Paix liturgique

It must be acknowledged that today, it is often the faithful who assume the responsibility of doing what the bishops should be doing, i.e. the leaders appointed to care for the community. A recent example: on July 12, the Pro Fide Ecclesiæ movement was formed in Offenbach am Main, Germany. Its aim is to unite German Catholics who have remained faithful to the Magisterium of the Church and who wish to defend the Catholic faith against the errors of the Synodal Path and, in general, against the increasingly evident errors of German Catholicism, as was made clear in Würzburg during the 104th Katholikentag (a biennial meeting of German Catholics that is a focus generating heterodoxy).

Every baptized person must defend the faith, but isn't that the primary function of the Successors of the Apostles? Nevertheless, German bishops are doing the exact opposite with complete impunity, and Rome isn't even attempting to reverse this trend through the right appointments. Bishop Hanke of Eichstätt, a notorious opponent of the Synodal Path, recently retired and has been replaced by Bishop Würtz, auxiliary bishop of Freiburg, who advocates for a "re-evaluation" of homosexuality and blessing ceremonies for same-sex couples. It's worth noting that the new prefect of the Congregation for Bishops, Archbishop Filippo Iannone, avoids the appointment of more classic bishops. The result is that, in Germany, the Catholic faith is not being defended by the bishops, but by the Christian people, instead of the bishops, and indeed against them.

Everywhere, and not only in Germany, we must recognize the paradoxical situation in which the faithful have found themselves over the past five decades: guided by the instinct of faith, in order to preserve the Catholic catechism and a liturgy purely Catholic, they have been forced to organize themselves independently of their parish priests, and even against them. Father Congar dreamed of subverting Tridentine ecclesiology and inverting the hierarchical pyramid of the Church, placing its base at the top and its apex at the bottom. And now, it is the defenders of Tridentine theology who are forced to play the game of democratization because of the shortcomings of the hierarchy.

Certainly, there have been priests—by definition collaborators of the bishops—who have come to the aid of these faithful forced to take matters into their own hands, as did bishops, cardinals, and entire priestly communities that formed themselves as communities “of suppliance”, beginning with that of Archbishop Lefebvre, who considered himself as what might be called a “bishop of suppliance” and who ensured that his Fraternity would guarantee the continuity of this episcopate “of suppliance”. But the vast majority of pastors remained passive, even hostile, to these movements of the faithful.

Let us be clear: when I speak of “bishops of suppliance,” I do not mean reducing their function to a mere sacramental service to the faithful (however indispensable as this may be). Bishops are bishops for the whole Church, insofar as, even without jurisdiction, a retired bishop, a cardinal without curial functions, or an auxiliary bishop of a diocese, without holding a jurisdictional office, are Successors of the Apostles in full and share in the care of the whole Church.

In fact, the German faithful gathered at Pro Fide Ecclesiae were also joined by a bishop from German-speaking Switzerland, Bishop Eleganti, former auxiliary bishop of the Diocese of Chur, who declared: “We want to defend the faith against heretical interpretations!” This clearly lends much more force to this Catholic response.

Furthermore, with regard to the liturgical question that concerns us so much, all the battles we wage to ensure that Mass and the sacraments may be celebrated according to the traditional rite take on a completely different dimension each time a bishop or a cardinal is involved. Thus, Bishop Schneider asked Pope Leo XIV to promulgate an apostolic constitution to "liberate" the traditional liturgy.

And what would have become of this struggle, initiated by priests and the faithful as soon as Paul VI's missal was promulgated, if Archbishop Lefebvre had not opposed with all his forces, both in word and deed (by ordaining priests), the reception of that missal?

It is easy to imagine that the landscape of the post-Vatican II era would have been different if not only two, Cardinals Ottaviani and Bacci, but all the bishops and cardinals hostile to the liturgical reform—Cardinal Siri, Bishop Carli, and others—had signed the Brief Critical Study of the New Ordo Missae.

It is clear that the struggle for the traditional liturgy is greatly bolstered by Cardinal Burke's assertion that "the liturgy, as practiced according to the usus antiquior of the Roman Rite, is an invaluable treasure of the Church that must be preserved and cherished, for it is intimately linked to the very identity of the Roman Catholic Church" and that "it is evident that this liturgy is missionary," and that "it attracts by its sense of the sacred and the transcendent" (Le cardinal Burke répond à nos questions : entretien exclusif à Chartres).

Faithful at large and some bishops. It has sometimes been said that the story of the people of the Vendée, who came to seek out and call upon their lords to guide them in resisting a Revolution that persecuted their Mass, is repeating itself today.

"Bishops, !" Come to the aid of all these faithful who are organizing to defend the faith and worship! Like those exemplary Parisian sentinels, whose tenacity is evident in their recitation of the rosary at number 10 rue du Cloître-Notre-Dame, from Monday to Friday, from 1:00 to 1:30 pm, in Saint-Georges de La Villette, at number 114 avenue Simon Bolivar, on Wednesdays and Fridays at 5:00 pm, in front of Notre-Dame du Travail, and on Sundays at 6.15 pm.