Arbitrary Will, or Obedience to the First Commandment of God?

Fr. François Laisney

An article was printed in the Wanderer on January 25, 1990 entitled "Conscience or arbitrary will", comparing Archbishop Lefebvre and "Sister" Agnes Mansour. One can truly doubt that the writer of this article has taken the time to actually read any writings of Archbishop Lefebvre, e.g. They Have Uncrowned Him (available at The Angelus Press, P.O. Box 1387, Dickinson, TX 77539, for those who have the honesty to check before they write something!)

In this book, Archbishop Lefebvre clearly shows what the Church, the Catholic Church, not his own "arbitrary self will", has been teaching through the centuries, and especially in the past two hundred years about the modern ideas; then he shows how this teaching is being systematically undermined since the Second Vatican Council. He relies on facts which everyone can check.

In another book, more simple and understandable by every Catholic, Open Letter to Confused Catholics (also available at the Angelus Press), he reviews the very sufferings which Mr. Kendall undergoes, caused by all the systematic changes of every aspect of Catholic life after the Council: religious orders had to change their rule, the liturgy was changed, there is a "new order" for every Sacrament, there is a "new ecumenical bible", there is a new Canon Law, there is a new spirit, the "Spirit of the Council", there is a new catechism, there is a new morality, more convenient, without sacrifice!

Now the questions which EVERY GOOD CATHOLIC Bishop, Priest, and layman faces are these: Are they not changing our Holy religion? Is our Catholic Faith left intact by all these changes? Or are not these changes a clear rapprochement towards the Protestants, and other non-Catholics? Just last December, the Pope declared that now, collaboration with Communism is possible. Is that in continuity with Pope Pius XI's clear warning that no collaboration whatsoever is possible with Communism, which is intrinsically evil? Who says the Truth?

Now the first thing Our Lord Jesus Christ requires from those who want to be saved is FAITH. The supreme law of the Church, and supreme duty of all Catholics, faithful, priests, bishops and Pope, is to keep the Faith in its integrity and purity. This is not "arbitrary will" but rather the Law of Jesus Christ Himself, it is the First Commandment of God!

Faith is not just anyone's belief; it is the full adhesion of the intelligence to the objective truth, revealed by God, by Our Lord Jesus Christ. The Object of the Faith, "Deposit of Faith", is UNCHANGEABLE, it is the "First Truth" (St. Thomas), the "Eternal Truth". Faith is thus a beginning of eternity!

Every Catholic not only may, but must keep the Faith, he must protect himself against anything that attacks and diminishes his Faith; in doing so, he does not follow his "arbitrary will", he follows the First Commandment, which includes the duty to keep the Faith.

Now by their fruit you shall know them: any honest observer of the fruit of the reforms of the Second Vatican Council, in the seminaries, in the parishes, in the religious vocations, in the morals of the "common" Catholics can see that these are bitter fruit. How many have abandoned the Church after Vatican II, distressed by all these changes, and looking for certitudes among Fundamentalists (which unfortunately cannot be found except in the true Doctrine of the Catholic Church), or giving up totally everything?

The disrespectful "cacophonous music", "the priest's constant improvisations and attempts at wit throughout the Mass," "the preaching that at least borders on heresy", plus Communion in the hands, putting the Blessed Sacrament aside, the horizontal instead of vertical dimension of the Mass, the hiding of the sacrificial character of the Mass, all these things act like drops of poison on the soul: little by little it undermines the Faith, until the day when you realize that your children have lost the Faith, and that yours is made blunt and dull by all these offenses against it.

Now it is not necessary that a Mass be invalid in order that one should avoid it: if it is a danger for the Faith, diminishing it, threatening it, it is sufficient reason not to attend it. Isn't sanctification of Sunday the very purpose of the law to go to Mass on Sunday? If a Mass does not help you to sanctify the Sunday, if on the contrary it is an occasion of scandal for your Faith, and that of your children, then it does not fulfil its purpose. One has the duty to avoid not only invalid Masses, but also Masses which may be forbidden for other reasons (e.g. schismatic Masses, scandalous Masses, etc...). In the middle ages, if I remember, there was a period when the Church was plagued by priests who had concubines in the rectory: in some places, the Church had forbidden the faithful to attend the Masses they were saying, though they were saying the Traditional Mass!

Often, one can keep the Faith and sanctify the Sunday better, travelling long distances to attend the Traditional Mass whenever possible, and on the other Sundays praying at home as the faithful were doing in the missions during the absence of the missionary: they kept the Faith better than many Catholics today with the Novus Ordo! This is not due to private conscience, it is rather due to the objective destructive situation brought in by all the modernist reforms in the Church!

You might say: but the faithful could attend and a priest could offer the Traditional Mass "in obedience" with the Indult.

First, any objective observer can see that the "Indult" would never have been granted, would there not have been many priests and faithful who remained faithful to the Mass of all times, to the Mass of their ordination, to the Traditional Mass IN SPITE OF THE PERSECUTION AND THE APPEARANCE OF ILLEGALITY in which they were operating.

Moreover, at the beginning these priests and the Bishop were working in perfect legality; they were properly appointed parish priests, the Seminary of Econe had been properly canonically approved. But pressures were put upon them to stop offering the Traditional Mass, to stop training priests with the Traditional training the Church had always given in seminaries. Archbishop Lefebvre has been teaching nothing new, but the pure unchangeable Doctrine of the Catholic Church.

Now I return your question: since he and many other good priests in similar situations, were operating in perfect conformity with the Law of the Church, and were doing what the Church herself, the Popes, asked for centuries from Bishops and priests, why were they asked to stop? Why was he asked in 1975 to close his seminary? Was it because the Church does not need good priests? No valid reason has EVER been given. He made two appeals to Rome which were not even heard!

What to do in such a situation? Would you stop doing good because you are commanded so? If every one around you was doing good, then you would legitimately let them do the good needed, and you would suffer the injustice. But when every one around is promoting modernism, is letting scandals enter (e.g.Communion in the hands), giving in without standing for the Faith, then it seems clear that, not for private conscience, but for the common good of the faithful, according to this great Commandment of Charity which commands us to come to the help of those in need, according to that First Commandment of the Law of God which commands us to keep the Faith AND PROFESS IT WHEN IT IS ATTACKED, he was right to continue his work for formation of priests!

There are things that must be endured patiently, there are other things for which we MUST stand up! Faith, the true Faith, the Catholic Faith is certainly among these great goods for which we must stand up, even at the price of our reputation, even at the price of persecution, even at the price of our blood! Are we not the children of the Martyrs?

When the Faith is attacked from outside the Church, there is no conflict between the duty to defend Faith and obedience to the Church, though there can be a conflict between the Faith and obedience to the emperor, to the King, which was most frequent in times of persecution! Then the Martyrs said with St. Peter: "We ought to obey God rather than men!" But when the Faith is attacked from within the Church by heretics, then we must never forget that there is no true obedience that can justify to accept something which endangers our Faith.

To stand up for the Catholic Faith of all times is not to follow "arbitrary will", it is to OBEY the First Commandment, even if one has to stand up against Church authority.

The First Commandment does not only oblige us to keep the Faith for our own self, hidden in our heart, it also commands us to PROFESS THE FAITH, to promote it, to spread it: "Neither do men light a candle and put it under a bushel, but upon a candlestick, that it may shine to all that are in the house. So let your light shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father who is in Heaven." (Mt. 5: 15-16); "Having the same spirit of faith, as it is written: I believed, for which cause I have spoken; we also believe, for which cause we speak also!" (II Cor. 4:13).

It is in order to continue promoting the Faith that these good priests and Archbishop Lefebvre have accepted to offer the Mass in public, and to consecrate Bishops in spite of an apparent disobedience: to continue the work of training and furnishing the Church with good priests, which work is most necessary in our times. Just pay a visit to a modern seminary, and you will immediately understand the need for traditional seminaries. A retired American bishop who knew quite well the situation in the American Seminaries said one day, in my presence, to Archbishop Lefebvre that the only good seminary he knew in America was St. Thomas Aquinas Seminary, of the Society of St. Pius X! This Bishop wrote to the Pope in June 1988, interceding for Archbishop Lefebvre.

Just tell me which Bishop do you know who has opened six seminaries in the past twenty years?

Should all these good fruits be cut off by lack of ordinations? No! They must continue, and they will provide the Pope in the years to come with the priests on whom he will be able to count the best.

Indeed the Archbishop has never tried in any way to set up his own "sect". The magazine 30 Days stated that "the Lefebvrites are interested in the (National Chinese) Church because the Patriotic Catholics linked to Peking still celebrate the Mass of the Latin Rite and reject the primacy of the Pope." This is pure calumny and thus grievously sinful. Archbishop Lefebvre has had to suffer greatly, in America in particular, because of his firmness in recognizing the pope in front of some independent-minded priests who tended towards sedevacantism. The Vatican knows that; they have never put in doubt his devotion towards the Roman Catholic Church and the successor of Peter! But as St. Paul stood up in front of Peter when there was a danger for the Faith (Gal. 2: 11-21); IIae q.33 a.4 ad 2m: "One must know, however, that when there would be a peril for the Faith, the prelates should be corrected by their subjects even publicly"), so does Archbishop Lefebvre in our times; not with a spirit of rebellion, but rather out of love for the Church and in order to obey the First Commandment of God, to keep the true Faith, which is the unchangeable Catholic Faith!

May Our Lady, Guardian of the Faith, protect our Catholic Faith always!