Our Lady of
"I am the Immaculate Conception"
thou art the joy of Israel,
thou art the honor of our people.
Judith xv, 10 -- Tract,
Mass of the Apparition of the Immaculate Virgin Mary
ATTEMPTS
ARE AFOOT TO MAKE THE VISIBLE FOUNDATION OF UNITY,
Recently
the Successor of Peter has been the object of
unprecedented outrage. It is unprecedented because part of the cause of
the
outrage has its origin among those who should be closest to the Supreme
Pontiff.
The
Directors and spiritual guides of the National Coalition of
Clergy and Laity apostolate, therefore, propose at least one day of
reparation and
petition leading to the feast of Our Lady of Lourdes, 11th February.
In reparation, one could, e.g.: 1.) request holy Mass to be offered for
the intention; 2.) offer one's own suffering/s for a prescribed period
for the intention; 3.) fast for a time; 4.) give an alms, or offer up
some other pious act - for instance at work or school - in
a spirit of humble sacrifice.
In petition, one could, e.g.: 1.) assist at holy Mass praying also in
reparation 2.)
offer one's personal or family prayers, such as the holy Rosary or a
novena to Our Blessed Lady of Lourdes.
If you agree to this proposal, it would be helpful to give this the
greatest
publicity (no need to mention NCCL by name). All good Catholics should
make
reparation, since outrage against the Vicar of Christ is a grave
offense
against Our Lord Jesus Christ. Moreover, faithful Catholics must storm
heaven,
and be seen to do so, asking Our Blessed Mother to protect the Vicar of
her
divine Son, Our Lord and Saviour.
In
our humble opinion, this will have much greater effects
than any other thing we might do. This should not exclude other
emergency expressions
of loyalty to the Holy Father. It should, however, take pride of place.
That is because we must be particularly uneasy about a neo-Pelagian
spirit with which a
certain type of Catholic attempts to defend the Church. We form part
of the Church
Militant not because we fight or engage in battle with her, the
Church’s,
enemies, but because we wage war against the “old man” which the
Apostle
Paul reminds us is in each one of us. Until we kill, with divine
grace, the “old
man,” the “new man” in us remains paralytic. We conquer and overcome
the world, with Christ, insofar as we allow the world to see Him in
(each one
of) us. For that is part of the starting point of the Catholic
apostolate in
our lives, as taught by the French Trappist abbot, Dom Jean-Baptiste
Chautard
(cf. Soul of the Apostolate):
“The
evangelization of people is but a result of one’s inner
life of union with God.”
“The Incarnation and the Redemption establish Jesus as the
Source, and the only Source,
of
this divine life which all men are called upon to share... Failure on
the part
of the apostle, to realise this principle, and the illusion that he
could
produce the slightest trace of supernatural life without borrowing
every bit of
it from Jesus Christ, would lead us to believe that his ignorance of
theology was equaled
only by his stupid self-conceit.”
Soul of the Apostolate
Incidentally, Archbishop Lefebvre gave pride of place to the writings of Dom Chautard. Few people know that although he came from a rich family, initially the future Archbishop wanted to become a Trappist laybrother. Born not far from the Abbey of Mont des Cats, in the Pas de Calais, the Archbishop‘s cousin was a monk in that Trappist monastery.