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The following are taken from The Recusant - Issue #66 Summer 2026. As found in this issue, the Analysis of Fr. Pagliarani's sermon is preceded by Archbishop Lefebvre's Consecration sermon of 1988:
Not the first time we have printed this sermon: but it is certainly worth revisiting. Compare it to the spirit of the modern SSPX and the sermon delivered recently at Écône.
Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre:
Episcopal Consecrations Sermon
Écône, 30th June 1988
In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.
Your Excellency, dear Bishop de Castro Mayer, my most dear friends, my dear brethren,
Behold, here we are gathered for a ceremony which is certainly historic. Let me, first of all, give you some information.
The first might surprise you a little, as it did me. Yesterday evening, a visitor came, sent from the Nunciature in Berne, with an envelope containing an appeal from our Holy Father the Pope, who was putting at my disposal a car which was supposed to take me to Rome yesterday evening, so that I would not be able to perform these consecrations today. I was told neither for what reason, nor where I had to go! I leave you to judge for yourselves the timeliness and wisdom of such a request.
I went to Rome for many, many days during the past year, even for weeks; the Holy Father did not invite me to come and see him. I would certainly have been glad to see him if some agreement would have been finalized. So here you have the information. I give it to you simply, as I myself came to know it, through the letter from the Nunciature.
Now, some indications concerning the ceremony and some relevant documents regarding its significance.
The future bishops have already sworn in my hands the oath which you find in the little booklet on the ceremony of consecration which some of you have. Thus, this oath has already been pronounced, plus the Anti-Modernist Oath, as it was formerly prescribed for the consecration of bishops, plus the Profession of Faith. They have already taken these oaths and this profession in my hands after the retreat which took place at Sierre during these last days. Do not, therefore, be surprised if the ceremony begins with the interrogations on the Faith, the Faith which the Church asks from those who are to be consecrated.
I also want to let you know that, after the ceremony, you will be able to ask the blessing of the bishops and kiss their rings. It is not the custom in the Church to kiss the hands of a bishop, as one kisses the hands of a newly-ordained priest, as you did yesterday. But the faithful may ask for their blessing and kiss their ring.
Lastly, you have at your disposal at the bookstall some books and flyers which contain all the elements necessary to help you better understand why this ceremony, which is apparently done against the will of Rome, is in no way a schism. We are not schismatics! If an excommunication was pronounced against the bishops of China, who separated themselves from Rome and put themselves under the Chinese government, one very easily understands why Pope Pius XII excommunicated them. There is no question of us separating ourselves from Rome, nor of putting ourselves under a foreign government, nor of establishing a sort of parallel church as the Bishops of Palmar de Troya have done in Spain. They have even elected a pope, formed a college of cardinals... It is out of the question for us to do such things. Far from us be this miserable thought of separating ourselves from Rome!
On the contrary, it is in order to manifest our attachment to Rome that we are performing this ceremony. It is in order to manifest our attachment to Eternal Rome, to the Pope, and to all those who have preceded these last Popes who, unfortunately since the Second Vatican Council, have thought it their duty to adhere to grievous errors which are demolishing the Church and the Catholic Priesthood.
Thus you will find among these flyers which are put at your disposal, an admirable study done by Professor Georg May, President of the Seminary of Canon Law in the University of Mainz in Germany, who marvellously explains why we are in a case of necessity: necessity to come and help your souls, to help you! Your applause a while ago was, I think, not a purely temporal manifestation; it was rather a spiritual manifestation, expressing your joy to have at last Catholic bishops and priests who are dedicated to the salvation of your souls, to giving to your souls the Life of Our Lord Jesus Christ, through good doctrine, through the Sacraments, through the Faith, through the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. You need this Life of Our Lord Jesus Christ to go to heaven. This Life of Our Lord Jesus Christ is disappearing everywhere in the conciliar church. They are following roads which are not Catholic roads: they simply lead to apostasy.
This is why we do this ceremony. Far be it from me to set myself up as pope! I am simply a bishop of the Catholic Church who is continuing to transmit Catholic doctrine. I think, and this will certainly not be too far off, that you will be able to engrave on my tombstone these words of St. Paul: tradidi quod et accepi — "I have transmitted to you what I have received," nothing else. I am just the postman bringing you a letter. I did not write the letter, the message, this Word of God. God Himself wrote it; Our Lord Jesus Christ Himself gave it to us. As for us, we just handed it down, through these dear priests here present and through all those who have chosen to resist this wave of apostasy in the Church, by keeping the Eternal Faith and giving it to the faithful. We are just carriers of this Good News, of this Gospel which Our Lord Jesus Christ gave to us, as well as of the means of sanctification: the Holy Mass, the true Holy Mass, the true Sacraments which truly give the spiritual life.
It seems to me, my dear brethren, that I am hearing the voices of all these Popes since Gregory XVI, Pius IX, Leo XIII, St. Pius X, Benedict XV, Pius XI, Pius XII, telling us: "Please, we beseech you, what are you going to do with our teachings, with our preaching, with the Catholic Faith? Are you going to abandon it? Are you going to let it disappear from this earth? Please, please, continue to keep this treasure which we have given you. Do not abandon the faithful, do not abandon the Church! Continue the Church! Indeed, since the Council, what we condemned in the past the present Roman authorities have embraced and are professing. How is it possible? We have condemned them: Liberalism, Communism, Socialism, Modernism, Sillonism. All the errors which we have condemned are now professed, adopted and supported by the authorities of the Church. Is it possible? Unless you do something to continue this Tradition of the Church which we have given to you, all of it shall disappear. Souls shall be lost."
Thus, we find ourselves in a case of necessity. We have done all we could, trying to help Rome to understand that they had to come back to the attitudes of the holy Pius XII and of all his predecessors. Bishop de Castro Mayer and myself have gone to Rome, we have spoken, we have sent letters, several times to Rome. We have tried by these talks, by all these means, to succeed in making Rome understand that, since the Council and since aggiornamento, this change which has occurred in the Church is not Catholic, is not in conformity to the doctrine of all times. This ecumenism and all these errors, this collegiality — all this is contrary to the Faith of the Church, and is in the process of destroying the Church.
This is why we are convinced that, by the act of these consecrations today, we are obeying the call of these Popes and as a consequence the call of God, since they represent Our Lord Jesus Christ in the Church.
"And why, Archbishop, have you stopped these discussions which seemed to have had a certain degree of success?" Well, precisely because, at the same time that I gave my signature to the Protocol, the envoy of Cardinal Ratzinger gave me a note in which I was asked to beg pardon for my errors. But if I am in error, if I teach error, it is clear that I must be brought back to the truth in the minds of those who sent me this note to sign. "That I might recognize my errors" means that, if you recognize your errors we will help you to return to the truth.
What is this truth for them if not the truth of Vatican II, the truth of the conciliar church? Consequently, it is clear that the only truth that exists today for the Vatican is the conciliar truth, the spirit of the Council, the spirit of Assisi. That is the truth of today. But we will have nothing to do with this for anything in the world!
That is why, taking into account the strong will of the present Roman authorities to reduce Tradition to naught, to gather the world to the spirit of Vatican II and the spirit of Assisi, we have preferred to withdraw ourselves and to say that we could not continue. It was not possible. We would have evidently been under the authority of Cardinal Ratzinger, President of the Roman Commission, which would have directed us; we were putting ourselves into his hands, and consequently putting ourselves into the hands of those who wish to draw us into the spirit of the Council and the spirit of Assisi. This was simply not possible.
This is why I sent a letter to the Pope, saying to him very clearly:
"We simply cannot accept this spirit and proposals, despite all the desires which we have to be in full union with you. Given this new spirit which now rules in Rome and which you wish to communicate to us, we prefer to continue in Tradition; to keep Tradition while waiting for Tradition to regain its place at Rome, while waiting for Tradition to reassume its place in the Roman authorities, in their minds."
This will last for as long as the Good Lord has foreseen. It is not for me to know when Tradition will regain its rights at Rome, but I think it is my duty to provide the means of doing that which I shall call "Operation Survival," operation survival for Tradition. Today, this day, is Operation Survival. If I had made this deal with Rome, by continuing with the agreements we had signed, and by putting them into practice, I would have performed "Operation Suicide." There was no choice, we must live! That is why today, by consecrating these bishops, I am convinced that I am continuing to keep Tradition alive, that is to say, the Catholic Church.
You well know, my dear brethren, that there can be no priests without bishops. When God calls me — no doubt this will be before long — from whom would these seminarians receive the Sacrament of Holy Orders? From conciliar bishops, who, due to their doubtful intentions, confer doubtful sacraments? This is not possible. Who are the bishops who have truly kept Tradition and the Sacraments such as the Church has conferred them for twenty centuries until Vatican II? They are Bishop de Castro Mayer and myself. I cannot change that. That is how it is. Hence, many seminarians have entrusted themselves to us, they sensed that here was the continuity of the Church, the continuity of Tradition. And they came to our seminaries, despite all the difficulties that they have encountered, in order to receive a true ordination to the priesthood, to say the true Sacrifice of Calvary, the true Sacrifice of the Mass, and to give you the true Sacraments, true doctrine, the true catechism. This is the goal of these seminaries.
So I cannot, in good conscience, leave these seminarians orphaned. Neither can I leave you orphans by dying without providing for the future. That is not possible. It would be contrary to my duty.
This is why we have chosen, with the grace of God, priests from our Society who have seemed to us to be the most apt, whilst being in circumstances and in functions which permit them more easily to fulfil their episcopal ministry, to give Confirmation to your children, and to be able to confer ordinations in our various seminaries. Thus I believe that — with the grace of God, we, Bishop de Castro Mayer and myself, by these consecrations, will have given to Tradition the means to continue, given the means to Catholics who desire to remain within the Church of their parents, their grandparents, of their ancestors. They built churches with beautiful altars, often destroyed and replaced by a table, thus manifesting the radical change which has come about since the Council regarding the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass which is the heart of the Church and the purpose of the priesthood. Thus we wish to thank you for having come in such numbers to support us in the accomplishment of this ceremony.
We turn to the Blessed Virgin Mary. You well know, my dear brethren, one must have told you of Leo XIII's prophetic vision revealing that one day "the See of Peter would become the seat of iniquity." He said it in one of his exorcisms, called "The Exorcism of Leo XIII." Has it come about today? Is it tomorrow? I do not know. But in any case it has been foretold. Iniquity may quite simply be error. Error is iniquity: to no longer profess the Faith of all time, the Catholic Faith, is a grave error. If ever there was an iniquity, it is this. And I really believe that there has never been a greater iniquity in the Church than Assisi, which is contrary to the First Commandment of God and the First Article of the Creed. It is incredible that something like that could have ever taken place in the Church, in the eyes of the whole Church — how humiliating! We have never undergone such a humiliation! You will be able to find all of this in [Daniel] Le Roux's booklet ["Peter Lovest-Thou Me?"] which has been especially published in order to give you information on the present situation in Rome.
It was not only the good Pope Leo XIII who said these things, but Our Lady prophesied them as well. Just recently, the priest who takes care of the Society's priory of Bogota, Colombia, brought me a book concerning the apparition of Our Lady of Buon Suceso, of "Good Success," to whom a large church in Quito, Ecuador, was dedicated. They were received by a nun shortly after the Council of Trent, so you see, quite a few centuries ago. This apparition has been thoroughly recognized by Rome and the ecclesiastical authorities; a magnificent church was built for the Blessed Virgin Mary wherein the faithful of Ecuador venerate with great devotion a picture of Our Lady, whose face was made miraculously. The artist was in the process of painting it when he found the face of the Holy Virgin miraculously formed. And Our Lady prophesied for the twentieth century, saying explicitly that during the nineteenth century and most of the twentieth century, errors would become more and more widespread in Holy Church, placing the Church in a catastrophic situation. Morals would become corrupt and the Faith would disappear. It seems impossible not to see it happening today.
I excuse myself for continuing this account of the apparition but she speaks of a prelate who will absolutely oppose this wave of apostasy and impiety — saving the priesthood by forming good priests. I do not say that prophecy refers to me. You may draw your own conclusions. I was stupefied when reading these lines but I cannot deny them, since they are recorded and deposited in the archives of this apparition.
Of course, you well know the apparitions of Our Lady at La Salette, where she says that Rome will lose the Faith, that there will be an "eclipse" at Rome; an eclipse, see what Our Lady means by this.
And finally, more recently, the secret of Fatima. Without a doubt, the Third Secret of Fatima must have made an allusion to this darkness which has invaded Rome, this darkness which has invaded the world since the Council. And surely it is because of this, without a doubt, that John XXIII judged it better not to publish the Secret: it would have been necessary to take measures, such steps as he possibly felt himself incapable of doing, for example completely changing the orientations which he was beginning to take in view of the Council, and for the Council. These are the facts upon which, I think, we can lean.
We place ourselves in God's providence. We are convinced that God knows what He is doing. Cardinal Gagnon visited us twelve years after the suspension: after twelve years of being spoken of as outside of the communion of Rome, as rebels and dissenters against the Pope, his visit took place. He himself recognized that what we have been doing is just what is necessary for the reconstruction of the Church. The Cardinal even assisted pontifically at the Mass which I celebrated on December 8, 1987, for the renewal of the promises of our seminarians. I was supposedly suspended and, yet, after twelve years, I was practically given a clean slate. They said we have done well. Thus we did well to resist! I am convinced that we are in the same circumstances today. We are performing an act which apparently — and unfortunately the media will not assist us in the good sense, the headlines will, of course, be "Schism!" "Excommunication!" to their heart's content — and, yet, we are convinced that all these accusations of which we are the object, all penalties of which we are the object, are null, absolutely null and void, and we will take no account of them. Just as I took no account of the suspension, and ended up by being congratulated by the Church and by progressive churchmen, so likewise in several years — I do not know how many, only the Good Lord knows how many years it will take for Tradition to find its rights in Rome — we will be embraced by the Roman authorities, who will thank us for having maintained the Faith in our seminaries, in our families, in civil societies, in our countries, and in our monasteries and our religious houses, for the greater glory of God and the salvation of souls.
In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.
Source: https://fsspx.news/en/news/econe-2026-fr...ions-59927
and: https://youtu.be/5EURjpGfKEA?
[Emphasis - The Catacombs]
Because it is so long and uninspiring, we will forgo our usual habit of reproducing the entire text at length. I have read it thoroughly, more than once, so that you don't have to! The reader who wishes to read the whole thing for himself will find it without difficulty on several SSPX websites, including those linked above.
Fr. Pagliarani begins his sermon by posing a rhetorical question:
...to which he then goes on to provide his own answer. He provides a superficial three part answer whose structure is to talk about Faith, Hope and Charity. "First of all, this ceremony must be a manifestation of [the] faith," he says. Good, that looks promising. "We cannot modify, reinterpret, or reconsider it," he adds. This looks very promising. All he has to do now is point out where the attack on the Faith is coming from and the justification for the SSPX disobeying modern Rome will become almost self-evident.
1. Faith — no mention of the conciliar elephant in the room
Alas, that second shoe never drops. Fr. Pagliarani never gets around to saying why anyone might risk altering or modifying the Faith. Where is the pressure coming from to alter the Faith? Who has been modifying or reinterpreting the Faith in recent years? He does not say.
Attacked by whom, one wonders? Whence does this "necessity" arise?
Wouldn't this be the ideal moment to remind people that the "church" which declared Archbishop Lefebvre schismatic is the conciliar church? But no, that distinction is never made. There is no mention, no hint of such a thing as the conciliar church, just "the Church" without any distinction. And yet that is the real reason for the "false dilemma" which he mentions: what is being asked, what was demanded of Archbishop Lefebvre back in the day, is to put the conciliar church before the Catholic Faith. But because Fr. Pagliarani doesn't say this, his point about a false dilemma remains rather unclear.
Again, what is this "necessity" and what is its cause?
So it's not that we're at war with a conciliar church which hates the Catholic Church and has tried to supplant it? It's that we just love the Pope so much ("Wuv, wuv, wuv!") and don't want to see him humiliated. Not that he himself is the instigator of his own humiliation? Not that his own humiliation is the least of the evils which he personally is inflicting on everyone else?
Doesn't this make it sound as though the Pope (Leo, as it happens, but Francis before him, and the other conciliar Popes before him…) is somehow a passive victim of "this humiliation" and not its main instigator? And where does this being treated "on an equal footing with all [false] religions" come from, one wonders? Could it perhaps be that there was an event in the 1960s, say, a Council, for instance, at which a false doctrine was proclaimed, let's call it… oh, I don't know, Ecumenism? Could there be a more obvious elephant in the room?
He continues:
So the problem in the Church, the cause of the crisis, the justification for the "necessity" of these new consecrations, is that people (who, exactly?) are using "the language of inclusion, of listening, of dialogue"…? If you were a convert new to Tradition, or a potential convert, how clear would you find this? Fr. Pagliarani is clearly avoiding naming the problem, the cause of the crisis in the Church: Vatican II. And whilst it is true that the SSPX, for the most part, does still "speak the language of Tradition," what that means in practice is that it still uses lots of "Traditional Catholic" vocabulary. For the most part. But even that is beginning to fall by the wayside. And I still haven't seen any mention of the conciliar church or even of Vatican II yet.
How's that for a new motto, a new mission statement for the modern, liberal SSPX? "We accompany people in the Faith"…!
After once again lamenting a vague and unspecified "difficulty in understanding one another" because "we speak different languages," Fr. Pagliarani moves on from Faith to Hope.
2. Hope! (and Joy!)
Oh thank goodness! Don't you just hate controversy and tension! And who doesn't love joy and hope?
True. But you can abandon Him: surely that is the more relevant point. You may be the same SSPX in purely worldly, legal, corporate terms, but you are a long way from 1988 in spirit. He then mentions the Incarnation, concerning which he adds:
Also true. But again, the question you should be asking is not whether God has whimsically decided to abandon you, but whether you have remained faithful to Him. And I mean institutionally faithful, not merely faithful on a level of personal sin (of which we are all guilty).
Was it the will of God that SSPX faithful get the covid vaccines? Was that for the good of their souls? Is declaring that Vatican II "enlightens and deepens" Tradition an example of remaining faithful to him, or that the New Mass and new conciliar rites were "legitimately promulgated by Popes Paul VI and John Paul II"…? We could go on. Fine words do not a faithful servant make. Talk is cheap. Actions speak louder than words. Anyone can preach a sermon about how we need to remain faithful to Almighty God — practicing it is another matter.
3. "Charity"
Last of all comes charity.
Charity towards which "church"? The Catholic Church, or the conciliar church? And just why is it that so many souls are confused and disoriented like never before? That elephant is still there!
Dishonoured by whom, and why? What exactly is the problem, what is going on in the Church — is anyone any the wiser so far?
Doesn't it sound as though the "Church" which treats us as rebels is the exact same "Church" which we are trying "to serve and love"? To anyone new to the SSPX who is not familiar with Archbishop Lefebvre, this must be so confusing!
In difficulty with what? Overwhelmed by what, suffering from what? Betrayed by whom?
Help her and support her — it sounds like she's in serious difficulty! Do tell more…
Indifferent to what, exactly? Are you getting the picture, dear reader? How very tedious this all is. If you feel frustrated reading it, just imagine how I feel reading it, analysing it and writing about it! The next few minutes of the sermon are standard stuff. The Precious Blood. Sin is evil, evil is sin, and so forth. Then things begin to get a bit more interesting.
The Exaltation of Man
This is the closest Fr. Pagliarani gets to naming the Council, the errors of Vatican II, the conciliar church and its false teaching, and all the rest. And of course, he doesn't name any of those things. As before, one is left wondering whether this "saturation" leading to "silent apostasy" has always been such a big problem, or whether it got worse recently (since the 1960s, for instance?). He does say that it is "the great evil of today" — but then he adds "of all history." So I guess there's nothing particularly bad about how things are today compared with a few hundred years ago, then? If it is such a "plague" and "a scourge" then surely it would be worthwhile naming the sources of this plague, this scourge, especially if it has somehow penetrated "deeply even into the Church" (and how and when did that happen, one wonders?).
Then comes more about the Incarnation, the Redemption. Nothing wrong with it, but it is unremarkable in itself. The Precious Blood and the Blessed Virgin Mary and the Cross. The new bishops will have a responsibility to preach those things, he says. "What an honour, and what a responsibility!" All very well and good, but nothing that one might not hear at the FSSP or certain conservative Novus Ordo parishes — and if ever there was a time to point out what is unique about the SSPX then surely these episcopal consecrations would be that moment. But that is what he studiously avoids doing.
The Cross, he says, is "a stumbling block for the Jews and folly for the Gentiles. Folly, especially today, for an apostate world which cannot understand and does not want to understand." Aha, so is the world apostate in a way that it didn't used to be, is that what you're saying? If only he were able to elaborate!
Humanism is an easy target, a low hanging fruit. What we all need to hear is who is pushing it and why, and how they have succeeded, and how we can most effectively fight against it. Imagine if Archbishop Lefebvre in 1988 had confined himself to preaching against a nameless, amorphous "humanism"! After this there follows more standard and frankly uninspiringly "normal" sermony-type stuff. Our Lord is a lamb, what a beautiful image, the new bishops are like lambs sent amongst wolves (*yawn*), and so forth. Then comes a lot of very fine talk which is the very worst type of hypocrisy.
Preaching what none of them practice
Here is a timely reminder that the man preaching about purity of morals is the very same man who publicly endorsed the taking of covid vaccines less than five years ago. Every single Traditional Catholic who lost his job over those wretched "vaccines" was betrayed by Fr. Davide Pagliarani's craven submission to government tyranny and the will of men such as Bill Gates. There was even a group of Novus Ordo bishops who said not to get those vaccines! But Fr. Pagliarani, knowing all that, not only put out articles in all the SSPX publications, he even went in person to the Angelus conference and told everyone that it was fine, we can go ahead and have them. Worse, the SSPX openly cited as its justification for this the documents produced by the modernist Vatican whitewashing covid vaccines. What a lot of insincere hypocrisy. Clearly talk really is cheap, and actions really do speak louder than words.
More empty, cheap, insincere and hypocritical talk. Let us not forget: when Bishop Fellay was the Superior General he openly admitted to changing the entire stance of the SSPX towards modernist Rome in the March 2012 Cor Unum and then on American TV and on youtube in various interviews. This was a monumental act of betrayal, of disobedience to the previous SSPX Chapter which he was bound in conscience to obey and about as far from "perfect docility, perfect submission" as one can imagine. The 2012 General Chapter which met a few weeks later, to its lasting shame, let him off the hook without so much as a slap on the wrist, largely at the instigation of — guess who? — that's right! — Fr. Davide Pagliarani, who was at that point District Superior of Italy. It should be clear by now to anyone who has been paying attention, that in the modern, liberal SSPX of 2026, "perfect docility, perfect submission to the will of God" really means: "Obey your superiors without question at all times, even if they contradict the will of God, even if they contradict what even they themselves were saying not so long ago!"
The irony here, of course, is that that is a pretty good description of Archbishop Lefebvre. It is a laughable description of the inoffensive, politically correct SSPX of 2026, however. When was the last time a priest of the SSPX preached against the rainbow flag movement, or the evils of feminism, or the secret societies and their global conspiracy, or even the errors of the local diocese? Given that we are now most of the way through the sermon and there has still been no mention at all of Vatican II, the conciliar church, the New Mass, the new sacramental rites, or any of the errors of the modern conciliar churchmen even once, all this talk of not bending is just yet more cheap hypocrisy. This entire sermon is one giant act of bending! He has carefully crafted the sermon so as to make it look like he's saying the right things to his own people whilst also saying as little as possible to which the modernists in Rome could object. Thirty-seven minutes of bending, and in the middle of it all he tells the new bishops not to bend. Besides which, if they were the sort of men who refuse to bend then they wouldn't have been chosen in the first place! In fact, these days, one suspects, such men wouldn't even manage to get to the end of seminary and be ordained to the priesthood, let alone be selected to become bishops!
Tradidi quod et accepi is a fitting motto for Archbishop Lefebvre's tomb. I would suggest as a motto for Fr. Pagliarani and his confreres when the time comes, a more fitting motto would perhaps be Prodidimus quod accepimus et aliud tradidimus. They really are no different to the conciliar bishops of the 1970s in that regard.
Once again — oh the irony, the hypocrisy! Do we really have to point it out? There is a timeless truth here: the greatest danger is usually the most subtle. The greatest danger to the SSPX faithful is not the modernism of Pope Francis or Pope Leo, but the far more subtle modernism of the SSPX, of Bishop Fellay, Fr. Pagliarani et al. Just as the modernism of the SSPX was never as dangerous to the Resistance faithful and priests as the modernism of Bishop Williamson. The more subtle and the closer to home, the greater the danger. The evil modernists in Rome conquered and neutralised the SSPX, as Fr. Pagliarani says, not by attacking it head on, but by sweet words, tasty cashew nuts and flattering gestures. Hence the SSPX of today has indeed slid "into a perception of the Faith, of the Christian life, and of relations with the world that is a little more up to date." He stands condemned from his own mouth.
To preach simply, without duplicity or fear or equivocation or ambiguity? What would that look like in practice? It would mean attacking Vatican II, attacking the current modernist authorities, pointing out that their sacraments are doubtful and their intentions evil and not to be trusted. It would mean pointing out that the last seven Popes in a row stand condemned by their predecessors. Once again, this is an accurate description of Archbishop Lefebvre but has nothing in common with the man preaching these fine words in 2026 nor the priestly society of which he is the superior. He is preaching an ambiguous, equivocal and (in all likelihood) duplicitous and fearful sermon, and in the midst of it this is the advice he gives them.
How about the priests expelled in 2012 and 2013 merely for repeating what Archbishop Lefebvre had said, the faithful denied communion and driven out of chapels which were their spiritual homes? How's that for "brother against brother"…? And the others who heroically left before they could be expelled: why did they do that if not to confess Our Lord before men?
We are at the end of the sermon now, and at this point comes the one token, throw-away mention of a name which has been conspicuously absent so far: that's right, Archbishop Lefebvre. Have to get that tick in the box, can't have it said that he was never mentioned at all! Naturally, what he says about Archbishop Lefebvre is suitably vague and harmless.
All of which is true, but notice that no details, no specifics are given. Fr. Pagliarani says that the Archbishop "was able to grasp the cause of the crisis" but he himself still hasn't yet said what this alleged "crisis" is, let alone the cause of it! The closest he came was complaining about a "humanism" which has "penetrated even into the Church" — is that what Archbishop Lefebvre saw and grasped so clearly, or is there a bit more to it than that?
"The path" which Archbishop Lefebvre "shows us to follow" is very simple and easy to understand and it is nowhere to be seen in this sermon, for the simple reason that Fr. Pagliarani is not following it. He is not following it because he doesn't believe in it. The Superior General of the modern, surrendered, compromised SSPX which has betrayed Archbishop Lefebvre is now telling his new bishops that Archbishop Lefebvre is showing them the way. Words fail me. I really can't take much more of this.
If this has been a slog and you need some refreshment, a "palate cleanser" for your mind, or if on the other hand you are not entirely convinced and think that I may be exaggerating, then I invite you — no I urge you! — to read (or re-read) Archbishop Lefebvre's sermon from the 1988 consecrations. The difference could not be more stark, it is like chalk and cheese, like night and day. That is the example left to Fr. Pagliarani and his confreres which he totally ignores, the way shown by their founder which they departed from some time ago.
Archbishop Lefebvre preached clearly and fearlessly. By contrast, Fr. Pagliarani seems to preach equivocally, ambiguously, and with an overpowering fear of offending the modernist enemy which prevents him even from naming them. This is what comes of compromising the Faith, as Archbishop Lefebvre said so well about the Indultists of the late '80s. Surely his words apply equally well to the SSPX today?
"It is evident that by putting themselves in the hands of the current conciliar authorities, they are implicitly accepting the Council and the ensuing reforms, even if they have [the Traditional Mass] ... Their speech is paralyzed because of this acceptance." — Archbishop Lefebvre, Letter to Fr. Couture, 18th March 1989
![[Image: Two-Sermons-Summary.png]](https://i.postimg.cc/76S111X9/Two-Sermons-Summary.png)
Not the first time we have printed this sermon: but it is certainly worth revisiting. Compare it to the spirit of the modern SSPX and the sermon delivered recently at Écône.
Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre:
Episcopal Consecrations Sermon
Écône, 30th June 1988
In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.
Your Excellency, dear Bishop de Castro Mayer, my most dear friends, my dear brethren,
Behold, here we are gathered for a ceremony which is certainly historic. Let me, first of all, give you some information.
The first might surprise you a little, as it did me. Yesterday evening, a visitor came, sent from the Nunciature in Berne, with an envelope containing an appeal from our Holy Father the Pope, who was putting at my disposal a car which was supposed to take me to Rome yesterday evening, so that I would not be able to perform these consecrations today. I was told neither for what reason, nor where I had to go! I leave you to judge for yourselves the timeliness and wisdom of such a request.
I went to Rome for many, many days during the past year, even for weeks; the Holy Father did not invite me to come and see him. I would certainly have been glad to see him if some agreement would have been finalized. So here you have the information. I give it to you simply, as I myself came to know it, through the letter from the Nunciature.
Now, some indications concerning the ceremony and some relevant documents regarding its significance.
The future bishops have already sworn in my hands the oath which you find in the little booklet on the ceremony of consecration which some of you have. Thus, this oath has already been pronounced, plus the Anti-Modernist Oath, as it was formerly prescribed for the consecration of bishops, plus the Profession of Faith. They have already taken these oaths and this profession in my hands after the retreat which took place at Sierre during these last days. Do not, therefore, be surprised if the ceremony begins with the interrogations on the Faith, the Faith which the Church asks from those who are to be consecrated.
I also want to let you know that, after the ceremony, you will be able to ask the blessing of the bishops and kiss their rings. It is not the custom in the Church to kiss the hands of a bishop, as one kisses the hands of a newly-ordained priest, as you did yesterday. But the faithful may ask for their blessing and kiss their ring.
Lastly, you have at your disposal at the bookstall some books and flyers which contain all the elements necessary to help you better understand why this ceremony, which is apparently done against the will of Rome, is in no way a schism. We are not schismatics! If an excommunication was pronounced against the bishops of China, who separated themselves from Rome and put themselves under the Chinese government, one very easily understands why Pope Pius XII excommunicated them. There is no question of us separating ourselves from Rome, nor of putting ourselves under a foreign government, nor of establishing a sort of parallel church as the Bishops of Palmar de Troya have done in Spain. They have even elected a pope, formed a college of cardinals... It is out of the question for us to do such things. Far from us be this miserable thought of separating ourselves from Rome!
On the contrary, it is in order to manifest our attachment to Rome that we are performing this ceremony. It is in order to manifest our attachment to Eternal Rome, to the Pope, and to all those who have preceded these last Popes who, unfortunately since the Second Vatican Council, have thought it their duty to adhere to grievous errors which are demolishing the Church and the Catholic Priesthood.
Thus you will find among these flyers which are put at your disposal, an admirable study done by Professor Georg May, President of the Seminary of Canon Law in the University of Mainz in Germany, who marvellously explains why we are in a case of necessity: necessity to come and help your souls, to help you! Your applause a while ago was, I think, not a purely temporal manifestation; it was rather a spiritual manifestation, expressing your joy to have at last Catholic bishops and priests who are dedicated to the salvation of your souls, to giving to your souls the Life of Our Lord Jesus Christ, through good doctrine, through the Sacraments, through the Faith, through the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. You need this Life of Our Lord Jesus Christ to go to heaven. This Life of Our Lord Jesus Christ is disappearing everywhere in the conciliar church. They are following roads which are not Catholic roads: they simply lead to apostasy.
This is why we do this ceremony. Far be it from me to set myself up as pope! I am simply a bishop of the Catholic Church who is continuing to transmit Catholic doctrine. I think, and this will certainly not be too far off, that you will be able to engrave on my tombstone these words of St. Paul: tradidi quod et accepi — "I have transmitted to you what I have received," nothing else. I am just the postman bringing you a letter. I did not write the letter, the message, this Word of God. God Himself wrote it; Our Lord Jesus Christ Himself gave it to us. As for us, we just handed it down, through these dear priests here present and through all those who have chosen to resist this wave of apostasy in the Church, by keeping the Eternal Faith and giving it to the faithful. We are just carriers of this Good News, of this Gospel which Our Lord Jesus Christ gave to us, as well as of the means of sanctification: the Holy Mass, the true Holy Mass, the true Sacraments which truly give the spiritual life.
It seems to me, my dear brethren, that I am hearing the voices of all these Popes since Gregory XVI, Pius IX, Leo XIII, St. Pius X, Benedict XV, Pius XI, Pius XII, telling us: "Please, we beseech you, what are you going to do with our teachings, with our preaching, with the Catholic Faith? Are you going to abandon it? Are you going to let it disappear from this earth? Please, please, continue to keep this treasure which we have given you. Do not abandon the faithful, do not abandon the Church! Continue the Church! Indeed, since the Council, what we condemned in the past the present Roman authorities have embraced and are professing. How is it possible? We have condemned them: Liberalism, Communism, Socialism, Modernism, Sillonism. All the errors which we have condemned are now professed, adopted and supported by the authorities of the Church. Is it possible? Unless you do something to continue this Tradition of the Church which we have given to you, all of it shall disappear. Souls shall be lost."
Thus, we find ourselves in a case of necessity. We have done all we could, trying to help Rome to understand that they had to come back to the attitudes of the holy Pius XII and of all his predecessors. Bishop de Castro Mayer and myself have gone to Rome, we have spoken, we have sent letters, several times to Rome. We have tried by these talks, by all these means, to succeed in making Rome understand that, since the Council and since aggiornamento, this change which has occurred in the Church is not Catholic, is not in conformity to the doctrine of all times. This ecumenism and all these errors, this collegiality — all this is contrary to the Faith of the Church, and is in the process of destroying the Church.
This is why we are convinced that, by the act of these consecrations today, we are obeying the call of these Popes and as a consequence the call of God, since they represent Our Lord Jesus Christ in the Church.
"And why, Archbishop, have you stopped these discussions which seemed to have had a certain degree of success?" Well, precisely because, at the same time that I gave my signature to the Protocol, the envoy of Cardinal Ratzinger gave me a note in which I was asked to beg pardon for my errors. But if I am in error, if I teach error, it is clear that I must be brought back to the truth in the minds of those who sent me this note to sign. "That I might recognize my errors" means that, if you recognize your errors we will help you to return to the truth.
What is this truth for them if not the truth of Vatican II, the truth of the conciliar church? Consequently, it is clear that the only truth that exists today for the Vatican is the conciliar truth, the spirit of the Council, the spirit of Assisi. That is the truth of today. But we will have nothing to do with this for anything in the world!
That is why, taking into account the strong will of the present Roman authorities to reduce Tradition to naught, to gather the world to the spirit of Vatican II and the spirit of Assisi, we have preferred to withdraw ourselves and to say that we could not continue. It was not possible. We would have evidently been under the authority of Cardinal Ratzinger, President of the Roman Commission, which would have directed us; we were putting ourselves into his hands, and consequently putting ourselves into the hands of those who wish to draw us into the spirit of the Council and the spirit of Assisi. This was simply not possible.
This is why I sent a letter to the Pope, saying to him very clearly:
"We simply cannot accept this spirit and proposals, despite all the desires which we have to be in full union with you. Given this new spirit which now rules in Rome and which you wish to communicate to us, we prefer to continue in Tradition; to keep Tradition while waiting for Tradition to regain its place at Rome, while waiting for Tradition to reassume its place in the Roman authorities, in their minds."
This will last for as long as the Good Lord has foreseen. It is not for me to know when Tradition will regain its rights at Rome, but I think it is my duty to provide the means of doing that which I shall call "Operation Survival," operation survival for Tradition. Today, this day, is Operation Survival. If I had made this deal with Rome, by continuing with the agreements we had signed, and by putting them into practice, I would have performed "Operation Suicide." There was no choice, we must live! That is why today, by consecrating these bishops, I am convinced that I am continuing to keep Tradition alive, that is to say, the Catholic Church.
You well know, my dear brethren, that there can be no priests without bishops. When God calls me — no doubt this will be before long — from whom would these seminarians receive the Sacrament of Holy Orders? From conciliar bishops, who, due to their doubtful intentions, confer doubtful sacraments? This is not possible. Who are the bishops who have truly kept Tradition and the Sacraments such as the Church has conferred them for twenty centuries until Vatican II? They are Bishop de Castro Mayer and myself. I cannot change that. That is how it is. Hence, many seminarians have entrusted themselves to us, they sensed that here was the continuity of the Church, the continuity of Tradition. And they came to our seminaries, despite all the difficulties that they have encountered, in order to receive a true ordination to the priesthood, to say the true Sacrifice of Calvary, the true Sacrifice of the Mass, and to give you the true Sacraments, true doctrine, the true catechism. This is the goal of these seminaries.
So I cannot, in good conscience, leave these seminarians orphaned. Neither can I leave you orphans by dying without providing for the future. That is not possible. It would be contrary to my duty.
This is why we have chosen, with the grace of God, priests from our Society who have seemed to us to be the most apt, whilst being in circumstances and in functions which permit them more easily to fulfil their episcopal ministry, to give Confirmation to your children, and to be able to confer ordinations in our various seminaries. Thus I believe that — with the grace of God, we, Bishop de Castro Mayer and myself, by these consecrations, will have given to Tradition the means to continue, given the means to Catholics who desire to remain within the Church of their parents, their grandparents, of their ancestors. They built churches with beautiful altars, often destroyed and replaced by a table, thus manifesting the radical change which has come about since the Council regarding the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass which is the heart of the Church and the purpose of the priesthood. Thus we wish to thank you for having come in such numbers to support us in the accomplishment of this ceremony.
We turn to the Blessed Virgin Mary. You well know, my dear brethren, one must have told you of Leo XIII's prophetic vision revealing that one day "the See of Peter would become the seat of iniquity." He said it in one of his exorcisms, called "The Exorcism of Leo XIII." Has it come about today? Is it tomorrow? I do not know. But in any case it has been foretold. Iniquity may quite simply be error. Error is iniquity: to no longer profess the Faith of all time, the Catholic Faith, is a grave error. If ever there was an iniquity, it is this. And I really believe that there has never been a greater iniquity in the Church than Assisi, which is contrary to the First Commandment of God and the First Article of the Creed. It is incredible that something like that could have ever taken place in the Church, in the eyes of the whole Church — how humiliating! We have never undergone such a humiliation! You will be able to find all of this in [Daniel] Le Roux's booklet ["Peter Lovest-Thou Me?"] which has been especially published in order to give you information on the present situation in Rome.
It was not only the good Pope Leo XIII who said these things, but Our Lady prophesied them as well. Just recently, the priest who takes care of the Society's priory of Bogota, Colombia, brought me a book concerning the apparition of Our Lady of Buon Suceso, of "Good Success," to whom a large church in Quito, Ecuador, was dedicated. They were received by a nun shortly after the Council of Trent, so you see, quite a few centuries ago. This apparition has been thoroughly recognized by Rome and the ecclesiastical authorities; a magnificent church was built for the Blessed Virgin Mary wherein the faithful of Ecuador venerate with great devotion a picture of Our Lady, whose face was made miraculously. The artist was in the process of painting it when he found the face of the Holy Virgin miraculously formed. And Our Lady prophesied for the twentieth century, saying explicitly that during the nineteenth century and most of the twentieth century, errors would become more and more widespread in Holy Church, placing the Church in a catastrophic situation. Morals would become corrupt and the Faith would disappear. It seems impossible not to see it happening today.
I excuse myself for continuing this account of the apparition but she speaks of a prelate who will absolutely oppose this wave of apostasy and impiety — saving the priesthood by forming good priests. I do not say that prophecy refers to me. You may draw your own conclusions. I was stupefied when reading these lines but I cannot deny them, since they are recorded and deposited in the archives of this apparition.
Of course, you well know the apparitions of Our Lady at La Salette, where she says that Rome will lose the Faith, that there will be an "eclipse" at Rome; an eclipse, see what Our Lady means by this.
And finally, more recently, the secret of Fatima. Without a doubt, the Third Secret of Fatima must have made an allusion to this darkness which has invaded Rome, this darkness which has invaded the world since the Council. And surely it is because of this, without a doubt, that John XXIII judged it better not to publish the Secret: it would have been necessary to take measures, such steps as he possibly felt himself incapable of doing, for example completely changing the orientations which he was beginning to take in view of the Council, and for the Council. These are the facts upon which, I think, we can lean.
We place ourselves in God's providence. We are convinced that God knows what He is doing. Cardinal Gagnon visited us twelve years after the suspension: after twelve years of being spoken of as outside of the communion of Rome, as rebels and dissenters against the Pope, his visit took place. He himself recognized that what we have been doing is just what is necessary for the reconstruction of the Church. The Cardinal even assisted pontifically at the Mass which I celebrated on December 8, 1987, for the renewal of the promises of our seminarians. I was supposedly suspended and, yet, after twelve years, I was practically given a clean slate. They said we have done well. Thus we did well to resist! I am convinced that we are in the same circumstances today. We are performing an act which apparently — and unfortunately the media will not assist us in the good sense, the headlines will, of course, be "Schism!" "Excommunication!" to their heart's content — and, yet, we are convinced that all these accusations of which we are the object, all penalties of which we are the object, are null, absolutely null and void, and we will take no account of them. Just as I took no account of the suspension, and ended up by being congratulated by the Church and by progressive churchmen, so likewise in several years — I do not know how many, only the Good Lord knows how many years it will take for Tradition to find its rights in Rome — we will be embraced by the Roman authorities, who will thank us for having maintained the Faith in our seminaries, in our families, in civil societies, in our countries, and in our monasteries and our religious houses, for the greater glory of God and the salvation of souls.
In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.
☩ ☩ ☩
An Analysis of Fr. Pagliarani's Consecrations Sermon
Écône — 1st July, 2026
Écône — 1st July, 2026
Source: https://fsspx.news/en/news/econe-2026-fr...ions-59927
and: https://youtu.be/5EURjpGfKEA?
[Emphasis - The Catacombs]
Because it is so long and uninspiring, we will forgo our usual habit of reproducing the entire text at length. I have read it thoroughly, more than once, so that you don't have to! The reader who wishes to read the whole thing for himself will find it without difficulty on several SSPX websites, including those linked above.
Fr. Pagliarani begins his sermon by posing a rhetorical question:
Quote:"What is the significance of this day, precisely? Why are we here? How are we to understand these consecrations? ... What does this mean for us?"
...to which he then goes on to provide his own answer. He provides a superficial three part answer whose structure is to talk about Faith, Hope and Charity. "First of all, this ceremony must be a manifestation of [the] faith," he says. Good, that looks promising. "We cannot modify, reinterpret, or reconsider it," he adds. This looks very promising. All he has to do now is point out where the attack on the Faith is coming from and the justification for the SSPX disobeying modern Rome will become almost self-evident.
1. Faith — no mention of the conciliar elephant in the room
Alas, that second shoe never drops. Fr. Pagliarani never gets around to saying why anyone might risk altering or modifying the Faith. Where is the pressure coming from to alter the Faith? Who has been modifying or reinterpreting the Faith in recent years? He does not say.
Quote:"The more the Faith is attacked, the more it disappears, the more this duty becomes urgent, because, without the Faith, it is impossible to please God, it is impossible to live well, it is impossible to be saved. And today we are taking exceptional measures, proportionate to this necessity."
Attacked by whom, one wonders? Whence does this "necessity" arise?
Quote:"Now, some might consider that we are faced with a dilemma. We are choosing the integral Faith, but we are separating ourselves from the Church. We would be in the process of choosing between the Faith and the Church. In order to preserve the Faith, are we breaking with the Church? This is a false dilemma. We belong to the Church first of all through the Faith, through the integral profession of the Faith, through the integral profession of the Faith of the Church. ... we belong to the Church because we profess the same Faith. It is therefore a false dilemma into which we cannot enter, because we cannot choose between the Faith and the Church; no one can choose. We want the Faith of the Church in order to remain in the Church. We want the Church through the Faith, in the Faith."
Wouldn't this be the ideal moment to remind people that the "church" which declared Archbishop Lefebvre schismatic is the conciliar church? But no, that distinction is never made. There is no mention, no hint of such a thing as the conciliar church, just "the Church" without any distinction. And yet that is the real reason for the "false dilemma" which he mentions: what is being asked, what was demanded of Archbishop Lefebvre back in the day, is to put the conciliar church before the Catholic Faith. But because Fr. Pagliarani doesn't say this, his point about a false dilemma remains rather unclear.
Quote:"It is very important to understand this, even if those facing us do not wish to understand it. All of this is not a matter of opinion, it is not a matter of personal sensibility, nor an option: it is a necessity."
Again, what is this "necessity" and what is its cause?
Quote:"We are accused of not loving the Pope, we are accused of not respecting him. But it is precisely because we love the Pope, sincerely, as the Vicar of Christ, as the head of the Church, that we no longer wish to see the Pope humiliated in the company of false shepherds, representatives of false religions. How many times have we seen this throughout all these years?"
So it's not that we're at war with a conciliar church which hates the Catholic Church and has tried to supplant it? It's that we just love the Pope so much ("Wuv, wuv, wuv!") and don't want to see him humiliated. Not that he himself is the instigator of his own humiliation? Not that his own humiliation is the least of the evils which he personally is inflicting on everyone else?
Quote:"It is because we love the Vicar of Christ that we no longer wish this humiliation for the Pope, a humiliation which falls upon the whole Church, treated on an equal footing with false religions."
Doesn't this make it sound as though the Pope (Leo, as it happens, but Francis before him, and the other conciliar Popes before him…) is somehow a passive victim of "this humiliation" and not its main instigator? And where does this being treated "on an equal footing with all [false] religions" come from, one wonders? Could it perhaps be that there was an event in the 1960s, say, a Council, for instance, at which a false doctrine was proclaimed, let's call it… oh, I don't know, Ecumenism? Could there be a more obvious elephant in the room?
He continues:
Quote:"But then, we have explained all of this many times. We have explained it in almost every language that exists on the face of the earth. Why are we not understood? Why, fundamentally, do we speak different languages? ... We speak the language of the Faith, the language of Tradition. And, before us, we are dealing with a language which operates at another level, which speaks of other things. It is the language of inclusion, of listening, of dialogue and of accompaniment."
So the problem in the Church, the cause of the crisis, the justification for the "necessity" of these new consecrations, is that people (who, exactly?) are using "the language of inclusion, of listening, of dialogue"…? If you were a convert new to Tradition, or a potential convert, how clear would you find this? Fr. Pagliarani is clearly avoiding naming the problem, the cause of the crisis in the Church: Vatican II. And whilst it is true that the SSPX, for the most part, does still "speak the language of Tradition," what that means in practice is that it still uses lots of "Traditional Catholic" vocabulary. For the most part. But even that is beginning to fall by the wayside. And I still haven't seen any mention of the conciliar church or even of Vatican II yet.
Quote:"We want the Faith. And then, in the Faith, we accompany people. We listen to people in the Faith, in order to bring them to the Faith and to convert them."
How's that for a new motto, a new mission statement for the modern, liberal SSPX? "We accompany people in the Faith"…!
After once again lamenting a vague and unspecified "difficulty in understanding one another" because "we speak different languages," Fr. Pagliarani moves on from Faith to Hope.
2. Hope! (and Joy!)
Quote:"We also live these consecrations in hope. We do not live them in controversy, nor in tension, nor in bitterness, nor in resentment. We live these consecrations in joy and in hope."
Oh thank goodness! Don't you just hate controversy and tension! And who doesn't love joy and hope?
Quote:"In 1988, those who condemned the Society foresaw its dissolution. Providence had another plan. Why did Providence have another plan? Your presence here today demonstrates it. God has not abandoned us, and God will not abandon us."
True. But you can abandon Him: surely that is the more relevant point. You may be the same SSPX in purely worldly, legal, corporate terms, but you are a long way from 1988 in spirit. He then mentions the Incarnation, concerning which he adds:
Quote:"Because the supreme law, the law of God, is the salvation of souls. This is why God has not abandoned us and will not abandon us; He will always provide us with means proportionate to our needs. If the work of the Redemption can encounter obstacles on the part of men, it will never encounter obstacles on the part of God. But the more we suffer, the more we struggle, the more we strive to be faithful to Him, the more He is with us, and He shows us this."
Also true. But again, the question you should be asking is not whether God has whimsically decided to abandon you, but whether you have remained faithful to Him. And I mean institutionally faithful, not merely faithful on a level of personal sin (of which we are all guilty).
Quote:"If we continue to seek the will of God, the good of souls, whatever the cost, we shall never lack anything."
Was it the will of God that SSPX faithful get the covid vaccines? Was that for the good of their souls? Is declaring that Vatican II "enlightens and deepens" Tradition an example of remaining faithful to him, or that the New Mass and new conciliar rites were "legitimately promulgated by Popes Paul VI and John Paul II"…? We could go on. Fine words do not a faithful servant make. Talk is cheap. Actions speak louder than words. Anyone can preach a sermon about how we need to remain faithful to Almighty God — practicing it is another matter.
3. "Charity"
Last of all comes charity.
Quote:"But above all, these consecrations must be understood and lived in a spirit of charity: charity towards souls, and charity above all towards the Church. The more souls are disoriented and confused, the more we must seek them, the more we must support them."
Charity towards which "church"? The Catholic Church, or the conciliar church? And just why is it that so many souls are confused and disoriented like never before? That elephant is still there!
Quote:"The more the Church is dishonoured, the more the splendour of her divinity is obscured, the more we must love her, we must serve her, and we must be ready to pay any price to serve the Church."
Dishonoured by whom, and why? What exactly is the problem, what is going on in the Church — is anyone any the wiser so far?
Quote:"The greatest of the sacrifices that God can ask of us is that of being treated as rebels, when we want to serve and love the Church as a Mother."
Doesn't it sound as though the "Church" which treats us as rebels is the exact same "Church" which we are trying "to serve and love"? To anyone new to the SSPX who is not familiar with Archbishop Lefebvre, this must be so confusing!
Quote:"We want to serve her as a Mother. A Mother in difficulty, overwhelmed, suffering; a Mother who is also sometimes betrayed; a Mother who needs, and deserves, that we help her, that we do something in the name of all that she has given us."
In difficulty with what? Overwhelmed by what, suffering from what? Betrayed by whom?
Quote:"Everything that we have received, we have received through the Church, in the Church. The Faith which we wish to bear witness to today and by which we wish to live comes to us from the Church. It is in the name of what we have received from her, and it is in the name of what she is — the Spouse of Christ, His Mystical Body — it is in the name of all this that we must do what is possible, as much as possible, to help and support her."
Help her and support her — it sounds like she's in serious difficulty! Do tell more…
Quote:"Could we remain indifferent, doing nothing? 'It is not our problem'? That is not what is asked of us. Can the Society remain indifferent? No. That would be to betray the Church, that would be to lack charity; we cannot do this."
Indifferent to what, exactly? Are you getting the picture, dear reader? How very tedious this all is. If you feel frustrated reading it, just imagine how I feel reading it, analysing it and writing about it! The next few minutes of the sermon are standard stuff. The Precious Blood. Sin is evil, evil is sin, and so forth. Then things begin to get a bit more interesting.
The Exaltation of Man
Quote:"[There is] one particular sin to which I draw your attention. This sin is always the same, from the beginning of humanity until today: it is the exaltation of man. We are saturated, we are literally saturated everywhere with this exaltation of man. Man who is altogether wonderful, man who is perfect, man who is astonishing, man who supposedly possesses infinite dignity. Well, in reality, all of this leads to pride. And, in the long term, it leads to contempt for God and to apostasy, to silent apostasy. That is where it comes from.
And the more man is exalted in a mad, fanatical way, the more, ultimately, he is distanced from God, and he is distanced from his perfection and his true good; it is a disaster. Man, full of rights, full of himself, incapable of turning towards God, incapable of recognising that he is wounded by sin and that he needs the Redemption. He needs Our Lord, he needs His Most Precious Blood. This is the great evil of today, of all history: the evil which encompasses all the others. This plague is a scourge, an obsessive idea which, it must be acknowledged, penetrates deeply even into the Church. This plague makes people blind; it paralyses souls. This is not what brings souls back to God."
This is the closest Fr. Pagliarani gets to naming the Council, the errors of Vatican II, the conciliar church and its false teaching, and all the rest. And of course, he doesn't name any of those things. As before, one is left wondering whether this "saturation" leading to "silent apostasy" has always been such a big problem, or whether it got worse recently (since the 1960s, for instance?). He does say that it is "the great evil of today" — but then he adds "of all history." So I guess there's nothing particularly bad about how things are today compared with a few hundred years ago, then? If it is such a "plague" and "a scourge" then surely it would be worthwhile naming the sources of this plague, this scourge, especially if it has somehow penetrated "deeply even into the Church" (and how and when did that happen, one wonders?).
Then comes more about the Incarnation, the Redemption. Nothing wrong with it, but it is unremarkable in itself. The Precious Blood and the Blessed Virgin Mary and the Cross. The new bishops will have a responsibility to preach those things, he says. "What an honour, and what a responsibility!" All very well and good, but nothing that one might not hear at the FSSP or certain conservative Novus Ordo parishes — and if ever there was a time to point out what is unique about the SSPX then surely these episcopal consecrations would be that moment. But that is what he studiously avoids doing.
The Cross, he says, is "a stumbling block for the Jews and folly for the Gentiles. Folly, especially today, for an apostate world which cannot understand and does not want to understand." Aha, so is the world apostate in a way that it didn't used to be, is that what you're saying? If only he were able to elaborate!
Quote:"This wisdom of the Cross is the only antidote to this humanism which leads to indifference, to apostasy. You must always keep this humanism in your sights."
Humanism is an easy target, a low hanging fruit. What we all need to hear is who is pushing it and why, and how they have succeeded, and how we can most effectively fight against it. Imagine if Archbishop Lefebvre in 1988 had confined himself to preaching against a nameless, amorphous "humanism"! After this there follows more standard and frankly uninspiringly "normal" sermony-type stuff. Our Lord is a lamb, what a beautiful image, the new bishops are like lambs sent amongst wolves (*yawn*), and so forth. Then comes a lot of very fine talk which is the very worst type of hypocrisy.
Preaching what none of them practice
Quote:"This means that you must first preach through the innocence of your life; it is the innocence, the purity of your life, of your morals, which will give a moral authority to everything that you will preach."
Here is a timely reminder that the man preaching about purity of morals is the very same man who publicly endorsed the taking of covid vaccines less than five years ago. Every single Traditional Catholic who lost his job over those wretched "vaccines" was betrayed by Fr. Davide Pagliarani's craven submission to government tyranny and the will of men such as Bill Gates. There was even a group of Novus Ordo bishops who said not to get those vaccines! But Fr. Pagliarani, knowing all that, not only put out articles in all the SSPX publications, he even went in person to the Angelus conference and told everyone that it was fine, we can go ahead and have them. Worse, the SSPX openly cited as its justification for this the documents produced by the modernist Vatican whitewashing covid vaccines. What a lot of insincere hypocrisy. Clearly talk really is cheap, and actions really do speak louder than words.
Quote:"To be a lamb also means, and above all, perfect docility, perfect submission to the will of God. Just as Our Lord is constantly subject to the will of His Father, so you, by virtue of an even higher dignity from today onwards, must always seek His will."
More empty, cheap, insincere and hypocritical talk. Let us not forget: when Bishop Fellay was the Superior General he openly admitted to changing the entire stance of the SSPX towards modernist Rome in the March 2012 Cor Unum and then on American TV and on youtube in various interviews. This was a monumental act of betrayal, of disobedience to the previous SSPX Chapter which he was bound in conscience to obey and about as far from "perfect docility, perfect submission" as one can imagine. The 2012 General Chapter which met a few weeks later, to its lasting shame, let him off the hook without so much as a slap on the wrist, largely at the instigation of — guess who? — that's right! — Fr. Davide Pagliarani, who was at that point District Superior of Italy. It should be clear by now to anyone who has been paying attention, that in the modern, liberal SSPX of 2026, "perfect docility, perfect submission to the will of God" really means: "Obey your superiors without question at all times, even if they contradict the will of God, even if they contradict what even they themselves were saying not so long ago!"
Quote:"... Our Lord, just as He is perfectly docile to the will of the Father, so He never bends before the spirit of the world. In order to serve the Father perfectly, He necessarily comes into conflict with the spirit of the world, with the spirit of the prince of this world. And likewise the bishop: just as he is docile to the will of God, so he constantly asserts before the world the rights of Our Lord, and not the rights of man. And a lion never flees, a lion does not retreat and, above all, a lion does not bend. Never bend before this spirit of the world, do not move, do not retreat; the consecration will give you an irresistible strength. From today onwards, throughout the whole world, there are people who are watching you, listening to you. In thirty, forty years, they must be able to say: They did not bend. They did not bend the knee before this spirit of the world. They bent the knee only before Our Lord the King."
The irony here, of course, is that that is a pretty good description of Archbishop Lefebvre. It is a laughable description of the inoffensive, politically correct SSPX of 2026, however. When was the last time a priest of the SSPX preached against the rainbow flag movement, or the evils of feminism, or the secret societies and their global conspiracy, or even the errors of the local diocese? Given that we are now most of the way through the sermon and there has still been no mention at all of Vatican II, the conciliar church, the New Mass, the new sacramental rites, or any of the errors of the modern conciliar churchmen even once, all this talk of not bending is just yet more cheap hypocrisy. This entire sermon is one giant act of bending! He has carefully crafted the sermon so as to make it look like he's saying the right things to his own people whilst also saying as little as possible to which the modernists in Rome could object. Thirty-seven minutes of bending, and in the middle of it all he tells the new bishops not to bend. Besides which, if they were the sort of men who refuse to bend then they wouldn't have been chosen in the first place! In fact, these days, one suspects, such men wouldn't even manage to get to the end of seminary and be ordained to the priesthood, let alone be selected to become bishops!
Quote:"They did not bend … That is the most beautiful thing that could be said about you at your death, the most beautiful memory that you could leave."
Tradidi quod et accepi is a fitting motto for Archbishop Lefebvre's tomb. I would suggest as a motto for Fr. Pagliarani and his confreres when the time comes, a more fitting motto would perhaps be Prodidimus quod accepimus et aliud tradidimus. They really are no different to the conciliar bishops of the 1970s in that regard.
Quote:"Why must a bishop be like a serpent? It is in order to discern, grasp, and detect the duplicity, ambiguity, and cunning that exist in the world and among the enemies of the Cross. Your worst enemies will not attack you head-on; they will try to make you slide gradually into a perception of the Faith, of the Christian life, and of relations with the world that is a little more up to date. That must be understood."
Once again — oh the irony, the hypocrisy! Do we really have to point it out? There is a timeless truth here: the greatest danger is usually the most subtle. The greatest danger to the SSPX faithful is not the modernism of Pope Francis or Pope Leo, but the far more subtle modernism of the SSPX, of Bishop Fellay, Fr. Pagliarani et al. Just as the modernism of the SSPX was never as dangerous to the Resistance faithful and priests as the modernism of Bishop Williamson. The more subtle and the closer to home, the greater the danger. The evil modernists in Rome conquered and neutralised the SSPX, as Fr. Pagliarani says, not by attacking it head on, but by sweet words, tasty cashew nuts and flattering gestures. Hence the SSPX of today has indeed slid "into a perception of the Faith, of the Christian life, and of relations with the world that is a little more up to date." He stands condemned from his own mouth.
Quote:"This is what it means to be like a serpent: to grasp the duplicity, the ambiguity, and the cunning that exist in the world, and to speak, to preach like doves: simply, without duplicity and without fear, without equivocation, without ambiguity."
To preach simply, without duplicity or fear or equivocation or ambiguity? What would that look like in practice? It would mean attacking Vatican II, attacking the current modernist authorities, pointing out that their sacraments are doubtful and their intentions evil and not to be trusted. It would mean pointing out that the last seven Popes in a row stand condemned by their predecessors. Once again, this is an accurate description of Archbishop Lefebvre but has nothing in common with the man preaching these fine words in 2026 nor the priestly society of which he is the superior. He is preaching an ambiguous, equivocal and (in all likelihood) duplicitous and fearful sermon, and in the midst of it this is the advice he gives them.
Quote:"And what else does Jesus say, what does Our Lord say? 'The brother shall deliver up his brother, the father his child, and you shall be hated by all because of Me, because of My name. Do not fear all this, for there is nothing hidden that will not be revealed, nothing secret that will not be known.' 'Do not fear all this,' Our Lord tells us. 'Let Me act, let Me judge; I Myself will intervene when necessary.' He has only one concern. What is it? 'Every one therefore that shall confess Me before men, I will also confess him before My Father who is in heaven.' Every man who will acknowledge My rights, My divinity, My Church, My Faith. 'Do not think that I came to send peace upon earth: I came not to send peace, but the sword.'"
How about the priests expelled in 2012 and 2013 merely for repeating what Archbishop Lefebvre had said, the faithful denied communion and driven out of chapels which were their spiritual homes? How's that for "brother against brother"…? And the others who heroically left before they could be expelled: why did they do that if not to confess Our Lord before men?
We are at the end of the sermon now, and at this point comes the one token, throw-away mention of a name which has been conspicuously absent so far: that's right, Archbishop Lefebvre. Have to get that tick in the box, can't have it said that he was never mentioned at all! Naturally, what he says about Archbishop Lefebvre is suitably vague and harmless.
Quote:"Another bishop, who is your model, closer to us, not yet canonised: Archbishop Lefebvre, certainly. Of him also one can say: zelus fidei sollicitus et multa perpessus. He had only one concern: it was the Faith itself, and, for this, he suffered greatly. This Faith, he saw clearly how it is summed up in the Holy Mass, in the defence of the Holy Mass, of the Most Precious Blood of Our Lord. What wisdom! How was he able, so many years ago, to grasp the causes of the crisis with such clarity, such insight, such strength?"
All of which is true, but notice that no details, no specifics are given. Fr. Pagliarani says that the Archbishop "was able to grasp the cause of the crisis" but he himself still hasn't yet said what this alleged "crisis" is, let alone the cause of it! The closest he came was complaining about a "humanism" which has "penetrated even into the Church" — is that what Archbishop Lefebvre saw and grasped so clearly, or is there a bit more to it than that?
Quote:"It is the wisdom of the Cross; the Cross that he carried was the source of his wisdom. Today, more than ever, his spirit is among us, he encourages us, he prays for us, he prays for you in particular, he shows us the path to follow, guided by this wisdom of the Cross."
"The path" which Archbishop Lefebvre "shows us to follow" is very simple and easy to understand and it is nowhere to be seen in this sermon, for the simple reason that Fr. Pagliarani is not following it. He is not following it because he doesn't believe in it. The Superior General of the modern, surrendered, compromised SSPX which has betrayed Archbishop Lefebvre is now telling his new bishops that Archbishop Lefebvre is showing them the way. Words fail me. I really can't take much more of this.
If this has been a slog and you need some refreshment, a "palate cleanser" for your mind, or if on the other hand you are not entirely convinced and think that I may be exaggerating, then I invite you — no I urge you! — to read (or re-read) Archbishop Lefebvre's sermon from the 1988 consecrations. The difference could not be more stark, it is like chalk and cheese, like night and day. That is the example left to Fr. Pagliarani and his confreres which he totally ignores, the way shown by their founder which they departed from some time ago.
Archbishop Lefebvre preached clearly and fearlessly. By contrast, Fr. Pagliarani seems to preach equivocally, ambiguously, and with an overpowering fear of offending the modernist enemy which prevents him even from naming them. This is what comes of compromising the Faith, as Archbishop Lefebvre said so well about the Indultists of the late '80s. Surely his words apply equally well to the SSPX today?
"It is evident that by putting themselves in the hands of the current conciliar authorities, they are implicitly accepting the Council and the ensuing reforms, even if they have [the Traditional Mass] ... Their speech is paralyzed because of this acceptance." — Archbishop Lefebvre, Letter to Fr. Couture, 18th March 1989
"So let us be confident, let us not be unprepared, let us not be outflanked, let us be wise, vigilant, fighting against those who are trying to tear the faith out of our souls and morality out of our hearts, so that we may remain Catholics, remain united to the Blessed Virgin Mary, remain united to the Roman Catholic Church, remain faithful children of the Church."- Abp. Lefebvre