The Distant Missions of the Society of St. Pius X

Father Laisney: My first reaction was one of complete surprise. Having seen many of my French brethren sent abroad I was trying to prepare myself for a possible appointment far away. But I couldn't imagine that I would be sent to Australia for the simple reason that, at the time, we did not yet have a house here.

The Australian faithful forced Monseigneur's hand by saying: "Australia has given many vocations to the Society; we are offering you a house, ready and waiting: give us priests!" Monseigneur couldn't refuse! And so the Society has followed the missionary tradition of France, Eldest Daughter of the Church. My second reaction was to open my English and geography textbooks once more!

Your geography textbooks . . . Did you not indeed feel homesick?

The first difference that I found was a different concept of distance. Australia is 4,025 kilometers from west to east, 3,220 kilometers from north to south, an area almost equal to that of the United States, but with only fifteen million inhabitants. Almost half the inhabitants live in the very extensive suburbs of Sydney and Melbourne. These geographical considerations have an effect on the ministry, for the faithful are sometimes very far from one another. Look at the map: Melbourne, Sydney and Brisbane seem close to one another; in fact, it is nearly 800 kilometers as the crow flies from Melbourne to Sydney, and as much again from Sydney to Brisbane; the same distance as from Paris to Nice.

Australia also has a different climate [from France]. The interior of the country is an immense desert. There was a great drought up to February 1982; cows and sheep which had died of thirst could be seen beside the Sydney and Melbourne railway line; many fires caused great damage. However, "The Lord covers the heavens with clouds, He prepares rain for the earth, He makes grass grow upon the hills" (Psalm 146), and now everything is green. May He deign to cause a shower of graces to descend upon souls!

Australia is also the land of kangaroos and of opals. There is an opal prospector who goes to Mass at Streaky Bay.

Australia is a new country. At the beginning it was peopled with English convicts. What is the situation now?

When the first colonists arrived, amongst them the Frenchman "La Perouse," there were a few aborigines, who now form only a very small part of the population. Not all the English convicts were common criminals. Amongst them were a good number of Irishmen, persecuted for their Faith. The first priest in Australia was an Irishman, transported for his Faith.

At the moment, the British are in the majority, but there are important Italian, Greek and Asian minorities, and a few Frenchmen, Spaniards, Dutch . . . The large number of Irish, with the Italians, allowed large scale development of the Church in Australia, whose greatest figure was His Excellency, Mgr. Mannix, Archbishop of Melbourne, from 1912 to 1963! Before the Council, Catholics formed about 40% of the population.

You said that the faithful asked Monseigneur for priests; what is the story of fidelity to Tradition in Australia?

From the introduction of the New Mass onwards a few priests refused to abandon the Mass of all time and assured the Traditional Mass to what was, at the beginning, a handful of faithful. The latter, however, organized quickly and well; so well that in 1973 they invited Monseigneur Lefebvre to come. Having exhorted the Australian faithful to fidelity by word and deed, he went to visit his sister, Mother Marie-Christiane who was at the time a Carmelite at Parkes (see map). He came back to Europe bringing with him the first Australian seminarian, Father Hogan, and the first sister of the Society, Sister Marie Michel, who came from Melbourne.

The faithful priests in Australia have sent many with vocations: five Australian seminarians, two New Zealanders, four sisters of the Society, a postulant, and a Carmelite.

One of the faithful priests, Father Cummins, worn out with illness, rediscovered excellent health despite his advanced age when he took to traveling to provide the Mass and the Sacraments for the faithful. He travels from Perth to New Zealand (that is more than 5,000 kilometers east to west), and from Melbourne to Townsville (or almost 3,000 kilometers north to south), visiting isolated families.

The faithful make great sacrifices to attend the Mass of all time: two of them went more than 1,500 kilometers, or two nights and a day in the train to be at Christmas Mass, and the same distance back! Others regularly go 200 kilometers there and back once a month to hear Holy Mass.

So this is why the faithful asked Monseigneur for priests so insistently!

Yes—in fact, Monseigneur did an exchange; he sent two young priests, but had Father Da Silva, a Dutch Marist who used to be at Domus Dei in Sydney, and who had been a professor almost all his life, come to Ecône; he continues to share his knowledge with the seminarians at Ecône, whom he even teaches Christmas carols in Hebrew! So in Australia and New Zealand there are eleven priests, most are old and only four of them travel to serve the faithful. There are also many friendly priests who will one day—let us hope and pray for this—return entirely to the traditional Mass.

How many centers do you serve?

There are twenty-two centers in Australia and seven in New Zealand; we alternate between 24 of them! Obviously, we cannot be everywhere on the same day so certain centers only have Holy Mass once a fortnight, others once a month, some every two months, yet others only during the week.

There the strength of the truly Christian family is seen. In many places it is through the family rosary, and family catechism that families keep the Faith. Would to God all French families were as those are. In New Zealand some of the faithful had set up a beautiful little chapel at Wanganui. Father Cummins who only goes to New Zealand every two months told them: "If you promise to come and adore the Holy Sacrament daily, I shall leave you the Most Holy Sacrament." They promised.

Then a family with six children came from Christ-church to Wanganui; that is more than 600 kilometers "to be near the Holy Sacrament." After three years this devotion had its reward, for a faithful priest, Father Smith, decided to leave a house of his order at Wangarei to be at the disposal of these faithful of Wanganui who now enjoy Holy Mass daily.

The centers certainly mean a lot of journeys. How do you travel?

For short distances (up to 20 kilometers) we go by car, for medium distances (250 to 600 kilometers) we go by train, further than that, by plane. It is cheaper by plane than by car from Sydney to Melbourne, and only a little dearer than by train, and it saves 22 hours on a return journey. Plane travel allows us to serve Sydney and Brisbane, 750 kilometers apart, on the morning and evening of the same Sunday.

You have said that many centers only see a priest at long intervals. What do you do to teach children the catechism?

We teach the catechism at Sydney, but everywhere else it is the parents who teach the catechism. We try to help them by means of correspondence courses; and when we visit them, we check the children's work. Parents who devote themselves to this task receive great graces for themselves and for their children.

A "catechism camp" has also been organized, bringing together 45 children with intensive teaching, Holy Mass daily, a beautiful candlelit procession of the Holy Sacrament in the evening . . . and games.

What is the situation in Australian schools?

It is the same as in France, although less "advanced"! There are drugs, immorality, courses which no longer teach anything, sex education . . . Parents are worried! If they live far enough from a large town they can use correspondence courses, a solution which many have adopted with success. The educational crisis has infected Catholic schools just as much as in France, and there is not a single traditional school.

Next school year we hope to open a traditional primary school in Sydney with Mr. Mark Hanney as headmaster. We shall have to open others later, for distance prevents many parents from sending their children; one would be necessary in each of the six states of Australia and one in New Zealand.

You said that four sisters of the Society come from Australia; will they be able to help you?

Australia had the honor of sending the first sister of the Society, but has not yet had the joy of benefiting from their presence. However, the generosity of the faithful causes us to hope that they will come soon. Then they will bring their prayers, their example, their help for the catechism and in the schools, in repairing altar cloths and sacred vestments, in decorating places of worship ...

What are your places of worship like?

In Melbourne we have a former Protestant church which we rent, and have transformed with good taste. In many places, families have set up permanent chapels in their homes, often very attractively . . . in other places, a hall is hired for the occasion and a portable "chapel kit" is brought. These chapel kits are very cleverly made; they fold up, complete with statues, tapestries behind the altar, paintings . . .

In the end, we acquired a former Methodist church at Sydney last August, through St. Joseph's intercession (this opportunity came to us on the very last day of St. Joseph's month), and by having recourse to the Infant Jesus of Prague. It is called "the Church of the Infant Jesus and St. Joseph." The first Mass was said on September 3 [1983], the feast of St. Pius X, on a temporary altar. The first Solemn High Mass was celebrated there on the Feast of Christ the King, with first Communions (it is near the end of the school year), a procession of the Holy Sacrament (because it is Springtime!), and sung Vespers. May the Infant Jesus deign to bless all those who pray in this church and may St. Joseph deign to protect them always!

Australia is not far from New Caledonia, a French territory. Have you gone there?

Providence knows how to bring good out of evil. In 1976, on the occasion of the ordinations and the Mass at Lille, the mass media spoke constantly of Monseigneur Lefebvre, criticizing him and trying to provoke a schism. But by means of this masonic press God caused new hope to be born, even in the New Caledonian brush, where the faithful said to themselves, "This bishop says the Old Mass. He must be a good bishop." So one of them wrote a letter addressed to "Msgr. Lefebvre, Econe, Switzerland." It arrived, and this was the beginning of an exchange of correspondence which led to my arrival on the soil of New Caledonia, on 5 May last, the feast of St. Pius V.

At the airport I was met by a magnificent Negro, Chief of a Canac tribe, the Gauiru. During a journey four hours long, by night, through the New Caledonian brush on the only road, and along dirt tracks he told me how his great-grandparents had had the habit of eating human flesh at festivals! . . . and how, from being a cannibal, his grandfather had become a catechist, converting all his tribe and some neighboring ones. He also described the situation of the Church over there to me: the reforms had wrought their devastation; altars destroyed, statues thrown out of churches; a remarkable plunge in the number of vocations and the practice of religion; priests involved in political "liberation" movements.

The priest at the Nindiah mission had threatened, on the bishop's behalf, to excommunicate everybody at my Masses, so that on the first day there were only three of the faithful; but a week later on the Feast of the Ascension there were more than forty adults and twenty children, some having come more than 130 kilometers. These faithful wanted to sing Gregorian chant; on Sunday they sang the Vidi aquam and the Common of the Mass, but this wasn't enough for them; on Ascension Day they sang the Proper of the Mass too, and this after more than a dozen years without Gregorian Chant!

The French missionaries had done their work well. These faithful still have a simple yet profound Faith, they know their catechism, but the younger generation knows nothing of it.

On the last two days I went to Noumea, the only "large" town (population 70,000). There were fifty people at Holy Mass, many good families. But these poor faithful are spiritually abandoned.

What conclusions can you draw on the apostolate in Oceania?

"The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few, pray therefore the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into His harvest" (Matt. IX 37-8).

I am sure that the Eldest Daughter of the Church which has already sent many missionaries to these distant lands will send others. Michael Delsorte from Australia and Frank Peek from New Zealand will be ordained on June 29 at Ecône.