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6 August 1978
The death of Pope Paul VI concluded what, to a certain extent, had become a personal conflict between the Pope and the Archbishop. Father Louis Bouyer had stated correctly in the first chapter of his book, The Decomposition of Catholicism, that: "Unless we are blind we must even state bluntly that what we see looks less like the hoped-for regeneration of Catholicism than its accelerated decomposition."1 Pope Paul has himself spoken of "the self-destruction of the Church" and "the smoke of Satan" entering the Church. Yet, strangely and sadly, in latter years of his life the Pope appeared to have put the case of Archbishop Lefebvre at the head of his list of priorities, and to have seen him as the greatest danger threatening the Church. It must be unprecedented for a pope to have used the important occasion of the Consistory of Cardinals two years in succession to reprimand the same man, and, incredibly, a man who was making a stand for Catholic Tradition, which was being engulfed in most western countries at that time by a resurgent and triumphant Modernism. In 1976 the Catholic Church in the USA repudiated, for all practical purposes, the authority of the Pope and went into Schism. This may appear to be a wild and irresponsible claim, but let those who doubt it read the resolutions of the “Call to Action” Congress held in Detroit, resolutions which have never been repudiated by the American Bishops, and upon which the present pastoral strategy of the American Bishops is clearly based.2 The message of the Detroit Congress was clearly that given to the Pope by the time-serving bishops of Henry VIII who signed this statement: “Romanus episcopus non habet maioram aliquam iurisdictionem collatam sibi a Deo in sacra scriptura inhoc regno Angliae quam alius quivis externus Episcopus” – that is, “The Bishop of Rome hath not any greater jurisdiction granted him by God in sacred scripture in this realm of England than has any other foreign bishop.” And yet, incredibly, Pope Paul VI does not appear to have uttered one public word of criticism of this Congress, its infamous resolutions, or of the American Bishops for failing to repudiate it, and yet he saw no incongruity in devoting so much time and effort in an attempt to crush the one bishop who was providing concrete and effective resistance to the decomposition of Catholicism. However, it transpired that Pope Paul VI was to die without resolving the problem of Archbishop Lefebvre. His death brought a completely new dimension to the situation. Evidently, Pope Paul had committed his personal prestige to obtaining the Archbishop's submission, but this would not be the case with his successor. There was thus good reason to hope that the chances for a reconciliation had improved. As the personality and policies of Pope Paul VI had played such a major role in the drama of Archbishop Lefebvre, it will be appropriate here to make some comment upon his pontificate. The criticism of Pope Paul VI which can be found in Pope John's Council and the Apologia, Volume I, has disturbed a number of readers. Some of their comments have been friendly and constructive; in other cases the reaction has been hostile and involved a gross distortion of what I have actually written. A Monsignor who has been of considerable help to me in my writing, and who is a fine theologian, remarked that although, in general, he tended to agree that my criticisms of Pope Paul VI were objective and justified, he found it hard to reconcile himself to my having made them while the Pope was still alive. He felt that to criticize publicly a reigning pontiff was alien to the Catholic ethos and lacking in piety. After all, whatever his faults, is not the Pope our "Holy Father"? And, furthermore, could such criticism have any effect beyond distressing the faithful and accelerating the decomposition of the Church? It would appear, then, that my friend did not consider that I had committed a sin against justice, but one against prudence. I would have sinned against justice had my criticisms been unfair, but my friend accepted that they were just. The subject of filial piety raises some interesting questions. I was prompted to write the Apologia by a sense of distaste at the injustice to which the Archbishop has been subjected, not simply in his treatment by the Vatican but by the Catholic media. The problem is, then, whether this injustice is of so serious a nature that protesting against it can justify the harm which must result from criticism of a reigning pope? The injustice suffered by the Archbishop was certainly very great, and it involved many others besides himself. He complained rightly that if he was at fault in any way, any sanction imposed should involve him alone, and that to suppress an entire religious order because of a fault committed by its superior was unprecedented and unjustified.3 It should also be noted that the condemnation despatched by the Commission of Cardinals on 6 May 1975 concerned Archbishop Lefebvre alone, it did not contain one critical remark concerning the Society of Saint Pius X or the Seminary at Econe (see Vol. I, pp. 57-59). Note, too, that the Archbishop was not even told who had judged him. The Commission simply conveyed decisions to him made by an unknown judge, and stated that these decisions had been approved by the Pope. He was then denied leave to appeal. This particular act of injustice was certainly compounded by the leniency displayed by the Holy See to notorious Modernists in several countries, who, by their writing and their acts, repudiated the doctrinal and moral teaching of the Church; Hans Kung was the most notorious example at the time. Given, then, that an act of serious injustice was involved, to what extent should reaction to it have been tempered by filial piety? It does not seem unreasonable to cite an analogy from family life. Imagine that the owner of a company dismissed a loyal, long-serving employee due to the pressure of other employees who disliked him for his integrity. If a son of the employer worked for the company, and knew that the person involved had been dismissed unjustly, where would his duty lie? Should respect for his father impel him to remain silent? Should concern for the general well-being of the company prompt him to withhold public criticism which might have a damaging effect? Public criticism of a reigning pontiff is far from unprecedented in the Church, and has often been well founded and amply justified (see Vol. I, Appendix II). We are still too close to the events to decide whether Archbishop Lefebvre might have served the Church better by submitting to injustice, and whether those who sympathized with him might have done better to remain silent. Time will tell. What is certain is that respect for the person of the Pope should preclude any criticism but that phrased in the most respectful terms. This has always been the attitude of Archbishop Lefebvre. In an address delivered in Montreal on 31 May 1978, he explained:
I certainly hope that in my own writing I have never spoken disrespectfully of Pope Paul VI or any of his successors; if any expressions I have used could give this impression I regret them sincerely. I spoke earlier of criticism of my books which had been a gross distortion of what I had written. I am thinking in particular of a priest who claimed in a speech which was reported in a widely circulated newspaper that I had accused Pope Paul VI of being a crypto-Protestant and Communist.5 I did no such thing! In my writing, in Pope John's Council in particular, I pointed out that policies followed by Pope Paul VI advanced the interest of Protestants Marxists, and Masons. This is a very different matter. I went to considerable lengths to point out that, for example, the Pope was definitely anti-communist in his personal capacity, but that he refused to commit the Church to a militant anti-communist stance in the tradition of Pope Pius XII. I am sure that his reason for doing so was that he thought that the interests of the Church, particularly of Catholics behind the Iron Curtain, would be advanced more by dialogue than by confrontation. In Pope John’s Council I went into some detail in examining the techniques used by communists to attain power, and noted that, from their standpoint, anyone who was not actively opposing them could be regarded as an ally. Pope Paul VI certainly had much to his credit, and I have always made a particular point of stressing this. His teaching includes a series of fine encyclicals upholding authentic Catholic teaching on many important issues, and, as I have shown in Pope John's Council, he made frequent interventions on behalf of orthodoxy during the course of the Second Vatican Council. Many of his allocutions deal with contemporary problems in terms that seem almost to have been divinely inspired, but on other occasions he displayed Liberal ideas and tendencies, the most notable being that of placing too much faith in man's own ability to overcome the great evils of our time. But his greatest weakness lay in the practical decisions he took concerning Church policy. When we look at the Church which he inherited, and the Church which he handed on to his successor, it is possible to claim with total objectivity that no pontiff in the history of the Church had ever presided over so widespread and serious a collapse of Catholicism. The Arian heresy and the Protestant Reformation had been catastrophic, but they had been far more gradual, and, in the latter case at least, there were clear lines of demarcation between truth and heresy. Today, in most western countries, a Catholic who leaves his own parish cannot be sure whether the priest in the one where he finds himself will be orthodox; he can no longer even presume that Catholic bishops are orthodox. Equally sad is the fact that a parent who sends his child to a Catholic school can no longer take it for granted that the child will be given orthodox Catholic instruction. In some dioceses the situation is now so bad that the presumption must be that he will not. Add to this the vast exodus from the priestly and religious life, the degradation of the liturgy, widespread abandonment of Catholic moral standards among the laity, and the frequency with which Catholics in some countries identify themselves with Marxist attitudes, and the inescapable conclusion is that the pontificate of Pope Paul VI was the most disastrous in history in its effects upon the Church. I am not claiming that Paul VI was a bad pope in a personal sense, there is no reason to suppose that he was not devout; but his pontificate was certainly bad for the Church, due largely to his weakness in correcting those who dissented from his teaching. He refused to bow to the spirit of the times where family life was concerned, and issued the Encyclical Humanae vitae; but at the same time he remained almost passive in the face of widespread and public dissent, which resulted in a serious erosion of respect for the papal office. It may not be totally fanciful to wonder whether his inflexibility towards Mgr. Lefebvre was because he realized "that the Archbishop was showing the inflexibility that he himself should have shown, the inflexibility of Saint Pius X. Whenever there has been a weak pope the Church has suffered, and never more so than during the pontificate of Pope Paul VI. The judgment in my books that the policies of the Pope Paul VI advanced the interests of Protestantism, Masonry, and Communism was confirmed dramatically after his death. These three bodies can be seen today as embodying the concept of "the world " as it is found condemned in the Scriptures.6 In no way do I wish to offend sincere Protestants in making this claim. I am referring to the direction taken today Protestantism as an "ism," which is that of the World Council of Churches' socio-politicization of religion. The mainstream Protestant bodies are now fully in step with the world, but it must be admitted that the Catholic Church in some countries is racing to catch up. At the same time I accept that some conservative Protestant denominations are now far more Catholic in practice than many nominal Catholics, especially as concerns moral values and such fundamental dogmas as the Trinity, Incarnation, Divinity of Christ, Virgin Birth, or the existence of heaven and hell. Cardinal Newman is very severe on those who are praised by the world. "To become a hero in the eyes of the world," he remarked in "The World Our Enemy,” “it is almost necessary to break the laws of God and man. Thus the deeds of the world are matched by the opinions of the world: it adopts bad doctrine to defend bad practice; it loves darkness because its deeds are evil.” Our Lord tells us that the hatred of the world would be a characteristic of the true Christian. "If the world hate you, know ye that it hath hated Me before you. If you had been of the world the world would love its own, but because you are not of the world, but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you" (John 15: 18,19). What then was the verdict of "the world " upon the pontificate of Pope Paul VI? It was certainly one of praise rather than hate. Before providing documentation to prove this I wi11 clarify my position once more. I am not suggesting and have never suggested that Pope Paul VI was a bad person who broke "the laws of God and man." I am not suggesting that Pope Paul VI was a crypto-Protestant, Mason, or Marxist. I am suggesting that he was weak and indecisive, and in some of his prudential decisions opted for a policy which was harmful to the Church and helpful to her enemies. Such imprudence upon the part of a pope has been by no means rare in the history of the Church. Why, then, does Our Lord permit it? Cardinal Journet, one of the outstanding theologians of this century, states simply that we do not know:
Here then are some of the tributes paid to Pope Paul VI by “the world.” They confirm in a dramatic and terrible manner the claim I made in Pope John's Council that the policies of Pope Paul VI, although not intended to do so, were actually helping enemies of the Church.
A Tribute from the World Council of Churches On 7 August 1978 the World Council of Churches published a tribute to Pope Paul VI which included the following:
Canon DuBois, a prominent Episcopalian clergyman in the USA, has described the W.C.C. as Anti-Christ. It is hardly necessary to have the W.C.C. jargon explained. None of the apparently innocuous phrases mean what they appear to mean. For example, by "justice for the poor and oppressed" the W.C.C. means supplying funds to terrorist groups in Africa which have now murdered countless Africans and Europeans, often accompanied by mutilation and other practices of a nature so bestial that even the secular press must omit the details.
A Masonic Tribute The Italian Masonic journal, Rivista Massonica (No.5, Vol. LXIX-XIII della nuova seria), published a tribute to Pope Paul VI which included the following:
Homage from Communists The Italian Communist Party has good cause to be grateful to Pope Paul VI and Vatican II, not to mention Pope John XXIII. As a direct result of the modification of Vatican hostility towards Communism the Italian Communist Party is now poised to take power in Italy. Nonetheless, many eyebrows were still raised in surprise when, after the Pope's death, the walls of Rome were plastered with a Communist poster paying tribute to the late pontiff. The full text read:
The Yugoslav dictator, President Tito, paid a tribute to the Pope which was published in Politika, Belgrade's leading Communist daily. According to the London Universe (25 August1978):
A translation of this Communist jargon is hardly necessary. What a Communist describes as "working for peace" means following a policy that will bring world-wide Communist rule one step nearer. In his open letter to Father Arrupe, published in the February 1979 issue of The Angelus, Hamish Fraser addressed a question to the Jesuit Order. Not a single Jesuit journal has yet published this letter, not a single Jesuit has attempted to answer his question:
In its issue of 17 August 1978, The Wanderer published page after page of glowing tributes to the late Pope, tributes which give the impression that this was possibly the greatest pontificate in history .One headline reads: " A Truly Great Pontificate." This is a sentiment echoed by the World Council of Churches, Freemasons, and Marxists. Can a pontificate considered "great" by "the world" be great in the eyes of God? Cardinal Newman remarked in a sermon (which is not included in the collection mentioned earlier):
As a final thought, it is worth reflecting upon the fact that there is one man who is hated by the world because he is clearly not of the world, a man whose beliefs and standards virtually the whole of contemporary society – Marxist, Masonic, Protestant, and, alas, Catholic – is united in rejecting, that is Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre.
After a Death This generous tribute was paid to Pope Paul VI in a homily delivered by Mgr. Ducaud-Bourget at a Mass for the repose of the soul of Pope Paul VI, celebrated in the Church of St. Nicholas du Chardonnet, Paris. It was printed in the November 978 edition of The Angelus:
14 August 1978 An Insolent Public Initiative The following letter appeared in The Times on 14 August, and in leading journals in other countries. It received considerable (usually favorable) publicity in the Catholic and secular press. It should be noted that signatories included some of the most notorious Modernists alive today, and that Father Yves Congar, a vociferous public critic of Archbishop Lefebvre, was content to associate himself with them. It is hard not to recall the adage that one can judge a person by the company he keeps! The title given to the letter appeared in The Times: The following is the full text of the declaration by ten Roman Catholic theologians on the criteria for the election of the new Pope.
1. Franciscan Herald Press, 1970, p. 1. 2. A detailed analysis of the Detroit Congress is provided in James E. Twyman's The Betrayal of the Citadel, published by Viva il Papa, which is not a traditionalist organization and tended to regard Pope Paul VI as an oracle. This booklet is available from The Angelus Press, P. 0. Box 1387, Dickinson, Texas 77539. 3. See the Archbishop’s appeal against the decision to suppress the Society, Vol. I, p. 73. 4. Le Doctrinaire, July/ August 1978, p. 8. 5. Father Cornelius O’Brien, Chaplain to Christendom College, The wanderer, 11 May 1978. 6. The Term “world” is not always used in a pejorative sense in the Scriptures, God so loved the world that He sent His only begotten Son to save it. A very profound analysis of the scriptural use of the term world can be found in Newman’s sermon The World our Enemy – included in Newman Against the Liberals, a collection of twenty-five of Newman’s sermons, available from The Angelus Press, at $11.00, post paid. 7. Théologie de I’Eglise (Desclée de Brouwer, 1960), p. 250.
Courtesy of the Angelus
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