The Recusant: An Open Letter to Confused Lefebvrists

[Stone]

An Open Letter to Confused Lefebvrists
Taken from The Recusant.com [slightly adapted]

An Open Letter to Confused Catholics reflects the reality in Archbishop Lefebvre’s day and although some decades have passed since it was written, and in spite of some of the references becoming a little dated, the essential wisdom it contains is timeless. And yet there are those who maintain that Archbishop Lefebvre was all very well for then but his wisdom is no longer what is needed today..!

Very well. Let’s take a little look and see how what he says applies to our situation today. The Resistance must follow Archbishop Lefebvre’s footsteps, or it might as well not exist! We maintain that if Archbishop Lefebvre were alive today, he would be fighting along side us.  But let’s see what we can see, and as far as possible, let the words speak for themselves. The quotations on the [about Modernist Rome] are from Open Letter to Confused Catholics and show us Archbishop Lefebvre’s analysis of modernist Rome back then. [Below them] is our analysis of where the modern SSPX finds itself today.


Modernist Rome then:

“On two occasions I have heard emissaries of the Holy See say to me: ‘The social Kingdom of Our Lord is no longer possible in our times and we must ultimately accept the plurality of religions.’ This is exactly what they have said to me.”

The Modern SSPX now:

Many people report having heard from the mouths of SSPX priests such as Fr Nicholas Pfluger that now is not the right time for the Social Reign of Christ the King. Wanting to be accepted by modern Rome “as we are” means in practice acceptance of modern Rome as they are. Recognition of SSPX marriages, permission for SSPX ordinations and jurisdiction for SSPX confessions means in practice the SSPX accepting that they are to become part of a  conciliar plurality of “movements” and “charisms” in the church (along side the Neo-Catechumenal Way, the Focolari, Medjugorje advocates, the ‘Catholic Charismatic Renewal,’ the Anglican Ordinariate, ‘Opus Dei’ and all the other catalogue of horrors in the conciliar church.)



Modern Rome:

“When I was a child, the Church had the same faith everywhere … anyone had told me then that it would be changed, I would not have believed him. … The new liberal and modernist religion has sown division. Christians are divided within the same family because of this confusion which has established itself; they no longer go to the same Mass and they no longer read the same books.”

The Modern SSPX now:

The SSPX may have kept (for now) the Traditional Mass, but that on its own is no guarantee of orthodoxy as anyone who has ever attended a diocesan indult Mass regularly for any length of time will be able to tell you.

Not so very long ago, the SSPX of “our youth” was the same everywhere. You could ask the same question of any priest and expect the same answer, there were no “liberal” or “conservative” SSPX priests. If someone had told us that in a few years there would be some SSPX priests who were creationists and others who were evolutionists, some who were pro-lockdown and anti- “conspiracy theories” and others of the opposite view, some who went about promoting NFP and warning married couples not to have too many children and others who held firm to the Church’s moral teaching on that score, some SSPX priests who thought the dialogue Mass was a good thing and others who thought it a bad thing… who would have believed it possible? And did not the liberalising of the SSPX also bring family division in its wake? Family members “no longer go to the same Mass,” they even “no longer read the same books,” since the new, liberal, modernist SSPX is now more interested in promoting books such as The Realist Guide than it is in promoting the books of Archbishop Lefebvre or Fr. Denis Fahey. Just try getting hold of those in a repository of the SSPX today.



Modernist Rome then:

“Priests no longer know what to do; either they obey blindly what their superiors impose on them, and lose to some degree the faith of their childhood and youth, renouncing the promises they made when they took the Anti-Modernist Oath at the moment of their ordination; or on the other hand they resist…”

The Modern SSPX now:

The newer SSPX priests are themselves much more liberal and are naturally in favour of all the modernism and liberalism. The older priest who know better must either silently accept what they see happening and shut their eyes in the interests of a ‘quiet life’ and in so doing they lose to some degree the faith of their youth together with its zeal and good fruits; or they resist. But if they show any sign of resisting, or even of resenting the new liberal attitudes at large in the SSPX, they are faced with the prospect of punishment, transfer, silencing or even expulsion, together with being maligned by their own superiors as disobedient, proud, divisive, etc.



Modernist Rome then:

“How many more have been forced to abandon the parishes where for years they had practised their ministry, victims of open persecution by their hierarchy…”

The Modern SSPX now:

How many SSPX priests of twenty or thirty years standing, pillars of zeal and good works, have been forced out of the SSPX parishes and Mass centres where for years they had practiced their ministry, in some cases the very parishes they themselves had founded and built up, victims of open persecution by their hierarchy…



Modernist Rome then:

“In the Diocese of Campos in Brazil, practically all the clergy have been driven out of the churches after the departure of Bishop de Castro-Mayer, because they were not willing to abandon the Mass of all time which they celebrated there until  recently.”

The Modern SSPX now:

The Traditionalist clergy who were driven out of Campos held firm with Archbishop Lefebvre for a little while after his death, but they eventually gave in and signed a compromise with modern Rome, gratefully accepting the approval which the modernists had to offer and in turn recognising their wretched Council and its poisonous teaching. Today they are indistinguishable from any other quasi-“traditional” indult or “Ecclesia Dei” group. At the time of Campos’s surrender to the modernists (2002) the SSPX condemned this compromise with the enemy. And then, barely a decade later, the SSPX itself followed suit and itself surrendered to the same enemy. To re-read what the SSPX said about Campos is to read the old SSPX condemning the SSPX of today.



Modernist Rome then:

“You will be tempted to say: ‘But what can we do about it? It is a bishop who says this or that. Look, this document comes from the Catechetical Commission or some other official commission.’ That way there is nothing left for you but to lose your faith. But you do not have the right to react in that way.”

The Modern SSPX now:

You will be tempted to say: ‘But what can we do about it? It is Bishop Fellay, it is Fr. Pagliarani who says this or that. Look, this is what it says on sspx.org, this is what this official SSPX youtube video says… Look, Fr. Robinson says that the world is billions of years old; look at these articles telling me that it’s fine to have the covid jab, that’s what SSPX is officially saying so it must be OK.’ That way there is nothing left for you but to lose your faith. But you do not have the right to react in that way.



Modernist Rome then:

“The crisis is profound, cleverly organized and directed, and by this token one can truly believe that the master mind is not a man but Satan himself. For it is a master-stroke of Satan to get Catholics to disobey the whole of Tradition in the name of obedience. A typical example is furnished by the “aggiornamento” of the religious societies. By obedience, monks and nuns are made to disobey the laws and constitutions of their founders, which they swore to observe when they made their profession. Obedience in this case should have been a categorical refusal.”

The Modern SSPX now:

Satan’s masterstroke has been to get even Traditional Catholics to loosen their grip on Tradition in the name of obedience. By obedience, SSPX priests and religious have turned their back on Archbishop Lefebvre, their founder, without whom they would never even have been Traditional in the first place. How many priests knew that the SSPX was being subverted in 2012 but ultimately fell in line and obeyed? Obedience in this case should be a categorical refusal.



Modernist Rome then:

“Have you thought that even if we who are of a certain age run a smaller risk, children and younger seminarians brought up in new catechisms, experimental psychology and sociology, without a trace of dogmatic or moral  theology, canon law or Church history, are educated in a faith which is not the true one and take for granted the new Protestant notions with which they are indoctrinated? What will tomorrow’s religion be if we do not resist?”

The Modern SSPX now:

Have you ever thought that even if you, being of a certain age, run a smaller risk because you remember the old SSPX which formed you and which you can still remember, there is a whole generation of young seminarians and children brought up in the new, liberal SSPX who know nothing of the old SSPX which used to condemn the errors of the conciliar church, promote the fight for the Social Kingship of Christ, and which took a firm stand against modern culture and the modern world in general? They take for granted the inoffensive, ‘respectable,’ worldly persona of the new SSPX to which they belong and the liberal, worldly attitudes with which they are indoctrinated. What will tomorrow’s religion be if we do not resist?



Modernist Rome then:

“Cranmer’s Prayer Book was composed by mixing parts of the Greek liturgy with parts of Luther’s liturgy.  How can we not be reminded of Mgr. Bugnini drawing up the so-called Mass of Paul VI, with the collaboration of six Protestant “observers” attached as experts to the Consilium for the reform of the liturgy? The [Anglican] Prayer Book begins with these words, “The Supper and Holy Communion, commonly called Mass...,” which foreshadows the notorious Article 7 of the Institutio Generalis of the New Missal, revived by the Lourdes Eucharistic Congress in 1981: “The Supper of the Lord, otherwise called the Mass.” The destruction of the sacred, to which I have already referred, also formed part of the Anglican reform.”

The Modern SSPX now:

In the 16th Century, the Catholic Church condemned the Anglican Prayer Book with its notion of “the Lord’s Supper.” It was un-Catholic, offensive to God, did not give grace and the faithful were not to attend it. The New Mass is indeed remarkably similar to an Anglican communion service. Thus it is perhaps not so surprising that in the days of Archbishop Lefebvre and for a little while after, the SSPX likewise condemned the New Mass as  being un-Catholic, offensive to God, not grace-giving, and something which the faithful should not attend. Today the Resistance finds itself having to condemn anyone else who tries to rehabilitate the New Mass as being in any way Catholic, approved of by God, grace-giving or something which the faithful might be able to attend. Both Bishop Williamson and the new SSPX are guilty of this; both have deviated away from Tradition and towards the conciliar church.



Modernist Rome then:

“Let us add this, that the greatest service we can render to the Church and to the successor of Peter is to reject the reformed and liberal church.”

The Modern SSPX now:

Let us add this, that the greatest service we can render to the Church, to the SSPX and to the memory of Archbishop Lefebvre is to reject the reformed and liberal SSPX.