“Conciliar or Catholic”
by Fr. Gomer de Pauw
Professor of Theology and Doctor of Canon Law
A Lecture given in Chicago, 1967
Ladies and gentlemen,
Two years ago, I had the privilege of speaking in your fair city for the first time and I had the privilege of addressing the Catholic people on the topic: “What in the name of God is happening to our Catholic Church?” And a year ago, I came back and I spoke on the topic: “How much more do we have to expect and do we have to take?” Today I am no longer asking, “What in the name of the God is happening to our Catholic Church,” because it is clear to anyone by now what’s happening to our Catholic Church. Neither am I asking anymore how much more do we have to take, how much more do we have to expect…because there isn’t much more to expect since the destruction of our Catholic Church, humanly speaking, is just about accomplished.
Today my topic is: “Are we going to become conciliar church members or are we going to remain Catholic Church members?” This is the problem which every Catholic has to solve today: Conciliar or Catholic.
Conciliar is a name I did not invent. It is a name which they gave themselves. One of their active tools of brain-washing is the regular publication sent mainly to priests and nuns. I must admit that the editors of that brain-washing sheet at least have the decency not to refer to themselves anymore as Catholics. They call it information from the “Conciliar Church.”
This is what we have to decide today: Conciliar or Catholic. And since the establishment of our once Catholic Church has banned me from exercising my chosen career, or my appointed career I should say, of the priest professor (they say there is no room anymore in any so-called Catholic seminary for a conservative theologian and Canon Lawyer as I am), I still try to keep in the practice of teaching. Maybe someday there will be room for people such as I.
So I’m going to bother you this afternoon with a little lecture in Church history – just a matter of keeping up the practice. But the main reason why I would like to ask you to go back down a few centuries is simply this: You cannot understand the Church of today, and you certainly cannot brace yourself properly for the Church of tomorrow, unless you really are acquainted with the Church of yesterday. So as briefly as I can – but once I am going, and I do get going – I usually take full advantage of my captive audience, as the cliché goes. At the same time, I feel there are some people here who have to catch a train, so don’t feel hesitant about it. If you really feel that train is calling you, just walk out…and if there are a few spies in the audience – as there always are – maybe they can write about them next week in the Catholic paper that some people walked out in protest.
So these points I would like to go over with you, ladies and gentlemen: the Church yesterday, the Church today, and the Church tomorrow.
Now the Church yesterday. We traditionalist Catholics, we still believe – and proudly so – that we are the only Church that can trace its origin as far back as Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. The Incarnate Second Person of the Blessed Trinity, the only person ever to walk this earth who could say: “I am the Way, the Truth and the Life.” We also believe that He founded one, true Church. We believe that this mandate still holds true today – the mandate that sounded “Go ye into the whole world and preach the Gospel to every creature. He that believeth and is baptized is saved. But he that does not believe shall be condemned.” Almost sounds like extremist, radical language, doesn’t it?
Before ascending into Heaven, after His Resurrection, which we Catholic traditionalists also still believe, He left His Church here on earth. He left it to be guided by the Holy Ghost, but also to be attacked by the UN-holy spirit, the spirit of wickedness, until the final day of reckoning. All through the history of our Church, generation after generation had to decide the simple action, the simple dilemma – simple but agonizingly acute: for Christ or against Christ? And so to close the door once and for all for all the neutralizers of the “middle of the road,” Christ made it clear that “he who is not with Me, is against Me.” And He also made it clear that those who are with Him will have Him on their side forever: “I am with you till the end of time.” And words of Our Lord, they are still echoing through Palestine. Then St. Paul was nearly the first one to put out an official God-inspired warning against the infiltrators that were already there in the ranks of the early Christians, when he wrote the Ephesians: “Brethren, be strengthened in the Lord and the might of his power. Put you on the armor of God that you may be able to stand against the deceits of the devil. For our fight,” he continues, “is not against flesh and blood, but against principalities and powers, against the spirits of wickedness in the high places.” And so that no one would make an appeal to a misunderstood law of obedience and listen to those who are sitting in the high chair of authority, St. Paul gave us an excellent, an extremely valuable guideline to go by, when he wrote to the Galatians: “Even if an angel from heaven should preach a gospel to you other than that which we have preached to you, let him be damned.”
Then the next stage in our history that carries some worthwhile implications for our present-day, were the centuries of the persecutions – the bloody persecutions from without. They ended when the Emperor Constantine gave the world what became known as the Edict of Milan, when the enemy from without was beaten and beaten good. But the enemy from within was not.
And then came the 4th century to bring us the first truly organized heretical schism in our Church, named after the bishop Arius. Arianism, of which the central, practical idea must sound quite familiar to you today, because basically what they were saying is this: that Christ is not our God, but our brother; that the Church and the world should not fight each other; that the Church should open its arms and live happily forever with the powers that be of the world. And the politicians of those days joined the powers that were in the Church. And so we have the spectacle of the first attempt, which would later on be known as “aggiornamento.” Eighty percent of the bishops became apostates and the other twenty percent didn’t want to rock the boat. But now St. Jerome wrote later on: “One morning, the Christian world woke up and it was all heretical and schismatic. It was all Arian.” And the pope in those days, by the name of Pope Liberius, first kept quiet, tried to reconcile things that could not be reconciled – Truth and Error, Water and Fire. And then for about three years he even joined the apostate bishops and closed his eyes, his heart and his conscience, when the sole, lonely voice of a bishop – a man named Athanasius – stood alone and fought the powers of the establishment of his days.
And it was the laity of the 4th century, the ordinary, so-called layman and laywoman, together with a few priests, that saved the true traditional Catholic faith. And three years later, after three years of agony for all those Traditional Catholics of those days, Pope Liberius changed his course of action and joined whatever was left of the true traditional Christian views. The Traditional Catholic Faith had been kept alive, through sacrifice and through persecution, by a handful of Catholic laypeople and even a smaller handful of priests. And it is quite interesting that in the long list of popes, beginning with St. Peter, you can start right there: St. Peter, St. Linus, St. Cletus…saint, saint, saint, saint. Until all of a sudden you hit Liberius. And there is no “S.” in front of his name – the first pope who didn’t make it on the list, he didn’t make it to the list of canonized popes. And it is also quite interesting that the one who was excommunicated by Pope Liberius – Athanasius – is now Saint Athanasius, Doctor of the Church. I’ve heard of nice Horatio Alger, but from excommunication to sainthood – that beats it all in my book.
What is the conclusion of this, ladies and gentlemen? The conclusion is an extremely practical one. That even a pope and bishops lose their spiritual authority when they cut themselves off from the teachings of their predecessors.
And then came the 7th century, and again, we have an extremely interesting situation which I believe, at least in my days, was always very carefully kept hidden in the church history books, even up to college. But obviously they didn’t hide it during the three years, of a post-graduate church history course which I took 20 years ago and what was then the Catholic University of Louvain (later on I also ended up in what was then the public university of America in Washington, D.C.). Now the 7th century had the first temporary schism between the eastern and the western church. So in the 7th century the heresy, which basically had to do with the divinity of Christ, brought us another pope by the name of Honorius, who was pope from 625 to 638. And I’ll come back to that later because the schism didn’t go too far, but 40 years later, Pope Honorius I, was solemnly anathematized by the 6th Ecumenical Council of Constantinople – unbelievable – anathematizing that person. That’s the other equivalent of a canonization. And the reason was because Pope Honorius I kept quiet when he should have spoken. He himself, the historians tell us, was not at all a heretic. He knew where the truth was, but he did nothing to stop the heretics who were destroying the church. Again I guess you guessed it. Pope Honorius I never got an “S.” before his name.
In the 11th century we really have the first big schism – the Eastern Schism, which basically came down to this: is the Pope in Rome the supreme pontiff, with authority over all Catholics (Bishops and Cardinals and Patriarchs included), or is he some chairman of the board, the first among equals? And in those days, the Popes stood up – not for their own personal rights, or for their own personal privileges, but for the Papacy. And he told the Eastern Patriarchs that if they did not want to recognize the Pope of Rome as the Supreme Pontiff, the Vicar of Christ, the one person with authority over all Catholics, that there was no room for them in the Catholic Church. And there was only one way out. In those days, Popes were not going to sell out their authority.
And then in the 16th century, we have the “Protestant Reformation,” of which they are celebrating – and it is still going on – the 450th Anniversary. The Protestant Reformation started by attacking the heart of the Catholic religion – the Liturgy. It was Cardinal Neumann who once wrote, “If you want to destroy the liturgy, destroy its central liturgy.” And so that you won’t think that I am giving you a biased version of the history of those days, I’ll read from a magazine which is usually not too favorably inclined to what I am doing – TIME magazine. But I understand that they gave an excellent description of what happened during the Protestant Reformation of the 16th century. And you just try to compare that to what’s happening today. I’m reading here from one of my favorite magazines – TIME. At least they spelled my name right.
“Luther tried to put into effect a spiritual reform that became the model for much of Germany. He started by revising the Latin liturgy, and translated it into German, allowing the laity to receive the consecrated wine as well as the host, substituting a new, popular and vernacular type of religious songs for the traditional Latin Gregorian chant. And Christian worship changed from the celebration of the sacrificial Mass to the preaching and teaching of God’s Word. The sacraments were reduced from seven to two – Baptism and the Lord’s Supper. Meanwhile the revolt against Rome spread in town after town. Priests removed statues from the churches, and abandoned the Mass. Clerical celibacy was also abandoned, and in 1525 Luther married a former nun, Catherine Vembola.” They don’t say what kind of uniform she was wearing at the time. Since there are some good Sisters in the audience, I won’t say anything more about the uniforms, because believe it or not, ladies and gentlemen, there are even Sisters walking around even today in the new Greek uniform who detest it as much as you do. And it’s a big sacrifice for them to give up the traditional uniform that was so expressive of their dedication to the Church. So let’s not all condemn them. Maybe someday they’ll be still having the heart, might still prevail.
Then later when an investigating committee reported to Edward VI that 90% of the English people were still clinging to the Catholic Faith of their Fathers, and they were still hoping that the old Catholic religion would be restored – it is then that King Edward VI decided to abolish the Mass. And then we have the famous decision of the King’s “Reformation Commission” of 1547. And that is the decree, ladies and gentlemen, where the tables that are now disgracing our sanctuaries originated. Oh, yes, now your new Greek clergymen, they tell you that that was all authored by the “Constitution on the Liturgy” in the Second Vatican Council. Now, believe it or not, if I may just say that, as I was an advisor, an attendant at the Second Vatican Council sessions, maybe I know a little more about it than your new Greek clergy in the parishes that are now trying to contradict me. And while I’m not exactly a Rockefeller at this moment, I’ll give them any nickel I still have left if they can show me WHERE in the Constitution on the Liturgy it says that our altars must be replaced with tables. It doesn’t say so in the Constitution on the Liturgy, the Constitution that passed in 1962. But it says it in 1547 all right – yes!
“All altars in every church or chapel must be taken down, and instead of them a table must be set up to move the people from the superstitions of the popish Mass and to the right use of the Lord’s Supper. The use of an altar is to sacrifice upon; and the use of a table is to eat upon. Altars were erected for the sacrifice, which, being now ceased, the form of an altar must cease together with it.” And that still didn’t go over too well with the good believing people in Great Britain, and 5 years later, in 1552, it was necessary to enforce – and literally do so – the second act of the uniformity, “so that the sinful people may form from the old superstition of the Sacrifice of the Mass to the right use of the Lord’s Supper, all altars shall be replaced with tables. The presiding minister must stand, not as in the old Mass with his back to the congregation, but facing the congregation so that the people can see. The use of all English text must also be imposed for the same reason – to emphasize the change in the view taken of the Sacrifice.” And all Catholic bishops but one, went down the drain and sold out their responsibility and their beliefs – except one. And that’s the only one whose name we still remember – Saint John Fisher.
And then came Modernism in the 19th and early 20th centuries. It all started – oh, all these things start in Europe. That’s why even today, the desecration of your churches, ladies and gentlemen, wasn’t born in an American dream. That was born in the evil brain of modernistic, unbelieving theologians in Western Europe. I should know; I studied with some of them.
Modernism started in 1816 with an apostate French priest named Lammenais. And here we have the second attempt to “aggiornamento.” Again the same chestnut they’re now selling in our churches: the Church should stop fighting the world, update itself, and get involved with the world. There were no bigots or riots in those days, otherwise Lammenais would have been there. In 1834 he was honest enough to make it public that he was no longer believing in the Mass and consequently was no longer going through the motions. That brought him immediate support from some interesting friends – the Freemasons, who supported him quite comfortably and made sure that he was in a position to gather around him a lot of young clergymen who would be very comfortably kept and very well trained to wait for the day of the open-attack on the Church.
One of his quotations, which sounds as if it were taken out of a modern-day Catholic newspaper, is: “The highest virtue today is not faith; it doesn’t matter what you believe. Just love.” – 1834.
Another statement: “All religions are basically the same, so let’s all get together and form a one-world religion.” – 1834.
And Rome really worked slowly, but there comes a time when the Pope gets fed up with things.
And in 1864, on December 8th, Pius IX came up with an encyclical and a Syllabus of Errors, condemning modernism and every form for all time to come! But the modernists did not leave the Church while some like Luther had the decency to quit and leave the Church, and make it clear that he wanted nothing to do with the Catholic Church. Yet the Modernists (as a whole) didn’t have that basic honesty. They were condemned as severely as any heresy ever was – but they didn’t leave the Church. They stayed right behind the lines, waiting for an opening to attack the modern Church from within. And that is why seven years after this solemn condemnation, Pius IX still had to say: “The real scourge of our Church is not the one who uses violence and bodily persecution to do the devil’s work on earth. The real scourge of our Church is the liberal Catholic.” Seven years later, Pius IX died and was succeeded by – what would be described by today’s terms – “Liberal Pope Leo XIII.” As an act of charity we will bypass his pontificate as far as doctrine is concerned, although the man should be remembered as one of the popes who gave us excellent documents in social doctrine, as you know particularly his “Rerum Novarum.” But maybe he was a little too much interested in the social aspect of things, and maybe that explains why under his pontificate the Modernists solidified their positions at an alarming rate.
When Pope Leo XIII died in 1903, the man was 93 years old. You can figure out yourselves how easy it is to abuse an old man who is in his late eighties and early nineties. And when he died, the evil spirit behind the throne of Leo XIII was Cardinal Rampolla. History clearly states that man’s strange connections with anything but religious interests. That man was elected pope, mind you, but God uses strange ways to keep his church on the right track. In 1903 Christ stepped in to block the election of Rampolla to become successor of Peter. And the means, the instrument God used to block the election was, believe it or not, the Emperor of Austria, who still had somewhere an old legal privilege – the “veto” privilege – to veto the election of any pope. And the good Commission of Catholic Cardinals, left with no other human means to block the election of this ungodly Cardinal, the good cardinals appealed to the secular power to block the election, and the Emperor of Austria used his veto power to veto that election. The cardinals elected another pope and obviously the Holy Ghost, who must have been relieved after having been heading in the direction of Rampolla, made sure that He took over this time in the election. And an unknown cardinal was elected – a cardinal by the name of Sarto, who became somewhat better known later on as Saint Pius X. It was he, who in 1907, solemnly and even more strongly, condemned Modernism in terms which our present-day Catholic press tries to ignore and tries to deny.
The Modernists again did not leave the Church – oh no, they stayed right in! – and joined the same forces they joined before. Freemasonry within the Catholic Church was the vehicle to undermine the Church from within. And then the next new movement to hit the scene to come on the scene was communism in 1914 St. Pius X died and World War I just started. He died 16 days after the beginning of World War 1.
In 1917 – exactly 50 years ago, as you know – the Communist Revolution took place. In 1917, something maybe of even greater importance took place – the Blessed Mother of God appeared in Fatima. All in the same year. And Communism, joined with modern techniques and modern money and to all the traditionally used tactics of the devil, started to work for his goal of world domination. And the Christians of all denominations – Catholics as well as Protestants – slept while the enemy was not at all sleeping.
In 1931, the Lenin school of political warfare sent out its secret instructions to its elite of workers, making it clear that in 20 or 30 years – now 31 – that would make it 1961+. Within about 30 years the day would come, that international Communism would gradually take over the entire world. Communism couldn’t do that unless it destroyed religion, and it started to work immediately on our best Protestant denominations, which, with the help of Freemasonry, were infiltrated to the bone. I have been warned not to say that in public, if I know what’s good for me. And that’s why I’m saying it again.
When in 1933, Hitler took over in Germany, Communism found a good excuse to gain respectability. Anyone who was against Hitler at the time was supposed to be “respectable.” Well there were a few fools like I was who believed that both Nazism and Communism were just two diseases, and we tried to fight both at the same time. But in 1933, it became evident that the Protestant denominations had been very successfully infiltrated, but that the Roman Catholic Church was still standing there alone as the big opponent of international communistic atheism. And it is in 1933, that Moscow ordered the infiltration of the Catholic Church because, since the priests did not become communists, communists would now become priests. And the instructions left no doubt that some of the most promising young men in communist ranks would be sent to our seminaries to go through all the motions of training for the priesthood and be ordained and try to get up as high as they could in the Catholic Church. This was in 1933, and by the law of average, some of them should have succeeded quite well by now. When those directives reached the Vatican, which at that time had an excellent detection service (it’s not so good these day, they tell me), when Pius XI became aware of this infiltration of atheistic communism, he composed personally (he didn’t use ghost writers – he personally composed this encyclical) Divini Redemptoris, in which he condemned Communism once and for all as intrinsically evil and warned the Catholic bishops of the world against infiltrators of the Church. But all the bishops sort of smiled and told the man in Rome he was getting a little hysterical.
Then came World War II, and Communism became a world power with infiltration its greatest weapon. Still quite successfully, the subversive forces continued to work to bring Catholicism down to the lowest level of the Protestant Reformation, and to bring the Protestant “reformed” churches down to the lowest level of the DE-formation, where we have now Christian theologians advocating a “God is dead” theology. And, by undermining all Christian denominations, hoped to create an emptiness in which atheistic Communism would nicely step in someday, as the old gentleman Khrushchev told us point-blank when we were dumb enough to be his host here in the United States: “Total unremitting warfare until the complete rule and every soul is controlled completely by the force known as Communism remains our goal today. Whether you like it or not, history is on our side,” he said. “We will bury you.”
Well they had the numbers to say that before, but just to show that we know what we are talking about, ladies and gentlemen. And again, when Pope Pius XII occupied the Chair of St. Peter – the Pope who was maybe one of the best informed Supreme Pontiffs ever to rule over our Church – he knew that the first attack, the first frontal attack, against the Catholic Church would be directed at the liturgy of the Mass. It was in 1947 already that Pope Pius XII warned the bishops against the fanatics of the liturgical and theological left who were already then beginning to agitate for some of the liturgical abuses and monstrosities which are now hailed as great accomplishments of the “revitalized liturgy,” but which the saintly Pope in his encyclical Mediator Dei called “insidious and very damaging extremes.”
“Wicked innovations they are preparing,” he warned the bishops. “Poisonous fruits,” he called them. And the advocates of that so-called “Liturgical Renewal” were condemned already then as “Men leaving the path of sound doctrine. Men who claim to promote the liturgical renaissance, but in reality contaminate the liturgy with errors regarding the Catholic doctrine.” I’m still quoting the saintly Pius XII: “Men,” he warned, “who propose wicked innovations and are WRONG in appealing to the social nature of the Holy Eucharist. Men who are unsound Catholics, who want to revive customs long eliminated as abuses. Men who want to falsify the people with new ways of doing things – new ways that are like poisoned fruits or like infected branches on a healthy tree.”
“Infected branches,” he calls them, “that should be cut off.” And knowing how these, already in 1947, were preparing their first counter-attack on the Latin language in the Church (because it was a symbol of our universality with Catholics all over the world and it was our symbol of our link with Rome), knowing that their first attack would be as Luther’s attack was, against the Latin language of the Church, Pope Pius XII told the bishops then: KEEP YOUR COTTON-PICKING FINGERS OFF THE LATIN! He didn’t use those words really, but this is what he said: “Use of Latin must continue in our Church because it is a clear and beautiful sign of unity, and more importantly, an effective remedy against corruptions of true doctrine.” And also knowing that the next attack would be against the altars to have them replaced with the monstrosities of ironing boards and tables, in 1947 already – some people think half of these things were happening overnight – it wasn’t happening overnight! These Modernists have prepared this for years and years! In 1947, Pius XII told the bishops to keep the altars in the churches because “he wanders from the right path who wishes to restore to the altar the ancient form of the table.”
And then came 1962, with Pope John XXIII occupying the Chair of Peter. “Good Pope John.” Never has the church known a Pope who was more traditional in his doctrine and in his liturgical outlook than the good Pope John XXIII, who is now being abused to justify the monstrosities which he detested and which he never authorized. Because when good Pope John XXIII convoked the Ecumenical Council for October 11, he was told by some of his advisors that he made a mistake in convoking a council which would not be a “happy meeting of a couple of weeks” where bishops from all parts of the world would get together and change a few niceties and then jointly make a declaration to the world that the Catholic Church, unchanged in its fundamental doctrines, was now willing to make a few adaptations in some non-essential, external things. When he was told, for instance, that the first attack of the Modernists would be against the traditional Latin liturgy, Pope John XXIII, who took responsibility when there was need for it, convoked all the Cardinals living in Rome and all those within reasonable traveling distance, and ordered them to come to Rome on February 22nd of 1962 – eight months before the opening of the Vatican Council. And most solemnly, personally leaving the Vatican to go and stand on top of the grave of St. Peter in Rome with all the Cardinals standing next to him and a score of bishops right underneath him, Pope John, in the form of an apostolic constitution, which is the highest form of papal intervention next to an infallible dogmatic definition, declared that there was nothing – no council or no bishop – that could touch the traditional Latin liturgy. He came out and on February 22nd, the Feast of St. Peter’s Chair (he selected just for that) with the constitution “Vitrum Sapientia,” made it clear that this wasn’t just a quick talk from the pope.
“In the full awareness of Our office and of Our authority, We decree and order ad Perpetuam Rei memoriam – in perpetuity,” he said. “We will and command that this Our constitution remain firmly established and ratified notwithstanding anything to the contrary…” And that constitution said that Latin had to stay in the liturgy and that the bishops had the obligation to see to it that no one under their authority works for the elimination of the Latin from either the liturgy or the studies for the priesthood in our seminaries. That was 8 months before the Vatican Council opened. And the Pope made it clear that this was ad Perpetuam Rei memoriam “for all perpetuity, this must remain in the fullness of Our authority We make this decision,” he said. And he made it quite clear why: “A universal religion needs a universal language.”
And it was in that year, 1962, that a schismatic heretical, Conciliar sect of the Church in the United States of America was born. Why? Because regardless of the clear, solemn oath of Pope John XXIII, the majority of our American bishops refused to obey. I should know because I was there on the faculty at the time. And I had instructions from our Bishop in Baltimore NOT to implement the constitution from Rome. That’s when I resigned.
And it is that day that the majority of our bishops automatically excommunicated themselves from our Roman Catholic Church! Now they try to threaten me with excommunication. I would consider it a high honor to be illegally excommunicated by men who were excommunicated 5 years ago. Why? Because the instruction they sent out to people such as I was: “Pay no attention to that old…” – I won’t quote what they called good, old Pope John. “Pay no attention. We will wait until the council convenes and we will get rid of that Latin liturgy fast. So just wait.”
Now, ladies and gentlemen, we are still living in a Church that believes in its Code of Canon Law. And, if you believe Pope Paul VI, and we still do, than Canon 2,332 of our Code of Canon Law makes it so clear.
“Each and everyone, of whatsoever position or rank, whether king, bishop or cardinal, who appeals from the laws, decrees or mandates of the reigning Roman pontiff to an ecumenical council is suspected of heresy and incurs automatic excommunication.” And the following Canon: “Persons who directly or indirectly prevent the implementation of acts issued by the Apostolic See incur automatic excommunication.” – Canon 2,333. And you don’t have to be a Doctor of Canon Law to understand that language.
1962 was the first step in the establishment of the schismatic, heretical, Conciliar sect which is now posing as the Catholic Church establishment in the United States. Because now we are faced with Conciliarism. Pope John XXIII convoked his Vatican Council – and ladies and gentlemen, let no one tell you that I personally, or the Traditional Catholic movement, are fighting the decisions of the Ecumenical Council. Oh no, we are not! No Catholic could! What we are fighting today are the false interpretations of the Second Vatican Council and it is high time for the present Holy Father to declare that the Vatican Council was BIG MISTAKE, and that it is now completely eradicated from the record. He could do it! He is the pope! And it isn’t just to the credit of Pope John XXIII, because it is much more to the credit of the Holy Ghost, that John XXIII made it crystal clear from the very beginning when he convoked that council. And I should know; I heard him say it! Yes, he said it in Latin, but I still understand a little Latin. He made it clear that, unlike all previous Ecumenical Councils, the Second Vatican Council was to be, not a Doctrinal Council, but a pastoral one, leaving the door open for any subsequent pope to just say “BUSTA!!”
When it became clear that the Second Vatican Council was heading, humanly speaking, for destruction, God stepped in and closed the Vatican Council. When I returned to the United States after the first session, I told my friends I had seen Pope John the day before I left Rome. I said, “That pope will not open any other sessions; that man is dying.” For once my predictions came true, though I have made a few others which have also come true incidentally.
But the man died – an act of God ended the Second Vatican Council, which had at that time, not made any decisions, any decrees whatsoever. The first session in 1962 ended, and no second session came because Pope John died. Now with the existing law of our Church, an Ecumenical Council is automatically ended when the reigning Supreme Pontiff dies. An act of God closed the Ecumenical Council. And many a church observer was hoping that, when the new pope was elected, he would not re-open the council which had been closed by an outspoken, unmistakably clear act of God. But after listening to some of his advisors, Pope Paul VI did not convoke a Third Vatican Council, which would have been more in line with the traditions, but he RE-opened the Second Vatican Council which had been closed. And I was not the only one to be a little bit uncomfortable when witnessing within a month or two: a Council closed by an act of God, re-opened by an act of Man.
But nevertheless, when the final session closed of the Second Vatican Council, every decision and every decree that officially was promulgated by it contained nothing but the traditional, sound doctrine of our Church. Oh, yes, I had heard proposals there you wouldn’t believe. Bishops proposing there, as acceptable Catholic doctrine, HERESIES – dogmatic and moral heresies – which had been condemned centuries ago! But these were not made law – oh no! Christ was still with His Church and the Holy Ghost still steered part of Peter and did not permit those proposals to be accepted. But what we are witnessing today, ladies and gentlemen, are precisely those defeated proposals which are now being forced down the throats of our Catholic people. The Modernists couldn’t get it done legally in Rome; now they are trying to do it illegally. And that’s why we’re attacking them!
Today we have the exact carbon copy of the situation St. Pius X described in 1903 where he made it clear that the promoters of error today are not found among our declared enemies – the promoters of error today are found in the very ranks of our own Church! Today we are witnessing that exact situation. We are also witnessing the very thing which was predicted in Fatima in 1917. And I could see right up, it’s not exactly making that public – but I don’t pretend to have the text of that message of Our Blessed Mother in Fatima, but the text I received in Rome has a few paragraphs there which are still very much of interest. It was predicted then and it is happening now.
“A time of severe trial is coming for the Church. Not today, nor tomorrow,” the Blessed Mother said in 1917, “but in the second half of the 20th century. Humanity will not develop as God desires it. Mankind will become sacrilegious and trample underfoot the gift it has received. No longer will order reign anywhere. Even in the high places,” the Blessed Mother predicted, “Satan will reign and direct the course of things. He will even succeed in infiltrating into the highest positions in the Church. Cardinals will oppose cardinals and bishops will oppose bishops. Satan will enter into their very midst. The Church will be obscured and all the world will be thrown into confusion.” It is the Mother of God who gave us such a description, ladies and gentlemen. And that is why we hold to the Holy Father – not attacking the pope as the false brethren of the so-called Catholic press have tried to make its readers believe. We did not attack the Pope in our letter to him. There isn’t a priest in the whole world who has more loyalty and more affection to the present Pope than I do. Because, if for no other reason, Pope Paul VI didn’t have to give me the personal attention and the personal affection he showed me when he gave me a personal audience and blessed the work I had been doing the last two weeks. I cannot forget that, unhappy as I am about some of the things his advisors made me do today. What we ask the Holy Father in my letter of August 15 (and if you are interested in the full text, just leave your name and we’ll gladly send you a copy) we ask the Holy Father to PLEASE be a Pope, to act like a Pope, to stand on his own two feet, and to give us loyal traditionalist Catholics the satisfaction of being able once more to say: “Rome has spoken and all Catholics will obey!” That’s what we asked him to do.
We are not trying to start a new schismatic church, ladies and gentlemen. This I have been accused of by the phony conservative Catholic press, which is now wandering around in all directions, and which is now sending out all sorts of splinter groups – some of whom are even exposing themselves to dangerous legal action by twisting Catholic traditionalists around. Where are the bishops who might still come out of the woods someday? The actual establishment of the so-called Catholic is no longer in line with the traditions of the church that go back to St. Peter and Our Lord Himself because the Conciliar Church of today has been one that has brought to the world nothing but the systematic destruction of the Catholic Church that every priest swore to defend.
We have witnessed the last 5 years in public what was prepared for the last 50 years – the systematic destruction of the Church in three stages. First, our liturgy had to be destroyed. Then, our dogmas had to be destroyed. And then, our morals had to be destroyed. And the enemy has done a good job doing all of these, ladies and gentlemen.
First, they have destroyed our liturgy. A year ago, I warned you of the ten steps you would be witnessing in your church. I told you that the first thing you would witness was the total destruction of Latin. I knew that was what they were shooting for. The second thing you would witness was Mass on a real altar, but facing the people. The third step, I told you, would be the altar replaced with a table – not to implement the Second Vatican Council, but in perfect conformity with the decrees of the Anglican Reformation of the 16th century. The fourth step, I warned you, would be the…on the altar would be destroyed and the tabernacle removed to some sort of a shoebox down the side. The fifth step, I warned you, would be the communion rail would be removed and you would be forced to stand while receiving the one, whom the Bible tells us, all should bend their knees for, even if His name is only mentioned. The sixth step, in the systematic destruction of our liturgy, I warned you, would be people would start selecting their own altar breads and bring them to the table.
First traditional looking hosts; later ordinary bread. The seventh step, I warned, you would be witnessing “special” masses now for select groups. “Hootenanny Masses” for teenagers because the teenagers asked for it! They don’t, ladies and gentlemen! A few nitwits among the teenagers may, but the liberals are insulting our teenagers by really making us “old-folks” believe that our teenagers are really going for that kind of degraded liturgy. They go not for that, ladies and gentlemen, and I’m extremely happy to say that one of my next talks will be in Arizona – organized by a group of teenagers! Special groups, hootenanny masses – of which the latest was a Mass in the cathedral, mind you, with dancing girls and boys together on the floor. Just as hootenanny masses will become available to teenagers – agape “Love Masses” would be made available for what they call a “select group” of adults. The eighth step I told you in the systematic destruction of our liturgy would be that everyone would be able to touch and handle the “Bread of Love,” as they call it. First they would permit some nuns to touch it.
Sure, even among the nuns you can find a few nitwits, just as you can find them among the priests (though I would say the nuns are in a wee more favorable position than we are now). First they would find a few nuns to break the ice. Then they would let the children help themselves to communion. Then the next step – everyone helps himself. When I was speaking like that once, some people said, “Well, he is exaggerating.” Ladies and gentlemen, I can take you to places where this is taking place! I also warned you about some of the sacrilegious abuses that would result from that destruction, and the picture I got was a picture of a former tabernacle, which is now being used as a dog house – they had a cocker-spaniel in what used to be the tabernacle, ladies and gentlemen. The ninth step, I warned you a year ago, would be no more obligatory Sunday Masses in churches, but voluntary “love masses” in homes – preferably on Saturday, the Sabbath. The tenth step, I told you, God knows what that would be. But a year ago we didn’t know what the tenth step would be, but today we do. The tenth step in the systematic destruction of our traditional Latin liturgy, was formalized two weeks ago on Oct. 22nd, 1967.
That was the day the counterfeit Mass was forced upon our people. That was the day when you went to the church establishment buildings where you witnessed your priests turning into ministers. That was the day the heretical, schismatic, Conciliar Church was formally established in the U.S. of America, as was proposed formally a year ago.
Now, ladies and gentlemen, I hesitated before I came here, whether I should tell you this or not. I hesitated before I came here to your city. But I decided, bad news as it is, I must give it to you. What you are attending today in the churches of our once Catholic Church establishment – what you are witnessing, ladies and gentlemen, is no longer a valid Sacrifice of the Mass. That’s a tremendous statement to make. So I have to prove it, and I owe it to you to give you the reasons.
Here in the city of Chicago between April 10 and April 13 of this year, our American bishops met in a luxury hotel and decided among other things that they would appeal to Rome (they still felt like going through that motion) for permission to use an all-English Mass, including the Canon of the Mass, including the most solemn part of the Canon, the Consecration. Twenty-one bishops fought against it and voted against it. Out of more than 250 American bishops, 21 were still Catholic enough to warn their fellow bishops not to destroy the Latin Traditional Mass altogether – particularly, not to fool around with the “form” of Consecration, which affects the validity of the Mass. I received the information of that exact number (which was supposed to be kept secret) two weeks ago from the Cardinal Office of our Bishop in Washington, who told me that he was one of the three Cardinals who fought against it. The other two were Cardinal Spelmann and Cardinal Macintyre, and 18 other bishops. They voted “no” because they knew it was wrong. I expected the next sentence to be: “…and that’s why at least in 21 dioceses you will still have a valid Mass available.” But no. That is not what I heard next. What I heard next was: “…but once the majority of the American bishops decided to go for an all-English Mass, we, who voted against it, decided not to break ranks and to go along with them.”
Those are the kind of leaders we have today, ladies and gentlemen. Now if they had only proposed an English translation of the Latin Canon, it would have been bad enough. They would have still gone directly contrary to the excommunication threat of the Council of Trent and Articles 36 and 54 of the Second Vatican Council’s “Constitution on the Liturgy.” But if it had been a literal translation, as much as I would hate to see the Latin go, you couldn’t really question the validity of the Mass.
Last night I spoke at a hall graciously placed at our disposal by a fellow priest of the Lebanese Rite. He certainly doesn’t use Latin, but I know it’s a valid Mass and that’s why I would rather see you go to a valid Mass in Aramaic in his Lebanese Church than to a phony Communion service in our so-called Latin Churches.
What our American bishops proposed to Rome was an entirely new (English version) Canon of the Mass – a version which was totally heretical, a version in which three infallibly defined dogmas were eliminated. The dogma of the Divine Maternity of the Virgin Mary, defined in 431 by the Council of Ephesus – OUT. The dogma of the Perpetual Virginity of the Virgin Mary, defined at the Lateran Council of 649 – OUT. The dogma of the Divinity of Our Lord and Savior Himself, defined at the Council of Nicæa in 325 – OUT. Needless to say, that the answer that came back from Rome last September, was “no.” Twice…“no.”
“We in Rome cannot possibly permit you American bishops to use this kind of Mass formula.”
Not to forget that the word “blessed” has also been eliminated and so has the actual blessing. The ministers today in our Church no longer bless the bread and the wine. I will explain to you later on why they don’t – they are consistent. Needless to say, Rome’s answer was “you cannot use this form in the Mass!”
Now, ladies and gentlemen, at one time that would have been the final decision and any Catholic bishop would have submitted immediately. No longer. The answer given by our American, so-called “Catholic” bishops, given in the person of Archbishop Deardon, the president of the American Bishops Conference (in Rome itself of all places), where he was to attend that same afternoon the opening Council of the Synod of Bishops last September 29, Archbishop Deardon of Detroit, in his capacity as president of the American Catholic Bishops, publicly announced that, even though Rome had rejected this English text of the Canon, we in the United States make it now mandatory in all public Masses and we will not even wait until December 3, the day we had originally planned. We will do it immediately, as soon as the printing can be done. And that’s why they made it mandatory on October 22nd. Now, ladies and gentlemen, if that isn’t an open schism, then I don’t know what a schism is.
And until four days ago, I personally still had doubts as to the validity of this new English ceremony in our churches. See, I’m not really as extreme as my opponents describe me to be. Some of my fellow theologians told me from the very beginning that, in their opinion, there was not the slightest doubt that this New Mass was invalid. I still had doubts…but no more. To me it was doubtful, but still, according to the Traditional teaching of Catholic moral theology, when the validity is at stake of a sacrament, a priest cannot follow the system of what they call “probabalism.” He must follow the system of “tutiorism,” meaning he must follow the more safe course. That means that, until Rome clearly defines that the new formula is technically valid, the priest must stick with the old formula which was established as “valid” until now. But three days ago, the latest issue of a magazine called “Worship,” which is the unofficial mouthpiece of American liturgical “experts,” and which is published with ecclesiastical approval – there are instructions directed to the priests explaining to them how to understand the new English Canon which they are now to use in their Masses. And if you read that, ladies and gentlemen, then there is not the slightest doubt that the valid Sacrifice of the Mass has vanished from our churches. I’m quoting here from that article where it says: “the new Canon is not just a change of words, but a development in Eucharistic theology. One can only do justice to the Canon of the Mass by interpreting it in the light of current writing on Eucharistic theology.” And then it explains what it means by the new “Eucharistic theology.”
The first element of this Eucharistic theology, which is now forced down your throats, is: “There is no more room for a sacrificial priesthood. The priest is now one of many ministers. He is no longer the one who sacrifices, who offers, sacrifices, and consecrates. He is now one of many ministers.” All through that article of instructions directed to the priests he is described as the “presiding minister” and to make it short they even invented a new word which is probably even making Webster turn around. They call it continuously now the “presider.” Now when I was ordained 25 years ago, I was not ordained a minister; I was ordained a priest. And with all due respect to some of my friends’ ministers, we consider ourselves in a different category. We were priests to offer the Sacrifice of the Mass and to forgive sins, and all the rest was accidental. I was never told that I was ordained a “presider”; yet, that is what I am now. And they describe the function of the presider – and watch it now, for there is not the slightest reference to the priestly powers of consecrating – as: “The one who preaches, who sums up the prayers of the faithful, who proclaims the Canon of the Mass (that is, the Eucharistic prayer), who initiates the peace greeting and makes sure that all the faithful present are served at the Holy Table.” Now that is not what I was ordained for, ladies and gentlemen. Now if that’s who is presiding over your so-called “Masses” on Sundays, then you may as well get yours snacks somewhere else to put it bluntly, tragic as it is.
And a new element enters the picture here. They make it clear that the presider’s job is essentially temporary. Any Catholic layman could become presider for awhile and, in a little footnote there, it says that we should make provisions to permit not only our priests, but even our bishops to look for another job if they get fed up with their present one. Unbelievable, ladies and gentlemen. We are already used now to see priests run away and break their vows publicly, but for the first time we are now gradually conditioned to face the fact that some of our previously esteemed bishops might now appear on our televisions screens with a tie on. I guess some would wear a red one, too.
To give you the exact proof, because I see a few persons there who are taking notes, on page 515 of that article it says: “We simply must provide, and soon, less arduous and less incriminating methods of resigning from the Episcopal and priestly functions.” There is no room anymore for a priest in what’s going on Sunday morning! He is the one who preaches, who sums up the prayers of the faithful, who proclaims the Eucharistic prayer, initiates the peace greeting, and makes sure that everyone is served at the table. You eliminate the priesthood, you have no sacrifice; you eliminate the sacrifice, you have no Mass. You have a 3rd class congregational Protestant service.
But worse.
That same article goes on by making it clear that there is no more room for a consecration in the new “Eucharistic Service,” as they call it. The transubstantiation is eliminated. No more change of bread and wine into the real living Christ – no. They explain now that the consecration consists in this: the presider proclaims that the bread and wine are consecrated, and this is accepted by God as our offerings. This is not a consecration, ladies and gentlemen! Bread and wine are only transformed, not transubstantiated into the sacramental Body of Christ – not the real Body of Christ. And then they explain what they mean by what they still say: “This is My Body.” They say the consecration is “a processive offering to the Father of Christ’s Body which is the assembly in front of us.” Christ’s Body is the assembly – no, ladies and gentlemen. Then they also explain that the words “Do ye this in commemoration of Me” mean the Eucharistic prayer is a proclamation of the Word of God. It is not! The Eucharistic sacrifice is the MAKING PRESENT of the living God – that’s what the Mass is!
When a Catholic entered his Church, he wasn’t entering just another prayer hall. He wasn’t just entering a spiritual dining room. He was entering the residence of the living God, Jesus Christ, who became present there as real as you and I through the words of the consecration of a priest. Now the “real presence” is the assembly, and that of course explains why the presider should face the assembly and the people! They make it clear that there is no more room for priests and, consequently, it says, “the priest should stop wearing ecclesiastical vestments.” The liturgical vestments should be rejected as “symbols of waste and superfluity.” There is no more living Christ; therefore the only living thing are the people present. And that’s why the presider must address himself to the living persons there. “To attend to anything else but the assembly, even the book or the bread and wine, is the opposite of the style we seek.” At least they had the decency to call it “bread and wine.” They also give the priest instructions to avoid, by all means, looking up to heaven, as he was directed to do during the Offertory, during Consecration and many other parts of the Mass. No more…because it says, “The heavenward gaze belongs to a few of the universe no longer with us.”
Do you blame me, ladies and gentlemen, for cabling a message to Rome immediately asking for instructions as to what I am to do now? I am not telling you a secret when I make it clear that what I have been doing the last few years was actually – in plain vernacular – I have been doing the dirty work for Rome here in the United States and in Europe. And I have followed my instructions to the letter and I haven’t doubted them. They told me I was in enemy territory when I left Rome. They said you are behind enemy lines now; whatever you do, you have our confidence, but don’t expect us to come out with public statements every month. But when there is an emergency, you send us a telegram, worded this way, and you will get your answer the same evening. I sent the telegram to Cardinal Brown on September 29th asking for instructions as to the validity of this Mass, which in my opinion, was at that time questionable, and which is now in my opinion, clearly invalid. I received no answer from Rome. When I had to address a public meeting 2 weeks ago, on October 22nd in Garden City, Long Island, I sent another telegram, begging for an answer before 6pm. The next day I had to address the people so that I could give them clear instructions as to what to do. Knowing my protectors in Rome – my bosses, I might say – I knew that they would not break their agreement. I knew they would send me a telegram one way or another before I had to address the public. Yet when I addressed the public at 6pm (I actually waited until 6:45), no telegram had arrived. Three days later, I did receive a letter [a telegram] from Cardinal Brown, who was the one appointed by the Pope to deal with these things, and the first words of the letter, written that day, were: “Dear Fr. de Pauw, you will have received my telegram of this morning…”
We started an investigation and at this point, the conclusion is that the telegram that the Vatican sent me was intercepted. But I fortunately got the letter then. Sad news, ladies and gentlemen, in which Cardinal Brown – the No.3 man in the Church there…the Pope, Cardinal Ottoviani, Cardinal Brown – informed me that, even a person in his position can no longer exercise his influence over the American bishops. All he could do, he said, is to present the question of the validity of the New Mass before the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, which he has done. But meanwhile, I’m on my own. He also informed me that the power of the Church is now completely in the hands of the Secretary of State which is, as you know, the political arm of the Vatican. And it was an ominous little news item in yesterday’s paper that the only persons who did see the Holy Father before he was to undergo surgery, were three representatives of the Secretary of State, the political arm of the Vatican.
And that brings us, ladies and gentlemen, to this extremely practical and tragic question: “What do we do now? What do we do tomorrow?” We know that our bishops, except for a very few you can count on the fingers of your one hand, we know that they have betrayed us, and betrayed the Holy Father. We know that the great majority of our priests, in their heart, agree in what I am saying and doing. But they are not willing to fight. We know that our enemies in our church establishment are no longer even interested in organizing an independent American Catholic Church. They are no more “American” than they are Catholic. They are simply interested in establishing, with the help of money and with the help of Freemasonry (and they have done so already now) the United States Division of the One World Church, controlled by a One World Government, hopefully controlled someday by a Communist United Nations. And that’s as simple as it is, ladies and gentlemen. And, once in a while, our opponents are so stupid that they even prove radically what I am trying to say. You would not believe it yourself, but there is already a monthly “Missalette” making the rounds in some churches. The picture on the front page is a man, supposedly like Christ, blessing the flags of all the different countries which are gathered around the table of the community meal. And it is true that, among those flags he is blessing, is still the U.S. “stars & stripes,” but also there is among those flags not only the Soviet Union’s hammer and sickle but also the flag of Red China. That is taken from a pew in a church in New York City of all places, ladies and gentlemen.
What can we really do, ladies and gentlemen?
PRAY.
Pray and pray. There are still some churches where they have the real Blessed Sacrament – the living God. Look them up and go on your knees and pray and pray. Because, humanly speaking, we are in a mess we can’t get out of. Right now we must ask God, Jesus Christ, to wake up. The situation of our Church today is very much like the situation the Apostles found themselves in when Christ was sleeping in the little boat during the big storm. We must storm Christ and ask him: “Lord, we perish! Save us!” With one hand extended, He calmed the seas then. Maybe He will calm them now. But, humanly speaking, there is no way out, ladies and gentlemen…except to hold on – we, the small group of Traditionalist Catholics – to the little flame of the traditional faith which is still burning just a little. But as long as we keep it burning, that flame of God’s help will someday go higher and higher again. But right now, it’s mighty, mighty low.
Also pray to the Blessed Mother. She predicted the mess we are in – in Fatima! Let’s pray to her that she gets us out of it.
Then, ladies and gentlemen, work on yourself. Get rid of that brainwashed idea of blind obedience! Ladies and gentlemen, there is no room for blind obedience in the Catholic Church! Blind obedience leads to nothing but tyranny, whether political, military or spiritual. The true Catholic teaching of obedience is the one I have said all over the country and in a few parts of the rest of the world.
As Catholics our first obedience is to God, Our Savior Jesus Christ. Our second obedience is to our Church – the one, true Church of Christ, the Catholic Church. Our third obedience is to our Pope. Our fourth obedience is to our bishop. And only your fifth obedience is to your priest. But our obedience to priests and bishops and even the Pope ends if, God forbid, any of them would be disobedient to either Church or God!
Work on yourself and convince yourself that you are not disobeying anyone who should be obeyed when you fight the establishment of the Conciliar Church. You are not disobeying anyone who should be obeyed. Work also on some of your neighbors, to join with you to form an elite minority. There are some of our Catholic people that are not worth discussing the situation with. If they haven’t seen by now what’s happening to the Church, don’t waste your time on them! Let them go to where they are heading – and it ain’t “heaven” (in the vernacular)! That doesn’t mean, ladies and gentlemen, that I’m not interested in the salvation of even one soul; I’ll fly to Timbuktu tonight if they assured me I can save a soul there. But the fact is that for almost 3 years now I have been traveling all over the world and over the country. I have been warning the people. There isn’t a soul anymore who has an excuse to say “well we didn’t know it!” We have made available printed things, records, tapes – you name it! They know we are right! Priests come to me daily and say, “You know, you are absolutely right, but I don’t want to lose my job.” That’s what they tell me. My answer is: “I LOST my job! But I don’t want to lose my soul!!”
Work on an elite group. All through history, anything of importance has been accomplished by a small minority, for good or for bad. You, ladies and gentlemen, you are that minority. A small minority – oh, yes, in their hearts 85% or 95% of the Catholics agree with what I am saying, but there aren’t 10% who are willing to fight for it! Ninety-five percent of the priests know that I am right, but they don’t want to lose their salary every month! Ninety-five percent of the nuns know that I am right, but they are bound by the system – they can’t do anything! And that’s why I forgive them. But you, ladies and gentlemen, you can still do something! Work together, share your views with others, work within the Catholic Traditionalist movement – the only organized force that has done something these last three years! And all the Johnny-come-lately, what are they asking now? A Latin Mass? The issue is no longer a Latin Mass – the issue is now OUR CATHOLIC FAITH!
What can you do, and what must you do? You must try to save whatever can be saved, just as in the 4th century. The flame of traditional Catholic beliefs was kept burning by a small group of people – lay people – and a few religious and a few priests. Now YOU have to do the same thing! You must BREAK with the Conciliar Church in order to save the true Catholic Church!
How can you do it?
Number one, refuse financial support to any priest turned minister whose Church now only offers a “last supper commemorative communion service” without the Good Friday sacrifice of the substantially present living God! Refuse to support financially schools where the Conciliar religion has replaced the Catholic religion! And, in turn, support financially and spiritually and morally those few priests and those few nuns who are holding out as best they can in their own positions! Look for churches where real Catholic priests are still validly consecrating. If you can’t find it in your own parish, make the sacrifice to travel a few miles. Your grandparents did it, driving horses or walking on their own legs. They built the churches years ago here in this country. Travel around and look for a church. here are a few left that still have the real Mass. Look for schools where the faith and morals of your children are not being ruined by sacrilegious and immoral so-called “religion books.” If you cannot find such churches, stop going to the establishment buildings where the true sacrifice is no longer available. And God knows that I carefully selected my words when I said that. No one who has been ordained 25 years a priest as I have been, no one who has trained priests for the last 15 years, is going to make a statement as I just made without carefully and prayerfully watching his language. Stop going to those sacrilegious services which are now being forced on you. Go on the weekday if you can, to a Church where a priest is still offering a real Mass – and IF you cannot find such churches anymore, then build NEW churches and NEW schools! You build the buildings and I will give you the priests and the teachers! And if you run into financial or technical difficulties – and I know you will because four days ago I was in the state of New Jersey, looking over the piece of property which was offered me to offer Mass the next Sunday with all sorts of privileges, building regulations, zoning regulations, and what have you.
That is why right now, ladies and gentlemen, build altars in your own homes, and invite priests to come there and offer the Sacrifice of the Mass! I’m going to send out all over the country the simple measurements – 65” wide, 20” deep, 41” high. Build an altar and I will give you the names of priests who are willing to come there for you and your neighbors and your children…to offer the REAL sacrifice.
Let there be a modern version of the catacombs! It is better to have the real Mass on an altar in your home than a phony, community service in what used to be Catholic churches. And if you cannot find any priests, if the 120 plus, who gave me their assurance that they would do it with me – if they all chicken out, then I will alone travel all over the country and say Mass instead of speaking to the people. Because the days are over for speeches, the days are over for publications, the days are over for pamphlets – the days of ACTION are here! We must now save nothing less than the real presence of God among us. Right now what we need is altars to offer Masses on. If we cannot have them anymore in our church buildings, YOU must have them in your homes! And I, for one, will go anyplace in the United States to offer the Sacrifice of the Mass and teach your children the old beliefs of your forefathers.
And I do hope that some priests, if they witness me doing it, might still have the GUTS to do the same. Do not fear the wrath of the bishops who today form the established, heretical, schismatic Church. Let us be prepared, ladies and gentlemen, to join the saints who were illegally excommunicated by the phony establishments and bishops of their days. I’m referring to Saint Athanasius, Saint Cyril, Saint Philip Neri, Saint Louis de Montfort, Saint Joan of Arc – just to name a few.
Ladies and gentlemen, I am not asking you or anyone else to become one of my followers. I’m not asking you to follow me! I am inviting you to walk with me and together we will follow, not any human being, but Jesus Christ alone. I have personally already given up all of my material possessions and the professional comforts that once were mine and I’m not asking for your sympathy, believe you me, I have never been happier than in the last three years of my life. But I have given everything I could and I’m still ready to give today my life and my all to lead those Catholics who are ready to fight the pseudo-bishops and priests of the Conciliar Church in order to stay within the Catholic Church.
Those of you, ladies and gentlemen, who are willing to join me in this fight for truth and tradition, to those of you who are willing to join me, I can only promise for the immediate future abuse, ridicule, smears and all forms of persecution – that persecution which Christ said would be the principle mark of his true Church. For the immediate future, all you can expect if you fight with me is abuse and ridicule and smears. But, for the distant future, ladies and gentlemen, I can promise you, not only the eternal salvation of your soul (and that’s what I’m still interested in), not only the eternal salvation of your soul in the world to come, but also the everlasting gratitude of your children and your grandchildren and your great-grandchildren who will bless YOUR name in generations to come for having preserved for them the burning fire of the Faith of your Fathers – the Faith you were born in or the faith you selected yourself as an adult when you joined the true Church of Christ.
Ladies and gentlemen, you mothers and fathers in particular, you must now become another Mathathias. I refer here to the example of Mathathias, who defended the faith of his Fathers against the establishment of his days for the benefit of his children. And I’d like to read for you that beautiful, eternal play in three acts, taken from the first book of the Machabees:
Act I
“In those days arose Mathathias the son of John…and he had five sons…these saw the evils that were done in the people…and Mathathias said: Woe, woe is me, wherefore was I born to see the ruin of my people, and the ruin of the holy city, and to dwell there, when it is given into the hands of the enemies? The holy places have fallen into the hands of strangers: the temple has become as a man without honor…and the vessels of her glory have been carried away captive. All her ornaments are taken away…and behold our sanctuary, and our beauty, and our glory is laid waste. To what end then should we live any longer? And they that were sent from king Antiochus came thither, to compel them to depart from the law of their Fathers. And many of the people consented: but Mathathias and his sons stood firm. And they that were sent from Antiochus, said to Mathathias: Obey, as all the others are doing, and thou and thy sons shall be our friends, and you shall be enriched with gold and silver and many presents. But Mathathias answered, and said with a loud voice: even if the whole world would obey your orders, and every other man would depart from the law of his Fathers, I and my sons and my brethren will obey the law of our Fathers. So help us God, we will never abandon the law and the traditions of our Fathers.”
Act II
“And every man said to his neighbor: If we shall all do as our brethren have done, and not fight against those people: they will quickly root us out of the earth. And they determined in that day, saying: Whosoever shall come up against us to fight, we will fight back. Then was assembled to them the stoutest of the people [you – the Traditionalists] and all they that fled from the evils, joined themselves to them, and were a support to them. And Mathathias and his friends went around and they threw down the false altar tables: and they did violently. And the work prospered in their hands: and they recovered the law out of the hands of the sinners.”
Act III
“Now the days drew near that Mathathias should die, and he said to his sons: Now, my sons, be ye zealous for the law and give your lives for the traditions of your Fathers. Remember the works of your forefathers which they have done in their generations: and you, too, shall receive great glory, and an everlasting name. And he blessed them, and was joined to his forefathers…and he was buried by his sons and all the people mourned for him with great mourning.”
Ladies and gentlemen, the future of our Church, humanly speaking, now rests with us. The small, elite group of Traditionalist Catholic lay people, and a few priests and religious. The larger part of our bishops, priests and nuns have betrayed us. The big question today is: on what side is Pope Paul VI?
I refuse to believe that what is going on today has the approval of the Holy Father. I cannot believe it. The pope who blessed me, who crossed my hands, encouraged me to do what I am doing, the pope who agreed with every word I said to him – that pope couldn’t possibly be in his right mind now when he approves of artificial birth control or priests advocating the public breaking of their vows, of the eliminating of the Ten Commandments, of playing ball with atheists, communists, and what have you. This pope couldn’t possibly approve of new Greek theologians who deny the Divinity of Christ, who make fun of the Resurrection of Christ, who ridicule the Virginity of the Blessed Mother, who now produce a counterfeit Mass for the people. The Pope that I met couldn’t do this! And that’s why I just can’t speak against Pope Paul VI! I know that he has been a weak pope and God knows I told him so in my letter to him! But I can’t believe he is a bad pope – I just can’t! True, it’s possible. But I still hope that Paul VI, when he recovers – and I pray for that – when he recovers from his surgery, that he will turn out to be, if not a new St. Pius X, who condemned Modernism (and he, too, waited seven years before he condemned it), than I still hope that he will be a new Liberius – a pope who also was a weak Pope the first three to four years of his pontificate, but THEN joined what was left of the true Catholic Church. I still cannot believe that, 40 years from now, a new Ecumenical Council will condemn Pope Paul VI as the Ecumenical Council of Constantinople condemned Pope Honorius I, with these words:
“We anathematize Honorius, who did not attempt to sanctify his Apostolic Church with the teaching of Apostolic Tradition, but by profound treachery permitted the teachings of the Church to be polluted.”
That’s how one Pope was condemned forty years later. And in 683 – three years later – Saint Pope Leo II confirmed the condemnation of his predecessor Honorius by adding this explanation: “Honorius…” he didn’t even call him Pope. He said:
“Honorius did not extinguish the flame of heretical doctrine from the beginning, but rather fanned the flame by his negligence.”
Some people say that the same thing will happen to Pope Paul VI. I can believe it, ladies and gentlemen. I hope and pray that this is not true.
The latest information I got from Rome a week ago – this past week – was bad. I give it to you as I received it. The latest information I got was that Pope Paul VI will be resigning after he recuperates from his surgery, that he is throwing in the towel and inviting the cardinals to elect a new pope. This is not a rumor made-up by some ecclesiastic somewhere; this is information which I received from – to use the cliché – usually very reliable sources in the Vatican.
If that is true, where do we go from there, if that would be true right now for the next month, that the Holy Father would be powerless, physically and maybe even mentally? What have they done to him? I don’t know, but I for one, ladies and gentlemen, I just cannot condemn him. I can only pray for him as I said in my letter and beg him to be a Pope and let the enemies of the Church go outside. We can do better without them! At the same time, ladies and gentlemen, I know enough Theology and enough Canon Law and enough Church History to realize that tremendous possibility. But as it is now, my loyalty – and even more than that – my affection, because a priest can’t forget the honor received as I did from a Pope. He didn’t have to receive me personally before I came back here to fight for truth and tradition. He didn’t have to do it, and his advisors did everything they could to convince him he shouldn’t do it. If, for no other reason, you can forget the face-to-face encounter with the person I still respect and love as the Supreme Pontiff of our Church…I KNOW he has been a weak pope and I DETEST some of the things his advisors have made him do, and my letter to him makes that clear!
“But,” as I wrote to him, “we Traditionalist Catholics – we still have pent up in the reserve of our hearts enthusiastic loyalty, which we Traditionalist Catholics have exclusively set apart for our Supreme Pontiff. And we would like nothing better than to forget the past four years and shower our loyalty on a Paul VI turned into a new St. Pius X, who had the courage to face the reality of enemies within our own ranks, and the integrity to condemn them.”
At the moment, we are practically abandoned, ladies and gentlemen. Our Holy Father is suffering more than the newspapers tell you. Physically, he is worse off than the newspapers tell us. Mentally, he is suffering tremendously. And if I would tell you one cent of the information I have received from Rome, you would think that I was writing horror stories for Alfred Hitchcock.
Let us pray for the Church and also for the Holy Father, ladies and gentlemen. Right now we true Catholics, we are like children abandoned by our spiritually leaders. We can only now fight as I explained it to you and pray for the day, that our now suffering Supreme Pontiff, will open his arms again and put the tiara back on his head – not the bishop’s mitre – but the tiara and let us have the satisfaction of once again shouting to the whole world: “Thank God, we have a Pope again!”
And I hope and pray that it will be Paul VI turned into a new Pius X. I have seen him; I think it could be done, ladies and gentlemen. But if it doesn’t happen, then we will have temporarily to carry on for the pope, and against the bishops who have betrayed us.
Do not hesitate, ladies and gentlemen, to ask me right now how do I possibly justify such a position for myself and advice others to do likewise. I can see your eyes. That question is right there. “How can you justify what you have told us here?” The question is there and you have a perfect right, you have a duty to ask me: “How do you justify it?” Ladies and gentlemen, here is my answer: the position I have taken is justified on only one ground.
This one…. exactly 25 years ago, the evening before my ordination to the priesthood, I placed my hand on God’s holy Gospel. And standing before my God – my living God – the exposed Blessed Sacrament, with the nearby statue of His Immaculate Mother glancing down on me, I solemnly stated: “This Catholic Faith, which I now freely profess and to which I truly adhere, the same I promise vow and swear to maintain and profess with the help of God, entire, inviolate and with firm constancy until the last breath of life. And I shall strive with the best of my ability that this same faith shall be helped, taught and publicly professed by all those entrusted to me.”
This profession of faith, ladies and gentlemen, I promised, vowed, and swore as a young priest 25 years ago. That same profession of faith, I promised, vowed and swore when the Church in the academic world promoted me to Doctor of Canon Law. That same profession of faith, I promised, vowed and swore for 13 consecutive school years when the Church appointed me Professor of Theology and Canon Law to train its young priests. That same profession of faith, I promised, vowed and swore when the Church selected me to participate in its latest Ecumenical Council.
Ladies and gentlemen, what my Church made me promise, vow and swear yesterday, she cannot ask me to deny today. I promised, vowed and swore it yesterday, I promise, vow and swear it today, and tomorrow, and the day after tomorrow, and the last day I’ll be here.
I hope and pray that the Holy Father will give us the leadership soon where we will have no longer to make the choice between the establishment of the Conciliar Church and the true, real Catholic Church. But, forced to choose between the official Conciliar Church and the real Catholic Church, I have already made my decision, ladies and gentlemen.
Against the official Conciliar Church and for the official Catholic Church! And I have not the slightest doubt, before God and the world, that in making that decision, I simultaneously decided for Christ and against Anti-Christ – so help us God.
