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Father Laisney's Letters 30th
November 2005 In the month of the Holy Rosary, three major events for our parish in Wanganui have given great joy to all of us. First there was Our Lady’s victory over abortion on October 7th, obtaining a vote of 9 against the introduction of abortion “services” at Wanganui Hospital versus 2 for it. This was a marvellous answer to the prayers and efforts, which I described in my last letter. The very postponing of the decision from 23rd September to 7th October was a good sign of Divine Providence. Learning it, we decided to storm Heaven with a final novena to Our Lady and St. Michael and we recited Our Lady’s litanies and the chaplet of St. Michael from St. Michael’s feast to the very morning of Our Lady’s feast. On that day, after the Mass and last novena prayers, twenty of us went to the hospital for the Board’s meeting, and silently sat in the back of the room, quietly praying their Rosary. As the Scripture says, “the heart of the king is in the hand of the Lord: whithersoever He will, He shall turn it” (Prov. 21:1). So also is the heart of the Board members! What we did appear so little in from of the Goliath of the establishment, but it was the “pebble” in David’s sling, which was directed by Our Lady. October 7th was formerly known as the feast of “Our Lady of Victories”, later renamed “Our Lady of the Rosary”. This is further an encouragement to have confidence in the power of prayer, especially through the intercession of Our Lady. The holy Curé of Ars used to say: “I know someone more powerful than God: the man who prays!” Sometimes God answers promptly, other times He answers in His own time, but never He leaves good prayers without reward. Some special thanks go to the Raaymakers for their tireless efforts, and to John-Paul and Rebecca Borberg for their leadership of the youth, and to all who joined in the prayers. The second event was the veneration of the relics of St. Thérèse of the Child Jesus. When we heard of the tour of these relics and of their stop over in Wanganui, I went to the local parish priest and asked whether he would allow us to have some time for our parish to venerate St. Thérèse. He kindly offered two hours for us. Fr. Bergez prepared very well the meditations and the singing. We processed in, the children having lilies to offer to St. Thérèse, we incensed her relics and we prayed devoutly. She most certainly has obtained and will continue to obtain many graces to our whole community. The very moment after her veneration, we were welcome to a cup of tea offered by the Maoris in the church hall, and invited them in return on All Souls day at St. Anthony’s for a solemn high Mass, with traditional Maori Catholic songs and a hangi afterwards. This was the occasion for them to find back the Mass of their youth; it was a day of graces for all. Some said: “Father, I do not say good-bye; I’ll be back!” The third event was the tour of exposition of the full-size replica of the Holy Shroud. It went quite well, with many graces everywhere. There were up to 270 people at the Wanganui Function centre (about half of our faithful and half visitors), and about 90 people in Christchurch, the Rose Historic Chapel being really full, with several people standing in the side aisles. There were quite a few letters to the editor in Wanganui following the exposition, which were an occasion to answer and perhaps reach out to some soul of good will. Let us pray for lasting fruits from these occasions of graces. In order to draw such lasting fruits, we are going to establish a Confraternity of the Blessed Sacrament, with a view to increase adoration of the Blessed Sacrament in Wanganui. Up to now, we had one holy hour per week; it will be replaced by a whole day of adoration per week, and perhaps in the future by more. Adoration of Our Lord Jesus Christ in the Blessed Sacrament is a beginning of the heavenly Life, the only difference being that it is now under the veil of Faith, and then it will be face to face. But it is the same Lord, who is the beatitude of the Saints, who fills with His grace and love the soul of those who come to Him in the Blessed Sacrament. Yesterday we celebrated the 100th anniversary of the birth of Archbishop Lefebvre, with a solemn high Mass in honour of Christ the High Priest, followed by a pot-luck dinner and some personal souvenirs of him. Having known him for fifteen years from 1976 to 1991, and having travelled for a full month with him for the confirmations in USA in 1985, I had the grace of knowing him quite well. The first thing that struck me was his meekness and humility. He was a true man of Faith, whose whole life was built on this immovable rock. He kept the Faith, he lived it, he defended it, he taught it, and he passed it on to the next generation. He had requested that these words of St. Paul be engraved on his tomb: “I have delivered that which I have received.” In the enclosed letter Bishop Fellay gives us a beautiful text of the Archbishop. Father Couture, our district superior, is coming next week, for the feast of the Immaculate Conception, which will also be the prize-giving day of St. Dominic’s College. He will officially establish the Confraternity of the Blessed Sacrament. He will renew the consecration of the District to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, using the prayer used by Fr. Schmidberger on 8th December 1984 for the consecration of the Society of St. Pius X to the Immaculate Heart. We are quite blessed to have him with us for this occasion. Father Baudot, the bursar general, is also paying us a visit next week, to inspect our finances and see the prospects for New Caledonia. Then Father Albert, O.P., is coming to preach the annual retreat of our Sisters and to prepare our postulant to her taking the veil on 22nd December. He will be here until after Christmas. Then we will have two Eucharistic Crusade camps, one for boys from January 2nd to 6th, and one for girls from January 9th to 13th. Father Cranshaw will be chaplain for both. These camps are particularly good for families that live far from the priory, and whose children are often isolated, without many friends who share the same Catholic Faith and love of Tradition. Then we have two Ignatian retreats, one for men from Monday 16th to Saturday 21st January preached by Fr. Bergez and myself, and one for women from Monday 23rd to Saturday 28th January preached by Fr. Bergez and Fr. Cranshaw. These are important opportunities to heal souls from the wounds of sins and build up strong convictions and virtues; these are times of graces and of advancement in the spiritual life. You are all warmly encouraged to come. Then the new school year will start again. We need more classrooms, and thus our building program will start sometimes in January. May I appeal to your generosity to help us build these classrooms for our growing school? A true Catholic education is of paramount importance for the future of the Church and of our country. It is not easy, and this my first year as a priest in a school, has been quite difficult; I have learnt a lot, and came short in many ways of what I should have done. By the grace of God next year should be better. Our Dominican Sisters and our experienced teachers are an invaluable help for our school. Please do help us, according to the blessings you have received from God. We do advise families with school age children to come to Wanganui for their children’s sake. This time of Advent is a preparation to celebrate the wonderful Birth of our Divine Saviour into this world at Christmas. He became man to save men; He became a little Child to save children. He became not only a model for all to imitate, but also the very cause of our salvation by His merits and His inner action within our soul. The whole Christian life consists in a complete gift of self to Him, so that He may become all in us, and that we be able to say with St. Paul: “I live, now not I: but Christ liveth in me” (Gal. 2:20). How to achieve this? St. Bernard gives a very simple answer: [the good use of freedom is] “always to say Yes to God;” in other words, to imitate our Blessed Mother, in her “Fiat.” The problem with us is often that we put a limit to this “yes”; our surrender to Our Lord is not complete; we are not willing to renounce ourselves. Yet the “fiat” of Mary was continued all throughout her life, and led her to say with her Son during His Passion: “not my will, but Thine be done” even as far as the Crucifixion. So let this time of Christmas be truly a time of grace, not worldliness, a time when we make the Child Jesus truly the King of our life, of our families, of our whole parish, of our whole country. Yours sincerely
in Jesus and Mary,
My dear Brethren, Much has happened since my last letter. Pope John Paul II passed away. May he rest in peace! He left his successor with a catastrophic situation of the Church and much to be corrected. Pope Benedict XVI has been elected. Bishop Fellay said that this brought a little hope. Indeed Cardinal Ratzinger was the figurehead of the conservatives at the conclave. That he has been elected so quickly shows that the conservatives have a large majority among the Cardinals. Moreover the choice of the name shows an intention no longer to continue as the previous two popes, but rather to rely more on prayer, St. Benedict being the model of monastic life. Several times now he has manifested his intention to correct abuses. Let us pray that, by the grace of God, he succeeds. As Archbishop Lefebvre had done with the previous Pope, Bishop Fellay asked for an interview and was received on 29th August, one week after the Society’s pilgrimage of reparation to Fatima. Bishop Fellay released the following statement after this meeting:
Because of the persecution against the Traditional Mass and against fidelity to the unchangeable Catholic Faith, Archbishop Lefebvre and the Society of St. Pius X found themselves the object of canonical sanctions, first the suspense a divinis for the ordinations in 1976 and later the excommunication for the episcopal consecrations in 1988. Our position has always been that these sanctions, being motivated by this persecution, were unjust and null in the eyes of God. Thus we find ourselves today in a canonically irregular situation, though not of our fault. We are willing to work for a regularisation, but not at the expense of compromising our defence of the Traditional Mass and of Catholic doctrine. In a certain way, the marginalisation caused by these sanctions protected us from the contagion of the modern errors. Moreover, there are many more things to be corrected in the Church today, other than our canonical situation, and these other things are much more important: the doctrinal situation in the modern seminaries is particularly grievous, being at the root of the moral situation in the clergy. Only a return to Tradition can restore the situation. So we stand fast in our fidelity to Tradition, this is the best service to the Church and to the souls we can give them. We cannot really love Our Lord Jesus Christ without loving the Catholic Church, which is His Mystical Body, His Bride, the great love of His Sacred Heart. Therefore we must grieve to see the current crisis, with so many who have lost the Faith, and so many who have lost the practice of the Faith. Our sorrow must not be sterile, it must lead us to prayer, sacrifice and action: this is why we are rebuilding, in a small way, especially by our schools. One important action was the pilgrimage to Fatima organised by the Society of St. Pius X in reparation for the great sin of idolatry committed there by some Hindus with the approval of the authorities of the sanctuary, who are even building an ecumenical centre right there, near the very place where Our Lady appeared to ask for conversion! This pilgrimage took place on the very feast of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, just the week before the meeting between Pope Benedict XVI and Bishop Fellay. Our four bishops consecrated Russia to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. There were around 2000 faithful from all over the world, including some from New Zealand. Another important action, which our parish has been leading for the past few months, has been to resist, with all legitimate means possible, the bringing of abortions in Wanganui. Currently the Health Board sends to Wellington those who want to abort their babies; but recently they have decided to bring this epitome of the world’s immorality into Wanganui. Through picketing in front of the hospital, saying publicly the whole Rosary (15 decades) each Saturday, through a Pro-Life march, Pro-Life T-shirts, through many written and oral submissions, and much prayer, we have tried to stop it. This spiritual battle is not finished, and the support of the prayers of all our faithful throughout New Zealand is very much needed. Another action will be the showing of the full-size replica of the Holy Shroud, more than 14 feet long, together with the full-size negative of the front image and the full-size negative of the back image. I have already shown it both in France and in the USA during my tour after Easter. As I explained in my previous letter, the purpose of this tour was the support of our mission in New Caledonia. It is time to show it here at home! On the feast of Our Lady of Mount Carmel we had the exposition in Wanganui, just for the faithful, to prepare for the greater exposition in October. At first we had hoped that Gerry Matatics could come, but he did not respond to our communications, so I will be obliged to give the conference myself. However the most important is not what you hear but what you see: the negative pictures especially are like a photograph of Our Lord Jesus Christ Himself. Of ancient rulers we have statues made during their life, but no photographs. Of Our Lord Jesus Christ we do not have statues nor pictures made during His life on earth, but He Himself provided something for us that approaches the perfection of a photograph… to be revealed 1900 years after! This exposition is a great occasion for each one of you to bring all your friends, relatives, neighbours. If you have some children or friends who have strayed from the Faith, this is a unique occasion to try to touch their souls and bring them back: invite them to come, urge them to come and see for themselves. The image left on the Holy Shroud by Divine Providence is really the most beautiful and venerable icon of Our Lord Jesus Christ in the whole world; the actual original of the Shroud has still today some of the Precious Blood of Our Lord. It is the most expressive commentary, nay testimony on the Passion and Resurrection of Our Lord. If some faithful want to organise an exposition of this replica in other cities not on the list at the back of this letter, it may be organized for sometime next year. Simply contact me. At the same time, the relics of St. Thérèse of the Child Jesus will pass through most of New Zealand: this is an occasion to venerate the Patroness of the missions, the greatest Saint of modern times as Pope Pius XI called her. The whole St Anthony’s parish has been allocated two full hours to venerate her at Wanganui. Deo gratias! She gave her life in particular to pray for priests: thus do pray through her for many holy priestly vocations. In December Michael Lavin, from Wanganui, who was ordained subdeacon in April, will be ordained Deacon at Holy Cross seminary in Goulburn. Pray for him, and also that many other vocations may follow him. Next January, two Ignatian retreats will be preached, one for men from Monday 16th at 10:00am to Saturday 21st at 2:00pm, and one for women from Monday 23rd at 10:00am to Saturday 28th at 2:00pm. Both will be preached at Jerusalem, in the old convent of the sisters of Compassion, the very one founded by Mother Mary Joseph Aubert. Do mark the days and come, there is only limited capacity. The first will be preached by Fr. Bergez and myself and the second by Frs. Bergez and Cranshaw. These retreats are most useful to strengthen in the Faith and grow in fervour; they are powerful to help overcome the laxity of the world, to whose influence we too often succumb. Since the feast of the Assumption our priory in Wanganui has been attached to the District of Asia and no longer to the District of Australia. Your priests are now dependent on Father Daniel Couture instead of Father Black, but it makes no difference for the faithful. For those who do not know Father Couture, he is a real missionary priest, with the largest district in the SSPX, surface-wise, not number-wise. He is quite a good superior and we might have the joy of his visit from Singapore sometime in the future. The elections are coming up, and they will have consequences for our school, and for our country. In the USA and Australia and other countries, Pro Life issues have had more and more importance in elections, and this is right. Not only should Catholic politicians promote laws which are in accordance to Catholic teachings, in particular in the defence of life, but also Catholic citizens should not give their support to politicians who explicitly promote an agenda opposed to the Laws of God and to the most basic rights of men, such as the right to life. In 1975 when the abortion laws were introduced in France, Archbishop Lefebvre stood up and took a public stand against these laws, which are rather “perversions of the law” according to St. Thomas Aquinas. We are distributing to all the parents in Wanganui an information sheet, published by the Independent Schools of New Zealand, that contain the policies of all the parties concerning schools. If any faithful want to read it, they may ask Mrs. Olsen at the school office for a copy. One should read in between the lines of what these policies say. For this, it is useful to keep in mind some facts. Public education is not free: it costs a lot of taxes on the taxpayer. Each child in a public school costs between $5000 and $7000 to the country per year, which is paid by your taxes. It is not just that the country pumps taxes on citizens for the education of the children, and then refuses to support the schools where their children are educated. Our school does not even receive a quarter of this amount, and some parties want even to decrease this. The subsidies that are given to independent schools are in fact due, since the parents (and other members of the school community) have paid their taxes. Public education is not achieving the quality level that many parents rightly expect, which is the reason why there is a trend of increased enrolment in independent schools. As an average, the quality education is much higher in independent schools than in public schools. Here at St. Anthony’s and St. Dominic’s, we prepare the children for the Cambridge exams, precisely because they offer a much better level than the national exams, and are easily accepted by NZ universities. For more than 200 years, the freemasons have waged a war against Catholic education. They want a God-less education, promoting their liberal morals, which are rather immoral. In order to protect Catholic independent schools, Saints such as Mother Mary of the Cross McKillop have preferred to suffer (even excommunication by her Bishop of Adelaide) rather than go along with these Masonic schemes. With the same spirit of Faith, we want to provide a truly Catholic education to our children, independent from the secular God-less philosophy. As Catholic citizens of New Zealand, you have the responsibility of supporting good Catholic schools; remember that the choices you make in an election do have important consequences for your schools. The Fathers, Sisters, teachers and parents are grateful for all those who generously answered my Lenten appeal, which has allowed us to continue until now. Next year, we really need some more classrooms for the high school. Currently we only have two rooms for three forms for the boys, and the same for the girls. Next year we will have one more class for each. Therefore we must build in the coming months. Now this is going to cost quite some money. We do have a part of it, thanks to the sale of the house of the late Fr. Lorrigan of Napier. But this will not cover all. Thus I come again to you and ask for your generosity. May St. Pius X reward you abundantly. Since my next letter will most probably be after the end of October, I enclose the November list, to be returned and placed on the altar here all through the month of the Holy Souls. Yours sincerely
in Jesus and Mary, March 2005 Dear Friends and Benefactors, Last December, when Father Black told me he would send me to New Zealand, it was not to an unknown land that he was sending me: I will never forget my first visit around Easter 1983, close to 22 years ago, when as a young priest. I followed in the steps of Father Cummins, from Auckland, through Hamilton, Wanganui, Wellington, Christchurch, and even Timaru and Temuka; three times did I do this circuit before being sent to the USA in 1984. I offered the first Mass in the present chapel in Tawa. Later under Father Gentili’s rule, I came three times and went also to Blenheim, Napier, Fielding, Dunedin and Invercargill. So it was a great joy to find again the workers of the first hour, and their children who had grown up, together with many new faces and young families. The growth is very manifest, especially in Wanganui that has drawn many faithful from the other chapels and missions. Looking the information for the diocese of Palmerston North, I noticed that from 1990 to 2002 they went from 115 priests to 63, which is half less priests in 12 years; during the same time, the Society of St. Pius X went from around 220 to more than 440 priests, the double. By their fruit you shall know them. Yet our three priests here are but very few for the many needs of the faithful attached to Tradition in New Zealand! The harvest is great, but the labourers are few: pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that He sends labourers into His harvest! The future
lies with the children: the future of a country, the future of the
Church too. Therefore a good Catholic education of the children
is of paramount importance. God has so designed our life on earth
as to be a school of charity. Charity consists essentially in giving:
each generation must learn charity in giving to the next generation
not only the material things, but most of all the spiritual goods
that it has received from the Source of all goods, the most Holy
Trinity. But as you know, schools cost a lot, especially with a relatively small number of children. Last year, we were obliged to withdraw $52’000 from the savings account to cover the cost of education, and this reduced it to less than $25’000; in other words less than half a year of survival. Some proper budgeting measures will be taken next school year, since they involve a redistribution of the classes; but we must survive this year. Father Delsorte explained to me that the savings “should last us until April.” I have already exposed the situation to the faithful in Wanganui, and some parents have paid their tuition until the end of the year to help. But I need also your help. Hence in this month of St. Joseph, I come to you: if we could count on $5'000 more per month, our school budget would be balanced, and we could start considering some future buildings. Indeed, counting on the grace of God, we should foresee more nuns here and they will direly need some less inadequate premises. And the secondary school has presently only two classrooms for the boys and only two decent ones for the girls. Clearly we will need to add three more each in the not too distant future. Thus if 25 of you, dear benefactors, could pledge $200 per month, or 50 of you pledge $100, or 250 of you pledge $20 per month, we would be able to make ends meet. May the Good Lord reward you a hundredfold here below and with eternal life after! This coming Saturday, I will be leaving for two months. The reason is that, before Father Black asked me to go to Wanganui, I had organised a whole series of exposition of a full size replica of the Holy Shroud with a conference, in Manila, Singapore, France and the USA, together with a collection for New Caledonia. Indeed last year, we had an exposition of this full-size replica in Hampton for Lent, and then it went to Adelaide, Streaky Bay, Kerang, Ballarat, Albury, Goulburn, Sydney and is now in Brisbane. You can see some photos on the www.sspx.com site. It was in each place a source of grace for the faithful who saw it, and for many other people who came to visit it. Some rediscovered at that occasion the traditional Mass. In Brisbane, the renowned Shroud author Ian Wilson gave the conference. This is the exposition, which I will bring with me. The idea to go in these other countries with it came from the need of reimbursing a loan, taken last September to buy a piece of land in New Caledonia in a very providential bargain: the seller was selling much below value, but pressed by the bank needed money quickly; I knew we could borrow it through a Swiss bank, and Bishop Fellay agreed to guarantee the loan, but now I must repay it. I intend to speak also about our Dominican community and perhaps, God willing, get some vocation. When I return, we will have this exposition in New Zealand, however not right away. Indeed with the help of a faithful here we have organised a tour of conference given by Gerry Matatics, and the exposition will be a drawing factor for these conferences; after his tour the exposition will return for a longer stay in each chapel. The tour is scheduled for October, and will be an occasion to be missionary and help other souls to return to the Traditional Mass, the very Sacrifice of which the Shroud is such a vivid witness. After my return, I will visit the different chapels served by the priory. May St. Joseph protect you and all your families, and may you have a very holy Week, filled with the graces of the Sacrifice of our Blessed Lord, through the intercession of the most Sorrowful Mother. Yours sincerely
in Jesus and Mary, |