prophesied for the twentieth century, saying explicitly that during the nineteenth century and most of the twentieth century, errors would become more and more widespread in Holy Church, placing the Church in a catastrophic situation. Morals would become corrupt and the Faith would disappear. It seems impossible not to see it happening today.
I excuse myself for continuing this account of the apparition but she speaks of a prelate who will absolutely oppose this wave of apostasy and impiety — saving the priesthood by forming good priests. I do not say that prophecy refers to me. You may draw your own conclusions. I was stupefied when reading these lines but I cannot deny them, since they are recorded and deposited in the archives of this apparition.
Of course, you well know the apparitions of Our Lady at La Salette, where she says that Rome will lose the Faith, that there will be an "eclipse" at Rome; an eclipse, see what Our Lady means by this.
And finally, more recently, the secret of Fatima. Without a doubt, the Third Secret of Fatima must have made an allusion to this darkness which has invaded Rome, this darkness which has invaded the world since the Council. And surely it is because of this, without a doubt, that John XXIII judged it better not to publish the Secret: it would have been necessary to take measures, such steps as he possibly felt himself incapable of doing, for example completely changing the orientations which he was beginning to take in view of the Council, and for the Council. These are the facts upon which, I think, we can lean.
We place ourselves in God's providence. We are convinced that God knows what He is doing. Cardinal Gagnon visited us twelve years after the suspension: after twelve years of being spoken of as outside of the communion of Rome, as rebels and dissenters against the Pope, his visit took place. He himself recognized that what we have been doing is just what is necessary for the reconstruction of the Church. The Cardinal even assisted pontifically at the Mass which I celebrated on December 8, 1987, for the renewal of the promises of our seminarians. I was supposedly suspended and, yet, after twelve years, I was practically given a clean slate. They said we have done well. Thus we did well to resist! I am convinced that we are in the same circumstances today. We are performing an act which apparently — and unfortunately the media will not assist us in the good sense, the headlines will, of course, be "Schism!" "Excommunication!" to their heart's content — and, yet, we are convinced that all these accusations of which we are the object, all penalties of which we are the object, are null, absolutely null and void, and we will take no account of them. Just as I took no account of the suspension, and ended up by being congratulated by the Church and by progressive churchmen, so likewise in several years — I do not know how many, only the Good Lord knows how many years it will take for Tradition to find its rights in Rome — we will be embraced by the Roman authorities, who will thank us for having maintained the Faith in our seminaries, in our families, in civil societies, in our countries, and in our monasteries and our religious houses, for the greater glory of God and the salvation of souls.
In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.
☩ ☩ ☩
An Analysis of Fr. Pagliarani's Consecrations Sermon
Écône — 1st July, 2026
Source: https://fsspx.news/en/news/econe-2026-fr...ions-59927
and: https://youtu.be/5EURjpGfKEA?
[Emphasis - The Catacombs]
Because it is so long and uninspiring, we will forgo our usual habit of reproducing the entire text at length. I have read it thoroughly, more than once, so that you don't have to! The reader who wishes to read the whole thing for himself will find it without difficulty on several SSPX websites, including those linked above.
Fr. Pagliarani begins his sermon by posing a rhetorical question:
Quote:"What is the significance of this day, precisely? Why are we here? How are we to understand these consecrations? ... What does this mean for us?"
...to which he then goes on to provide his own answer. He provides a superficial three part answer whose structure is to talk about Faith, Hope and Charity. "First of all, this ceremony must be a manifestation of [the] faith," he says. Good, that looks promising. "We cannot modify, reinterpret, or reconsider it," he adds. This looks very promising. All he has to do now is point out where the attack on the Faith is coming from and the justification for the SSPX disobeying modern Rome will become almost self-evident.
1. Faith — no mention of the conciliar elephant in the room
Alas, that second shoe never drops. Fr. Pagliarani never gets around to saying why anyone might risk altering or modifying the Faith. Where is the pressure coming from to alter the Faith? Who has been modifying or reinterpreting the Faith in recent years? He does not say.
Quote:"The more the Faith is attacked, the more it disappears, the more this duty becomes urgent, because, without the Faith, it is impossible to please God, it is impossible to live well, it is impossible to be saved. And today we are taking exceptional measures, proportionate to this necessity."
Attacked by whom, one wonders? Whence does this "necessity" arise?
Quote:"Now, some might consider that we are faced with a dilemma. We are choosing the integral Faith, but we are separating ourselves from the Church. We would be in the process of choosing between the Faith and the Church. In order to preserve the Faith, are we breaking with the Church? This is a false dilemma. We belong to the Church first of all through the Faith, through the integral profession of the Faith, through the integral profession of the Faith of the Church. ... we belong to the Church because we profess the same Faith. It is therefore a false dilemma into which we cannot enter, because we cannot choose between the Faith and the Church; no one can choose. We want the Faith of the Church in order to remain in the Church. We want the Church through the Faith, in the Faith."
Wouldn't this be the ideal moment to remind people that the "church" which declared Archbishop Lefebvre schismatic is the conciliar church? But no, that distinction is never made. There is no mention, no hint of such a thing as the conciliar church, just "the Church" without any distinction. And yet that is the real reason for the "false dilemma" which he mentions: what is being asked, what was demanded of Archbishop Lefebvre back in the day, is to put the conciliar church before the Catholic Faith. But because Fr. Pagliarani doesn't say this, his point about a false dilemma remains rather unclear.
Quote:"It is very important to understand this, even if those facing us do not wish to understand it. All of this is not a matter of opinion, it is not a matter of personal sensibility, nor an option: it is a necessity."
Again, what is this "necessity" and what is its cause?
Quote:"We are accused of not loving the Pope, we are accused of not respecting him. But it is precisely because we love the Pope, sincerely, as the Vicar of Christ, as the head of the Church, that we no longer wish to see the Pope humiliated in the company of false shepherds, representatives of false religions. How many times have we seen this throughout all these years?"
So it's not that we're at war with a conciliar church which hates the Catholic Church and has tried to supplant it? It's that we just love the Pope so much ("Wuv, wuv, wuv!") and don't want to see him humiliated. Not that he himself is the instigator of his own humiliation? Not that his own humiliation is the least of the evils which he personally is inflicting on everyone else?
Quote:"It is because we love the Vicar of Christ that we no longer wish this humiliation for the Pope, a humiliation which falls upon the whole Church, treated on an equal footing with false religions."
Doesn't this make it sound as though the Pope (Leo, as it happens, but Francis before him, and the other conciliar Popes before him…) is somehow a passive victim of "this humiliation" and not its main instigator? And where does this being treated "on an equal footing with all [false] religions" come from, one wonders? Could it perhaps be that there was an event in the 1960s, say, a Council, for instance, at which a false doctrine was proclaimed, let's call it… oh, I don't know, Ecumenism? Could there be a more obvious elephant in the room?
He continues:
Quote:"But then, we have explained all of this many times. We have explained it in almost every language that exists on the face of the earth. Why are we not understood? Why, fundamentally, do we speak different languages? ... We speak the language of the Faith, the language of Tradition. And, before us, we are dealing with a language which operates at another level, which speaks of other things. It is the language of inclusion, of listening, of dialogue and of accompaniment."
So the problem in the Church, the cause of the crisis, the justification for the "necessity" of these new consecrations, is that people (who, exactly?) are using "the language of inclusion, of listening, of dialogue"…? If you were a convert new to Tradition, or a potential convert, how clear would you find this? Fr. Pagliarani is clearly avoiding naming the problem, the cause of the crisis in the Church: Vatican II. And whilst it is true that the SSPX, for the most part, does still "speak the language of Tradition," what that means in practice is that it still uses lots of "Traditional Catholic" vocabulary. For the most part. But even that is beginning to fall by the wayside. And I still haven't seen any mention of the conciliar church or even of Vatican II yet.
Quote:"We want the Faith. And then, in the Faith, we accompany people. We listen to people in the Faith, in order to bring them to the Faith and to convert them."
How's that for a new motto, a new mission statement for the modern, liberal SSPX? "We accompany people in the Faith"…!
After once again lamenting a vague and unspecified "difficulty in understanding one another" because "we speak different languages," Fr. Pagliarani moves on from Faith to Hope.
2. Hope! (and Joy!)
Quote:"We also live these consecrations in hope. We do not live them in controversy, nor in tension, nor in bitterness, nor in resentment. We live these consecrations in joy and in hope."
Oh thank goodness! Don't you just hate controversy and tension! And who doesn't love joy and hope?
Quote:"In 1988, those who condemned the Society foresaw its dissolution. Providence had another plan. Why did Providence have another plan? Your presence here today demonstrates it. God has not abandoned us, and God will not abandon us."
True. But you can abandon Him: surely that is the more relevant point. You may be the same SSPX in purely worldly, legal, corporate terms, but you are a long way from 1988 in spirit. He then mentions the Incarnation, concerning which he adds:
Quote:"Because the supreme law, the law of God, is the salvation of souls. This is why God has not abandoned us and will not abandon us; He will always provide us with means proportionate to our needs. If the work of the Redemption can encounter obstacles on the part of men, it will never encounter obstacles on the part of God. But the more we suffer, the more we struggle, the more we strive to be faithful to Him, the more He is with us, and He shows us this."
Also true. But again, the question you should be asking is not whether God has whimsically decided to abandon you, but whether you have remained faithful to Him. And I mean institutionally faithful, not merely faithful on a level of personal sin (of which we are all guilty).
Quote:"If we continue to seek the will of God, the good of souls, whatever the cost, we shall never lack anything."
Was it the will of God that SSPX faithful get the covid vaccines? Was that for the good of their souls? Is declaring that Vatican II "enlightens and deepens" Tradition an example of remaining faithful to him, or that the New Mass and new conciliar rites were "legitimately promulgated by Popes Paul VI and John Paul II"…? We could go on. Fine words do not a faithful servant make. Talk is cheap. Actions speak louder than words. Anyone can preach a sermon about how we need to remain faithful to Almighty God — practicing it is another matter.
3. "Charity"
Last of all comes charity.
Quote:"But above all, these consecrations must be understood and lived in a spirit of charity: charity towards souls, and charity above all towards the Church. The more souls are disoriented and confused, the more we must seek them, the more we must support them."
Charity towards which "church"? The Catholic Church, or the conciliar church? And just why is it that so many souls are confused and disoriented like never before? That elephant is still there!
Quote:"The more the Church is dishonoured, the more the splendour of her divinity is obscured, the more we must love her, we must serve her, and we must be ready to pay any price to serve the Church."
Dishonoured by whom, and why? What exactly is the problem, what is going on in the Church — is anyone any the wiser so far?
Quote:"The greatest of the sacrifices that God can ask of us is that of being treated as rebels, when we want to serve and love the Church as a Mother."
Doesn't it sound as though the "Church" which treats us as rebels is the exact same "Church" which we are trying "to serve and love"? To anyone new to the SSPX who is not familiar with Archbishop Lefebvre, this must be so confusing!
Quote:"We want to serve her as a Mother. A Mother in difficulty, overwhelmed, suffering; a Mother who is also sometimes betrayed; a Mother who needs, and deserves, that we help her, that we do something in the name of all that she has given us."
In difficulty with what? Overwhelmed by what, suffering from what? Betrayed by whom?
Quote:"Everything that we have received, we have received through the Church, in the Church. The Faith which we wish to bear witness to today and by which we wish to live comes to us from the Church. It is in the name of what we have received from her, and it is in the name of what she is — the Spouse of Christ, His Mystical Body — it is in the name of all this that we must do what is possible, as much as possible, to help and support her."
Help her and support her — it sounds like she's in serious difficulty! Do tell more…
Quote:"Could we remain indifferent, doing nothing? 'It is not our problem'? That is not what is asked of us. Can the Society remain indifferent? No. That would be to betray the Church, that would be to lack charity; we cannot do this."
Indifferent to what, exactly? Are you getting the picture, dear reader? How very tedious this all is. If you feel frustrated reading it, just imagine how I feel reading it, analysing it and writing about it! The next few minutes of the sermon are standard stuff. The Precious Blood. Sin is evil, evil is sin, and so forth. Then things begin to get a bit more interesting.
The Exaltation of Man
Quote:"[There is] one particular sin to which I draw your attention. This sin is always the same, from the beginning of humanity until today: it is the exaltation of man. We are saturated, we are literally saturated everywhere with this exaltation of man. Man who is altogether wonderful, man who is perfect, man who is astonishing, man who supposedly possesses infinite dignity. Well, in reality, all of this leads to pride. And, in the long term, it leads to contempt for God and to apostasy, to silent apostasy. That is where it comes from.
And the more man is exalted in a mad, fanatical way, the more, ultimately, he is distanced from God, and he is distanced from his perfection and his true good; it is a disaster. Man, full of rights, full of himself, incapable of turning towards God, incapable of recognising that he is wounded by sin and that he needs the Redemption. He needs Our Lord, he needs His Most Precious Blood. This is the great evil of today, of all history: the evil which encompasses all the others. This plague is a scourge, an obsessive idea which, it must be acknowledged, penetrates deeply even into the Church. This plague makes people blind; it paralyses souls. This is not what brings souls back to God."
This is the closest Fr. Pagliarani gets to naming the Council, the errors of Vatican II, the conciliar church and its false teaching, and all the rest. And of course, he doesn't name any of those things. As before, one is left wondering whether this "saturation" leading to "silent apostasy" has always been such a big problem, or whether it got worse recently (since the 1960s, for instance?). He does say that it is "the great evil of today" — but then he adds "of all history." So I guess there's nothing particularly bad about how things are today compared with a few hundred years ago, then? If it is such a "plague" and "a scourge" then surely it would be worthwhile naming the sources of this plague, this scourge, especially if it has somehow penetrated "deeply even into the Church" (and how and when did that happen, one wonders?).
Then comes more about the Incarnation, the Redemption. Nothing wrong with it, but it is unremarkable in itself. The Precious Blood and the Blessed Virgin Mary and the Cross. The new bishops will have a responsibility to preach those things, he says. "What an honour, and what a responsibility!" All very well and good, but nothing that one might not hear at the FSSP or certain conservative Novus Ordo parishes — and if ever there was a time to point out what is unique about the SSPX then surely these episcopal consecrations would be that moment. But that is what he studiously avoids doing.
The Cross, he says, is "a stumbling block for the Jews and folly for the Gentiles. Folly, especially today, for an apostate world which cannot understand and does not want to understand." Aha, so is the world apostate in a way that it didn't used to be, is that what you're saying? If only he were able to elaborate!
Quote:"This wisdom of the Cross is the only antidote to this humanism which leads to indifference, to apostasy. You must always keep this humanism in your sights."
Humanism is an easy target, a low hanging fruit. What we all need to hear is who is pushing it and why, and how they have succeeded, and how we can most effectively fight against it. Imagine if Archbishop Lefebvre in 1988 had confined himself to preaching against a nameless, amorphous "humanism"! After this there follows more standard and frankly uninspiringly "normal" sermony-type stuff. Our Lord is a lamb, what a beautiful image, the new bishops are like lambs sent amongst wolves (*yawn*), and so forth. Then comes a lot of very fine talk which is the very worst type of hypocrisy.
Preaching what none of them practice
Quote:"This means that you must first preach through the innocence of your life; it is the innocence, the purity of your life, of your morals, which will give a moral authority to everything that you will preach."
Here is a timely reminder that the man preaching about purity of morals is the very same man who publicly endorsed the taking of covid vaccines less than five years ago. Every single Traditional Catholic who lost his job over those wretched "vaccines" was betrayed by Fr. Davide Pagliarani's craven submission to government tyranny and the will of men such as Bill Gates. There was even a group of Novus Ordo bishops who said not to get those vaccines! But Fr. Pagliarani, knowing all that, not only put out articles in all the SSPX publications, he even went in person to the Angelus conference and told everyone that it was fine, we can go ahead and have them. Worse, the SSPX openly cited as its justification for this the documents produced by the modernist Vatican whitewashing covid vaccines. What a lot of insincere hypocrisy. Clearly talk really is cheap, and actions really do speak louder than words.
Quote:"To be a lamb also means, and above all, perfect docility, perfect submission to the will of God. Just as Our Lord is constantly subject to the will of His Father, so you, by virtue of an even higher dignity from today onwards, must always seek His will."
More empty, cheap, insincere and hypocritical talk. Let us not forget: when Bishop Fellay was the Superior General he openly admitted to changing the entire stance of the SSPX towards modernist Rome in the March 2012 Cor Unum and then on American TV and on youtube in various interviews. This was a monumental act of betrayal, of disobedience to the previous SSPX Chapter which he was bound in conscience to obey and about as far from "perfect docility, perfect submission" as one can imagine. The 2012 General Chapter which met a few weeks later, to its lasting shame, let him off the hook without so much as a slap on the wrist, largely at the instigation of — guess who? — that's right! — Fr. Davide Pagliarani, who was at that point District Superior of Italy. It should be clear by now to anyone who has been paying attention, that in the modern, liberal SSPX of 2026, "perfect docility, perfect submission to the will of God" really means: "Obey your superiors without question at all times, even if they contradict the will of God, even if they contradict what even they themselves were saying not so long ago!"
Quote:"... Our Lord, just as He is perfectly docile to the will of the Father, so He never bends before the spirit of the world. In order to serve the Father perfectly, He necessarily comes into conflict with the spirit of the world, with the spirit of the prince of this world. And likewise the bishop: just as he is docile to the will of God, so he constantly asserts before the world the rights of Our Lord, and not the rights of man. And a lion never flees, a lion does not retreat and, above all, a lion does not bend. Never bend before this spirit of the world, do not move, do not retreat; the consecration will give you an irresistible strength. From today onwards, throughout the whole world, there are people who are watching you, listening to you. In thirty, forty years, they must be able to say: They did not bend. They did not bend the knee before this spirit of the world. They bent the knee only before Our Lord the King."
The irony here, of course, is that that is a pretty good description of Archbishop Lefebvre. It is a laughable description of the inoffensive, politically correct SSPX of 2026, however. When was the last time a priest of the SSPX preached against the rainbow flag movement, or the evils of feminism, or the secret societies and their global conspiracy, or even the errors of the local diocese? Given that we are now most of the way through the sermon and there has still been no mention at all of Vatican II, the conciliar church, the New Mass, the new sacramental rites, or any of the errors of the modern conciliar churchmen even once, all this talk of not bending is just yet more cheap hypocrisy. This entire sermon is one giant act of bending! He has carefully crafted the sermon so as to make it look like he's saying the right things to his own people whilst also saying as little as possible to which the modernists in Rome could object. Thirty-seven minutes of bending, and in the middle of it all he tells the new bishops not to bend. Besides which, if they were the sort of men who refuse to bend then they wouldn't have been chosen in the first place! In fact, these days, one suspects, such men wouldn't even manage to get to the end of seminary and be ordained to the priesthood, let alone be selected to become bishops!
Quote:"They did not bend … That is the most beautiful thing that could be said about you at your death, the most beautiful memory that you could leave."
Tradidi quod et accepi is a fitting motto for Archbishop Lefebvre's tomb. I would suggest as a motto for Fr. Pagliarani and his confreres when the time comes, a more fitting motto would perhaps be Prodidimus quod accepimus et aliud tradidimus. They really are no different to the conciliar bishops of the 1970s in that regard.
Quote:"Why must a bishop be like a serpent? It is in order to discern, grasp, and detect the duplicity, ambiguity, and cunning that exist in the world and among the enemies of the Cross. Your worst enemies will not attack you head-on; they will try to make you slide gradually into a perception of the Faith, of the Christian life, and of relations with the world that is a little more up to date. That must be understood."
Once again — oh the irony, the hypocrisy! Do we really have to point it out? There is a timeless truth here: the greatest danger is usually the most subtle. The greatest danger to the SSPX faithful is not the modernism of Pope Francis or Pope Leo, but the far more subtle modernism of the SSPX, of Bishop Fellay, Fr. Pagliarani et al. Just as the modernism of the SSPX was never as dangerous to the Resistance faithful and priests as the modernism of Bishop Williamson. The more subtle and the closer to home, the greater the danger. The evil modernists in Rome conquered and neutralised the SSPX, as Fr. Pagliarani says, not by attacking it head on, but by sweet words, tasty cashew nuts and flattering gestures. Hence the SSPX of today has indeed slid "into a perception of the Faith, of the Christian life, and of relations with the world that is a little more up to date." He stands condemned from his own mouth.
Quote:"This is what it means to be like a serpent: to grasp the duplicity, the ambiguity, and the cunning that exist in the world, and to speak, to preach like doves: simply, without duplicity and without fear, without equivocation, without ambiguity."
To preach simply, without duplicity or fear or equivocation or ambiguity? What would that look like in practice? It would mean attacking Vatican II, attacking the current modernist authorities, pointing out that their sacraments are doubtful and their intentions evil and not to be trusted. It would mean pointing out that the last seven Popes in a row stand condemned by their predecessors. Once again, this is an accurate description of Archbishop Lefebvre but has nothing in common with the man preaching these fine words in 2026 nor the priestly society of which he is the superior. He is preaching an ambiguous, equivocal and (in all likelihood) duplicitous and fearful sermon, and in the midst of it this is the advice he gives them.
Quote:"And what else does Jesus say, what does Our Lord say? 'The brother shall deliver up his brother, the father his child, and you shall be hated by all because of Me, because of My name. Do not fear all this, for there is nothing hidden that will not be revealed, nothing secret that will not be known.' 'Do not fear all this,' Our Lord tells us. 'Let Me act, let Me judge; I Myself will intervene when necessary.' He has only one concern. What is it? 'Every one therefore that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father who is in heaven.' Every man who will acknowledge My rights, My divinity, My Church, My Faith. 'Do not think that I came to send peace upon earth: I came not to send peace, but the sword.'"
How about the priests expelled in 2012 and 2013 merely for repeating what Archbishop Lefebvre had said, the faithful denied communion and driven out of chapels which were their spiritual homes? How's that for "brother against brother"…? And the others who heroically left before they could be expelled: why did they do that if not to confess Our Lord before men?
We are at the end of the sermon now, and at this point comes the one token, throw-away mention of a name which has been conspicuously absent so far: that's right, Archbishop Lefebvre. Have to get that tick in the box, can't have it said that he was never mentioned at all! Naturally, what he says about Archbishop Lefebvre is suitably vague and harmless.
Quote:"Another bishop, who is your model, closer to us, not yet canonised: Archbishop Lefebvre, certainly. Of him also one can say: zelus fidei sollicitus et multa perpessus. He had only one concern: it was the Faith itself, and, for this, he suffered greatly. This Faith, he saw clearly how it is summed up in the Holy Mass, in the defence of the Holy Mass, of the Most Precious Blood of Our Lord. What wisdom! How was he able, so many years ago, to grasp the causes of the crisis with such clarity, such insight, such strength?"
All of which is true, but notice that no details, no specifics are given. Fr. Pagliarani says that the Archbishop "was able to grasp the cause of the crisis" but he himself still hasn't yet said what this alleged "crisis" is, let alone the cause of it! The closest he came was complaining about a "humanism" which has "penetrated even into the Church" — is that what Archbishop Lefebvre saw and grasped so clearly, or is there a bit more to it than that?
Quote:"It is the wisdom of the Cross; the Cross that he carried was the source of his wisdom. Today, more than ever, his spirit is among us, he encourages us, he prays for us, he prays for you in particular, he shows us the path to follow, guided by this wisdom of the Cross."
"The path" which Archbishop Lefebvre "shows us to follow" is very simple and easy to understand and it is nowhere to be seen in this sermon, for the simple reason that Fr. Pagliarani is not following it. He is not following it because he doesn't believe in it. The Superior General of the modern, surrendered, compromised SSPX which has betrayed Archbishop Lefebvre is now telling his new bishops that Archbishop Lefebvre is showing them the way. Words fail me. I really can't take much more of this.
If this has been a slog and you need some refreshment, a "palate cleanser" for your mind, or if on the other hand you are not entirely convinced and think that I may be exaggerating, then I invite you — no I urge you! — to read (or re-read) Archbishop Lefebvre's sermon from the 1988 consecrations. The difference could not be more stark, it is like chalk and cheese, like night and day. That is the example left to Fr. Pagliarani and his confreres which he totally ignores, the way shown by their founder which they departed from some time ago.
Archbishop Lefebvre preached clearly and fearlessly. By contrast, Fr. Pagliarani seems to preach equivocally, ambiguously, and with an overpowering fear of offending the modernist enemy which prevents him even from naming them. This is what comes of compromising the Faith, as Archbishop Lefebvre said so well about the Indultists of the late '80s. Surely his words apply equally well to the SSPX today?
"It is evident that by putting themselves in the hands of the current conciliar authorities, they are implicitly accepting the Council and the ensuing reforms, even if they have [the Traditional Mass] ... Their speech is paralyzed because of this acceptance." — Archbishop Lefebvre, Letter to Fr. Couture, 18th March 1989
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| Florida archbishop tells state that Catholic schools will continue to mandate vaccines |
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Posted by: Stone - 08-19-2026, 06:16 AM - Forum: Health
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Florida archbishop tells state that Catholic schools will continue to mandate vaccines
Archbishop Thomas Wenski suggested that parents who seek religious exemptions for vaccines
– which are often made with aborted babies’ cells – should not be allowed to send their children to Catholic schools.
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Archbishop Thomas Wenski
Joe Raedle / Staff / Getty
Aug 18, 2026
(LifeSiteNews - [slightly adapted - not all hyperlinks included from original]) — A Florida archbishop said that Catholic schools should not allow for religious exemptions to vaccination in defiance of the state attorney general’s warning that Catholic schools may be barred from state-funded scholarships.
Earlier this month, Republican state Attorney General, James Uthmeier, a Catholic, wrote a letter to the Florida Conference of Catholic Bishops advising them that schools must provide under Florida law religious exemptions from vaccination requirements if a parent has a religious objection to a vaccine. He warned them that Catholic schools may be disqualified from state-funded scholarships and vouchers due to their denial of vaccine religious exemptions.
On Monday, Archbishop Thomas Wenski of Miami published an op-ed in the Miami Herald in which he ironically insisted that Uthmeier’s challenge to their policy “intrudes upon our religious freedom.”
“The state cannot disqualify Catholic schools from the scholarship program merely because a state official’s understanding of Church teachings differ from that of the bishops,” Wenski wrote. He maintained, however, that a Catholic school may disqualify a student from admission because their understanding of Church teachings differs from that of the bishops.
Wenski claimed that Catholic schools do not grant religious exemptions for student vaccinations “because the vaccines as presently developed and administered do not violate Church teachings.”
Some Catholics oppose the use of certain vaccines on moral grounds because they were developed using cell lines derived from the tissue of aborted babies. The National Catholic Bioethics Center (NCBC) teaches that Catholics have a “general moral duty to refuse the use of medical products, including certain vaccines, that are produced using human cells lines derived from direct abortions” as part of its Vaccine Exemption Template Letter.
Uthmeier has pointed out that, because abortion violates the right to life of the unborn, “the Catholic Church has historically encouraged the faithful to abstain from the use of vaccines produced from aborted fetal tissue, while at the same time recognizing the moral permissibility of using such vaccines in certain circumstances.”
Several vaccines required for school entry are developed using aborted babies’ tissue. Rubella-containing vaccines were developed using the WI-38 cell line; chickenpox vaccines were developed using cell lines derived from aborted babies, including WI-38 and MRC-5; and the viruses of Hepatitis A vaccines can be grown in these baby cell lines. The Florida Department of Health currently lists two doses of MMR and two doses of chickenpox vaccines among the routine school immunization requirements.
According to Wenski, parents who desire vaccine religious exemptions due to the use of aborted babies’ tissue in their development should simply not be permitted to attend Catholic schools.
“The Church does not force or coerce parents to vaccinate their child. No one must go to a Catholic school,” the archbishop wrote. “At the same time, we do try to accommodate those children whose physician indicates that a medical exemption is necessary.”
As Uthmeier noted, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith has stated that “practical reason makes evident that vaccination is not, as a general rule, a moral obligation.”
“But even if abortion-derived vaccines may be permissible to take, Church teaching also recognizes that no one should be forced to take a vaccine ‘if it would violate the sanctity of his or her conscience,’” Uthmeier added in his letter.
Wenski was the first U.S. bishop to publicly receive a COVID-19 shot. After the COVID-19 outbreak, he posted to his Instagram account two pictures of himself receiving the abortion-tainted Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 shot. The Pfizer shot was tested on the cells of aborted babies.
There are compelling moral arguments being presented by bishops and priests as to why it is morally illicit to receive a vaccine connected to the use of aborted children’s tissue.
Fr. Michael Copenhagen, in his article “Restore Ye to its Owners: On the Immorality of Receiving Vaccines Derived from Abortion,” begins by highlighting the issue, in these vaccines, of the theft and desecration of human remains.
He brings up Scripture’s story of Tobit, who “insisted on honoring God and neighbor by burying the dead at a time when the desecration of their remains was the state mandate. For this great deed, he was forced to flee and placed under a sentence of death.”
Dr. Copenhagen points out that the human remains involved in vaccines have likewise been desecrated through exploitation and trafficking, that “labeling human remains obtained through violence as ‘illicit biological material’ is not only insufficient but dehumanizing and offensive.”
Also, because the cells belong to the child, who has been “silenced,” and “the parents have forfeited by abortion any right of consent to respectful scientific use of the body, the scientists and patent holders have no right to possess or use the cells: these human remains belong to God, must be respectfully reposed.” Therefore, the remains of the child have been stolen, and our “distance” from this act does not negate moral complicity in taking a vaccine involving their exploitation.
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