On
November 1, 2012, on the feast of All Saints, Bishop Bernard Fellay celebrated
Mass at the seminary in Ecône. During his sermon, after recalling the
spiritual meaning of this feast, he explained the status of the relations of
the Society of Saint Pius X with Rome
some excerpts - for the
full sermon go to the dici website
…Now, to speak about
the future, what we will try to do with the Roman authorities is to tell them
that it does no good to pretend, for the sake of the faith, that the Church
cannot be mistaken. Because, at the level of faith, we are entirely in
agreement about the assistance of the Holy Ghost, but you have to open your
eyes to what is happening in the Church! It is necessary to stop
saying: the Church can do nothing bad, therefore the new Mass is
good. It is necessary to stop saying: the Church cannot err, and
therefore there is no error in the Council. But look at reality
then! There can be no contradiction between the reality that we apprehend
and the faith. It is the same good God who made both. Therefore if
there is an apparent contradiction, there is certainly a solution.
Perhaps we don’t have it yet, but we are not going to deny reality for the sake
of the faith! Now this is truly the impression that one has with regard
to what Rome
And therefore we
continue, come what may! We know very well that one day this trial—a
trial that affects the whole Church—will end, but we do not know how. We
try to do everything that we can. Don’t be afraid. The good Lord is
above all that; He is still the boss. That is the extraordinary
thing. And the Church, even in this state, is still holy, is still
capable of sanctifying. If today, my very dear brothers, we receive the
sacraments, grace, the faith, it is through this Roman Catholic Church, not
through her faults but certainly through this real, concrete Church. It is
not an image, it is not an idea, it is a reality, the most beautiful aspect of
which we are celebrating today: Heaven. Well! Heaven is
prepared here below. That is the beauty of the Church, this terrifying,
extraordinary combat with the forces of evil in which the Church finds herself,
and even in this state of terrible suffering in which she is today, she is
still capable of transmitting the faith, of transmitting grace, the
sacraments. And if we give them—these sacraments and this faith—it is
through this Church, it is in the name of this Church, it is as instruments and
members of the Catholic Church that we do so.
May the saints in
Heaven, may the angels come to our aid and support us! Obviously it is
not easy, obviously we are fearful. This is what today’s Gradual
says. It is necessary to have fear of God. To those who fear Him,
the good Lord gives everything. Let us not be afraid of having fear of
the Lord. The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom. May it
lead us through the labyrinths of life here below toward Heaven, where the
Blessed Virgin Mary, Queen of all saints, Queen of angels, is really our
protectress, truly our Mother. If we say about Our Lord that He wants to
be all in all, we must say almost the same thing about the Blessed
Virgin. We have a mother in Heaven who has received from God an
extraordinary power, the power to crush Satan’s head, to crush all
heresies. Therefore we can also say that she is the mother of faith, the
mother of grace. Let us go to her. Let us consecrate to her our
lives, our families, our joys, our sufferings, our plans, our desires.
May she lead us to that eternal haven so that we might always enjoy eternal
happiness with all the saints, that vision of God which is the beatific vision.
So be it. Amen.
In order to preserve
the character of this sermon, the oral style has been retained.
(Source: FSSPX/MG –
Pictures : Seminary of Ecône – Transcription and translation by DICI no. 264
dated November 9, 2012) http://www.dici.org/en/
