He will return with his immense heart, with his heart of fire, his poor man's soul
and his smile. He will return! And the Immaculate Heart of Mary will triumph!

OUR LADY OF FATIMA CAMP 2007

THE SECOND VATICAN COUNCIL

« SACROSANCTUM CONCILIUM »

REJECTION OF AN IMMEMORIAL LITURGICAL HERITAGE

Liturgy, the Abbé Georges de Nantes wrote, is not a science of rites, a sacred art, or a technique of group dynamics. It is a spiritual life, a sacred observance: the observance by the whole Church of her mystical life, that is to say, of her life with God through Jesus Christ. God lives with us through the words and actions that produce our sanctification, and we live with God through the praise that as a congregation we raise up to Him, the Father of us all, our Heavenly Father. »

It is a ritual because it has been instituted in accordance with sacred gestures and formulas; however the liturgy does not have the fixedness of dogma. « The latter does not recognise a middle way between truth and error or historical evolution from the one to the other. The former cuts a broad path between fixism and mobilism, but always with the sovereign respect of holy doctrine and the apostolic tradition. » ¹

Thus the liturgy has neither the perfection of divinely inspired Scripture nor is it marked with the immutable character of a dogmatic definition. It is not guaranteed against the wear and tear of time, awkward innovations, and regrettable omissions » ².

A PROMISING LITURGICAL MOVEMENT

After restoration of the Roman liturgy in France during the pontificate of Blessed Pius IX, the liturgical movement was encouraged by Popes St. Pius X and Pius XII and experienced new growth. Scholars studied the history of liturgical institutions, discovered forgotten rites, understood and explained their meaning. The charter of that promising current was the encyclical Mediator Dei, published on 20 November 1947.

« Under the direction of Dom Lambert Beauduin and up to the time of Dom Botte, our Father explained, the restoration of the liturgy was governed by two or three essential principles: the liturgy is entirely orientated to the worship of God and the sanctification of the faithful; as a means it is subordinate to divine grace, to the faith of the Church, to charity, to the Christian life of the faithful. Pius XII himself steered the liturgists in this direction and presided over certain reforms, such as those of Holy Week, and took certain bold decisions like authorising the use of a bilingual ritual for the Sacraments.

« But these liturgists saw their reform hijacked, their movement diverted, their ranks infiltrated by people who brought other principles into it, who imposed quite different goals on it. » ³

It was the aggiornamento decreed at the Second Vatican Council that allowed the fanciful and the perverted to impose reforms that Pius XII had deemed « absurd »:

« We observe, with considerable anxiety and some misgiving, that elsewhere certain enthusiasts, over-eager in their search for novelty, are straying beyond the path of sound doctrine and prudence. Not seldom, in fact, they interlard their plans and hopes for a revival of the sacred liturgy with principles that compromise this holiest of causes in theory or practice, and sometimes even taint it with errors touching Catholic Faith and ascetical doctrine. » Thus by an excessive « archaeologism »:

« Assuredly it is a wise and most laudable thing to return in spirit and affection to the sources of the sacred liturgy. For research in this field of study, by tracing it back to its origins, contributes valuable assistance towards a more thorough and careful investigation of the significance of feast-days, and of the meaning of the texts and sacred ceremonies employed on their occasion. It is neither wise nor laudable, however, to reduce everything to antiquity. Thus, to cite some instances, one would be straying from the straight path were he to wish the altar restored to its primitive table form; were he to want black excluded as a colour for the liturgical vestments; were he to forbid the use of sacred images and statues in Churches; were he to order the crucifix so designed that the divine Redeemer’s body shows no trace of His cruel sufferings…

« This way of thinking and acting bids fair to revive the exaggerated and senseless antiquarianism to which the illegal Council of Pistoia (1786) gave rise. It likewise attempts to reinstate a series of errors which were responsible for the calling of that false Council as well as those resulting from it, with grievous harm to souls, and which the Church, the ever watchful guardian of the “deposit of Faith” committed to her charge by her divine Founder, had every right and reason to condemn. » (Mediator Dei)

CONTINUITY OR RUPTURE?

At the Second Vatican Council, the schema on the liturgy was the first one to be presented and discussed in the aula because the Modernist minority had succeeded, with the support of Annibale Bugnini, in introducing some of their ideas into it. Unlike the other preparatory schemata, the one on the liturgy responded to the desires of the reformist party.

Cardinal Frings from Cologne, whose advisor was the young Abbé Ratzinger, opened the discussions on 22 October 1962 by praising the schema. He claimed that it was « a quasi testament of the great Pope Pius XII ». Quasi, that is to say, almost. What did this almost mean? That is the whole question.

Did this schema in its teachings and practical decisions really fall within the framework of the liturgical renewal desired by St. Pius X and Pius XII? In order to win the adherence of the assembly, Cardinal Frings suggested as much…

The defenders of the Faith denounced this trick by revealing the rupture: they denounced the numerous theological errors contained in the document.

COUP DE FORCE AGAINST OTTAVIANI

Cardinal Ottaviani, the Secretary of the Holy Office and President of the Doctrinal Commission, demanded it be rejected and completely revised. Mgr Staffa, Mgr Parente and Cardinal Siri seconded his request.

Since the innovators took cover under Pius XII’s authority, Cardinal Ottaviani reminded them of one of his decisions: « The Sovereign Pontiff said at the international liturgical conference of Assisi in 1956: “The Church has serious reasons for firmly maintaining in the Latin rite of the Mass the unconditioned obligation for the celebrating priest to use the Latin language.” If you appeal to Pius XII’s authority, do not only cite him when it pleases you. »

Cardinal Alfrink, one of the leaders of the reformist party who chaired the session, rang the bell and bluntly interrupted Cardinal Ottaviani claiming that he had exceeded the prescribed ten minute time limit. On Cardinal Alfrink’s order, a technician cut off the microphone. Humiliated and appalled, Cardinal Ottaviani left the tribunal amidst the mocking applause of the reformers. « The Secretary of the Holy Office was cut down to size on an equal footing with the bishops and holding no more authority than the Bishop of Cuernavaca » ⁴

« I will not return to this assembly, he declared, until I have obtained satisfaction. »

He was disavowed by the Pope, and fifteen days later he returned without having obtained satisfaction.

John XXIII was not in the least disturbed by the coup de force against the guardian of the Faith. On the contrary, the orientations that the reformist party imposed on the assembly seemed to him to augur well.

When the defenders of Tradition came to demand justice from the Pope against the violence and illegalities that the innovators perpetrated, John XXIII replied to them that « things had been worse at the Council of Trent during which a Latin bishop had torn out the beard of a Greek ». Yes, but for having torn out part of Mgr Zanettino’s beard, the Bishop of Cava was expelled from the Council.

The traditionalists all rallied to the schema that, modified by amendments, became the Constitution Sacrosanctum Concilium, and was adopted almost unanimously by 2158 votes against 19. Pope Paul VI promulgated it on 4 December 1963.

There was an abyss between two worlds.

Upon reading it, our Father observed that the principles expounded in the Constitution were partly traditional. Nevertheless, he found two dangerous novelties in it, one concerning the power that devolved upon the “assemblies of bishops”, the other dealing with the use of the vernacular language. This is why in January 1964, in his Letter to My Friends n° 163, he raised the alarm against the subversive use of the Constitution, which he foresaw and feared.

In the Auto-da-fe that he wrote – let us remind you, in 1996 during his exile in the monastery of Hauterive, he had in mind Cardinal Ratzinger who, in the name of his “hermeneutic of continuity”, attacked those who affirm that « an abyss cuts the history of the Church into two irreconcilable worlds: the preconciliar world and the postconciliar world » ⁵. The cardinal claimed to « fill » the abyss.

It was too late! The very analysis of the Constitution Sacrosanctum Concilium shows that it is « infested with the general principles of the Reform, those that were to lead on the last day of the Council to the celebration of the cult of man by the Pope ».

As for its implementation decrees, they have already brought about « a total transformation of rites and Christian prayer » ⁶.

THE TAKEOVER PLOT

At the beginning of the 1960s, the Modernist mafia saw that it could not revolutionise the liturgy as long as the Congregation of Rites kept the power in matters of the liturgy in Rome. How could this obstacle be overthrown?

This could be done by introducing an innovation in Paragraph 2 of Article 22 of Sacrosanctum Concilium.

This article began by affirming the traditional doctrine: the regulation of the liturgy belongs to the Pope and the Congregation of rites that governs in his name, and to the bishop, to each bishop, personally, in his diocese.

« It is perfectly true, our Father wrote, but this is in order to better deceive us, for straightaway Paragraph 2 introduces a new, a different power: “In virtue of power conceded by the law, the regulation of the liturgy within certain defined limits belongs also to various kinds of competent territorial bodies of bishops legitimately established.” »

Here is an amazing observation: « In 1963, when this constitution decided “also” to entrust regulation of the liturgy to assemblies of bishops, the Council had not yet recognised, either dogmatically or legally these new entities, which were until then unknown! Sacrosanctum Concilium prematurely passed judgement on something that would be ardently discussed and accepted with difficulty, then created experimentally by Lumen Gentium and Christus Dominus. »

Our Father perfectly understood in 1963 what was hatching in the Modernists’ headquarters – a veritable plot that historians are discovering today when studying in detail the archives of the bishops and the periti.

« Now, as everyone knows, our Father explained, an assembly cannot propose doctrinal syntheses or prepare laws. All the work that directs minds and makes decisions is entrusted to permanent secretariats and commissions of experts. »

« A network of commissions was going to throw its spider’s web over the whole Church, leaving the episcopate as a poor serf, enslaved by “experts” (n^o 25), “eminent laymen” (n^o 44), as well as clerics. »

« Thus was silently born in the Church the technobureaucracy that is the unnatural canker characteristic of our modern democratic and decadent societies. The liturgy was the first thing to fall into the hands of the fanatics of reform, the scholars of archaeology, the professionals of subversion and group dynamics. »

OVERTHROW EVERYTHING, REBUILD EVERYTHING

The watchword that announced the Constitution’s intention was given in the introduction: the liturgy had to be « renewed ».

« The liturgy of yesterday and of this very moment – 1962 –is never mentioned as a treasure, a rule, an example of fruitfulness, but always as something to be overthrown. » Thus there are many “classical pieces” in the conciliar Constitution on the liturgy, veritable « trompe-l’œil » presentations of good principles, followed by revolutionary decisions of a practical order.

The vice of the Constitution is the will to renew everything by introducing democracy into the liturgy. It is the democratic spirit that perverted the new liturgy by turning it away from its traditional ends.

THE LITURGY BY THE PEOPLE

In order to give God the Father the worship due to him, we have a Mediator, Our Lord Jesus Christ. The Abbé de Nantes wrote: « It is Jesus Christ in Person who celebrates the holy liturgy as the unique and sovereign priest. This dogma, far from excluding all human priesthood, consecrates the priestly order in the Church and marks it with a singular character. The function of the priest in the assembly is to act “in persona Christi”, holding the place of the Lord Himself.

« Ordination to the priesthood and it alone, confers on those chosen by God the power to celebrate the divine worship of the Holy Sacrifice, to forgive sins and to distribute the Sacraments. » ⁷

Now, the Council attempted to abolish the distinction between the priestly order and the faithful people. Pius XII had sensed the advent of the heresy and insistently recalled it in the encyclical Mediator Dei.

The slide towards democracy is clear in Article 10 of the Constitution: the mediator, that is, the priest representing Jesus Christ, has disappeared; the assembly remains. « For the aim and object of apostolic works is that all who are made sons of God by faith and baptism should come together to praise God in the midst of His Church, to take part in the sacrifice, and to eat the Lord’s supper. »

« The liturgy, our Father wrote, will no longer be a priestly work, a work of mediating between God and His sinful people! It will no longer be worship given to God by the ministry of the priests for the sanctification of the faithful. But it will be the work of a perfect and sacred People-priest offering pure praise to God. »

Traditionally, the liturgy was ritual: the priest uttered sacred and public formulas, pure of all error and superstition, which assured the lawfulness and the validity of the rites that have a supernatural efficacy: they communicate grace.

« What was invented at the Council? This: that the rites were inaccessible, incomprehensible to the people. It was necessary that from then on the liturgy would be the work of Christ by means of “His Body”, which is the faithful people, “but” given life by the Reform. »

ACTIVE PARTICIPATION OF A NEW KIND

Popes St. Pius X and Pius XII had, of course, encouraged “active participation” of the faithful, but always with the same goal: in order for them to adhere interiorly to the divine mysteries.

The Council dreamed of something else:

« This dream, our Father wrote, they called “the most efficacious way”. The “pastors” must not be concerned so much with the “laws of a valid and licit celebration, but also – but above all! – they must ensure that the faithful take part fully aware of what they are doing, actively engaged in the rite, and enriched by its effects (n^o 11). The “but also” sends to oblivion what was done before, and announces that what was incidental, and which was developed and imposed by the Reform, will supplant what is essential and yet what is divine action!

The rupture of the Council with Tradition is clear: « For the periti of Vatican II, exterior, natural, modern participation is the whole of their business: the very intimate communication with God is nothing… and the interior action of God giving Himself to souls by the means of sacramental rites is neglected. »

To the real people, scorned for their attachment to the past and their slowness, the Council addresses a pressing invitation to an awakening and a new life that must be – because the reformers want it to be so, have promised it, and already congratulate themselves on it.

« All the faithful should be led to that fully conscious and active participation in liturgical celebrations that is demanded by the very nature of the liturgy. Such participation by the Christian people as “a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a redeemed people (1 Pt 2.9; cf. 2.4-5), is their right and duty by reason of their baptism. This full and active participation by all the people is the aim to be considered before all else… » (n^o 14)

Cardinal Ratzinger wrote: Those who gave to « active participation the meaning of exterior activism, interpreted the Council in an erroneous manner » ⁸. Nevertheless, Article 19 explicitly states that the pastors of souls must instil in the Christian people « active participation in the liturgy both internally and externally with zeal and patience »… and the word is said: « by means of the necessary instruction » – instruction and not piety.

« The external participation required by the Council is an intense application of the whole being, not to God, to Jesus Christ, still less to the Blessed Virgin Mary! – but to the liturgy, that is, to the “circus” staged by the reformers. The sacred action par excellence becomes that of the leaders-actors to make the assembly lively. »

We experience and suffer it every Sunday in our parishes! In this false conception according to which exterior participation is the primary source of Christian life, « there is a twofold and threefold slide, our Father wrote. Remember in the Gospel, Zacchaeus, the Samaritan woman, and the man born blind … The primary source is the mercy and grace that poured forth from the Heart of God, which provoked in return the torrent of piety that overflows from the faithful heart. Thus, what is essential, what is most important is the interior life that all the rest nourishes as much as possible. The liturgist objects that it is necessary to teach, that is to say to awaken, educate, raise the consciousness of the people, hence the exaltation of the liturgy of the Word… and the chattering of the priest or ladies!

« The error is obvious. For the Creed says everything, the catechism explains it, and piety is fed by it. When a parish priest gives a homily, he does not make new revelations to his parishioners. He evokes, for the thousandth time, the divine mysteries that will arouse their meditative and contemplative piety. You think that the faithful are sleeping! They are adoring. Moreover, the Holy Spirit poured into their hearts fires them with love. You experts who scorn this interior, sovereign Master, burning like a flame, you maltreat these poor people by making them shout songs and clap their hands…

« How can the Sacraments be received amidst such an uproar, with greatly symbolic gestures that are contrary to the fervour of the souls who are receiving the divine life. When you have finished perturbing everyone, you impose a time of “sacred silence”, with your eyes fixed on your watches! »

THE LITURGY FOR THE PEOPLE

In order to facilitate and develop people’s “participation”, the Council asked the experts to “organise both texts and rites so that they express more clearly what they signify” (n^o 21), by distinguishing in the liturgy immutable elements from the elements subject to change. What imprudence this was. It lets it be thought that all that is not “divinely instituted” could and should be changed!

To the traditional principle, to the essential end of the liturgy, Article 33 added a new iconoclastic concern: « Although the sacred liturgy is above all things the worship of the divine Majesty, it likewise contains much instruction for the faithful. »

« This “although”, our Father commented, is an admission of divorce between the people and their God. » In fact, the essential theocentrism of the liturgy is coupled with a competing – and for the periti, primordial! – anthropocentrism. The worship of God will be neglected in order to promote “the instruction” of the people.

Article 34: « The rites should be distinguished by a noble simplicity; they should be short, clear, and unencumbered by useless repetitions; they should be within the people’s powers of comprehension. »

Thus, « Vatican II gave a free hand to those who will always go further than the spirit of the Council, simplifying, abolishing, adapting, innovating in order to make the divine liturgy more understandable, easier, more open and adapted to everyone… to the point of making it entirely human » ⁹.

THE PROGRESSIVISTS’ HATRED FOR LATIN.

Cardinal MacIntyre from Los Angeles, observed: « The attack against the Latin language in the liturgy is indirectly, but really, an attack against the fixedness of the sacred dogmas. »¹⁰

The proof that Latin is doctrinally more reliable is that all the dogmatic definitions were formulated in Latin. In his Journal of the Council, Fr. Congar admitted that it was difficult for him to speak of ecumenism in the Latin language because it prevented him from expressing « the nuances » of his thought (Vol. 1, p. 254). With Latin, he was unable to cheat.

Furthermore, Latin constituted a barrier against progressivist naturalism that transposes the whole Christian mystery into the temporal sphere while encapsulating it within earthly horizons.

Through its hieratic quality, that is to say, its sacred character, Latin introduces us into the domain that is reserved for God. When expressed in Latin, the words love, peace, justice form one body with the universe of religion, Holy Scripture, and ecclesiastical tradition. « The Latin word caritas unhesitatingly evokes a pure, generous and essentially supernatural love; justitia has the mark of wise moderation, of Roman equity, while preserving the Hebrew and Evangelical savour of a strictly religious virtue, namely that of the just and humble man. The word pax touches the things of the soul and speaks to us of a state of grace and of union with God. This is the word that shines down from the gateway of a monastery. The word libertas appears frequently in our prayers but always in the context of the struggle against and victory over the Devil; never does it evoke licence. » ¹¹

Our Father, who was combating progressivism, then proposed to develop, by means of a pedagogical method, the participation of the faithful in the Latin liturgy:

« It being understood that Latin is par excellence the sacred language of the Roman Catholic Church whose rite has become the universal rite, it is important that Latin be not only conserved by everyone, but practiced as a living language, thus understood, spoken and loved by priest and the faithful. I advocated, well before the Council, that important freedom be given to the vernacular language in the liturgy itself, in particular in schools, seminaries, theological schools, not in order to compete with Latin and finally supplant it, but in order to have access to it and appreciate it. »

The solution would be “pedagogical bilingualism”, in which it would suffice to alternate the recitation of certain prayers between French and Latin in order for clerics and the faithful to understand their meaning and retain it.

When he was the parish priest of Villemaur, at the beginning of the sixties, our Father used this “pedagogical bilingualism”. During Masses for the children of catechism, our Father had the canon recited aloud to them in French. Thus, they were instructed in the divine Mystery that radiated during festive Sunday celebrations. During high Masses, without forbidding all hymns in French, our Father, with a marvellous enthusiasm, had his parishioners sing the proper in Gregorian chant.

While the progressivists denigrated the ancient Roman rites, the Abbé de Nantes thus proved that they could still be celebrated with the intelligent and fruitful participation of the Christian people.

THE « SACRIFICE » OF LATIN

The Second Vatican Council satisfied the demand of the progressivists by permitting, according to the odious expression of Paul VI, the « sacrifice » of Latin.

It is in Article 36. « First, as always, our Father remarked, comes the lie: we will strongly maintain… the rest will always give the legal means to destroy it. For example:

« First paragraph: “Particular law remaining in force, the use of the Latin language is to be preserved in the Latin rites.” »

« Second paragraph: “But”, in this, in that, and in the next thing “the use of the mother tongue frequently may be of great advantage…” »

The use of the vernacular language will be decided by “the competent territorial ecclesiastical authority mentioned in Art. 22, 2”, namely by the “bodies of bishops”.

« Thus was opened the enormous work room to produce liturgical books in all languages and dialects! »

« In newly founded Christian communities the transition from Latin to the language of the natives was a brutal and ill-understood return from European Christian culture to the ignorance of the previous paganisms. »

Another novelty was the introduction into the liturgy of local Churches of traditions, gestures or expressions that were part of the patrimony of their people.

THE REQUISITES OF ECUMENISM

« Article 47 is a classic on the Mass: Everything comes from St. Augustine, St. Thomas and St. Cyril of Alexandria. »

Nonetheless, our Father wrote, « old Catholics will notice that this religion becomes a friendship, an association between Jesus and His Church, and His own, in which everything happens admirably well. » He then pointed out the Council’s omissions: « There is no longer adoration of an almighty God, sins are mentioned no longer, no longer is there supplication in order to obtain forgiveness. There is no longer a propitiatory sacrifice », that is, a sacrifice offered for the forgiveness of sins and that distributes the fruits of redemption… There is no longer an obligation of annual confession and communion, no longer a Hell for those who would violate the laws on the reception of the Sacraments.

« Article 48 adds what is essential today: “the active participation of the faithful”, that is to say exterior activism. As though the ancient liturgy and interior participation in the divine mysteries did not give to the faithful what they had come to seek: contrition for their faults, adoration, communion with Christ, longing for the eternal life of Heaven. No, they were, the Council tells us, “as strangers or silent spectators”. Thus, the Mass is going to change. »

Articles 49 and 50: « The rite is to be revised in order that the sacrifice of the Mass, even in the ritual forms, may become pastorally efficacious to the fullest degree… »

« Pastoral efficacy is juxtaposed to the supernatural efficacy of the divine Mystery. Juxtaposed, in theory, but superimposed in reality and finally, substituted for the other. »

What the periti had veiled was their ecumenical aim, which had been discretely announced, however, in the preamble of the Constitution, where it is stated that « whatever can promote union among all who believe in Christ » would be fostered. According to Fr. Gy, a consultor on the preconciliar commission, they had « included » in the preparatory schema « everything that was evangelically worthwhile in the liturgical perceptions of the reformers », that is to say of the Lutherans and Calvinists. ¹²

The new ordinary of the MASS that was promulgated after the Council in 1970 would comply with the orientations of the conciliar Constitution, in particular by the suppression of numerous propitiatory prayers or of prayers mentioning the propitiatory sacrifice of Our Lord.

Assuredly, the postconciliar liturgical reforms corresponded to the ecumenical aims of Vatican II.

Article 53: « There is to be restored, after the Gospel and the homily, “the common prayer” or “the prayer of the faithful”… »

« Is this something new? No, it is archaeologism », our Father commented. In fact, the common prayer was removed from the Roman rite in the fifth century. It only remained in the office of Good Friday, in the form of solemn prayers, which the conciliar Reform would falsify… Why was it re-established other than to attribute to the people an alleged « priestly » function? It is stated in black and white in the General Presentation of the new missal.

Article 55. Communion under both kinds. « It is granted in special cases, the barriers to which will soon be overcome.

« Nevertheless, the Abbé de Nantes remarked, what is most surprising for a decision so memorable – one that Bossuet had already demanded in order to facilitate the conversion of the Protestants and one that all mystics desired so strongly – is that this article is terse like a regulation and lacks any exposition that, for once, would have touched souls. What a pity… »

« The Sacrament of Holy Orders is sacrificed in five lines. It is so derisory that it shows the Council’s indifference towards this subject: priests. But, in fact, was there a clergy before Vatican II? It can be seen nowhere in this act of the Council on the liturgy. »

SLOTH, HUMANISM, IMPIETY

« Revision of the sacramentals. In this short article the irreligion of its authors is apparent: the religious foundation of the rites to be treated is completely neglected, effaced, while the revision of forms, of appearances, are the only concern, not for a purer, more virtuous relationship to God, but for the animation of the human community gathered together for the occasion.

« The Divine Office, or canonical hours. This is an admirable classic on the hymn of praise to which “all the community of men” must be associated! » The burden that the divine office constitutes is neglected: « There is no misery, no infidelity, no fear of God, no penance, no human powerlessness, cowardice or betrayal. One wonders if this idyllic picture of the divine office is a prophetical future or an inconsistent dream. For it is certainly not the picture of the past that they are once again on this matter going to crush and break in order to remake wholesale.

« “In order that the divine office may be better and more perfectly prayed…” It is still the same dream: by changing the rules, we will change the hearts of men! Thus, they revise the breviary… They announce in passing that Vatican II will give two times fewer the number of psalms to be recited; for centuries the week had been well adapted to the one hundred and fifty psalms. St. Pius X likewise distributed the psalms over the different days of the week. This Pope, taking into consideration the extra ministerial work of parish priests and curates on Sundays, reduced this day’s portion. The reduction of the number of canonical hours and their distribution would be modelled on the sloth of our generation.

« The regulations are relaxed… without limit. For the open door has been enlarged to the dimension of a racecourse: “”In particular cases, and for a just reason, ordinaries can dispense their subjects wholly or in part from the obligation of reciting the divine office, or may commute the obligation.”

« “It will be necessary to take into account the modern conditions in which daily life has to be lived, especially by those who are called to labour in apostolic works.” »

To favour the apostolate, and what an apostolate! in relation to worship, is precisely one of the errors of progressivism.

« 102. The liturgical year. A choice has been made: that of the commemoration “the resurrection and the glorification of the Lord”, at the same time as His blessed Passion. Protestants see that we are working for them. Humanists also, because it is the joy of Easter that prevails over the Cross of Christ. The “regeneration” of the faithful produces thanksgiving and recommends the observance of Sunday as a day of joy and rest. This suggests that each Sunday morning, the whole Church, all mankind are regenerated, without there being anything to regret, to expiate, to ask, to correct. No, everyone is nice, everyone is pretty. We go to Mass to celebrate our joy in Jesus Christ and to raise up our divine praises towards a God who inspires no fear, reverence, or adoration in us.

« 109. Lent. Here tact and shrewdness were necessary – qualities that the periti did not lack. It is thus a question of everything but sin, the humiliation of Ash Wednesday, abstinence from pleasures, necessary alms, the Way of the Cross in parishes, compulsory Confession, personal thought of Hell… They embark on liturgical marketing: commercial advertisements for baptism, and insistence on the social consequences of sin »

Sin is only mentioned, all in all, in this Constitution, in a single article. The Council addresses itself to perfect people.

« It is in a very, very mild manner that it recommends “penance”, an abstract word, less provocative than the plural penitential observances. It wants it to be “exterior and social”, left to the discrete initiative of each individual: no fasting, no abstinence, nothing!

« Yes, the Council recalls the obligation of the sacred fast of Good Friday… and it forgets to mention the two-thousand year old fast of Ash Wednesday, the day of Christian penance and humility. The only day on which the Church administers on man the unforgettable lesson that his formidable pride requires. It is forgotten! »

THE IMMACULATE DESPISED

From Article 103, dedicated to the Blessed Virgin Mary, our Father retained this sentence: « In Mary the Church holds up and admires the most excellent fruit of the redemption. » He commented: « Because the Council demolishes the Marian devotion of hyperdulia, it gives Her perfectly hypocritical praise: Mary, “the most excellent fruit of the redemption”, because this is what all the enemies of the dogma of the Immaculate Conception stress. »

Mgr Tarcisio Benedetti of the Carmelite Order asked in the conciliar aula that this Constitution recommend popular devotions, in particular the devotion of the scapular of Our Lady of Mount Carmel. His request was rejected. The Rosary is not even mentioned in the Acts of Vatican II. What a snub for the Queen of the Rosary!

Cardinal Larraona, a Spanish Claretian, Prefect of the Congregation of Rites, nevertheless had devotion towards the Immaculate Heart of Mary. On 10 May 1963, the said Congregation granted the privilege of a proper Mass for the feast of Our Lady of the Most Holy Rosary of Fatima to the diocese of Leiria. Three days afterwards, Cardinal Larroana presided over the ceremonies of the pilgrimage of Fatima: « It is urgent, he declared in his homily, to establish in the world devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, as a guaranteed means of salvation. »

Nevertheless, since he did not want to create a commotion in the Council, he made no move in this direction. Thus it was the diabolical who prevailed. The feast of the Immaculate Heart of Mary was practically abolished in the new liturgical calendar: it was downgraded to the rank of a simple optional commemoration, lacking its proper Office and Mass. It was relegated to a position after the feria, following the ordinary feasts of the Saints and the obligatory commemorations.

SACRED MUSIC: ANYTHING AND EVERYTHING!

The last articles of the Constitution deal with sacred music and art. « They are instructions that are as general as they are imprecise, our Father wrote. They permitted the insane upheaval that changed our churches into deplorable modern places of worship.

« Article 116. The Mafia’s most terrible and saddest lie. Here it is word for word: “The Church acknowledges Gregorian chant as specially suited to the Roman liturgy: therefore, other things being equal, it should be given pride of place in liturgical services.”

« As soon as the portal has thus been opened to Gregorian chant alone, a gate is put in the other side as the entrance for modern artists: “other kinds [all kinds? whatever kind?] of sacred music, especially polyphony, are by no means excluded from liturgical celebrations, so long as they accord with the spirit of the liturgical action, as laid down in Art. 30.” »

Could it be that Our Holy Father Benedict XVI who, before his election to the sovereign pontificate, claimed that the active participation desired by the Council was not to be interpreted in the sense of an exterior activism has never read this Article 30 that grants full liberty for creativity? Here it is:

« “To promote active participation, the people should be encouraged to take part by means of acclamations, responses, psalmody, antiphons, and songs, as well as by actions, gestures, and bodily attitudes”. In short, anything and everything! Then in order to better poke fun at everyone, the paragraph that encourages a hullabaloo and sacred dances ends thus: “At the proper times all should observe a reverent silence.” »

« An integrist undoubtedly rose during the night and, in the darkness, added a final line in order to avoid the worst: “The texts intended to be sung must always be in conformity with Catholic doctrine; indeed they should be drawn chiefly from Holy Scripture and from liturgical sources.” Then the schema was put to the question. It rallied the traditionalists to the most appalling liturgical revolution in our ecclesiastical history. »

TOMORROW, WHAT LITURGY?

« The main error of the Second Vatican Council, our Father wrote, was to deal first with the liturgy, when the truths of the Faith on which it is based, which must shed light on the whole work and orient it, were no longer guaranteed but on the contrary were contested. »

The Third Vatican Council of our hopes « will proceed in order. It will first determine the Faith, the divine Faith of the Church, against the alleged Modernist evangelism and its de facto humanism, which leads to the cult of man substituted for the cult of God. »¹³

« We need to remind ourselves of Prosper of Aquitaine’s maxim: Legem credendi lex statuat supplicandi or its shortened but ambiguous version: Lex orandi lex credendi... The law of^-prayer, or rather the hieratic, unchangeable, traditional, canonical form of rites and liturgical words, comes down to us from the depths of ages, teaching us the law of faith in no uncertain manner and the dogmas of our belief on the highest authority. » ¹⁴

This is why the Third Vatican Council will make every effort to « restore the traditional Roman liturgy and give it absolute pre-eminence over every other less universal and less ancient form, because this ancient liturgy is for the Church an inestimable source of her faith, an incomparable and living catechesis. »

« The Council could also detect in the innovations, either prayers or rites rediscovered in antiquity, worthy of being adopted or modern creations in harmony with the traditional liturgy. » We must not « yield to reactionary exasperation that would make us canonise everything that existed yesterday. The restoration cannot be a systematic restoration of the liturgy of 1958 [or of 1962]. »

« The traditionalism of the Catholic Counter-Reformation consists in conserving and enriching liturgical life by means of an effort of piety, intelligence, imagination and zeal. » ¹⁵

LITURGICAL DEVOTION TO THE IMMACULATE HEART OF MARY

Traditionally, liturgical innovations were conceived in order to respond to the heresies of their time, in order to teach and illustrate an element of the Faith that was contrary to them. If we were to present a project for the Third Vatican Council, our Father wrote, it would be that « of a liturgy in which the Action of Christ the Sovereign Priest in His Body given up for us and His Blood shed, in sacrifice of praise and propitiation, would be fully taught and expressed. » (CCR n° 80, p. 11).

It is noteworthy that today it is the devotions and liturgical “innovations” demanded by Our Lady of Fatima, and refused by the Second Vatican Council, which allow us to preserve the dogma of the Faith.

Sister Lucy wrote in 1970: « I have great hope that the day when the prayer of the Holy Rosary and the chaplet will be declared a liturgical prayer is not far off. Yes, because it is entirely a part of the liturgy of the Eucharist. Let us pray, work, sacrifice ourselves, and have confidence: “In the end My Immaculate Heart will triumph!” »

Likewise, the practice of the reparatory devotion of the First Saturdays of the month implies a strong faith in the signal privileges of the Virgin Mary. Now, to the very extent that we believe in it, we are preserved from apostasy, for « all the great dogmas of our faith, the Abbé de Nantes observed, are so closely bound up with the glories and privileges of Mary that to believe in the latter is to avoid all error with regard to the former. The most ancient dogmas, of the perpetual Virginity and of the divine Motherhood of Mary, but also the two most recent dogmas of the Immaculate Conception and of the Assumption, in practice protect faith in Jesus man-God and safeguard the prerogatives of the Father Almighty, able to intervene in matter itself, etc. » ¹⁶

« Mary, Sister Lucy also says, was the first tabernacle where the Father enclosed His Word, the first monstrance and the first altar where the Lord remained exposed to receive our adoration and our love. » Now, what God wants today is to put this “tabernacle” back at the centre of the Church where the Father in days of old enclosed His Word, this “monstrance” where He wants to manifest Himself and silently sanctify souls, this “altar” where He continues to offer the perfect and eternal Sacrifice, namely the Immaculate Heart of Mary, so that the Lord remaining there “exposed to receive our adoration and our love”, may draw to Himself all flesh. This is the meaning of the liturgical devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary that will give an unequalled splendour and marvellous influence to the new restored Christianity throughout the world.

Brother Francis of Mary of the Angels.
Excerpts from Il est ressuscité! n° 64, December 2007, pp. 17-26.

To consult the original unabridged French text

1. Préparer Vatican III, CRC n° 53, pp. 3-10

2. The Reform of the Mass: Idle Dream or Reality?, CCR n° 80, November 1976, p. 5

3. CRC n° 80, p. 4

4. Letter to My Friends n° 195

5. Un chant nouveau pour le Seigneur, Desclée-Mame, 1995, p. 174

6. CRC n° 52, January 1972, p. 10

7. CRC n° 53, pp. 11-12

8. Un chant nouveau pour le Seigneur, 1995, p. 184

9. CRC n° 53, p. 8

10. Acta I, 1, p. 370

11. Letter to My Friends n° 94, October 196

12. La Maison-Dieu, n° 76, 1963, p. 17

13. CRC n° 53, p. 10

14. CRC n° 113, January 1977, p. 6

15. CRC n° 53, pp. 10-13

16. CCR n° 176, February 1985, p. 15