Number CDXCVIII (498)
   
January 28, 2017
Benevolent Ally?

A V II bishop wishes Tradcats well? –
But can he see how V II leads to Hell?

Bishop Athanasius Schneider, originally from Germany but now a Bishop of Astana in Kazakhstan, has made himself known to Traditionalists in recent years for his many statements at least apparently sympathetic to Catholic Tradition. For instance last year he associated himself publicly with the four Cardinals’ questioning of Pope Francis’ doctrine in the papal docuмent, Amoris Laetitia. When he himself does so much to criticize the Church swinging “left,” he may not understand or appreciate coming under attack from the “right,” but it is the Truth which is at stake, not our little personalities. Your Excellency, thank you for much truth that you have had the courage openly to defend, but do understand that the full Truth is much stronger, and more demanding, than you think. You gave recently an interview to Adelante la Fe. Please do not take it personally if I quote (in italics) a few of your answers and criticize them:?—

I am convinced that in the present circuмstances, Msgr. Lefebvre would accept Rome’s canonical proposal of a Personal Prelature without hesitation. Your Excellency, that is impossible. Archbishop Lefebvre believed, and proved by argument from Church theology and history, that Vatican II was an unprecedented betrayal, by the highest authorities in the Church, of 1900 years of unchangeable Church doctrine. But official Rome is still following that objectively treacherous Council. Therefore to put the SSPX under this Rome will be to put the fox in charge of the hen-coop. The Archbishop always hoped Rome would come right. It has still not done so.

Msgr. Lefebvre was a man with a deep”sensus ecclesiae,” or sense of the Church. That is true, because above all he had a deep and clear grasp of Catholic doctrine, or teaching, which is at the heart of the Church. “Going, TEACH all nations,” was Jesus’ last instruction to his Apostles (M t.XXVIII , 20). Vatican II betrayed Catholic doctrine, so the Archbishop’s very sense of the Church made him repudiate that Council. Today’s Conciliarists in Rome can never rebuild the Church.

He consecrated four bishops in 1988 because he was convinced that there was a real state of necessity. It was the objective crisis that gave rise to the subjective conviction, and not the other way round. Our modern world is mentally sick with subjectivism. The Archbishop was an objectivist.

If the SSPX remains canonically independent for too long, its members and followers will lose their sense of the need to be subject to the Pope, and they will end up ceasing to be Catholic. The Pope is Pope in order to “confirm his brethren” in the Faith. See Luke XXII, 32. If he is a Conciliar Pope with his faith corrupted by Vatican II, he can no longer give what he has not got. It is by being subject to Conciliar Popes that countless Catholics since the Council have lost the true Faith.

No Catholic can pick and choose which Popes he will or will not be subject to. God guides His Church. The present crisis in the Church is unprecedented because never before in Church history has there been a series of Popes out of line with the true Faith as we have seen since Vatican II. This means that Catholics must – exceptionally – judge their Popes, bishops and priests. By this crisis God is purifying His Church, and when the purification is complete, He will grant to His Church a great and truly Catholic Pope.

I have told Bishop Fellay, we in Rome need the SSPX in today’s great battle for the purity of the Faith. Your Excellency, do believe that Conciliar Rome will do its best to complete the SSPX’s corruption of the Faith. Already the official SSPX has slidden far from the Archbishop’s objective Faith.

Kyrie eleison.

And Bp. Williamson's conclusion...

["No Catholic can pick and choose which Popes he will or will not be subject to. God guides His Church. The present crisis in the Church is unprecedented because never before in Church history has there been a series of Popes out of line with the true Faith as we have seen since Vatican II. This means that Catholics must – exceptionally – judge their Popes, bishops and priests. By this crisis God is purifying His Church, and when the purification is complete, He will grant to His Church a great and truly Catholic Pope." ]

 
Is substantiated by St. Francis of Assisi's deathbed prophecy:


The Saint Prophesies Great Schisms and Tribulation in the Church

A short time before the holy Father's death, he called together his Children and warned them of the coming troubles saying: 'Act bravely my Brethren; take courage and trust in the Lord. The time is fast approaching in which there will be great trials and afflictions; perplexities and dissensions, both spiritual and temporal, will abound; the charity of many will grow cold, and the malice of the wicked will increase. The devils will have unusual power, and the purity of our Order and of others will be so much obscured that there will be very few Christians who will obey the true Sovereign Pontiff and the Roman Church with true hearts and perfect charity.

At the time of this tribulation a man, not canonically elected, will be raised to the Pontificate, who by his cunning, will endeavor to draw many into error and death. Then scandals will be multiplied. Our Order will be divided and others entirely destroyed, because they will consent to error instead of opposing it. There will be such diversity of opinions and schisms among the people, the religious and the clergy that except those days were shortened according to the words of the Gospel, even the elect would fall into error were they not specially guided, amid such great confusion by the immense mercy of God. Then our Rule and manner of life will be violently opposed by some, and terrible trials will come upon us. Those who are found faithful will receive the crown of life. But woe to those, who trusting solely in their order shall fall into tepidity for they will not be able to support the temptations permitted for the proving of the elect.

Those who preserve their fervor and adhere to virtue with love and zeal for the truth, will suffer injuries and persecutions as rebels and schismatics; for their persecutors, urged on by the evil spirits will say they are doing a great service to God by destroying such pestilent men from the face of the earth. But the Lord will be the refuge of the afflicted and save all who trust in Him. And in order to be like their Head these, the elect will act with confidence, and by their death will purchase for themselves eternal life; choosing to obey God rather than man. they will fear nothing and they will prefer to perish rather than consent to falsehood and perfidy. Some preachers will keep silence about the truth and others will trample it underfoot, and deny it. Sanctity of life will be held in derision even by those who outwardly profess it, for in those days, Our Lord Jesus Christ will send them not a true Pastor but a destroyer.
[/b]
Source: WORKS OF THE SERAPHIC FATHER ST. FRANCIS OF ASSISI,

TRANSLATED BY A RELIGIOUS OF THE ORDER

R. WASHBOURNE, 18 PATERNOSTER ROW, LONDON, 1882

IMPRAMATUR. +WILLIAM BERNARD, BISHOP OF BIRMINGHAM

See Chapter XIII Pages: 248, 249, 250

PDF Book Link

Thank you Incredulous! The last public interview of Sr. Lucia of Fatima also fits in today's context. Note there is no mention of the Traditionalist movement nor the TLM:


Sister Lucy’s Last Public Interview - 1957

Fr. Augustin Fuentes


http://www.traditioninaction.org/HotTopics/g23ht_Interview.html

    A reader recently noted that the interview Sister Lucy gave to Fr. Augustin Fuentes in 1957, is always partially reported, and asked TIA if we could post the full text. To assist in this request we are now posting the most complete text available of the 1957 interview with our own translation from the original Spanish. Fr. Augustín Fuentes was the Mexican priest named vice-postulator of the cause of beatification for Francisco and Jacinta. In that interview Sr. Lucy said that Our Lady told her: “The last means that God will give to the world for its salvation are the Holy Rosary and My Immaculate Heart.”

    This important conversation of December 26, 1957 was the last public interview of Sr. Lucy. After it, permission was refused for any other interviews and she was effectively silenced and completely hidden away for the next several decades.

    Another very jovial Sr. Lucy appeared 10 years later in 1967 during Paul VI’s visit to Fatima. This Sr. Lucy, square-faced, cheerful and robust – incredibly different from the oval faced, sad and pale Sr. Lucy who spoke to Fr. Fuentes - was seen more regularly starting in 1982, after John Paul II’s visit to Fatima. [See our Two Sister Lucys' analysis]

    These are the authentic words of her 1957 conversation with Fr. Fuentes, which came from the records of the official archivist of Fatima, Fr. Joaquín María Alonso, CMF. Fr. Alonso spoke with Sr. Lucy and publicly testified that her statements to Fr. Fuentes in 1957 were genuine and true.

    This text is from his book, La verdad sobre el Secreto de Fátima, Fátima sin mitos [The Truth about the Secret of Fatima without Myths ]. The text has the approval and imprimatur of Archbishop Sánchez of Santa Cruz, Mexico.

    What follows is the literal translation of Fr. Fuentes' text reporting what he heard "from the lips of" the seer of Fatima.    TIA





Interview of December 26, 1957

Speaking to the sisters of Motherhouse of the Missionaries of the Sacred Heart in Mexico on May 22, 1958, Fr. Fuentes said, “I want to tell you the last conversation I had with her [Sister Lucy], which was on December 26 of last year. It was in the convent, where I found her very sad, pale and drawn.”


He then proceeded to read Sister’s Lucy’s words to him at the December 26, 1957, interview:

“Father, the Blessed Virgin is very sad because no one has paid attention to her Message, neither the good nor the bad. The good, because they continue on the road of goodness, but without paying mind to this Message. The bad, because of their sins, do not see God’s chastisement already falling on them presently; they also continue on their path of badness, ignoring the Message. But, Father, you must believe me that God is going to punish the world and chastise it in a tremendous way.

“The chastisement from Heaven is imminent. The year 1960 is on us, and then what will happen? It will be very sad for everyone, and far from a happy thing if the world does not pray and do penance before then. I cannot give more details, because it is still a secret. By the will of the Blessed Virgin, only the Holy Father and the Bishop of Fatima can know the secret. Both have chosen, however, not to open it in order not to be influenced by it. (1)

“This is the third part of the Message of Our Lady, which still remains secret until 1960. Tell them, Father, that the Blessed Virgin said repeatedly – to my cousins Francisco and Jacinta as well as to me – that many nations would disappear from the face of the earth, that Russia would be the instrument of chastisement from Heaven for the whole world if the conversion of that poor Nation is not obtained beforehand. …”

A decisive battle with the Devil


“Father, the Devil is fighting a decisive battle against the Virgin and, as you know, what most offends God and what will gain him the greatest number of souls in the shortest time is to gain the souls consecrated to God. For this also leaves unprotected the field of the laity and the Devil can more easily seize them.

”Also, Father, tell them that my cousins Francisco and Jacinta made sacrifices because they always saw the Blessed Virgin was very sad in all her apparitions. She never smiled at us. This anguish that we saw in her, caused by offenses to God and the chastisements that threaten sinners, penetrated our souls. And being children, we did not know what measures to devise except to pray and make sacrifices. …”

We cannot wait for Rome to speak

Referring to the vision of Hell that Our Lady showed her and Jacinta and Francisco, she said:

“For this reason, Father, it is my mission not just to tell about the material punishments that will certainly come over the earth if the world does not pray and do penance. No, my mission is to tell everyone the imminent danger we are in of losing our souls for all eternity if we remain fixed in sin.

“Father, we should not wait for a call to the world from Rome on the part of the Holy Father to do penance. Nor should we wait for a call for penance to come from the Bishops in our Dioceses, nor from our Religious Congregations. No, Our Lord has often used these means, and the world has not paid heed. So, now each one of us must begin to reform himself spiritually. Each one has to save not only his own soul, but also all the souls that God has placed on his pathway.

Two last remedies to save the world

“Father, the Blessed Virgin did not tell me that we are in the last times of the world, but I understood this for three reasons:

“The first is because she told me that the Devil is engaging in a battle with the Virgin, a decisive battle. It is a final battle where one party will be victorious and the other will suffer defeat. So, from now on, we are either with God or we are with the Devil; there is no middle ground.

“The second reason is because she told me, as well as my cousins, that God is giving two last remedies to the world: the Holy Rosary and devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary. And, being the last remedies, that is to say, they are the final ones, means that there will be no others.

“And the third, because in the plans of the Divine Providence, when God is going to chastise the world He always first exhausts all other remedies. When He sees that the world pays no attention whatsoever, then, as we say in our imperfect way of talking, with a certain fear He presents us the last means of salvation, His Blessed Mother.

If we despise and reject this last means, Heaven will no longer pardon us, because we will have committed a sin that the Gospel calls a sin against the Holy Spirit. This sin consists in openly rejecting – with full knowledge and will – the salvation that is put in our hands.

“Also, since Our Lord is a very good Son, He will not permit that we offend and despise His Blessed Mother. We have as obvious testimony the history of different centuries where Our Lord has shown us with terrible examples how He has always defended the honor of His Blessed Mother.

“Prayer and sacrifice are the two means to save the world. As for the Holy Rosary, Father, in these last times in which we are living, the Blessed Virgin has given a new efficacy to the praying of the Holy Rosary. This in such a way that there is no problem that cannot be resolved by praying the Rosary, no matter how difficult it is - be it temporal or above all spiritual - in the spiritual life of each of us or the lives of our families, be they our families in the world or Religious Communities, or even in the lives of peoples and nations.

“I repeat, there is no problem, as difficult as it may be, that we cannot resolve at this time by praying the Holy Rosary. With the Holy Rosary we will save ourselves, sanctify ourselves, console Our Lord and obtain the salvation of many souls.

“Then, there is devotion to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, our Most Holy Mother, holding her as the seat of mercy, goodness and pardon and the sure door to enter Heaven. This is the first part of the Message referring to Our Lady of Fatima, and the second part, which is briefer but no less important, refers to the Holy Father.”

    1. In 1943, the Bishop of Fatima José Correia da Silva authorized Sister Lucia to write down the Third Secret during her bout with pleurisy, which threatened her life. On June 17, 1944, this docuмent was officially placed in his hands. When Sister Lucia gave the letter to Bishop da Silva, she told him that he could read it, but he refused. Instead, he ordered the sealed docuмent to be kept in the safe of the Episcopal Curia. Pope Pius XII also chose not to read the message, and left it in the care of Bishop da Silva until 1957, when the sealed envelope was sent to Rome at his request.

I do hope that Bp. Schneider will read this excellent piece by Bp. Williamson, and seriously consider what it says.

As Bp. Williamson says..."the full Truth is much stronger, and more demanding than you think."