AURIESVILLE SERMON
Obviously, we cannot define ourselves as against the Second Vatican Council. In fact, we have no need to define ourselves. It is sufficient for us to be Catholics, Catholics whose ideal is to fight as soldiers of Christ to bring about His kingdom, and especially His social kingdom on earth. But a soldier can only fight effectively if he is armed and trained to fight, if he has received an adequate formation so that he knows his enemy. That is the reason why it is important to meditate on this fateful Council. It is not our intention to launch now into deep study of the Council. We simply want to be on our guard against the danger of getting used to the current situation in the Church. We want to show what our reaction ought to be in the face of this disaster, which Archbishop Lefebvre called "the Third World War."
We must not fear to say it: the present situation is a revolution. During the Council, commandos took over the command posts in the Church and worked for her destruction from within. Until now, the Church had to fend off assaults coming from the outside, and the attackers never succeeded. But then Satan changed his strategy and attacked Holy Mother Church from within. He infiltrated his henchmen there, spreading error in seminaries so that the young clergy would be tainted by it without even knowing it.
The danger for us would be to forget this and think that the present situation is only a simple crisis that will pass away by itself. Let us not be deceived: the enemies of the Church have sworn her destruction and that of our souls. They will agree to some compromises and some concessions, hoping that we will take the bait, but they will never agree to give up their goal: the complete destruction of Holy Mother Church.
They already have cried victory. They are mistaken. Their battle is lost in advance and their momentary triumph resembles that of the enemies of Christ on Good Friday. Let's not fool ourselves: error will not win. Christ permits this success as a chastisement to purify his church and to bring her to His side on the cross. We must look beyond external appearances, and find within our souls the peaceful certainty that God permits the present humiliation of His Church in order to assimilate her more completely to His Son. He will share with her the triumph of His resurrection. We must wait for that hour, but remaining always vigilant, as the temptation to seek peace by compromising will be great.
We must also be attentive to see that the error of liberalism, that error which surrounds us and the poisons of which we drink daily, though unwittingly, does not surreptitiously enter into our souls. Let us remember that of which St. Augustine warned us: By seeing everything, we end by enduring everything, and by enduring everything, we are ready to accept anything. That is to say, that what at the beginning justly scandalizes us, little by little becomes so habitual that we take part in it, and thus, unconsciously, we drink the poison. If we are not on our guard, we will be so filled up with this mortal error of liberalism that, in turn, we will also fall and contribute to the destruction of the Church.
This is the time to be on our guard. We must pray and be formed at the source of the true doctrine, so as that error will not contaminate us. After 40 years of seeing the application of the decrees of the Council, we can follow the advice of our Lord and judge the tree by its fruits. Certain advocates of the Council challenge this evangelical judgment and try to separate the Council from its aftermath. But it is not so. The reforms that followed are, in fact, the natural issue of the Council. Without the Council, these disastrous reforms would never have seen the light of day.
The most reprehensible consequence of the Council has been the destruction of the sense of the sacred. We see that very clearly in the systematic destruction of the theological virtues of faith, hope, and charity. By faith, by the knowledge we have of Him, we adhere to God directly and enter into His intimacy. By hope we raise our hearts above all created things and soar towards God, to adore Him as our Creator and Redeemer, and, with a holy impatience, long to possess Him in eternity. By charity, we love God through our Lord Jesus Christ as He loves Himself. Faith, hope, and charity establish us in God, and through these virtues we live in His holy presence. These virtues find their most beautiful expression in the liturgy when the priest offers the holy Mass and we unite ourselves to him, giving God the homage that is due.
Today, the new liturgy shows, sadly but clearly, that the virtues of faith, hope, and charity are no longer the holy way towards God. There is no transcendence, and it is not unusual to hear, in one way or another, that strange profession of faith of Pope Paul VI: "We have, more than any other, the cult of man" [Closing Speech, Fourth Session of the Second Vatican Council, Dec. 7, 1965–Ed.]. Does this mean that faith, hope, and charity are now the expression of the faith of man, of hope placed in him and of charity reduced to only a vague philanthropy? It is impossible to think otherwise when we see that the New Theology teaches that all men are to be saved, and yearns for a golden age on earth where we will be united to everyone, beyond our differences, into a universal brotherhood.
Such ideas are a profanation of the theological virtues: faith in man, who will save himself as man because he is mysteriously united to Christ by his human nature; hope of a universal peace when men will finally recognize the inestimable value of their humanity, which enables them to live in mutual respect of their irreconcilable differences, a mutual respect that they dare to call charity; in a word, faith in man, hope in man, love of man–omnipresent man–who thus has become the center of a new worship! We are confronted with a profanation of the mystery of the Incarnation, which has become no more the revelation of the love of God for man, but instead the revelation of the intrinsic value of man himself. There is no longer anything sacred but man!
What more can we say about this delirium? May God have pity on us. The children of God ask for the bread of doctrine, but they have received only stones for food! How shall we react in face of this "destruction of the sacred place," as Pope Pius XII said? Above all, we must not react in a human way, because acting in this manner will expose us to great dangers. We might be even tempted to abandon the struggle, because humanly speaking no solution seems possible....A natural weariness can lead us to excessive and dangerous decisions.
Our reaction ought to be a reaction prompted by faith, and only by faith. We must not reduce the mystery of the passion of the Church to an intellectual problem, or worse, to a sentimental one. It is not for us to understand this mystery of the identification of the Church with Christ crucified, but to acknowledge that it is a providential design of God and then adore Him.
We must follow the advice of St. Vincent of Lerins and hold fast to what the Church has always and everywhere taught. That is to say, that our attachment to tradition is not a question of custom or preference, but a question of faith and of fidelity to this faith. This is also why we cannot sign some practical agreement with "neo-modernist Rome," because we would be drawn down a slippery slope of compromise and would slowly but surely lose the faith.
If our reaction is truly prompted by faith, we will desire to offer reparation. In ascending to heaven, our Lord imposed on us the duty of making reparation for the insults against Him and His holy mother. Is not the destruction of the faith in the very heart of the Church an insult against Christ, who left us, as our inheritance, the deposit of faith to transmit it unchanged? This loss of faith, apart from being most insulting to Christ, is the source of the eternal loss of innumerable souls.
Our duty is clear. We cannot let the insult pass without desiring to make reparation for it. Our reparation consists in living in a way that renders homage to God, and not in enjoying the sinful pleasures that the world proposes. We will make reparation by loyally fulfilling the duties of our state in life. This fidelity to duty rests on two pillars: prayer and mortification. A soul that desires to offer reparation is essentially a soul of prayer and sacrifice.
Our prayer must be, above all, the offering of the most precious Blood of Christ to His Father during the Mass, of course, but also during the day, uniting ourselves in spirit to the Masses being celebrated throughout the world; and reciting our rosary, through which we are united to our Lady and to her prayer of intercession. They must be prayers that go forth before the throne of God to implore the grace of obtaining numerous priestly and religious vocations, so that the glory of God may be manifested and that souls will not be abandoned, but receive the graces they need; prayers that simply ask pardon for all those who have introduced novelties in the Church, prayers that repeat for them the words of our crucified Lord: "Father, forgive them, they know not what they do," prayers for those who follow these mercenaries and are lost.
Prayer certainly, but mortification is also needed to raise ourselves above vain and worldly concerns, and to sustain our prayer with the divine nourishment of sacrifice. Mortification consists mainly in doing faithfully our duty and offering it to God. We want to stress that an important aspect of this duty of state is to take great care to raise our children in a true Christian spirit. That is, not only helping them to put distance from the temptations of the world, but also preparing their souls to fight against these temptations, which will always arise. Do not hesitate, Christian parents, to undertake all the sacrifices required to raise your children. Their souls have been entrusted to you; they have cost Christ His most precious Blood. Do not let that blood go to waste. To educate a child is to accept the sacrifice.
Faced with the disaster of the Second Vatican Council, we must respond to the call of Archbishop Lefebvre, a call to a crusade of parents, so that our families might be truly blazing hearths of the love of our Lord, gathered around the priest and preparing in their bosom the vocations of tomorrow.
Our times are critical. The Immaculate Spouse of Christ, our Holy Mother the Church, agonizes, insulted and mocked. Her children no longer know what it is to be Christians or no longer dare to affirm it loudly and forcefully. Vocations are diminishing, and we fear that tomorrow, deprived of pastors, men will fall into idolatry, as a great number of them already have, alas! The Second Vatican Council promised us a new springtime in the Church, but has left behind it only the rubble piling up.
Our times are critical. It is not, however, a time for despair. It is the hour of the cross. It is also, mysteriously, the hour of victory. It is the time when we need to go to Mary, who stood strong in her unwavering faith, praying and uniting her sorrows to the sorrows of her Son. She is our mother and she will protect us, so that we will keep the faith thanks to prayer and mortification.
Our Lady has vanquished all heresies. She will overcome modernism; she has promised so at Fatima, affirming that in the end her Immaculate Heart shall triumph. Victory belongs to us; we have the certainty of it. It suffices for us to be her children, to enter joyously in the school of our Lady and to pray and do penance as she has so often asked. Do not doubt the power of prayer, because as our Lady specifically said at Pontmain: "Pray, my children, as my Son allows Himself to be touched by your prayers."
And if our Lord hears us, who will succeed against us? Let us pray. We are the youth of God, full of faith, the faith of our baptism, that of our Mother, the Holy Church; the faith that cannot change in any way, the faith that vanquishes the world, the faith through which we are ready to live and die, in order to defend the honor of God and thus make reparation for the offenses done to Him.
Fr. Yves le Roux was ordained for the Society of Saint Pius X in 1990 and is currently Rector of St. Thomas Aquinas Seminary in Winona, Minnesota. This sermon was given at the 2005 Auriesville Pilgrimage.
Current Issue
