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The Catholic Counter-Reformation in the 21st century |
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HE IS RISEN! |
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No 19 |
Editor : Abbé Georges de Nantes |
March 2004 |
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The Catholic Counter-Reformation in the 21st century |
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HE IS RISEN! |
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No 19 |
Editor : Abbé Georges de Nantes |
March 2004 |
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He will return with his immense
heart, with his heart of fire, his poor man's soul |
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SIXTY YEARS OF CATHOLIC
COUNTER-REFORMATION A SON OF THE CHURCH by Brother Bruno of Jesus |
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Looking back over his entry into the seminary in 1943, the Abbé de Nantes wrote: « I entrusted myself to the Church like a child to his mother, in order to receive everything from her and from no one else. Now, what an unforgettable wonder, she came up to my expectations, she adopted me as one of her own. I forgot that my father was paying board and lodging, I had an oblate’s mentality, I was ready to accept everything. Later on, when I became aware of what was to follow, I considered this to be an inestimable grace. » Later on, starting in 1944, divisions would tear apart the fabric of the Church, initially in France and, gradually, throughout the entire Catholic Church, as we can see today. Our Father continued: « Because I lived, I received my first Catholic heritage and my first clerical imprint in the Church of all time, in the absence of all contestation and division, I can say that I am the legitimate child of this Church, I am her truthful and faithful witness. Had I entered a year later, I would not have had this opportunity, and I would not be able to vouch for anything. From the start, I would have been the member of a party, of a faction, and necessarily against the others. Most certainly, for my masters I would have looked like an opponent. They would have discouraged or expelled me. Had they kept me I still would have only been able to identify with one tradition, one school, one party in the Church, which would have left me powerless. As it is, I identify with the Catholic totality wherein I was born into clerical life in this year of 1943-1944, simply, peacefully devoted to the Church and accepted by her unreservedly. » Certainly, the “resistance” already silently undermined the unity of the ecclesiastic and national organism : « A certain party, which will soon dominate, may claim that it already existed and mistrusted me, but it was then “clandestine”. Nothing that is clandestine is Catholic, and there is nothing that is Catholic that must make itself clandestine in the Church. » (Mémoires et Récits, vol. II, p. 30) Now, as a son of the apostolic Roman Catholic Church, the Abbé de Nantes would be led, starting in 1944, to defend this Holy Mother against two antagonist parties originating from within herself. Against those among her children who want to “reform” her, to the extent of altering her divine constitution as Spouse of Christ in order to make her espouse the world, he would not rest until she sent away the intruder, namely the world and all its “religions”, in order to come back to her unique Spouse, Our Lord Jesus Christ. Then, once the “reformer’s” faction had carried the day at the end of the Second Vatican Council, he had to defend her against those who no longer wanted to acknowledge her as their Mother. Looking back today over these sixty years of the Counter-Reformation and Counter-Revolution fight, as an eye-witness, I do not feel an “integrist’s” or “reactionary’s” nostalgia, but an immense admiration for the ways of the Divine Providence that guided the destiny of its servant. Convinced that a new language was necessary, but which was still that of the Church, he unceasingly denounced the error which passes itself off as the truth, and defended, with great boldness, the disfigured truth. Fifty years ago, I was in the final year of philosophy at Saint-Martin de Pontoise College. And the philosophy professor was the Abbé de Nantes. A SIGN OF CONTRADICTION Already, Providence’s hand could be made out in this paternal decision which placed me, from a young age, in this college so far from my native Dauphiné. My younger brothers will be entrusted to the Jesuits of Saint Joseph’s college, at Avignon, following a well established family tradition. I was put aside, exiled, at nine years of age, and during too brief stays back home, I learned to cry out echoes to our mountains: « Que-vaut-un-o-ra-to-rien... 1 – Rien ! – Com-bien-vaut-il-de-jé-suites ? – Huit ! » As it happened, the adage was confirmed far beyond all that could be expected! Not that the Abbé de Nantes was to become an Oratorian, but he was to be taken in by Father Dupré, the founder of the college, then Superior General of the Oratory, stricken by pity for this young priest, from the Dauphiné as well! and who was put on the sidelines less than five years after his ordination. He literally picked him up off the streets of Paris, at the moment when he had been expelled from the diocese by Cardinal Feltin. For what reason? Since 1949 he had been a contributor to Aspects de la France, the journal of Action Française, writing under the pseudonym of Amicus, with a theologian’s competence which exasperated these gentlemen from the Archbishop’s House in Paris. But in April 1952, setting aside all prudence, Amicus, used his real name, “the Abbé Georges de Nantes”, when at the “Chapeau rouge room”, in the city of Nantes, he gave a conference, the title of which was “The M.P.R. (Mouvement républicain populaire) conveyor of Communism”. What a scandal it was in this Christian Democratic stronghold! The Prefect of Nantes alerted the Prefect of Paris who transmitted the complaint to the Archbishop. Canon Potevin, the Chancellor of Paris, called in the Abbé de Nantes. « So you are “Amicus”? – Yes. – The Cardinal has asked me to inform you that he requests you to leave the diocese of Paris! – And for what reason, Canon? » Then showing one of Amicus’ article from among a bundle that he had on his desk, he pointed to this title referring to the Catholic newspaper La Croix: “At La Croix, they still crucify.” – Have you read the article, Canon? – No, but this sentence alone is an insult for the Assumptionists, the editors of this Catholic newspaper. – Canon, please read it… » The article had been written to defend Maréchal Pétain, who had been shamefully treated in La Croix on the occasion of his death on 23 July 1951. Now the worthy canon had been the chaplain of the Maréchal during his incarceration at Montrouge, where he had been able to admire his magnanimity of soul. There followed an embarrassed silence. But orders are orders, and the Abbé de Nantes found himself out on the street, with his cases of books and his unexploited good will. The Bishop of Grenoble, Mgr Caillot, who was his own bishop and fended for him, wanted to appoint him professor of moral philosophy at the Major Seminary of Rondeau, but the superior refused to accept him. This is when Father Dupré took him in and sent him to Saint Martin’s, where Father Tourde, the college’s superior put him up, like “Cinderella” in the attic of the “Mansion”, and put him in charge of the fourth-year religious instruction class. One year went by, absorbed in the preparation of a doctoral thesis on “The Metaphysical Structure of the Person”. I met him one day in the lane that goes up to the “Hermitage”. I remember as though it was yesterday. He raised his eyes from his breviary, smiled at me most graciously and then continued his prayer. The following year, “Cinderella” was house master at the “Pommeraie” and “professor of philosophy”. How had this come to be? Oh! In the most providential of ways… » During the summer of 1953, the college was deprived of its philosophy professor, following an affair with which students had no need to concern themselves. At the start of the new academic year, it turned out that “Cinderella”, with his four licentiates and his vast erudition was the ideal person to fill the position. He became professor of philosophy and “house master” at the “Pommeraie”, according to the system that divided the six hundred students of this magnificent college among several proprieties that were all joined into one single park. My best friend, Gérard Cousin, had already been at the “Pommeraie” for several years. This is where the adventure began, and it is not over yet. Fifty years have gone by. United for life in the same “Maison Saint-Joseph” Cousin and Bonnet-Eymard never cease giving thanks, under the direction of the same “house master”… A SCHOOL OF THOUGHT
He was an extraordinary professor. The 100 % success rate at the final examinations of that year suffices to prove this. Without the slightest concession to the prevailing errors of the post-war and post-liberation period, he already taught the “whole” truth with an infectious enthusiasm. Theology was the first master, through the religious instruction course which we no longer thought to heckle, as was the tradition in this liberal college. “The cycle of the Father, the cycle of the Son, the cycle of the Holy Spirit”, introduced us into the only religion that established between Heaven and earth bonds of a circumincessant and divine charity: the Son of God becoming Son in this world, the Son of Mary, in the village of Nazareth, teaches us to love every kind of filiation on earth. A friend whom we called Pachy, and who had revolted against his father, immediately drew the practical consequences from it: he begged him pardon, and was eternally grateful to his philosophy prof who had enabled this reconciliation to take place. His filial fervour became proverbial among us and gave rise to an unusual incident during our end of studies retreat, organised by the Oratorians in Belgium’s royal abbey of Orval. The Abbé de Nantes accompanied us, but the retreat was preached by Fr. Liégé, a Dominican filled with a revolutionary spirit, and who would raise havoc in the Latin Quarter a few years later, in May ’68. Fr. Liégé had arranged a “forum” on “love”. The anticipated “exchange” was a drag, for we hardly had any experiences to “share”. Suddenly “Pachy” raised his hand: « I have a fantastic experience of love! » All eyes fixed on him; those of Fr. Liégé sparkled with curiosity: « Love of my father! » The Dominican, disappointed, ended up calling us philistines, daddy’s boys, and refused to take part in the convivial meal which was to conclude our college life. I remember his spiritual direction which consisted in warning me against my philosophy professor. And for what reason? Because he was “Action française”. I was wide-eyed. I knew nothing about A.F., of which the Abbé de Nantes had not even spoken. It is true that the “relational” crux of his religious instruction course, issued from a philosophy which was the principal object of our studies for the final examination: A total and prime Truth that posited every “human person” as a “creature” considered not only in his “nature”, but in his origin. Aristotelian-thomist realism, boldly professed before our examiners, immunised us against Kantian idealism, a « mental illness » chosen as an optional subject for the oral examination, with the study of the preface of the second edition of Criticism of pure reason. But our professor pointed out to us that Aristotle, and therefore St. Thomas, lacked the consideration of the « relationship of origin », through which each one is lead to discover his « vocation ». A morality diametrically opposed to human rights emerges from this, which teaches us to consider null and void, the so-called “dignity of the free, autonomous and independent human person” (“dignité de la personne humaine, libre, autonome et indépendante” [abbreviated p. h. l. a. i. in our class notes…]) On the other hand, by acknowledging and accepting his present state, as God had given it to him beginning from the original condition in which he placed him when calling him into existence, everyone learns from Christ what place he is called to occupy in the universal brotherhood, and towards what revelation of the Divine Paternity he is advancing. When the heart of man willingly responds to this vocation, without rebelling against the state into which he was born, then peace is possible: in the home, in the village, in the country and in the entire world. Not peace emanating from an impossible “justice” inferred from “human rights” by virtue of an abstract definition of human nature. It is a peace of compromise, however, and expectation that arises from the circumstances arranged by Divine Providence. It awaits a final transfiguration in the Heaven towards which we are advancing, where the only thing that will matter is the love and generosity with which we will have responded to our vocation of children of Mary. There is no race nor class of “sons of God”; everyone in his own state, in his own original condition, at the place where Providence placed him, is a brother of the Child of Bethlehem, Son of God, if he knows how to find his peace and joy in the little that has been granted him, in which shines the light of Christmas. We were captivated. A flood of light was generously imparted not only in class, but during meals, recreations, at the chapel, from morning to nightfall. All this occurred without weariness either on the part of the master or the students. It immunised us against idealism, as I have said, against racism, against socialism and against the democratic pride that was illustrated by the current events that he explained to us. For, he spoke to us about politics, as Edith Stein had done with her own students during the inter-war period. And this is perhaps what gripped us the most.
But this was also what began to worry the Oratorians… The haunting question ran: « Can a priest be involved in politics? » To this question, the Abbé de Nantes gave the same reply as they did: No! Politics is not the priest’s trade, nor is it that of the farmer, the craftsman, any more than it is that of the philosopher. Politics is a royal work, and it must be practiced by the King alone. This is how we became monarchists for life! This occurred even before ever having spoken of Action française, whose very name he did not pronounce throughout the entire year. No, it is not the priest’s role to be in politics! It was no more his role than waging war was the office of a shepherdess from Domremy… But when the King is absent, when he is not acknowledged, then loyal subjects must exercise regency. Their mission is not to found a dynasty nor to invent a legitimacy, which is what the English and their henchmen were always inclined to do, from the Hundred Years’ War right up to 1944. « Legitimacy is a reality that religion guarantees and strengthens », he taught us. From 1940 to 1944, this principle prevailed. All the bishops joined Cardinal Gerlier in saying: « Pétain is France; and France is Pétain. » This provoked a new psychodrama in our class: we had a classmate whose father, an important member of the “Resistance movement”, had brought him up to adulate De Gaulle. With countless precautions, the Abbé de Nantes showed him his father’s error, while at the same time teaching him the reverence that he should have towards his father. This was the great revelation of that blessed year: the service of the “truth” outweighs all other considerations. Joan of Arc’s example when she left her father and mother at the call of the Voices demanded that we fulfil our sacred duty with the same generosity, the same disinterestedness, whatever the consequences might be. For, however powerful, however firm they were when it was a question of ensuring the political mission, the heavenly Voices remained silent when Joan questioned them concerning her particular destiny: « I asked my Voices if I will be burned at the stake; they told me to put my faith in Our Lord, and He will help me. » It may be said that this line of conduct was that of the Abbé de Nantes, although he did not recommend it as a universal maxim. For an urgent necessity must command our action in order to inspire such selflessness! Not only in the time of Joan of Arc, but even more so in our own times. To be truthful, I must admit here that I was averse due to the consequences and was looking for a way out: there is, on the one hand, the truth derived from the dogma of the Holy Trinity, and form the catechism in general with its obligations. And there is historical truth, with its doubts and uncertainties: some are for Pétain, others are for De Gaulle. Is one not free to chose? Well, no! The “truth” is just as sacred in the field of historical science, the object of rigorous study, as in that of dogmatic faith. From the moment when it is well established that Pétain was the providential saviour of France, and De Gaulle, her infernal wrecker, it is a sin against God to approve of those who sent the Maréchal to prison, just as it is to approve of those who burned Joan of Arc, or those who crucified Jesus Christ. France still suffers from all the consequences of this “original sin”. « In the dark hours of revolution and foreign occupation, he told us, repeating the substance of Amicus’ articles, Joan taught us that it is beautiful for a maid from the Marches of Lorraine, to stand up, to leave everything and put her life to the service of her King. » All the more so for a young priest! « It is not insurrection that is the most sacred of duties. » We understood: it is not the Resistance. « It is real submission », in the name of religion and philosophy, inseparably, since it is our mutual dependence that makes it a duty for us, a sweet and fraternal obligation. « It is the service of the true leader who personifies the nation. » It is obviously Pétain, it is not the Other one, who came from abroad. « This reconquest of the country for its King was of interest to God Himself; this is the supreme lesson of the miracle of St. Joan of Arc. » « All that I did was done on God’s command », she said. The Abbé de Nantes can say this as well, without the intervention of heavenly Voices, nor God’s miracles, other than that of a consuming zeal that is humanly inexplicable. This is what supported him with an invincible strength in the defence of the clearly perceived truth, without allowing him to veer to the right or the left, at the moment when the whole of civil and ecclesial society was sinking into an immense apostasy. « The voice that clearly rose in the flames of the stake at Rouen expresses eternal truths; what was sacred before is still sacred today, and one cannot fail in his duty by devoting himself to the same cause that at one point in history seemed divine. » These lines, signed Amicus, justifies the Abbé de Nantes’ vocation of explaining politics to us for fifty years. He does it with such lucidity that events have always proven him to be right. They came at the price of persecutions. In 1955, he left Saint Martin’s to enter the Carmel. But the Carmelite Fathers, who had been warned by Fr. Tourde, refused to accept him. How can we bear a grudge against him? Brother Gerard was about to follow the Abbé de Nantes; he was burning with enthusiasm, while I was sulking. If our Father and Brother Gerard had been admitted, today they would be prisoners, handcuffed and gagged like Sister Lucy in her Carmel at Coimbra. Yet, filled with Elijah’s spirit, he and his Elisha, remained true sons of St. John of the Cross in order to serve the « living God »; they were free and refused to bend the knee before the idol… Let us admire the ways of Providence! Nevertheless, at that time, only one thing was certain: he was out on the street, with his cartons of books, once again not knowing where to go. « Accept everything with good grace », sing St. Catherine and St. Margaret, as in the times of St. Joan of Arc. Driven out of Pontoise, he found refuge at the College of Normandy, where André Charlier was only too happy to acquire such a professor! He spent three years there before founding the Little Brothers of the Sacred Heart at Villemaur, through a new intervention of divine Providence that is worth relating. MISSIONARY MONK
In October 1956, he sent Letter number 1 to seventy friends: « “In the evening of life, only one thing is left: love. Everything must be done through love.” Reflect on these words from the Carmel; they will be a soothing light for you in the trials of your life. » What does it teach us? A truth that is the grace of the first eight years of his priesthood: « God is good when He “breaks one’s career”. All false grandeur and all false riches are thereby taken away, and if one receives the grace of losing all hope of ever regaining them, then room will be found for the true wealth of contemplation. To all of you, I wish such a break. » Really? So we can understand why the “Friends” to whom the letters were destined, were never crowds… « No one will lose by it, I assure you, neither those nearest to you, your country or the Church. » The monumental work to which this Letter to my Friends no 1 is the preface, provides today overabundant proof. That year, a book whose importance the Abbé de Nantes immediately understood, was published on the origins of Islam: it was the first work to break with « the age-old attitude of the East and the West towards Islam that was characterised by simple acceptance of its pretended origins. A man took the liberty of reading the Koran like a document of the past and of seeking to explain it by the simplest laws of historic methodology that has been used for ages within Catholicism in the study of the Bible. » The author of this book, Fr. Théry was a learned medievalist who belonged to the Order of St. Dominic and who hid his identity under the pseudonym of Hanna Zakarias. He was won over by the book review published by the Abbé de Nantes in Ordre français: « You have expressed my thought in a most exact manner; you have drawn conclusions from it that I had barely glimpsed ». He wrote him even before having revealed to him his true identity. Now, since 1938, at fourteen years of age, Georges de Nantes had heard Charles de Foucauld’s call to come to the help of the souls of the infidels for whom France had taken the responsibility of colonising. The concern for scientific, exegetic and historical “truth” was more important than ever, since it would be the preliminary to any missionary project in Islamic countries. His failure to enter Carmel had not made him abandon the desire of becoming a monk: a missionary monk in imitation of Father de Foucauld. When he confided this desire to Fr. Théry, he advised him to write a Rule that he would take upon himself to submit for approval to a bishop from among his numerous friends. This is what in fact happened. Our Father wrote in one go the one hundred and twenty articles of a “provisional” rule, under which, ever since then, we, the Little Brothers and Little Sisters of the Sacred Heart accomplish our noviciate so as to one day be worthy of canonical recognition, at the hour that God will chose. This hour has not yet arrived. How could this be surprising? This Rule was written at the beginning of the summer of 1957. Now in December of that same year, Sister Lucy said to Fr. Fuentes : « Father, we should not wait for an appeal to come from Rome, on behalf of the Holy Father, calling on the whole world to do penance. Nor should we wait for it to come from our bishops in their dioceses or from the religious congregations. No. Our Lord has already made frequent use of these means and the world took no notice. That is why each of us must now begin his own spiritual reform. Each person must not only save his own soul, but also all the souls that God has placed on his path. » This was the concern that had already been inspiring the author of the Letters to my Friends for over a year. However, Mgr. Le Couëdic, the Bishop of Troyes, to whom Fr. Théry had forwarded a copy of the Rule, proposed to the Abbé de Nantes to undertake the planned foundation in his diocese. This is how on 15 Sepembre 1958, for the centenary of the birth of Charles de Foucauld, we sang the first vespers of the feast of Our Lady of the Seven Sorrows in the church of Villemaur.
During five years, the founder of the Little Brothers of the Sacred Heart devoted himself to an intense parochial ministry: as a “monk” in his parish of Villemaur, and “missionary” on the roads to Pâlis and Planty. During this time, we were finishing our licentiates in Scholastic Philosophy at the Catholic Institute, and Literature at the Sorbonne, and we then left for twenty-seven months of military service in Algeria. October 1959-December 1961: it was subsequent to the national outburst of 13 May 1958, the most favourable moment for a providential “period of instruction” in this Christian land, the object of the missionary solicitude of Father de Foucauld. It was at this time that Mgr Le Couëdic allowed us to don the monastic choir habit, the white Cistercian cowl, an indication of his firm resolve to establish us truly as a community of missionary monks. Yet we were rapidly warned that this foundation would soon become intolerable to all the political, ecclesiastic and administrative powers, as is the case even today. The dreadful drama of our French Algeria was reaching its height of injustice and horror; this compelled our Father resolutely to enter into the struggle to defend her, but to the detriment of the canonical recognition of the Little Brothers of the Sacred Heart that was thus seriously compromised at the moment when it was about to succeed in Rome! Mgr Philippe, a Dominican who was Secretary of the Sacred Congregation of Religious, gave a positive response… on one condition: « The text of this Rule might well be approved by the Sacred Congregation and your projected foundation could take place. » But, he added, « what creates a problem is your political commitments… your defence of French Algeria… Here, at Rome, this French prelate said, such an attitude cannot be understood. You must absolutely abandon it. » He obtained this proud reply: « Excellency, the defence of my assassinated brethren, is in any case, an imperative duty imposed on me by Christian morality; recognition of the Order, which I have just requested of you, depends only on God’s good pleasure. If this design is in keeping with His Will, it will come about in due time. I could not pay for this official recognition at the cost of an immoral act that certainly is gravely culpable. This is why we are still not recognised. From the pulpit of truth, the parish priest of Villemaur, Pâlis and Planty continued to recall to his parishioners their duties of justice and charity towards their Christian brothers and fellow French citizens who had been handed over to fellagha knives: « Brethern, how can you expect me to teach your children not to kill and not to lie, when it is the head of State who gives them an example of lying and homicide? » On 14 March 1962, four inspectors presented a search warrant and an order for Villemaur’s parish priest to be kept under police surveillance. They took him to the police station. The statement that he made enraged the Prefect, who had been informed of the matter by the Head of the Sûreté. « I reprove and declare to be disgraceful the clever acts of perjury and treason of the head of State. I protest against his abandoning our fellow citizens of Algeria, Muslim as well as Christian, to the knives of cutthroats. I declare unconstitutional, unlawful and immoral all that M. de Gaulle is doing contrary to his duty and contrary to his numerous promises. I refuse this the most shameful capitulation in our history that he is determined to sign… » To the civil servant who said that this amounted to « insults to the head of state », Villemaur’s parish priest replied that the insult was found in the General’s acts rather than in the words that denounced them. Since he did not dare intern his prisoner, the Prefect called the Bishop to ask him to lock up this troublesome priest… in the Major Seminary… that was devoid of seminarians. His Lordship attempted to blackmail the prisoner in the same way as Mgr Philippe had, calling into question the future of the Order… He received the same reply, in the name of the Church and of truth, and our Father wrote to us brothers: « I remain here, therefore – in detention – and wait to see what will happen next. Pray hard that in all this I do nothing following my own will and that I remain most faithful to the Holy Spirit. But as for a prison, it is ideal: a seminarian’s room, my papers, my books, a chapel, a prie-Dieu. I bless you “in vinculis”. What an extraordinarily “Christian” situation a prison is! His first “captivity”. But not the last… A few days later, he confided to us: « I am indeed quite well here. It is a house arrest without guards and without bolted doors. However, I had to endure meetings with His Lordship that were much more painful than the interrogations of the police. There is a wall of incomprehension that cuts us off now from our confreres or superiors. There are some who agree to discuss and those who want to be led by the feelings of the masses, by the “collective will” that the General sovereignly expresses and that the majority ratifies. »This was the case with Mgr Le Couëdic, who was a great admirer of General de Gaulle. « This is the point we have reached and, in the atrocious “repression” which is presently continuing at Bab-el-Oued, it is the Frenchmen cast out of the country and handed over to the FLN who are the criminals! » Fifty years after All Saints Day, 1954, when the carnage began, we are still at the foot of the same « wall of incomprehension ». And Algeria, which was abandoned by us, is more than ever put to fire and sword. SUSPENSION “AB OFFICIO” Our Father wrote to us once again a few day after the so-called “Évian agreements” of 19 March 1962: « I disassociate myself from a clergy that, out of blindness, cowardice, or democratic, liberal or revolutionary ideology, side with the Muslim FLN, with world Communism, with the government that betrays, tortures, lies, and corrupts everything, against the French and the Christians who want to live free in a land that is French and Christian. May God assist us in this deplorable struggle. » On 1 April, “Laetare” Sunday, he returned to his parishes and went up into the pulpit: « A priest is obliged to tell the truth. When he disregards truth and good, an infernal chain of lies begins. » However the Prefect did not lessen his pressure on the bishop, ordering him to depose the parish priest of Villemaur. Mgr Le Couëdic did not give in, at least not immediately. After « the Christian traitor had handed Algeria over to the Muslim assassin » on 1 July (Letter to my Friends no 112), on 11 October 1962 the Second Vatican Council opened. During this first session, Brother Gérard and I were refused advancement to Holy Orders by the Council of the Carmelite Seminary. At first sight, the two events are not at all related. And yet… To M. Cousin who asked for explanations, the Superior, Fr. Tollu replied: « I assure you that for me it is a great sorrow not to be able to call to the priesthood young men who have so many good qualities. But we cannot fail to note, alas! the disastrous effects of M. de Nantes’ influence. » Brother Gérard, who had been entrusted with the role of commentator at the 11 November Mass at the Carmelite church, had sparked things off when he proposed as a prayer intention the repatriates, prisoners, and harkis who were victims of the atrocious reprisals of the FLN in Algeria throughout the summer and autumn of 1962. This was called a « political attitude » that was absolutely unacceptable on the part of future priests; they therefore refused to admit us to Orders at the precise moment when the first session of the Council was opening the Church to a boundless love destined to soon bring about the great universal reconciliation… At first, Mgr Le Couëdic seemed to want to carry on regardless and keep his promise of supporting the projected foundation of the Abbé de Nantes, of whom he would say right to the end of his life: « He was certainly the most well instructed of my priests, the soundest theologian. I have always followed his writings attentively, and even now I still read them. From a doctrinal viewpoint, they are irreproachable… » His Lordship was full of praise concerning « his elevated spiritual life, for on the plane of religious life, he is also a person of merit, of remarkable piety, and true asceticism… Yes, he is a great soul. » Then how and why did this bishop come to remove him from his office of parish priest at Villemaur, Pâlis and Planty, asking him to leave the diocese of Troyes? For the reason that our Father would soon express in a pithy phrase to Mgr Le Couëdic himself: « I was the first victim of the Conciliar revolution. » This revolution had been developing for a long time. Our Father had detected its harbingers in 1944, in the “liberated seminary” at Issy-les-Moulineaux, and we in turn were subject to its forerunners fourteen years later, in the Seminary of the Carmelite Fathers, from the time of the death of Pius XII and the accession of John XXIII, in 1958, acclaimed by the entire left-wing intelligentsia as the end of one world and the dawning of a new era. A bad spirit began to blow against all the traditional institutions that we loved. I made the cruel discovery when my turn came to make my first sermon in the presence of the superior and confreres. I recited, eloquently perhaps?, in any case with enthusiasm, the Letter to my Friends no 134, of 19 March 1963: « The very thought of belonging to the Church is enough to renew the soul’s jubilation, for the Church is holy, like Her Spouse Jesus Christ, whom She so resembles, so that there is nothing in the world so beautiful, so wise and so majestic as Her face and Her whole being. She is our Mother, and I add: She is the unique incomparable Spouse, alone holy, wise, and sublime, leaving false religions and deceptive philosophies far behind in their darkness. » What had I done! Without realising it, what I had said was tantamount to contradicting the entire “spirit of the Council” in advance. M. Tollu, our Superior, severely criticised this thoughtless praise of the Church of the Crusades, the Inquisition, and the Galileo affair, etc. So we were not discontented to leave the seminary, shaking off the dust from our sandals, to rejoin our Father at Maison Saint-Joseph to lead there a community life inspired by Father de Foucauld. He had sought to “descend”, remaining a long time distant from the priesthood due to the honour which is attached to it, in order to rejoin Our Lord, our « Unique Model », in the « abjection » of the « last place ». And since we wanted to imitate him, was not seeing our Father Superior and Founder suspens ab officio, and ourselves barred admission to Holy Orders, a good start for a congregation that claims to abide by his spirit? We did however finish our theological studies, as « auditors » at the Catholic Institute, where a prestigious professorial body was shining its last glimmer before the post-Conciliar collapse: Fr. Daniélou, who taught the origins of Christianity, showed interest in my studies on the origins of Islam, and wanted to publish the preliminary conclusions; Fr. Bouyer, a Protestant convert, Fr. Lallemant, the commentator of St. Thomas who was so “integrist” that he stood in the way of the young Abbé de Nantes’s thesis on “The Metaphysical Structure of the Person in the Work of St. Thomas of Aquinas” in 1950, labelling it “modernist”! There were also great Bible scholars from what our Father refers to as the “French school” of exegesis: Fr. Cazelles who had himself been his professor, Father Feuillet and Canon Osty. We were above all disciples of the Abbé de Nantes… THE FOUNDATION OF MAISON SAINT-JOSEPH Our Father found himself, put on the sidelines, in a de facto « withdrawal of obedience », due to the will of his bishop, and not due to his own initiative. We moved into Maison Saint-Joseph, which was acquired thanks to the generosity of our friends. Despite Mgr Le Couëdic’s repeated entreaties, our Father insisted on remaining in the diocese of Troyes, since we were honourably known there. He was willing to recommend us as being the best of his diocese to any other bishop, provided that we leave! We began our community life on 15 September 1963, on the anniversary of the birth of Father de Foucauld, on the feast of Our Lady of the Seven Sorrows, living as « missionary monks » according to our Provisional Rule. Relieved of all “office”, our Father was free to follow the unfolding of the Council when the second session of the Council was beginning. He immediately understood what was at stake in the debate on collegiality, what its objective was, and which ended in what Fr. Congar himself called the « October Revolution ». Our Father summarised the outcome: « Power passed from being personal, whether considering that of the bishop in his diocese or that of the Pope over the entire Church. From a system where power carries with it potent authority and personal responsibility, the Church has passed to a government by a college or assembly, whose characteristic is to put authority to the vote and to dilute responsibility to the point of rendering it anonymous. » Even then, a strong minority resisted in the Conciliar aula, and I remember how our Father was concerned about fighting alongside them with all his strength and all his influence; his action took the form of circulating the Letters to my Friends in Rome: « It is our inviolable right to express to the four hundred defenders of ecclesiastical Tradition and pontifical Primacy, our gratitude, our admiration, our entire confidence. We want the Church to remain what she is, monarchic, of divine right, monolithic in the face of the infernal forces unleashed against her! » (Letter no 156, 31 October 1963) By this “charismatic” office, he proved himself to be a true « missionary monk », a son of Elijah, the prophet who founded Carmel, and a zealot of the Living God eager to topple over an idol more infernal than all the idols that the missionaries of former times had fought. At Bethlehem, on 6 January 1964, the feast of the Epiphany, Pope Paul VI, « Paul-outside-the-walls », proclaimed a new Gospel: « We must assure to the life of the Church a new manner of feeling, desiring, behaving. » A more explicit invitation to « change religion » could not be made. The Pope himself contributed to this by his spectacular, « prophetic » gestures, for example, by giving up the tiara that year as a sign that the Roman Pontiff had given up his sovereignty over heads of State. From Bombay, where he had gone to a Eucharistic Congress, he brought back to the Vatican a statue of the god Krishna, the eighth incarnation of the god Vishnu! as a sign of « sacred communion », he explained on 2 December 1964, the feast of St. Francis Xavier, to the representatives of “non-Christian religions”: « in this sacred communion we must all join together in working for the common future of humanity. » This was shortly after the third session of the Council during which the proposed schema on religious freedom was the subject of a dramatic debate in which our Father had vigorously taken part while at the same time expressing reservations concerning its opportuneness: « In fact, this debate can only lead to catastrophes », he wrote on 1 October 1964. It is not a good thing to express certain truths: « It was necessary to avoid recalling truths that were too austere if the men of the Church were too cowardly to shoulder the burden, or to proclaim them proudly and paternally in the face of the modern World, which does not accept them and dies for want of them. But discuss them, never! The Church cannot stray from them without disavowing them and committing apostasy. Freedom comes from God alone. Perfect human freedom belongs to Jesus Christ alone and, in the divine gift that He made of it, to the Catholic Church. She alone is the true religion and the perfect society whose rights dominate all powers and all created individuals. It is by virtue of their membership in this divine and true Church that all Catholics have the full freedom of worship and apostolate in all nations and in all states. This is the foundation of an absolute and sacred family, social, political, and international law. The other religions, being deprived of any historical proof and any supernatural mark of truth, have no specific authority and those who practice them, even sincere persons, have no special right other than that of natural morality. Neither the Church nor States should recognise such religions, nor grant them the slightest social right, for error constitutes no basis for a real right. Only the requirements of the common good and peace can bring about a certain tolerance, which, however broad it may be, will be no more than a make-shift solution that always remains dangerous for the true faith, for the supernatural good of societies, and for the salvation of souls! « Therefore, one must not speak of freedom except in the context of private consciences, which cannot be forced: under no circumstances can one be compelled to practice a religion that his conscience invincibly rejects as being evil; but it does not follow that his conscience has the power to act exteriorly in accord with its error. » There can be no question, therefore, of permitting the construction of mosques for Muslims, with minarets to call them to prayer… « Furthermore, society must expend all its efforts to bring it to the truth and redress it in accord with the good to which God calls it. « To say that it is violent for the Church to demand for herself what she refuses to others is to lead minds astray, it is to renounce the true God, the true faith, the unique Church of Jesus Christ. The objective is to judge things no longer except from the point of view of Man, an autonomous and absolute being who has taken God’s place and is free to believe and to act without restriction! » Ultimately, the session ended without the proclamation of religious freedom that had been so desired by the “reformers” for the centenary of the Syllabus, so as to blot out its very memory. So, to make sure of carrying it off during the closing session, Pope Paul VI went to proclaim it at UN headquarters in Manhattan, on 4 October 1965, the feast of St. Francis of Assisi. On that day, « the spirit of Assisi » descended on Manhattan, to give life to the Movement for the Spiritual Animation of Universal Democracy, MASDU, « a marvellous and living, vaguely angelical chimera, wrote Jacques Perret, the cover of whose wings will keep us here below in darkness and condemned to pursuing our temporal bliss as our lone ambition. God will only provide discrete assistance to them. What a strange mutation of the dove of St. Remi », and a denial of the Dove of the Baptism of Jesus Christ! Without invoking any divine authority, John the Baptist (Montini) spoke with a voice different from the divine voice heard at Bethany on the far side of the Jordan, two thousand years ago: that of an « expert in humanity and a pilgrim for peace ». He proclaimed: « Never again war! Never, never again! It is peace, peace which must guide the destiny of peoples and of all humanity. » And for his unflagging efforts in the service of this « sacred cause », John the Baptist Montini did not praise God, but the Organisation founded on « the fundamental rights and duties of man, his dignity, his freedom and above all, his religious freedom. » This is how Pope Paul VI forced the hand of the Council, where a minority still resolutely voted against « the unthinkable schema on religious freedom », as Mgr Lefebvre said, before rallying over to it himself. « So here the Church is, enslaved to temporal powers, and to the worst of them, our Father remarked after the Pope’s voyage to the UN. Her doctrine has been determined, not by a legitimate act of the Magisterium, but in anticipation of it and forcing it, by means of a speech that Paul VI addressed to the nations. The era of freedom has begun by an act of secular constraint. » On 8 December 1965, the day of the Council’s closing, he wrote: « This is the final combat of Rock against Rock, of Manhattan against Rome, of the God-man against the Man God and, according to St. Paul’s declaration, tragically omitted from Ecclesiam Suam, of “Christ and Belial”. » Through an extraordinary penetration of the thought of Paul VI, he unwittingly contradicted, word for word, while at the same time closely mirroring it, the speech that the Pope had delivered the preceding day: « Secular, profane, humanism has finally revealed itself in its terrible shape and has, in a certain sense, challenged the Council. The religion of God made man has come up against a religion – for there is such a one – of man who makes himself God. And what happened? An impact, a battle, an anathema? That might have taken place, but it did not. » Now this had taken place during the reigns of Pius IX, Pius X, and even Pius XII. « But that did not take place », continued Paul VI on 7 December 1965, just as could be inferred from the encyclical Ecclesiam suam of 6 August 1964, in which this Pope clearly announced that he intended to open a new era of reconciliation with the Devil. Our Father continued, « I say tragically because if Paul VI had pronounced these words of the Apostle: “What fellowship has light with darkness? What accord has Christ with Belial?” (2 Co 6.15), he would never have gone to the UN, where the reign of divinised man is being inaugurated, the latest creation of Satan’s genius. » Alarmed by what he had just written, our Father added: « These things are terrible to write and terrible to read. They show the imminent peril of universal apostasy. But it is the Black Rock of the UN that will be shattered by the Power of God. At Rome, Peter, the unshakeable Rock, will confirm his brethren and we shall be saved. » Such is still today our act of faith and hope in the Church. Erected in the centre of the « Meditation Room », designed as a “chapel”, is a Masonic sanctuary; « the Black Rock of the UN that will be shattered by the Power of God » is an “altar” of stone, covered with a gold plaque that reflects a shaft of light. This black rock symbolises the divinities of the ages of darkness that nevertheless somehow reflected the light of the One Spirit, the Grand Architect. This black rock is found at Mecca. Now it is erected at Saint Peter’s! On 7 December 1965, the Pope concluded the Council by proclaiming that it would not pronounce an anathema upon the modern idol, quite the reverse: « It was the old story of the Samaritan that formed the model for the Council's spirituality. It was filled only with an endless sympathy. Its attention was taken up with the discovery of human needs – which become greater as the son of the earth (sic) makes himself greater. « Do you at least recognise this its merit, you modern humanists who have no place for the transcendence of the things supreme, and come to know our new humanism: we also, we more than anyone else, have the cult of man. » Not a single bishop could be found to refuse to bend the knee before the idol. No! There was neither « impact », nor « battle », nor « anathema ». Except against… the Abbé de Nantes, and against him alone, because, like Elijah he alone remained a « free man among the dead », a prophet of purely Catholic fidelity. SUSPENSION “A DIVINIS” Before leaving Rome to return to their respective dioceses, the French bishops decided to publish a warning against the Abbé de Nantes. Mgr Le Couëdic was at their forefront, thinking that he could easily silence this importunate opponent of the Conciliar “Reform” by enjoining him to: 1 leave the diocese, 2 stop publishing the “Letters to my Friends”, on pain of suspension a divinis, that is, to be deprived of celebrating Holy Mass. The Bishop’s aim was to have him leave the diocese, and he did not doubt that he would be obeyed by a priest who was soon to write: « I realise in fact that it is at Mass, by threads more or less invisible, that my whole life has always been held, my morning, my midday and my evening. » That was to fail to understand that the Catholic faith was at stake. The Abbé de Nantes replied to his Bishop with a clear summary of the doctrinal motives of his opposition to the Conciliar reform and appealed to Rome to obtain a judgement on the substance: « If I surrendered – not to your reasons, you do not give me any, no one gives me any from an authoritative source – but to the terrible threats of your spiritual power, if I yielded to your order to remain silent and to submit myself to this evolution, to this mutation of the Church, if I agreed to participate knowingly in this deception which is its protective smoke screen, I would be unable to do so without losing my faith in the Holy Church of Jesus Christ… « To be able to accept the current course of events, I would have to identify the Holy Spirit with the cunning of the modernist faction; I would have to identify the holiness of my Mother the Church with the passion of adultery and the prevarication that is raging everywhere; and identify the divine government, with the sordid diplomacy, the universal demagogy that floods everywhere. That is what the Church is? It is impossible to admit this without losing the faith! » A truce followed during which our Father commented on our Roman Catholic Creed in a series of Letters written from February to July 1966 (Letters to my Friends nos 222-230). Simply listing their titles constitutes a veritable manifesto of Catholic Counter-Reformation: « I believe in God the Father, Creator of Heaven and earth », and not in man, who is himself merely a creature. « I believe in the twofold law of Nature and Grace. I believe in their great goodness. » “Nature” without “Grace” is open-ended, capable of the best and the worst, precisely because man is “free” to chose between good and evil. « I believe in the Holy Angels and in Demons. I believe in their inexpiable temporal combat. » The angelic creatures chose in an instant, and for ever, for or against the worship of God, to the cry of Mi-ka-el, « Who is like God? » or Non serviam! « I will not serve! » It is frightening. « I believe in the creation of Adam and Eve. I believe in their original justice and in their fall. » Their original justice through grace. Their fall at the instigation of the Devil: « You will be like gods », the first claim to “religious freedom”! « I believe in the holy Wrath of God on all humanity. I believe in the human bondage to Sin and to the Devil. » Therefore, the human person is not born free, autonomous and independent, contrary to what the Declaration of Human Rights claims. « But I believe in the secret ways of Mercy. » « I believe in the miraculous foundation of Israel, God’s unique and true Chosen People », custodian of the unique divine revelation, the other so-called “religions” being merely human or diabolical inventions. « I believe in its supernatural grandeur and its culpable decadence. I believe in its mysterious fulfilment »… in the Roman Catholic Church. But the Abbé de Nantes did not have the opportunity to develop this last point, because Mgr Le Couëdic did not leave him enough time. He broke the truce, condemning him to celebrate Holy Mass no longer in the diocese of Troyes by suspending him “a divinis”. This occurred six months after a Council that was to launch a new era of peace, love and freedom! The motive for this punishment today has been entirely forgotten: in order to open the trial in Rome, our Father wrote an official letter to Cardinal Ottaviani, the Prefect of the Holy Office. Mgr Le Couëdic, having read it in passing, judged this letter insulting and refused to forward it through official channels. Our Father was therefore forced to send this petition by mail, as well as the package of Letters to my Friends that were the subject of the action… on which Mgr Le Couëdic had already decided, anticipating Rome’s judgement! So as not to be debarred, the Abbé de Nantes had no other choice than to publish the Letter to Cardinal Ottaviani in which he made himself the spokesman for the « long, ardent, vast plea rising towards Her » of Catholics who held that « the faith had been changed »: « Since 1960, the reform and the renewal have become so widespread in the Church that people of tradition are no longer tolerated in ecclesiastical society. Furthermore, the hierarchical authority has apparently committed itself to this with such power that it seems to have become impossible to remain faithful to the Church of Jesus Christ within the Church of John XXIII, Paul VI and Vatican II without being accused of heresy and schism. For the crime of fidelity, we find ourselves on the verge of excommunication. » By suspending the Abbé de Nantes a divinis for this unauthorised publication, Mgr Le Couëdic hoped to see him leave this diocese where he was now unwelcome in order to be able again to continue to say Mass. Frustrating this ruse, our Father submitted to the unjust sanction without defending himself, preserving in this way his entire liberty to continue the fight against the transformation of the Church into Masdu, Movement for the Spiritual Animation of Universal Democracy, « in the political sphere, an absurd and criminal dream, and in the religious sphere, an apostasy, a denial of Jesus Christ. » In point of fact, each side has made its case: it is impossible to condemn the Abbé de Nantes, because he is right. This is why Joseph Cardinal Lefebvre, Archbishop of Bourges, an assessor of the Holy Office and President of the Assembly of Bishops of France was appointed by Cardinal Ottaviani to attempt to convince the Abbé de Nantes to abandon the introduction of this appeal. It was in vain: the Abbé de Nantes respectfully but firmly requested a canonical judgement on his writings. The cardinal then said, repeating Festus’s formula to St. Paul: « Cæsarem appellasti ? Ad Cæsarem ibis. » (Ac 25.12) (To be continued) Brother Bruno of Jesus 1) « How much is an Oratorian worth? – Nothing! – How many Jesuits is an Oratorian worth? – Eight ! |
