Letter from the Dominicans of Avrillé–No. 38 February 25

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Letter from the Dominicans of Avrillé

No. 38: January 2023

“Unless The Lord Build The House…

…they labor in vain that build it.” This verse from Psalm 126 assures us in advance that the construction of the New World Order is doomed to failure, as were the project of a gigantic tower in Babel and so many other utopias dreamed up by “masons.” At the time chosen by God, this project, which has come out of hell, will return there for the confusion of the devil and his minions.

The history of the world, says Saint Augustine, is that of the construction of two Cities: the City of God, cemented by love of God to the point of self-contempt, and the earthly City, or City of the Devil, by love of self to the point of contempt for God. But, while the divine City is built in silence and discretion, the devil’s City, unceasingly overturned and unceasingly under construction, announces itself with great fanfare and publicity.

Look at the “first stone” of the divine City: it appears in the manger of Bethlehem, unknown to most men, but not to the angels who come to sing their joy that the Kingdom of Heaven, somewhat disrupted by Lucifer’s revolt and Adam’s sin, was being rebuilt more beautiful than it was. Then compare with the dark kingdom foreseen by the United Nations Agenda 2030 and the World Economic Forum’s Great Reset…

Why two cities?

Why does the good Lord allow this double construction, when He could easily close down the devil’s construction site and let the children of God work quietly? The answer is simple and well known. If the sons of light were not persecuted by the sons of darkness, they would quickly fall asleep and forget to work.

But this is not the time for sleeping, as St. Paul reminded us in the epistle for the first Sunday of Advent: “It is already time to wake up from sleep” (Rom 13:11). We must not settle down on this earth, either. We are traveling, we must walk, we must advance, and this is done “with steps of love”, as the ancients used to say. That is why Jesus comes to visit us with His Cross to detach us from the earth, to turn us towards heaven, to encourage us to turn to Him and to offer him our sorrows and our labors. “The evils that press upon us here below,” says St. Gregory, “impel us to go to God (mala quæ nos hic premunt, ad Deum ire compellunt).”

Blessing of Roses

Let’s do our part

The building of the heavenly city is above all a spiritual matter: this city is built in heaven as we build up the “inner man” within us. Our good deeds, done for the love of God, make our virtues grow, especially charity. At the hour of our death, we will be judged on love and placed in the heavenly edifice in the place we have deserved. And if we find ourselves empty of charity – God forbid! -we will be mercilessly cast into the outer darkness.

However, even if the essential is invisible and takes place in souls, the heavenly city also has a visible aspect, notably in the buildings constructed for the glory of God. In spite of all the efforts of the enemies of the Church (and they are powerful – see the destruction carried out by the Protestants in the 16^th century, by the revolutionaries at the end of the 18^th century, or by the conciliarists in our days), they have not been able to erase all the religious monuments of the past which show us how God and his holy Mother are loved.

There is no lack of work sites today that deserve your help, but we would like to beg you for some help in building the new parish hall and school cafeteria, which you can see on the cover of this letter.

But, as our main concern is the building of the spiritual Jerusalem, we also ask for your prayers that we may be holy religious, and we assure you of ours.

The War Against Religious

This text is excerpted from a book by Father Marie-Antoine de Lavaur, a Capuchin (1825-1907), one of the founders of the Lourdes pilgrimage, who died in the odor of sanctity. In this book, written in 1879, he describes the wounds from which society suffers. A few months later, on March 29, 1880, the decrees against religious orders were published, which led to the expulsion of religious throughout France (261 establishments, from October 14 to November 8). This text has not aged a bit in almost a century and a half.

[Father Marie-Antoine fictitiously has an angel speak to a pilgrim:]

The angel: I told you, Pilgrim, after a great Doctor, two loves have built two cities. Inspired by this thought, a Christian orator [Father Felix in a sermon in the cathedral of Notre-Dame] said these words: “Two currents carry the new generations in two diametrically opposed directions: one goes to Jesus Christ, the other goes away from Him.”

“The first of these two currents is vast and deep. It follows in a divine silence its slow and progressive march, in spite of the shudders of the passions as they strike the shore. The second grows like a torrent, it is violent, it rushes, it leaps, it foams. It strikes with a crash against the obstacle that rises up, the immovable granite. But, like the torrent, it will pass quickly and will leave behind it only the vestiges of its disasters. This is the anti-Christian current, this is anti-Christianity. It tries once again to overthrow this religion that is always killed and never knows how to die.”

The current that goes to Jesus Christ leads to religious life. The current that goes away Him, flees from this sublime life. The eternal glory of the religious life, pious Pilgrim, is to have the same friends and the same enemies as Jesus Christ. The world does not want religious people because it does not want God or Christ, but God laughs at its fury.

Assumption Procession

Listen to the God of heaven and earth: “This little nothingness which has served me to prove the supernatural, to exalt the glorious and holy poverty and to confound the powers of the world, I am going to use it again to proclaim the glories of the religious life, this masterpiece of my Redemption.” God has spoken. And the child [Bernadette] was chosen by Mary to bear witness to God as the divine model of the religious life. By this first choice, Mary raised her to the rank of the angels; by the second, Jesus raises her far above the angels, He makes her a Queen. Bernadette had been docile to Mary’s call; she was docile to Jesus’ call. Her soul had melted with love before the Grotto where Mary spoke, now it melts with love before the tabernacle where Jesus speaks.

“My daughter, listen: From all eternity, I have chosen you to be the bride of my heart. The religious life to which I call you is the paradise of the earth. Only souls victorious over the world and their passions can inhabit it. There, I watch over them as a mother watches over the child of her tenderness. Perfect peace, ineffable joy: that is their life. It is the life of love; it is the life of the angels, with the only difference that the love of the angels only enjoys my divinity, while here love immolates itself unceasingly. This is paradise, I have conquered it with My Blood, and it is this paradise that I want to give you. ‘Come, my child, look, incline your ear’ (Ps 44). When My mother spoke to you, She left you among your people. You went back to your father’s house. You were only Her messenger. I want to make you My wife. You will be My Queen because I am King, and a Queen must live in the King’s palace: the convent is that palace! Leave the world that is not worthy of you; are you not greater than the world? ‘Forget your people and your father’s house’ (Ps 44), say goodbye to your mother, your brothers, your sisters. I do not want divided hearts. I want you all for Myself, I find you so beautiful! You reflect the beauty of My Mother, My Immaculate Mother.”

Thus spoke Jesus in the depths of the tabernacle, and the child quivered! It is so sweet, the voice of Jesus! It is so strong, so powerful, so penetrating… He shows His heart to the ravished child, from this heart an arrow leaves. This flaming arrow is the arrow of divine love (Ps 44:6). Bernadette’s heart is conquered; it belongs to Jesus for eternity.

(to be continued)

[Excerpt from Nos plaies sociales et la mission de Bernadette, chapter 8, “Septième plaie: La guerre contre les religieux”]

Chronicle:

June 29^th 2022 (SS. Peter and Paul) 2022: Solemn High Mass in thanksgiving for the 40^th anniversary of the ordinations of Fathers Innocent-Marie and Marie-Dominique (at Écône in 1982, by Archbishop Lefebvre).

July 2022: A busy summer, as always: spiritual retreats preached at the Friary; camps for the children of St. Thomas High School and St Philomena Primary; General Chapter of the Knights of Our Lady; Gregorian chant session…

August 4^th-13^th 2022: Fr. Koller preaches our annual retreat, on the Merciful Love of Our Lord. At the end of the retreat, Brothers Pie-Marie and Marie-Thomas renew their vows, and Brother Joseph-Marie makes his profession as an oblate brother.

Brother joseph-Marie’s profession

A ugust 16^th 2022: Fr. Marie-Laurent leaves for his apostolate in the Czech Republic, and then in Poland, where Fr. Hyacinthe-Marie joins him on the 21^st.

August 22^nd 2022: Solemn Funeral Mass for Mr. Joël Morin, our faithful and sorely missed history professor.

September 5^th-11^th 2022: Living Latin session for the clerical brothers and seminarians.

Living Latin session

October 17^th 2022: Acquisition of a new property in the village of Bartrès, near Lourdes, where Saint Bernadette was employed as a shepherd girl shortly before the apparitions of Our Lady. Five minutes by car from the Grotto, the “Saint Dominic Hostel” now provides us with a place to help our postulants get used to life away from the world before entering the Friary.

St. Dominic’s Hostel at Bartrès

October 22^nd 2022: First Solemn High Mass of Fr. Paul Rousseau (SAJM), former student of the boys’ school, ordained by Bishop Faure in June.

November 19^th 2022: Fr. Emmanuel-Marie and Br. Marie-Thomas present our publications at a festival organized by Civitas (a group promoting Catholic social doctrine), in Paris.

December 8^th 2022: Solemn High Mass for the Immaculate Conception at the “Greniers Saint Jean” in Angers, followed by a candle-light procession throughout the center of town.

December 16^th 2022: The children of Saint Philomena School present their Christmas Pageant to the elderly in a nearby retirement home.

December 23^rd – January 9^th 2022: Fr. Marie-Laurent is in the US (Texas, Kansas…) to help out Bishop Zendejas.

January 1^st 2022: Annual Christmas “afternoon recreation” for the fathers and brothers. This year the lay brothers present “Jodel, Our Lady’s Minstral”, and the clerical brothers rejoice us with their musical talents (piano, flute, guitar…).

January 27^th 2022: Fr. Hyacinthe-Marie holds the first meeting by Skype for our tertiaries in Poland.

January 27^th – 29^th 2022: Formation session at the Friary for the Knights of Our Lady.

January 14^th – 20^th 2022: Annual pilgrimage in Rome for the senior class of St. Thomas Aquinas, accompanied by Fr. Emmanuel-Marie.

News from our worksites

Begun in September, the construction of the new parish hall is advancing quickly. (see the picture on the cover.)

We have also finished fencing off the woods, as well as a plot of land behind the boys’ school. These past few years, illegal intruders have been getting less and less rare.

For timely articles and spiritual reading, please go to our website:

www.dominicansavrille.us

To send a donation:

YOU MAY USE PAYPAL (ON OUR WEBSITE), OR SEND TO:

Dominicans of Avrillé, Inc.
P.O. Box 23, Newman Lake, WA. 99025

Please take note that we no longer have our other bank accounts. Please specify when sending donations to the above address whether your donation is in American or Canadian dollars.

For more information :

Couvent de la Haye-aux-Bonshommes

49240 Avrillé, France

Two Sermons of His Excellency Bp Gerardo Zendejas

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1. Sermon of His Excellency Bp Gerardo Zendejas

at Ordination of three Subdeacons

for the Society of the Apostles of Jesus and Mary

in the church of the Dominicans in Avrillé (France)

April 2, 2022

M;. l’abbé Paul ROUSSEAU

M. l’abbé Etienne PEREZ

M. l’abbé Emeric BLANCHET

Your Excellency [Bp Faure], Rev. Fathers, Sisters, Seminarians, Brethren,

It is a great honor to be here among all of you, on this singular occasion for giving the first major order within the frame of the Sacrament of the Holy Orders, for the purpose of continuing the priestly Crusade launched to preserve the Traditional Roman Rite of Ordinations by our venerable Founder Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre.

As a matter of fact, in the midst of today’s darkness which is confusing minds and hearts, we are witnessing how the Operation Survival worked out in 1988 by the Archbishop still continues to be a spring source, inspiring young men to come over into the ranks of the Traditional Catholic priesthood. Here and now we have three candidates willing to receive the subdiaconate and not long from today to pursue their priestly Ordination.

To become a priest needs much courage and determination in your part, but it essentially needs the grace of God from above – gratia supponit naturam. Hence, there is a need to cooperate with the grace of God in the mystery between what is Divine and what is human. Certainly, clergy and laity today look at the human part with all its struggles and implore the Divine Grace to recapitulate all things in Christ. In that sense, Pius XII said that “if at times there appears in the Church something that indicates the weakness of our human nature, it should not be attributed to her essential foundation, but rather to that regrettable inclination to evil found in each individual which its Divine Founder allows even at times in the most exalted members of His Mystical Body, FOR THE PURPOSE OF TESTING THE VIRTUE OF THE SHEPHERDS no less than of the flocks…. That is not a reason why we should lessen our love for the Church but rather a reason why we should increase our devotion to Her members” (Pius XII, Mystici Corporis, June 29, 1943).

We certainly have to acknowledge, and to be aware of the tragic situation in which our Catholic Faith is going through, leading by heresies into a general apostasy. One cannot close his eyes in witnessing today’s crisis in the world and within the Church. The realities are right there in front of us; we witness to all of the horrible things that are happening in the Holy place, in the Holy of the Holies, as well as in public lives of the sacred ministers who celebrate the holy sacrifice of the Mass, the veritable holocaust of Calvary. The more time goes by, the more the errors with their blasphemies are spreading, and the more not only the faithful but also priests are losing the practicing of Catholic Faith by exercising the coldness of Charity. “When the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?” (Luke, 18)

Here moreover are some words said by Archbishop Lefebvre: “Right now we do not have the happiness of living in peace and in total confidence in the hierarchy. We are caught up in a great disorder but it is our duty to maintain the most appropriate attitude, so we don’t go astray and don’t hold in our hearts certain sentiments and orientations that would lead us straight out of the Church” (Ecône, September 7, 1981).

Indeed, the Church is divine; She will always possess the eternal Truth. She does objectively communicate to us divine realities, in particular the Holy Eucharist. Yes, the Church is divine, but She is also human. On the contrary, the Church is made up of sinful men. It is true for instance that the Pope has a share in the divinity of the Church to a certain degree by the charism of the Infallibility, yet he remains ‑ outside of that infallible quality ‑ a man entangled with the consequences of the original sin which could prompt him to sin. Then, it is the same tragic scenario for any other churchman who has received the Sacrament of the Holy Orders.

Are we supposed to separate then ourselves from the Roman Catholic Church?

Are we supposed to attach ourselves one by one directly to our Lord Jesus Christ in order to belong to any Christian church but without Christ Himself?

In spite of all difficulties and adversities inflicted against the Church, and in the midst of all persecutions that religious and laity are suffering, even from those who have authority in the Church, let us not abandon the Roman Catholic Church, the Mystical Body of Jesus Christ.

We want to continue the Tradition in the Church by transmitting the Royal Priesthood of our Lord Jesus Christ, by celebrating the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass of Saint Pius V, by administering and receiving the true Sacraments, by believing the Latin Bible, by teaching the true and perennial Catechism of Trent, by learning the teachings of Saint Thomas Aquinas, and by practicing the Canon Law without any doctrinal contamination fostered since the Second Vatican Council.

Absolutely, for that end Archbishop said, “one thing only is necessary for the continuation of the Catholic Church: bishops who are fully Catholic, without the least compromise with error, who found seminaries where young aspirants may be nourished on the milk of true doctrine, placing our Lord Jesus Christ in the center of their minds, of their wills, of their hearts; a lively faith, a profound charity, a boundless devotion will unite them to our Lord; like Saint Paul they will ask us to pray for them, so that they might advance in the knowledge and the wisdom of the MYSTERIUM CHRISTI, where all the divine treasure is to be found” (Spiritual Journey, p 9).

Now let me say some words for you who are receiving the first of the three great Orders: the subdiaconate.

The Council of Trent registered it among the major Orders; it confers the right to arrange everything in the sanctuary, and to assist the priest at the altar. As subdeacons you are going to come into the Holy of the Holies, to the Sanctuary where the Blessed Sacrament is adored. That’s why in this ceremony, coming forward with a step, you are going to pledge yourself to the celibacy which will give you a perpetual honor; and to the recitation of the Breviary, which will make you an official churchman of public prayer.

1.‑ CELIBACY

In ecclesiastical law, from the beginning of the ordination to the subdiaconate, the bishop warns the candidates that perpetual chastity is imposed upon them and that no one may be admitted to this holy order without the sincere will to accept celibacy (Canon 132).

The ceremonial of the Subdiaconate remarks the holiness of the priesthood, which is an inward holiness. It finds concrete expression in the decision to give oneself completely to Jesus-Christ and to leave the world, to abandon all the cares of the world.

My dear subdeacons, celibacy is like a shining beam of light coming from the sublimity of Our Lord reflecting on you. With holding nothing back, you are desiring to belong entirely to almighty God. Nothing manifests the holiness of the Church like this commitment. Indeed, the more the virtue of purity is present in your soul, the stronger it will be the crystal integrity of the doctrine in your thoughts, words, and deeds, because you are going to participate in the great mystery of God in a manner even more effective and profound.

In true, the essential element for consecrating priestly celibacy is the same reason for which the most Blessed Virgin herself remained a virgin. It was fitting that she remained a virgin because she had carried our Lord in her womb. The priest also brings God to earth by the words which he pronounces at the consecration when saying Mass. He has such closeness to God, who is spiritual Being, a Spirit above all, that it is good and just and eminently fitting that the Priest should be a virgin and to remain celibate. This is the essential element for his chastity.

More than ever, the public presence of the religious habits in today’s filthy chaos, is in much need, in particular from those who have received major Orders or have pronounced religious vows. That’s why it is a divine honor to belong to the Holy Trinity in this particular manner through the incredulity of today’s world imbued in its satanic hedonism. Doubtless to say that the grace of God is always ready to protect us, as Saint Augustine explained that God does not ask us anything impossible, in response to Him he said, “ask me whatever You want but give that grace to do so.”

2.‑ BREVIARY

In order to allow the subdeacons to raise their mind regularly to God, the Church commands them to recite the breviary, under the penalty of Mortal sin (Canon 135). Their new state demands of them a profound spirit of faith and the practice not only of purity of body but also of soul.

Saint Joseph of Cupertino, a Franciscan friar, was once asked by a bishop the best means to sanctify his clergy, “Get your priests ‑ he said ‑ to recite the Divine Office with attention and to celebrate Mass with devotion. These two exercises are enough to make them perfect.”

What is the Breviary? It is an admirable compendium of all Christian truths; it is a magnificent picture in which, one by one, the mysteries of our Faith come into view and how the great Christians have been produced; it is THE CATHOLIC PRAYER; it is the praising united with both the Triumphant Church and the Militant Church, with the Suffering Church; it is the ETERNAL PRAYER ‑ Jesus Christ Yesterday, Today, and the same Forever.

Indeed, in reciting the Breviary what do you do? You present yourself as one chosen by the whole Church to adore God, to praise Him, to give Him thanks and to entreat with Him of the Eternal interests of souls in interceding for all, as an ambassador from Heaven.

And how should you recite the Breviary? Digne, Attente, et Devote. Saint Augustine said, “What do you profit with clashing words if your heart is silently careless? It should be with Dignity, with Attention and with Devotion”.

So, from today onward, you are going to carry the prayer of the whole Church through your Breviary, and you are going to pray every day, until the end of your life, to ask God to spread His graces over the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church. This is a necessity of the Church ‑ the prayer of the validly ordained priest. In manifesting your spirit of prayer, you will be rejoicing the Church; you will be rejoicing the hearts of the faithful, and you will inhabit the shrine of the Holy Trinity.

Lastly, let us remember that some of those who have received Majors Orders have abandoned our Lord and His true Church; some others have faithfully remained to their religious duties for the greater Glory of God and the eternal salvation of many souls. What group you would like to be accounted in?

Therefore, let’s take care of our duties because to the extent that we move away from our Lord Jesus Christ, then dissensions certainly would arise, and hatred, and divisions, and wars among the faithful and priests, among the individuals and countries, within and without the Church. So, we must not give into discouragement ‑ Oportet Illum regnare, He Must Reign, said Saint Paul; Viva Cristo Rey, said the Cristeros in offering their lives to our Lord Jesus Christ.

Let us not faint in the combat we are waging for Christ the King, in order to contribute for the Kingdom of God on earth as it is in Heaven, for the preservation of the priesthood of Our Lord Jesus-Christ according to the Roman Latin Rite, against the Communist and Globalist Agenda with their satanic idols and pluralist Green Religion of mother earth and Pachamama.

On the contrary, We should contribute in our level but with all our strength, to the restoring of the kingdom of Our Lord Jesus-Christ over hearts, over souls, families, nations… May Christian civilization be restored, and for that purpose we ask the intercession of Saint Pius X in order to re-enkindle the fire and zeal of the tribe of Judah of the New Testament, as he named after this beloved country of France.

And above all, let’s have a great devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary, the Mother of God, who in several times has manifested her maternal protection, as She did at “Rue du Bac”, in the Apparition of the Miraculous Medal: Oh Mary conceived without Original Sin, Pray for us who have recourse to Thee. Amen.

2. Sermon of His Excellency Bp Gerardo Zendejas

for the ordination of a Deacon at the Seminary of

the Society of the Apostles of Jesus and Mary

in Morannes (France)

April 9, 2022

M. l’abbé Paul ROUSSEAU

Dear confreres in the priesthood, seminarians and sisters, dear faithful.

We are gathered in the chapel of the Seminary of Saint Louis-Marie to celebrate this ceremony of ordination to the diaconate. In today’s particular circumstances, we find ourselves in the Alma Mater of the Congregation of the Apostles of Jesus and Mary — in fact, we find ourselves in the heart of the Resistance, so to speak, where the vital principles for the fight of our Faith are forged against the pluralistic modernism, impregnated with political humanism, and by which the churchmen are leading to the apostasy of the faith, resulting in the abandonment of Catholic civilization.

We absolutely oppose to the masonic principles of the Second Vatican Council, as Archbishop Lefebvre has given us not only the means but also the example to continue the royalty of the sacred priesthood instituted by Our Lord Jesus Christ.

We must continue to defend our Faith in spite of the reigning chaos in which we live. Yes, we must continue to be faithful even alongside and in the battle line where many priests are truly remarkable, either for their fidelity in practicing the priesthood, or for their tepidity in practicing their consecrated priestly life which is at last going to be the driving force in abandoning the doctrine of the Deposit of the Faith.

No doubt these principles of action were also experienced in the ministry of the Apostles after the ordination of the seven deacons — Stephen, Philip, Prochorus, Nicanor, Timon, Parmenas, Nicholas (Acts 6:5-6). The history of the Church teaches us about those events that followed the ordination of the first deacons. Hence, we should at least remember two things: the first is the greatness of St. Stephen due to his faithfulness to the Holy Ghost, and the second is the downfall of Nicholas, who inoculated the virus of the plague of the Nicolaitan heresy, characterized by committing sins against the flesh (and all impurities) in spite of their consecrated life to God, as it is said in the book of the Apocalypses (Rev. 2).

Certainly, the living testimony of the Faith according to the revealed Truth is maintained by the practice of the Christian virtues. This is why it is always good to meditate on the example of the saints so that we might always admire them, as sometimes might imitate them as well. Catholic deacons should be inspired by the example of St. Stephen, protomartyr, well-known in the Greek rite — the Catholic rite — for his zeal to preach until his death, which at that time his death led to the conversion of Saul into Saint Paul.

Deacons must also contemplate the fidelity of St. Lawrence, who is a glory of the Roman Rite. It is a very important fact in order to understand the word romanitas which Archbishop Lefebvre has talked about in his book Spiritual Journey (Itinéraire spirituel à la suite de Saint Thomas d’Aquin).

As a matter of fact, deacons receive the Holy Ghost by the ceremony of the Ordination, alike to St. Stephen and St. Lawrence who were filled with the Holy Ghost, and through their fidelity they preached the Truth supernaturally revealed in the Holy Scriptures. So, their fidelity to the Deposit of Faith is the example that we must keep alive.

In addition to the power of preaching, the deacon receives the grace to baptize begetting children of God in order to lead them to the heavenly glory, and to administer the sacrament of the Holy Eucharist ‑ Let us not forget this principle when receiving Holy Orders: the closer a sacred minister comes to the altar, the more power he receives over the Mystical Body of Our Lord Jesus Christ. This is why the deacon has a place of honor in the celebration of the Holy Sacrifice of the Altar — to the right of the priest.

On the other hand, let us not forget the infidelity of Nicholas, deacon. Most certainly, Our Lady of La Salette referred to the loss of faith in some sacred ministers by leading a double life — one on the outside by keeping the appearances of the consecrated life, but another on the inside by indulging in sins of the flesh and impurity against the Sixth and Ninth Commandments of the Law of God. One can see with his own eyes the deep crisis in which some ministers consecrated to God are living, transmitting the horrible consequences of doctrinal errors, full of heresies that certainly are leading to the General Apostasy. Let us remember that corruptio optimi pessima — from the corruption of the best comes the worst.

So, let us consecrate ourselves to the Blessed Virgin Mary in order to remain faithful to our religious vocation in the midst of the darkness of today’s world. God will surely give us the grace to continue carrying the Cross of Our Lord Jesus Christ. Let us also ask for the grace of divine joy, because the fight in defending the Faith we perhaps may encounter the temptation to get some envy and bitter zeal, for example when priests criticize priests, when bishops criticize bishops.…

Envy is sadness for the good of others, says St. Thomas; and bitter zeal DESTROYS the charity of God in the soul, says Dom Marmion. Let us not be envious or bitter like the Pharisees.

Finally, may Our Lord give us the graces of martyrdom, like all the saints who were martyred in the region of La Vendée (France), whose general said in the heat of action, “If I advance, follow me; if I retreat, kill me; if I die, avenge me.”

Or like José Sanchez del Rio, that 12-year-old boy who joyfully offered his life for the love of Jesus Christ in the Holy Sacrament, whose last words were “Long live Christ the King!”

Amen.

Letter from the Dominicans of Avrillé–No. 37: January 2022

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Letter from the Dominicans of Avrillé

Adoration by the Magi (Lorenzo Monaco, 1421-1422).

No. 37: January 2022

O Great Mystery

Joy is one of the most striking sentiments of the liturgy for the mystery of the Nativity. The Church invites us constantly to be joyful recalling the words of the Angel to the shepherds “To you I announce good news which will be for you the source of great joy: a Savior is born”. (St. Luke 2: 10-11). The joy of Christmas is one of deliverance, of a conquered heritage, of peace, and especially of the vision of God given to men. “And he will be called Emmanuel”. (Isaiah 7: 14; St. Matthew 1: 23)

But this joy will only be assured if we remain faithful to the grace given to us by the Savior and which makes us His brothers. “O, Christian,” says St. Leo the Great in his sermon that the Church reads during the Holy night, “recognize your dignity. And participating in the Divinity, be careful not to fall from such a sublime state.”

“If you knew the gift of God” (St. John 4, 10), said Our Lord. If you knew this Son who is given to you! Let us receive Him as we should. May it not be said of us: “He came into the world and His own received Him not.” (Christmas Gospel) By creation we are all in the domain of God, we belong to Him; but there are those who have not received Him on this Earth. How many Jews and pagans have rejected Our Lord because He appeared in humility and corruptible flesh! Souls drowned in the darkness of pride and sensuality: “The light shown in the darkness and the darkness received it not.” (Last Gospel)

And how must we receive it? By Faith – those who “believe in His Name”. It is to those who believing in Him, in his words and works, have received this Child as God that it has been given in return to become themselves children of God.

Such is, indeed, the fundamental disposition that we must have in order that this great mystery (antiphon of the Octave of Christmas) produces in us all its fruits. Only by Faith may we know the terms and the manner in which it is realized. May we penetrate into the depths of this mystery and have a true knowledge worthy of God.

There are different modes and degrees of knowledge.

“The ox and ass knew their God,” (Isaiah 1: 3) was written by Isaiah speaking of this mystery. They saw the Child lying in the manger. But what did they see? That which an animal can see: the form, the size the color, the movement- rudimentary knowledge which does not leave the realm of sensation. Nothing more.

The passers-by, the curious who came to the stable saw the Child; but for them, He seemed to be like all others. They did not go further than this purely natural knowledge. Perhaps they were struck by the beauty of the Child? Perhaps they were saddened by His destitution? But this sentiment did not last, and indifference took over quickly.

The shepherds, simple souls, “enlightened by a ray of light from on high” (St. Luke 2: 9) certainly understood more; they recognized in this Child the promised Messiah, the expectation of the Gentiles. (Genesis 49: 10) they gave Him homage and their souls were for a long time filled with joy and peace.

The angels also contemplated the New – Born, the Word made flesh. They saw in Him their God. This knowledge cast these pure spirits into stupor and admiration at such a debasement, impossible to understand. It is not the Angelic nature that He wanted to take, but the human nature. “For nowhere doth He taketh hold of the angels: but of the seed of Abraham he taketh hold.” (Hebrews 2: 16)

What would we say of the Blessed Virgin Mary when she saw Jesus? To what depth of this mystery did this regard so pure, humble and tender, full of kindness penetrate! We would not be able to be express with what graces the soul of Our Lord filled His Mother and what sublime adorations, what perfect homages Mary gave to Her Child, to Her God, and to all that of which the Incarnation is the substance and root.

There is finally, and this is undeniable, the regard of the Father contemplating His Son, made flesh for men. The Heavenly Father saw that which never, neither man nor angel nor Mary herself, will ever understand: the infinite perfections of the Divinity which are hidden in a Child. And this contemplation was the source of unspeakable glory, “Thou art by beloved Son. In Thee I am well pleased.” (St. Matthew 1: 11; St. Luke 3: 22)

When we contemplate at Bethlehem the Word made flesh, let us lift ourselves above our senses, and only look with our eyes of Faith. The Faith allows us to participate here below in the knowledge that the divine Persons have of one another. There is no exaggeration in this. Sanctifying Grace makes us indeed, participants of the Divine Nature. And the activity of the Divine Nature consists in the knowledge and love that the Divine Persons have for one another. So, we participate in this knowledge. And even as sanctifying grace opening itself into glory will give us the right to contemplate God as He sees Himself; so on Earth, in the shadows of Faith, grace gives us the possibility to look into the depths of these mysteries through the eyes of God. “A new ray of your greatness has shown in the eyes of our souls” (Preface of Christmas)

Extract of Dom Marmion,

Christ in His Mysteries

Community Chronicle

September 26^th: In the beginning of the new school year a parish pick-nick allows our faithful to deepen the bonds of charity among each other and have an afternoon to speak with different Fathers of the community.

October 2^nd: As history has proved, during times of great distress it is necessary to pray fervently, especially the rosary. On our little scale, as the world wide situation continues to go downhill, we try and help others to invoke our Lady. During this month October we organize a public Rosary in front of the cathedral every Saturday afternoon.

Public Rosary in front of the cathedral.

November 14^th: Better late than never! After about a two month’s delay we are at last able to start our different conferences for the formation of our faithful on such topics as catechism, philosophy and education.

November 16^th: We sing a Requiem Mass for the repose of the soul of Father Xavier Ignatius, Indian priest and Dominican tertiary. He passed away after 70 years of priesthood and shortly before his 100^th birthday. During many years he travelled all around the South of India in order to spread the Rosary Confraternity and support our tertiaries. One of our priests was able to visit him in 2004.

November 21^st: Thanks to the generous help of many faithful, the annual winter market is the occasion to help finance our grade school and gather our parishioners for a pleasant afternoon.

December 8^th: Once again this year we cannot do the procession through the streets of Angers because of the governmental restrictions. But we organize the Rosary in front of the cathedral in honor of the Immaculate Conception.

The Nativity scene in our church.

December 22^nd-January 5^th: During Christmas vacation, with all the activities of our schools ceasing, our community gathers around the crib and the great mystery of the Word made flesh. These moments of greater calm and recollection remind us that Dominicans are contemplatives whose contemplation simply overflows into different forms of apostolate for the salvation of souls.

News from our worksites

We have begun enclosing the woods of our property with a real fence. During the past few months we have also finished up some smaller jobs such as the new school sacristy and a roof for our Lady’s statue in our woods. God willing, we shall shortly be able to start up the worksite of the future parish hall.

Thank you for all your help!

“Amen I say to you, as long as you did it to one of these my least brethren, you did it to me.” (Mt. 25, 40)

Construction of the fence around our woods.

Remember, Oh Most Pious Virgin Mary!

In the face of a spiritual battle, spiritual weapons are needed. […] Human forces alone are unable to face the looming threat. For this we must understand how important and irreplaceable is the use of prayer and divine help, with the invincible weapon that the Blessed Virgin Mary has given us to fight the Enemy of mankind.

I invite everyone to a World Rosary Crusade, to obtain God’s intervention and victory over the unleashing of the forces of Evil through the powerful intercession of the Blessed Virgin.[…]

In all nations, in all cities of the world, may the cry of our prayer be raised confidently and loudly. As children gripped by tribulation we throw ourselves at the feet of our Mother, invoking her with the certainty of obtaining listening. Let us make our own the words of Saint Bernard: Remember, O most pious Virgin Mary, that it has never been heard in the world that some have resorted to your protection, begged for your help, asked for your help, and been forsaken.

Let us kneel to pray in our homes, churches, streets and squares of our cities. In recognizing that we are all in need of the help of the Virgin of the Holy Rosary, we honor the divine order against the infernal chaos, placing all our hope in her who at the foot of the Cross was given to us as Mother, and who as Mother loves and helps us, as it always has done throughout history.

May even the little ones accompany us in this Crusade, whose innocence moves Heaven. May the elderly and the sick also be spiritually united with us, offering their sufferings in union with the Passion of Our Lord Jesus Christ. The devil is terrified by the prayer of children and the penance of those who suffer, because in purity and sacrifice he sees the image of Christ, who has defeated him.

May our heartfelt prayer resound everywhere. We ask the Mediatrix of all Graces to put an end to this destruction of our world, of our freedom, of our identity, of our affections. We ask you to open our eyes, so as not to be pushed into the abyss of despair, hatred, social conflict, pandering to those who sow division in order to hit us in body and soul. […] We ask you to convert the Shepherds, to whom the Lord has entrusted his flock and to whom he will ask for an account of every soul. And for this to happen, we implore the forgiveness of our sins and the public sins of the Nations, since only with repentance and the resolve to no longer offend His divine Son can we hope to be heard.

Animated by this trust, I turn to you, O Mother, Virgin of virgins; I come to you, before you I bow down, repentant sinner. Do not, oh Mother of the Word, despise my prayers, but listen to me kindly and hear me.

+ Carlo Maria Viganò, Archbishop

January 6, 2022

The Epiphany of the Lord

For timely articles and spiritual reading, please go to our website:

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Couvent de la Haye-aux-Bonshommes

49240 Avrillé, France

Letter from the Dominicans of Avrillé – No. 36: September 2021

admin Our seminary, The Convent, The Fight for the Faith November 10, 2021November 10, 2021Ordinations

Letter from the Dominicans of Avrillé

The Tavola, one of the first paintings of Saint Dominic, surrounded by his Brothers at table.

No. 36: September 2021

Motto of the Dominican Order

For the 800^th anniversary of Saint Dominic’s birth into Heaven (August 6, 1221), let us give a few explanations on the motto of his Order: VERITAS. From the very beginning our Order has been faithful to the Truth and throughout the centuries the Dominicans have considered it as their first title of nobility. In 1266, Pope Clement IV, wanting to define the Dominican vocation officially proclaimed the Order of Saint Dominic “the keeper of Truth.” This means that above all we were founded to defend and spread the truth. The Dominican apostolate is essentially doctrinal and our first work is an intellectual one.

The intellect, handmaid of man, must establish our minds in truth and enable man to practice virtue. Without the base of truth, the will can lean on nothing solid to make resolutions. Whoever despises the intellect and truth removes from man his first force against the powers of disorder. It is a great misfortune that in Catholic preaching sentiment takes the place of the idea. The result is a piety without order which produces unbalanced souls, who only ask for the sensible in the mysteries of Faith. Joseph de Maistre wrote, “Man is only worth what he believes,” and Bonald “dogmas make people.”

Thus the Dominican wants above all to be a sower of truth, and to spread light. Before stimulating men, he wants to enlighten them. Confident in the Divine sense which Baptism has planted in the Christian soul, he does not fear to expose the highest truths even to the crowds, which he endeavors to bring to the heights of Christianity. He is persuaded that he will only bring the hearts of men to Christ by revealing God as much as God has revealed Himself.

A necessary consequence is that the Dominican spirit is without mercy for error. The measure of one’s love for Truth is the measure of one’s hatred for error. History shows the Dominican Order detesting heresy and pursuing it tenaciously to the point that we could summarize these 800 years as a long combat with error. Today, however, a despicable doctrinal liberalism makes all ideas equal, giving the same rights to both truth and error. Nothing is more hateful than this false modern tolerance. Error has no rights, except to disappear.

Far from hurting the apostolate, this doctrinal intolerance fructifies it. What is the first need of modern souls, lost in the complexity of systems without harmony and unity? Doctrine! Is there such a thing as a “modern” soul? No, there are simply ruined intellects. The Dominican applies himself to restore order, bring back the exiled truth, generous and magnificent Queen. In her escort, she will bring back all our old lost Christian glories.

Saint Dominic’s Testament

“My very dear brothers, this is what I leave to you as a possession to be held by right of inheritance by you, my children. Have charity, preserve humility, and possess voluntary poverty.”

Such was the testament of Our Father St. Dominic on August 6, 1221. “Do not weep, I will be more useful after my death than I was during my life,” he added before giving his soul to God.

A little beforehand, after making his general confession to Brother Ventura, he told the Brothers around him, “The mercy of God has conserved until this day my flesh pure and stainless. If you want this same grace, avoid all suspicious occasions. The way in which this virtue is kept makes the servant agreeable to Our Lord and gives him glory and credit before people. Keep serving God in the fervor of the spirit, apply yourselves to uphold and spread this Order which has only started, be constant in holiness, in regular observance and grow in virtue.”

After 800 years we can notice that this inheritance has been transmitted from generation to generation. The Order has had to be reformed many times because of human weakness, but has never ceased to produce Saints and to preach the Sacred Truth.

More than ever the harvest is great and the laborers few. Hence to celebrate St. Dominic this year, we dare ask all our friends to storm Heaven with their prayers for Dominican vocations.

The Religion of Medicine and the credulity of skeptics

Medicine holds a high place in the society of skeptics. The more man distances himself from Christian virtues, the more he attaches himself to life. Whether he believes to return to nothing, or the thought of an afterlife comes to torment him, to live a long time is his principal affair, since his nature abhors nothing and his conscience fears eternity.

He fears sickness not only because it is the privation of pleasure, the only happiness to which he looks for, not only because it causes pain, of which he ignores the price and against which his soul is powerless, but because it is the announcement or threat of this death which will either destroy him completely like an animal or perhaps deliver him to perish in the hands of the Supreme Justice. As long as he is well, he is voluntarily skeptical, and irreverent towards the art of healing, at the first sign of sickness, medicine becomes his only hope. He delivers himself to medicine docile to the point of cowardice, gullible to the point of stupidity.

The Religion of medicine knows no atheist among those who deny the rest. How often do we not see these people, mocking religious practices and abstinence, who as soon as they have a real or imaginary disease become sober, chaste, flee the world and its seductions, make a retreat to the countryside, and pilgrimages far off […]. There is nothing that medicine cannot obtain from them. Their body which gives them so many worries is submitted to penances without number. They pay and swallow without complaining the worst drugs, they stay in prison, and they walk vigorously through the countryside, whip themselves, exile themselves, or even go into icy or putrid waters. What will they not do?

If the doctor told them to spend every day two hours kneeling on a kneeler before a lighted candle, certainly they would fill our churches and force the State to build new ones.

-Louis Veuillot (1813-1883)

Community Chronicle

February 14^th: Our senior class leaves for their pilgrimage to Rome accompanied by Father Terence. Because of the present circumstances the churches are rather empty, which thus allows a greater recollection for prayer.

February 27^th: His Excellency Bishop Faure confers the tonsure on our Brothers Pie-Marie and Marie-Thomas as well as the second minor orders upon Brother Augustine-Marie.

April 21^st: All the brothers available are called on to help plant 2500 potato seedlings in our garden.

May 23^rd: Several of our Fathers are absent to accompany pilgrimages for the feast of Pentecost, for example at Ile Bouchard or Vézelay.

June 3^rd: Father Prior represents the community at Riddes in Switzerland for the 60^th anniversary of Father Epiney’s priestly ordination. Father Epiney is the priest who “welcomed” Archbishop Lefebvre to Ecône when the seminary was founded because Ecône is geographically in the parish of Riddes. Father has remained faithful despite many persecutions and trials over these 60 years.

June 19^th: Part of the community assists at the ordinations conferred by His Excellency Bishop Faure at Morannes (about 45 minutes from our friary). Rev. Fr. Chirico (from Italy) was ordained to the priesthood and Rev. Mr. Nass (from Brazil) was ordained to the diaconate. Both of them followed their studies at our friary.

July 4^th: Fathers Innocent-Marie, Marie-Dominique and Emmanuel-Marie participate at the 50^th anniversary celebration of the MJCF (a French Catholic youth movement for apostolate). Many conversions and vocations have come from this movement. The first members of our Dominican community also come from this youth group.

July: Among our summer apostolate there are two retreats (one men’s and one ladies’) and also several camps for young boys and young girls. It is an example of the Dominican life that preaches in all circumstances (from a Sunday sermon to classes in a school, from a spiritual retreat to two weeks in the mountains for a summer camp).

August 4^th: This year it is the 800^th anniversary of our Holy Father Saint Dominic’s entrance into Heaven (August 6^th, 1221). His Excellency Bishop Faure honors us with his presence to help celebrate the occasion with a Pontifical High Mass and a conference on the present day crisis. In the evening our annual retreat begins preached by Father Dominique Rousseau on the mystery of the Transfiguration.

August 14^th: For the Vigil of the Assumption our Brother Vincent makes his first vows while Brother Augustine-Marie renews his. As for Brother Jean, he makes his perpetual profession in the Third Order as an oblate brother.

August 15^th: Procession in honor of Our Lady through the streets of the neighborhood.

August 18^th: Father Marie-Laurent leaves for a few days of apostolate in Prague and its surroundings.

August 19^th: Father Alain accompanies our tertiaries on a pilgrimage in the footsteps of Saint Dominic at Fanjeaux.

August 22^nd: For the feast of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, Miss Juniper Figueroa (from St. Mary’s, Kansas) received the Dominican habit in the young community of teaching sisters just five minutes from our friary. Her name is now Sister Catherine-Marie (in honor of St. Catherine of Ricci).

September 7^th: Father François-Marie celebrates the funeral of his two parents, who died three days apart shortly after their 70^th wedding anniversary.

September 13^th: The school year begins once again for both our grade school and our boarding school.

News from our worksites

The Covidian Crisis brings along with it many delays. Among others, the construction companies are taking much longer to respond to our bidding invitations.

Parish Hall Project

We are also considering enclosing the woods of our property with a real fence. Yet, it remains to be decided before God which worksites are the most important, taking into account our present means.

“Amen I say to you, as long as you did it to one of these my least brethren, you did it to me.” (Mt. 25, 40)

Letter from the Dominicans of Avrillé

admin Convent Life, In defense of our convent, Liturgical Seasons, Our seminary October 24, 2020October 24, 2020Third Order of Penance

Letter from the Dominicans of Avrillé

No. 34: August 2020

A Bishop Speaks Out

Bishop Carlo Vigano, former Apostolic Nuncio to the U.S., has come into the forefront in recent months, speaking publically against the Second Vatican Council in itself (and not just the “abuses”). Here are a few excerpts that we hope will encourage you to pray for this courageous prelate.

What leaves one truly scandalized is seeing how the top levels of the Hierarchy are openly placing themselves at the service of the Prince of this world, adopting the demands made by the United Nations for the globalist agenda, Masonic brotherhood, Malthusian ecologism, immigrationism… What is being created is a single world religion without dogmas or morals; according to the wishes of Freemasonry…it is obvious that Bergoglio, along with those who are behind him and support him, aspires to preside over this infernal parody of the Church of Christ. (letter to a cloistered nun published 31 May)

It seems that even the post-conciliar church, modernist and Masonic, aspires to transform, to overcome the Church of Christ, replacing it with a “neo-church”, deformed and monstrous creature that does not come from God.

The purpose of this neo-church is not to […] convert and save all people […], but to establish itself as the spiritual arm of the New World Order and advocate of Universal Religion. In this sense, the Council’s revolution first had to demolish the Church’s heritage, its millenary Tradition, from which it drew its vitality and authority as the Mystical Body of Christ, then get rid of the exponents of the old Hierarchy, and only recently has it begun to offer itself without pretense for what it intends to be.

[This] represents the concretization of Freemasonry’s plan and the preparation for the advent of the Antichrist. (interview, April 21, 2020)

Ordination of Br. Alain

Attempts to correct the conciliar excesses – invoking the hermeneutic of continuity – have proven unsuccessful […]. If the image of an infernal divinity was able to enter into Saint Peter’s, this is part of a crescendo which the other side foresaw from the beginning. […]

What the world wants, at the instigation of Masonry and its infernal tentacles, is to create a universal religion that is humanitarian and ecumenical, from which the jealous God whom we adore is banished. […]

It is surprising that people persist in not wanting to investigate the root causes of the present crisis, limiting themselves to deploring the present excesses as if they were not the logical and inevitable consequence of a plan orchestrated decades ago. […]

I was one of the many people who, despite many perplexities and fears which today have proven to be absolutely legitimate, trusted the authority of the Hierarchy with unconditional obedience. In reality, I think that many people, including myself, did not initially consider the possibility that there could be a conflict between obedience to an order of the Hierarchy and fidelity to the Church herself.

[…] It is undeniable that from Vatican II onwards a parallel church was built, superimposed over and diametrically opposed to the true Church of Christ. This parallel church progressively obscured the divine institution founded by Our Lord in order to replace it with a spurious entity, corresponding to the desired universal religion that was first theorized by Masonry. Expressions like new humanism, universal fraternity, dignity of man, are the watchwords of philanthropic humanitarianism which denies the true God.

[…]For decades we have been led into error, in good faith, by people who, established in authority, have not known how to watch over and guard the flock of Christ.

[…] Just as I honestly and serenely obeyed questionable orders sixty years ago, believing that they represented the loving voice of the Church, so today with equal serenity and honesty I recognize that I have been deceived. […]

And we know well that the purpose of these ecumenical and interreligious initiatives is not to convert those who are far from the one Church to Christ, but to divert and corrupt those who still hold the Catholic Faith, leading them to believe that it is desirable to have a great universal religion that brings together the three great Abrahamic religions “in a single house”: this is the triumph of the Masonic plan in preparation for the kingdom of the Antichrist! (excursus on Vat II: June 9, 2020)

Enlargement of the garden

Bishop Vigano is equally lucid concerning the recent “Corona Virus” scare:

And it appears that the children of darkness – whom we may easily identify with the deep state which you wisely oppose and which is fiercely waging war against you in these days – have decided to show their cards, so to speak, by now revealing their plans. They seem to be so certain of already having everything under control that they have laid aside that circumspection that until now had at least partially concealed their true intentions. The investigations already under way will reveal the true responsibility of those who managed the Covid emergency not only in the area of health care but also in politics, the economy, and the media. (letter to Pres. Trump: June 7, 2020)

We have reason to believe, on the basis of official data on the incidence of the epidemic as related to the number of deaths, that there are powers interested in creating panic among the world’s population with the sole aim of permanently imposing unacceptable forms of restriction on freedoms, of controlling people and of tracking their movements. The imposition of these illiberal measures is a disturbing prelude to the realization of a world government beyond all control. (declaration of May 2020)

Getting the terrain ready for the garden: the boys lend a hand for the removal of some heavy material

Community Chronicle

December 12^th: The children of Saint Philomena’s School, with Father Angelico, present their Christmas Pageant for the residents of a local retirement home.

January 24^th: A Requiem Mass is sung for the soul of Mrs. Maria-Helena Pacheco dos Santos, the mother of our Br. Louis-Bertrand (Brazil).

February 17^th-24^th: Fr. Angelico accompanies the seniors from St. Thomas Aquinas on their pilgrimage to Rome. Providentially (considering the turn of events), it was decided to go in February instead of during Easter vacation, as usual.

February 21^st – 23^rd: Fr. Marie-Dominique and Br. Alain are in Brittany for the Third Order and a meeting of the Knights of Our Lady.

March 1^st: Again in Brittany, this time it’s Fr. Hyacinthe-Marie and Br. Agostinho for a recollection with the Sisters of Mary Coredemptrix.

March 6^th-8^th: Fr. Marie-Laurent is in Ireland.

March 22^nd: The schools are closed and public Masses are forbidden, but the Fathers are far from being on vacation. Not only do classes have to continue “by correspondence,” but the spiritual support of the faithful (especially the sick and isolated) becomes a top priority.

March 28^th: Bishop Faure confers the first minor orders to our Br. Augustin-Marie.

Mai 1^st: For his feast day, the installation of a new little oratory for St. Joseph (built by Brothers Bernard-Marie and Martin), in the garden behind the friary. The previous one was erected in 1995, at the start of the reconstruction of the fourth wing. After having watched over the construction, St. Joseph is now supervising the final stage of work: the covering of the bare cement wall with typical slate rocks of the region.

May 30^th: Two postulants (both from France) receive the habit: Martin receives the clerical habit, with the name Br. Vincent; Christophe receives the habit of lay brother and the name Br. Betharram (after Our Lady of Betharram, honored in his native region close to Lourdes).

June 6^th: 23 souls receive the sacrament of Confirmation at the hands of Bishop Faure.

June 26^th: Br. Alain is ordained to the priesthood by Bishop Faure at the friary.

Month of July: Thanks to God, all our summer activities were able to proceed as planned: spiritual retreats (one for women/girls, one for couples), camps (The Cadets of the Sacred Heart do an itinerant camp in Brittany, the children of Our Lady of Fatima camp in Anjou), General Chapter of the Knights of Our Lady…

News from our worksites

The covering of the façade of the east wing is well under way, and the renovation of the west wing may be able to start this year. Red tape is still blocking the construction of the Parish Hall. Please keep this intention in your prayers! The need for more building space is all the more urgent considering the possible “social-distancing” measures that may be required soon…

Covering the Façade

Thanks to a friend of the friary, a specialist in organic farming, we were able to start a real, “monastic-sized” vegetable garden!

The New Garden

For timely articles and spiritual reading, please go to our website:

www.dominicansavrille.us

To send a donation:

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Dominicans of Avrillé, Inc.
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— In Canada:

Association of St. Dominic

CIBC, 201-21 Street East

Saskatoon (SK) S7K OB8 Canada

Please include a note, and specify:

acc. #40-91531

— In the U.K.:

Association of St. Dominic

R B S Edinburgh, 17 Comiston Road

Edinburgh EH10 6AA

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Couvent de la Haye-aux-Bonshommes

49240 Avrillé, France

Letter from the Dominicans of Avrillé No.32: September 2019

admin Convent Life, Letters to Friends and Benefactors, Our seminary, Retreats, The Convent, The Rosary Confraternity, The Third Order of Penance September 15, 2019September 15, 2019Knights of Our Lady

Letter from the Dominicans of Avrillé

No. 32: September 2019

Profession before Fr. Prior (August 14^th)

Fioretti of St. Vincent Ferrer

Even though he preached for hours, St. Vincent never tired the faithful. He frequently put them at ease with anecdotes, little stories, comparisons to nature, and even jokes! “Squash,” he said, justifying this practice, “are delicate and delicious, but in order to prevent them from burning and sticking to the pot, it’s necessary, if you want to cook them well, to keep stirring them with a spoon!”

The unjust innkeeper

One day an innkeeper asked St. Vincent to preach on the obligation of paying debts, because several clients were behind in their bills. “Alright, I’ll explain how much those who retain the goods of others are guilty; but first, show me the wine you sell.” Once the innkeeper brought out a bottle, St. Vincent had him pour it into his scapular, which he held out in the form of a bowl. The water passed through, and the wine stayed in the scapular: a lot of water, and very little wine…!

“St. Vincent’s water”

A very loquacious woman, on bad terms with her irascible husband, asked St. Vincent for advice on how to “convert him.” “If you want to put an end to your quarrels, go to the porter of our convent and ask him to give you some water from the well in the middle of the cloister. When your husband comes home, put some of this water in your mouth right away, without swallowing, and you’ll see your husband become as gentle as a lamb.”

The woman did as she was told, and when her husband came home grumbling, she took a mouthful of the “miraculous” water. Her husband, seeing that his wife kept her peace without talking back, calmed down himself and thanked God for having changed her heart — and closed her mouth. The same scene repeated itself several times, always with the same happy success. At the end, the woman came to thank St. Vincent, who explained: “The real remedy was not the water from the well, but silence. In the future, keep silent, and you’ll live in peace.”

The hermit and the sack of gold

St. Vincent recounted the story of a saintly hermit who was walking to town one day when he came across a burse of gold coins. He fled immediately, crying out: “Death and tragedy!” A few onlookers asked what he saw, but his only answer was: “There, by the tree — flee while you can!” However, they didn’t take his advice, and taking the gold pieces, they went into town, got drunk and ended up killing each other in a violent dispute.

Community Chronicle

May 24^th: Mr. Jean-Claude Marchon, benefactor of the community, passes away at the age of 91. Mr. Marchon gave up a comfortable apartment in Paris to come and spend his last years doing penance in our Friary. His good humor and edifying example will be sorely missed. (On the 29^th: Solemn High Requiem Mass, and burial in the Friary’s cemetery.) R.I.P.

May 26^th: Fr. Marie-Dominique is at the Loncheray with the youth group “Friends of the Sacred Heart,” to prepare for their summer camp.

June 2^nd: “Solemn Communion” ceremony and public profession of Faith for 6 young ladies of the parish (4 from the school St. Rose of Lima).

The same day, Fathers Marie-Dominique and Hyacinthe-Marie are in Paris for the Third Order.

June 8^th-10^th: Fr. Marie-Laurent and Br. Michel-Marie represent the Friary at the annual Pentecost pilgrimage of the Combat for the Faith, at the Puy-en-Velay. After the pilgrimage, Bishop Zendejas pays a visit to the Friary on his way back to the U.S.

June 19^th: Solemn High Votive Mass of the Sacred Heart celebrated by Fr. Angelico in celebration of the 10^th anniversary of his ordination.

June 20^th: Fr. Marie-Dominique is in Riddes, Switzerland, at Fr. Epiney’s parish for the 25^th anniversary of the ordination of his vicar, Fr. Grenon. Fr. Epiney is a legendary figure in the Fight for Catholic Tradition; it was he who received Archbishop Lefebvre in his parish for the foundation of the seminary of Écône. He has stood firm in his fidelity to the combat of the Archbishop, even at the price of now being ostracized by the superiors of the Society of St. Pius X.

June 23^rd: Corpus Christi procession with the presence of Bishop Faure, and presided by Fr. Dominique Rousseau, who recently joined the Combat for the Faith.

June 26^th-28^th: Exams for the seminarians and our clerical brothers.

July 1^st-6^th: Fathers Marie-Dominique, Hyacinthe-Marie, and Fr. Ballini preach a retreat at the Friary for 22 men.

July 3^rd: Fathers Prior and Louis-Marie, accompanied by Br. Alain, are at the Villeneuve (priory of Fr. Pivert) for a formation session for the “Friends of the Sacred Heart.”

General Chapter of the Knights of Our Lady, held this year in the Friary’s library

July 12^th-15^th: The Knights of Our Lady hold their 26^th annual General Chapter at the Friary. This year they celebrated the 30^th anniversary of the restoration of their traditional observance.

July 14^th: Fr. Prior and Br. Augustin-Marie are at Saumur for a doctrinal session for a group of tertiaries.

The second half of July: As every summer, several Fathers and Brothers are busy with camps: Fathers Angelico and Hyacinthe-Marie, with Br. Agostinho at the Lion-d’Angers for Our Lady of Fatima’s Youth Group (elementary boys and girls), and the “Valliant Souls” (adolescent girls); Fr. Terence (joined later by Fr. Angelico) and Brothers Alain and Augustin-Marie in Dordogne (near the famous sanctuary of Rocamadour), with the Cadets of the Sacred Heart. Despite the heat wave, the children all went home happy, and hopefully a few steps closer to God.

July 17^th: Outing in Tours for the novitiate, with a guided visit by our Greek professor, Mr. Trouillet.

July 20^th: The Friary hosts the marriage of a former student of Saint Thomas Aquinas Boys’ school; Fr. Louis-Marie has the honor of celebrating and receiving the vows.

July 22^nd-27^th: Fathers François-Marie, Marie-Laurent, and Fr. Picot preach a retreat at the Friary for 32 women.

July 23^rd-27^th: Fr. Prior is in Lourdes visiting Fr. de Mérode.

August 2^nd: For our table reading, we read the Friary chronicles for July-August-September 1979, to commemorate the 40th anniversary of our definitive installation here at the Friary of La Haye-aux-Bonshommes. Fond memories for the most senior members of the community, and fascinating discoveries for the younger members (many of which were not even born at the time)!

August 4^th-12^th: Our annual retreat was preached this year by Fr. Morgan, who inspired us with the example of Bl. Dominic Barberi (1792-1849), the Italian Passionist priest who was responsible for a wide movement of conversion to the Catholic Church in England in the 19^th century.

August 14^th: Vigil of the Assumption: Solemn High Mass, during which our postulant Emmanuel receives the habit of lay brother, and a new name: Brother John. The ceremony also included the first profession of Brothers Pie-Marie and Marie-Thomas, who will now start their philosophy and theology classes with the other clerical brothers.

August 15^th: Annual Assumption procession, with a large crowd of faithful from all parts of Western France: a big difference from the 6 faithful present for the first procession 40 years ago, when the Fathers just arrived!

August 22^nd: Feast of the Immaculate Heart of Mary and 25^th anniversary of the perpetual vows of Brother Martin. This day is also the 25^th anniversary of the profession of our very first tertiary: Sr. Catherine (Miss Ruth McQuillan, Scotland). Ad multos annos!

News from our worksites

Other than a few small maintenance projects and the preparation of a Calvary mount, we don’t have much to announce. Please pray that we may finally obtain the authorization for the construction of the new parish hall with cafeterias for our schools. The lack of space has reached a critical point.

Crisis in the Church

In 2017, The Conference of French Bishops published the latest statistics concerning the Church in France. Compared to the statistics from 1990 (let alone those from before Vat II!), they show clearly that the crisis in the Church is still raging.

	1990	2015
Baptisms	472,130	262,314
Confirmations	91,281	43,627
Marriages	141,146	55,854
Priests	32,267	16,830^*
Religious (female)	52,507	29,183
Religious (male)	10,652	5,490

^*10 000 of which are over 65 years old…

What’s more, we have to ask ourselves what kind of formation does this “little rest” have? How many of these souls have actually kept the Catholic Faith?

Clama ne cesses! Cry out, never cease!

(arms of St Vincent Ferrer)

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Continuing the Battle of Saint Pius X

admin Apologetics, conciliar Church, Our seminary, The Fight for the Faith July 9, 2019July 9, 2019Modernist Rome, st. pius x

Continuing the Battle of Saint Pius X

Sermon given at the Dominican Monastery of La Haye-aux-Bonshommes Avrillé (France)

My Dear Brethren,

Today, the Church makes us celebrate the feast of Saint Pius X.

Let us remember the exceptional destiny of a small child from the countryside, who became priest, pastor, canon at Treviso, Bishop at Mantua, Cardinal, Patriarch of Venice, then Pope; a Pope whose “pontificate shone like in the Golden Ages of Church“ according to the expression of Pope Pius XII ¹.

Divine Providence placed a saint on the seat of Peter, at the dawn of a century that would see, on the occasion of two world wars, the installation of communism, and then globalism into this world; and where the Church, infiltrated by her enemies, would know the gravest crisis of her history.

It is thus valuable to recall the teachings of this saint, to guide us in the present times. It is not for nothing that Msgr. Lefebvre wanted to make him the celestial patron of his work of restoring the priesthood, and of the battle that we lead today for the Church.

By nature, no one sweeter, more amiable than he, no one more a friend of peace, no one more paternal. […] [But] in front of the unavoidable attacks against God and the Church, he knew how to rise up like a giant in all his majesty, […] making the powers of the earth tremble and retreat, reassuring the hesitant and galvanizing the timid ².

Restoring all things in Christ

He set the tone in his first encyclical:

Who can fail to see that society is at the present time, more than in any past age, suffering from a terrible and deep-rooted malady which, developing every day and eating into its inmost being, is dragging it to destruction? You understand, Venerable Brethren, what this disease is – apostasy from God.

And as might be expected we find extinguished among the majority of men all respect for the Eternal God, and no regard paid in the manifestations of public and private life to the Supreme Will – nay, every effort and every artifice is used to destroy utterly the memory and the knowledge of God ³.

A century later, how relevant this is! He continues:

When all this is considered there is good reason to fear lest this great perversity may be as it were a foretaste, and perhaps the beginning of those evils which are reserved for the last days.

To combat the evil at its root, Saint Pius X sees only one solution: to restore all things in Christ. It will become his motto and essential agenda of his pontificate.

We proclaim that We have no other program in the Supreme Pontificate but that “of restoring all things in Christ” (Ephes. i., 10), so that “Christ may be all and in all” (Coloss. 3, 2). […]

We shall never, however much we exert ourselves, succeed in calling men back to the majesty and empire of God, except by means of Jesus Christ. “No one,” the Apostle admonishes us, “can lay other foundation than that which has been laid, which is Jesus Christ” (I. Cor 3, 2) ⁴.

This is why Pius X will vigorously condemn the separation of Church and State in France and will forcefully defend the liberty of the Church in face of the plundering French government ⁵.

Obviously, more than a century later, the evil is so deep and the entire world is so much in the grips of Freemasonry that any purely human means cannot reverse the course of things, it is necessary to be realist.

But let us not be discouraged! The pope continues:

The victory will ever be with God […] We believe and expect with unshakable faith. But this does not prevent us also, according to the measure given to each, from exerting ourselves to hasten the work of God – and not merely by praying assiduously […] but, more important still, by affirming both by word and deed and in the light of day, God’s supreme dominion over man and all things, so that His right to command and His authority may be fully realized and respected ⁶.

Battling Modernism

But what do we see today, after the latest Council?

The popes travel the world preaching the rights of man; since the Council, the Vatican has demanded that the last remaining Catholic States not mention in their constitutions that the Catholic religion is the State religion and to give the same rights to all the religions. In no speech is it understood that Our Lord is the only Savior of men and societies. Such a silence, if one thinks about it, is hardly believable.

Msgr. Lefebvre could write:

This is our opposition [to Rome today], and this is what cannot be understood. Our Lord came to reign. They say no, and we say yes with all the popes [before the Council] ⁷.

How did we get there?

Well! The good God rose up a saint at the beginning of the 20^th century to enlighten and warn us in advance. This is the great encyclical of Pius X on the doctrines of the modernists: Pascendi Dominici Gregis, 8 September 1907.

Saint Pius X had the lucidity to see, and the courage to say, that the evil is not only in civil society, but that it is also in the Church, which is much worse:

The partisans of error are to be sought not only among the Church’s open enemies; they lie hid, a thing to be deeply deplored and feared, in her very bosom and heart, and are the more mischievous, the less conspicuously they appear. […] Though they express astonishment themselves, no one can justly be surprised that We number such men among the enemies of the Church ⁸^.

And Saint Pius X analyzed the entire modernist system.

It is not possible to explain the details of the whole encyclical here ⁹.

What is necessary to understand is that modernism completely destroys the faith.

Faith, as you know, is a gift from God received at baptism, which makes us hold as true all that Our Lord has revealed to us, and which he teaches us through His Church, when she speaks infallibly. This is what we recite in the act of faith:

My God, I firmly believe all the truths that you have revealed and that you teach us by your Church, because you cannot be deceived nor deceive us.

What is it for the modernists? What is faith for them? Saint Pius X says that for the modernists :

Human reason is […] incapable of lifting itself up to God, and of recognising His existence, even by means of visible things. (§6)

Faith […] consists [only, for them] in a sentiment which originates from a need of the divine (§7)

The divine reality [existence of God], for the Modernists […] [is found] In the experience of the individual. (§14)

What is to prevent such experiences from being met within every religion? […] And with what right will Modernists deny the truth of an experience affirmed by a follower of Islam? With what right can they claim true experiences for Catholics alone? Indeed Modernists do not deny but actually admit, some confusedly, others in the most open manner, that all religions are true. (§14)

This is today’s ecumenism. And it is what Masonry seeks for extending its global government, precursor of the antichrist. One cannot find anything more opposed to the motto of St. Pius X: « To restore all things in Christ! »

Of course the Catholic life is not something purely intellectual. A certain “experience” of God is found in it. Catholic life is a life of friendship with Our Lord, through the virtue of charity, the action of the Holy Ghost, and His seven gifts. All this makes our faith a living faith.

But when religious experience is not guided by the faith, if it is entirely reduced to sentiment, to individual conscience, the door is open to all deviations and heresies:

[Modernism is] the synthesis of all heresies (§39).

[It leads to] the annihilation of all religion, – atheism (§39).

Modernism was clearly condemned by Saint Pius X. The pope even took strict measures to remove the modernists from positions of responsibility.

But they refused to submit, continued to work underground, and three years later the pope will find:

They have not ceased to attract followers, either, by forming a clandestine group; by these means, they inject in the very veins of the Christian Republic the virus of their doctrine, by editing books and publishing articles in anonymity or with pseudonyms ¹⁰.

And they held the power at the Second Vatican Council.

Continuing the fight of Saint Pius X

Well! It is necessary to continue the fight of Saint Pius X, which is simply the fight of twenty centuries of Church; it is the only combat that has the assurance of victory, as the holy pope reminds us.

Studying and disseminating Catholic doctrine

It is first necessary to save the faith, which is disappearing today.

Saint Pius X has constantly insisted on the necessity of disseminating Catholic doctrine, encouraging the study of St. Thomas Aquinas; adding to the Catechism of the Council of Trent a simplified catechism in the form of questions and answers, which is extremely deep and luminous, now called the Catechism of Saint Pius X.

He asked the bishops to found schools of religion for the youth in the cities, and he asked the priests to institute congregations of Christian doctrine in the parishes. He insisted that, in their sermons, priests should make the Council of Trent known ¹¹.

Pius XII calls Saint Pius X “the pope of Catholic doctrine” ¹².

In this spirit, it is necessary that the faithful today implement a program of readings for the year, fixing each week a time for religious reading, alone or as a family; or organize a doctrinal group to study doctrine with other faithful, under the guidance of a priest.

Living the Mass

Then we must focus our life on the Mass.

Regnavit a ligno, Deus : God reigns by the cross.

At Calvary, Our Lord has definitively conquered sin, the devil, and the world. Holy Mass, renewing the Sacrifice of Calvary, extends the victory and reign of Our Lord over our countries. Christendom was built around the altar of the Sacrifice.

Saint Pius X therefore wanted to establish his fight for Christ the King on the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, the Holy Eucharist.

Pius XII calls Saint Pius X “the Pope of the Holy Eucharist in our time” ¹³:

— he restored the dignity of worship, “primary and indispensable source of the true Catholic spirit” ¹⁴;

— he reestablished frequent and daily communion in the Church, “much desired by Jesus Christ and by the Catholic Church” ¹⁵;

— he allowed little children to receive holy communion early, as soon as they can “distinguish the Eucharistic Bread from ordinary bread” ¹⁶.

The modernists destroyed the mass: it is the ecumenical mass of Paul VI. Divine Providence raised up Archbishop Lefebvre to give us Mass of all ages. Let us live the holy Mass, now that it has been returned to us. Let us read about the Mass; if we are living not far from a traditional chapel, let us try to go to Mass on weekdays, at least sometimes; let us prepare the evening before Sundays, by reading the texts of the Sunday Mass, and make a good thanksgiving after Holy Communion, at least spiritually if we cannot attend Mass (we will have the same spiritual fruit).

Making Our Lord reign amongst us

Finally, Saint Pius X exhorts us to work for the restoration of all things in Christ by word and deed, study the doctrine of Christ the King, make it known around us, and constitute strongholds of resistance where Our Lord may reign: our soul, our families, our traditional parish communities, and wherever we can influence.

As a conclusion, let make ours the prayer of the Church in the collect of the Mass for the feast of saint Pius X:

O God Who, for the defense of the Catholic faith and the restoration of all things in Christ, filled St. Pius, the Supreme Pontiff, with heavenly wisdom and apostolic fearlessness, mercifully grant that, by following his teachings and examples, we may receive Your eternal rewards. Amen.

1 — Pius XII, Allocution for the beatification of Saint Pius X , 3 June 1951 (AAS 43 pp. 471).

2 — Pius XII , Ibid. p. 472

3 — Saint Pius X, encyclical E Supremi Apostolatus, 4 October 1903, §3 and §4.

4— Saint Pius X, Ibid. §4 and §8.

5— One can refer to his encyclical Vehementer nos, 11 February 1906.

6— Saint Pius X, encyclical E Supremi Apostolatus, §7.

7— Mgr Lefebvre, L’Église infiltrée par le modernisme, Éditions Fideliter, 1993, p. 70.

8— Saint Pius X, Pascendi Dominici Gregis, 8 September 1907, §2 and §3.

9— Le Sel de la terre 93 (été 2015) published a complete analysis of this encyclical by Msgr Richard Williamson (pp. 71-87). One can also read the Catechism on Modernism by Fr. Jean-Baptiste Lemius, O.M.I., published in 1907 with a letter of commendation by Cardinal Merry del Val. The French edition was happily reprinted by Éditions Delacroix in 2003.

10— Saint Pius X, Motu Proprio Sacrorum Antistitum, 1 September 1910 [English translation]

11 — Encyclical Acerbo Nimis, 15 april 1905, on the teaching of catholic doctrine.

12 — Pius XII, Allocution for the beatification of saint Pius X, ibid.

13 — Pius XII, Allocution for the beatification of saint Pius X, ibid.

14 — Saint Pius X, Motu Proprio Tra Le Sollecitudini on Sacred Music, 22 november 1903.

15 — Saint Pius X, Decree De Quotidiana SS. Eucharistiae sumptione, 20 december 1905.

16 — Saint Pius X, Decree Quam Singulari, 8 august 1910.

Letter from the Dominicans of Avrillé No. 31: May 2019

admin In defense of our convent, Our seminary, The Third Order of Penance, Writings of the Dominican Fathers June 4, 2019June 4, 2019Rosary, Third Order of Penance

Letter from the Dominicans of Avrillé

No. 31: May 2019

2019: Year of St. Vincent Ferrer

St. Vincent Ferrer: 1350-1419

The apostolate of St. Vincent Ferrer was as international as the Dominican Order itself. Spain, Portugal, Italy, France, Switzerland (some even say England, but proof is lacking)… received his visit, and all of Europe felt the power of his message.

He traveled on foot – or, at the end of his life, riding on a donkey – accompanied by a group of confessors and a flock of penitents who would follow for a time the preacher that converted them. Arriving in town, he would kneel down on the ground, not wanting to penetrate any further into the city without imploring for it the divine blessing. After which, the mission commenced.

He himself would rise each morning at 2 o’clock, in order to recite the Breviary and say his private prayers. A few hours later, the mission would start with a Solemn High Mass, celebrated by St. Vincent, with deacon, sub-deacon, and a highly-trained schola — with musical instruments! The saint placed great importance on the beauty of the liturgy, which for him was the first way to preach.

The Mass was generally celebrated outdoors, as no church could contain the crowds of faithful. Next came the sermon, which easily lasted three hours (sometimes longer), the blessing of the sick (and the resulting miracles), and the reconciliation of enemies.

The Angel of the Last Judgment

In the eyes of the faithful, Saint Vincent Ferrer was above all — as he said himself — the “Angel of the Last Judgment”, he who came to cry out to the world: “Fear God, and give Him glory, for the hour of His judgment is come” (Apoc. 14:7). Born in 1350, two years after the start of the terrible bubonic plague that decimated Europe, he preached to a Christendom ravaged by the Hundred Years War, natural catastrophes (such as the earthquakes shaking even St. John Lateran and St. Peter’s), and the Great Western Schism. If that wasn’t the end of the world, it was at least a striking prefiguration. Throughout Church history, just as there have regularly been precursors of the Antichrist, God has sent precursors of the intrepid preachers who will be his direct adversaries at the end of the world.

A hundred years ago, the review La Vie spirituelle underlined the significance of St. Vincent’s mission, for his epoch and ours:

God gave him the mission to speak to all the people of Europe, to repeat during 30 years, without tiring, the importance of salvation, the blinding light of the final judgment, the eternity of Hell. […] The whole of St. Vincent’s preaching consists in boldly confronting his listeners with the most frightening and the most certain of all realities: Hell is the punishment for sin. Unless you convert, you will all perish.

The Angel of the Judgment is thus [always] a “Saint for today”.

The Problem of Evil

If God exists, where does evil come from? This is a common objection, but which actually turns against atheism and leads to religion.

And yet, evil exists, doesn’t it? Evil (for example, deafness, blindness…) does not have its own proper existence: it’s an absence, a lack, a disorder, that doesn’t exist all by itself, but only in something else that it damages. Evil is a privation of being — a privation of the normal order.

What does that prove? A privation does not have a proper cause. The shadow of a tree (privation of light) is not positively produced by the tree (which only limits the action of the Sun), and much less by the Sun itself! In a way, one could say that evil is to God what shadows are to the Sun.

But if God is all-powerful, what could limit His action? God, being all-powerful, is free to manifest His goodness as He wishes. Instead of an egalitarian universe (with millions of identical beings), His wisdom preferred a diversified creation, reflecting His goodness in a multiple fashion (in varying degrees). In this hierarchy, certain beings cast shadows on others: animals eat other animals, which eat plants, which assimilate minerals, etc. Each creature, with its limits, contributes to the general order of things.

Doesn’t the presence of evil inside humanity itself (wars, crimes, injustice…) argue against the existence of God? False notes in a concert do not in any way rule out the existence of the symphony, nor the existence of a composer. It’s actually the opposite which is true: it would be impossible to discern the false notes if the melody and harmony of the whole did not exist. Similarly, the presence of evil in the world does not in any way raise doubts as to the existence of God: to the contrary, we could not discern what is evil without having first recognized a general order of the universe.

Evil remains a scandal! Evil is a scandal for those who are more or less pantheistic (thinking that the universe itself is God), or who adore Mankind. The imperfections of our world prove first and foremost that the world is not God; it is not the Supreme Being, and so we must therefore search for something higher. Every man has a thirst for happiness which cannot be completely satisfied by things here below. This is just one more proof of the existence of God: true happiness is over and above this world!

But if God is good, couldn’t he eliminate all evil? Evil will always be a mystery for our limited human reason. We can understand that evil is permitted by God for a greater good, but it remains difficult to discern what this greater good actually is. The mystery of evil calls upon other mysteries which alone can shed light upon it: the mystery of eternal life (our life on earth is only a temporary trial, before our real life), the mystery of final judgment (one day, everyone must render an account of their actions), the mystery of original sin (man used his liberty to “thwart” God’s plan), and the mystery of Jesus Christ, who made reparation for sin in a manner even more beautiful than if sin had never existed (God’s goodness is revealed better by Jesus taking on human nature in order to make reparation and suffer in our place). To all those who suffer and are tempted to revolt, only Jesus (who suffered even more, but who leads us to happiness), provides the true answer.

Community Chronicle

January 31^st: Mrs. Miriam CARROLL (Sr. Claire Gambacorta t.o.p.) passed away in Kansas, fortified by the sacraments of the Church and assisted by her fellow tertiaries. According to the constitutions of the Third Order and her personal wishes, she was buried wearing the Dominican habit.

February 1^st: At Montagnac-la-Crempse (Périgord), Fathers Marie-Dominique and Angelico represent the community at the funeral services for Mother Marie-Emmanuel, the first Prioress of the contemplative Dominican sisters of Avrillé.

February 9^th: Brothers Michel-Marie and Augustin-Marie receive the tonsure during a Pontifical High Mass celebrated by Bishop Zendejas. Several seminarians receive the cassock, tonsure and minor orders on the same occasion.

February 10^th: The Third Order Fraternity of “Saint Dominic and Saint Francis” (which gathered together all our tertiaries of Southeastern France) having become too big, Fathers Angelico and Marie-Laurent preside the erection of a new Fraternity for our tertiaries of Auvergne: the Fraternity “Saint Vincent Ferrer.” The fledgling Fraternity will be consecrated to the Immaculate Heart of Mary on May 5^th, feast of St. Pius V.

February 17^th: Third Order meeting for Fathers Marie-Dominique and Hyacinthe-Marie at “Saint Joseph’s Domain” (Convent of the Sisters of Mary Coredemptrix, near Rennes, Brittany).

March 9^th/10^th: Weekend recollection for the faithful near Bordeaux, with Fathers Marie-Laurent and Hyacinthe-Marie.

March 17^th: Annual pilgrimage in honor of St. Joseph for the families of St. Philomena School, with Fathers François-Marie and Angelico. Fathers Marie-Dominique and Hyacinthe-Marie are in Chartres for a conference, then to Paris for the Third Order.

March 30^th/31^st: For the 600^th anniversary of St. Vincent Ferrer’s entry into Heaven, Father Louis-Marie leads a group of tertiaries on a pilgrimage to his tomb in Vannes (Brittany).

March 24^th: Arrival of Bishop Thomas Aquinas, who will stay several weeks in France.

March 28^th: Father Prior is in Rennes (Brittany), where Bishop Thomas Aquinas presides over the ceremony of the final vows of Sr. Marie-Liesse, and the temporary vows of Sister Marie-Joseph (Sisters of Mary Coredemptrix).

March 30^th-April 6^th: Annual pilgrimage to Rome for the graduating class of St. Thomas Aquinas Boys’ School, accompanied by Fr. Marie-Dominique.

Death of St. Vincent at Vannes (Brittany)

News from our worksites

In order to have a spotless church in time for Holy Week and Easter, a 5-day cleaning operation, under the direction of our Br. André-Joseph, was accomplished in late February. The height of the vaulted ceiling and the fragility of the murals (dating from the 14^th century) made it necessary to rent a crane for the delicate procedure.

The construction permit for the future Parish Hall was rejected due to a change in zoning laws… The architect is now revising the blue prints in conformity with the new requirements, and we’re hoping to get the project under way in 2020. We’re also counting on your prayers to remove all the administrative and financial obstacles!

Crisis in the Church

February 4^th, 2019: “The pluralism and the diversity of religions, color, sex, race and language are willed by God in His wisdom.” (Declaration on Human Fraternity signed by Pope Francis in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates.)

March 30th, 2019: Rabat, Morocco: the Pope visits the “Mohamed IV Institute for the Formation of Muslim Preachers,” thereby giving formal encouragement to spread a false religion fiercely opposed to Our Lord!

To send a donation:

YOU MAY USE PAYPAL (ON OUR WEBSITE), OR SEND TO:

— In the U.S.:

Dominicans of Avrillé, Inc.
P.O. Box 23, Newman Lake, WA. 99025

— In Canada:

Association of St. Dominic

C I B C, 201-21 Street East

Saskatoon (SK) S7K OB8 Canada

Please include a note, and specify:

acc. #40-91531

— In the U.K.:

Association of St. Dominic

R B S Edinburgh, 17 Comiston Road, Edinburgh EH10 6AA

Please specify: acct. # 00105564

For more information :

Couvent de la Haye-aux-Bonshommes

49240 Avrillé, France

Sermon of Bishop Gerardo Zendejas in Avrillé – February 9, 2019

admin FEATURED POSTS - Articles and Texts section, Our seminary, Spirituality February 28, 2019February 28, 2019Archbishop Lefebvre, Ordinations

Sermon of Bishop Gerardo Zendejas in Avrillé for taking of Cassocks, Tonsures, First and Second Minor Orders for Saint-Louis Grignion-de-Montfort Seminary and the Dominicans

Saturday February 9, 2019

+ In the name of the Father, and the Son, and of the Holy Ghost

Dear Bishop Faure, Father Prior, Priests, Brothers, Sister, my dear Brethren….

Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre, our venerable Founder, has always encouraged us with his 1974 doctrinal declaration, like a testament for preserving Catholic Tradition as essential element in Catholicism. Here are some exerts of his words…

“Even though we, or an angel from heaven, preach a gospel to you besides that which we have preached to you, let him be anathema.” (Gal. 1;8)…

“… The lex orandi cannot be profoundly changed without changing the lex credendi. The New Mass is in line with the new catechism, the new priesthood, new seminaries, new universities, and the charismatic or Pentecostal church, all of which are in opposition to orthodoxy and to the all time Magisterium.

This reform, since it has issued from Liberalism and Modernism, entirely is corrupt. It comes from heresy and results in heresy, even if all its acts are not formally heretical. It is thus impossible for any faithful Catholic who is aware of these things to adopt this reform, or to submit to it in any way at all. To ensure our salvation, the only attitude of fidelity to the Church and to Catholic doctrine, is a categorical refusal to accept the reform.

It is for this reason that, without any rebellion, bitterness or resentment, we pursue our work of the formation of priests under the star of all times Magisterium, in the conviction that we can thus do no greater service to the holy Catholic Church, to the Sovereign Pontiff, and to future generations….”

My dear brethren, let us give thanks to Our Lord Jesus Christ, Lord of Lords and King of Kings, Who allows us to meet here once again at Avrillé to participate together in this ceremony of Tonsure and Minor Orders, which are ascending steps for the continuation of the Catholic Priesthood according to the Traditional Roman Rite of Ordination, as Archbishop Lefebvre has transmitted to us the Deposit of the Faith so that we should continue to do likewise for future generations.

Dear Seminarians and Dominican Brothers, God willing, you might be future priests; and you, dear faithful, should pray for religious vocations to come out from your young families. Therefore, let’s summarize, as it seems to me, in two points these words “for future generations.”

1) The preservation of the Catholic Priesthood

2) The Royalty of Our Lord Jesus Christ professed by Episcopal Ministry

1) The Catholic Priesthood

As Archbishop Lefebvre constantly insisted, the raison d’être for a Catholic priest is the Cross of Our Lord Jesus Christ, and the continuation of His Cross on Calvary through the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. The priest must necessarily live the precepts of the Gospel, namely, poverty-obedience-chastity through prayer and abnegation, in order to preserve his raison d’être. If a priest neglects the Cross of Jesus Christ, he is certainly losing the essential element for the eternal salvation of his soul and of many others.

The Holy Sacrifice of the Mass should certainly keep up that grace which we have received at our baptism. When our godparents have said we renounce Satan, his works and allurements, the priest has also said to us “serva mandata; Keep the Commandments of God.” Then he put the white veil on our head, and in giving out a candle to us through the intermediary of our godparents he has said – “Keep intact the purity of your soul as this linen with which you are covered, and then you shall have eternal life.” We must therefore fulfill our baptismal promises so that we could enter in the Kingdom of heaven.

For those who have entered in religious life, they have pronounced their religious vows, engaging in a solemn way themselves even more than any faithful, devoting themselves not only to almighty God but also the whole Church. That’s why pronouncing their vows of religion, they have engaged themselves in a public and official way, acknowledged by the Church, practicing the vows of poverty, obedience and chastity. This is the raison d’être for a religious – he has made his profession to tend to perfection, and to strive for holiness.

And you, who are going to be tonsured – my dear Levites, as Archbishop Lefebvre used to called us – you are going to receive the cassock and the tonsure; but these two things are very distinct: One can receive the religious habit, yet without receiving Tonsure.

One enters into the clergy by the tonsure; this is the Tradition in the Catholic Church. In receiving the tonsure, there is already a promise to go to the Altar – to ascend to the altar. A Tonsured can be promoted by his superiors to receive Minor Orders, and in preparation to receive the Major Orders: a Sub-Deacon commits himself to his vow of chastity forever; a deacon approach closer to the altar by preaching, baptizing and giving holy communion; and then comes the priesthood – a priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek.

As Saint Thomas Aquinas teaches, there are two signs which determine someone’s vocation, this is to say – the inclination of the person who wants to pursue a religious vocation, and the acceptation or calling from the bishop to receive step-by-step the holy Orders. As a matter of fact, many people are willing to follow their vocation but very few of them are promoted by the calling of the bishop.

To those who are receiving Minor Orders, the Bishop is about to warn you saying: “You must give example by your life; you must sanctify the faithful by the example of your life, not only by words, not only by performing your functions, but also by the example of your life.”

In fact, in every admonition he gives to the Order of Lector or Porter, as well as to the Order of Exorcist or Acolyte; the bishop reminds the exigency to engage oneself in following Our Lord Jesus Christ in order to perform the most important act, which Our Lord did – His sacrifice.

Doubtless to say that throughout the history of the church, all the disasters and misfortunes have come in general from the lukewarm clerics and religious. Why?

For clerics have befallen into sins of the flesh, or have chosen some comfort in sharing the world, or have indulged some Satan’s pride alike. Many of them have abandoned the royal way of the Holy Cross, which is scandal for the Jews and foolishness for the pagans…. Unfortunately, there are many religious souls practicing a double standard in life, in one hand a worldly private life and on the other a public tepid life.

What to do about that? The Archbishop reminds us once again that…

“…This is not a human battle. We are in close fight with Satan. It is a struggle that demands all the supernatural forces which we need, in order to fight against him who wants to radically destroy the Church; he wanted to do so since Our Lord has born; and he wants to continue on abolishing and destroying the Mystical Body, wiping out His reign and all His institutions whatever they may be.

We have to be conscious of this dramatic, apocalyptic struggle in which we live, and not minimize it. To the extent of, if we minimize it, our eagerness in the battle grows less. We then become weaker and dare no more to proclaim the Truth….” (Archbishop June 29, 1987)

2) The Royalty of Our Lord Jesus Christ professed by Episcopal ministry.

We have received the means to instruct formally with Catholic doctrine the future priests, in order to administer to them, the Sacrament of the Holy Orders according to Traditional Roman Rite. You well know that there can be no priest without a bishop. Thus, bishops by divine institution are shepherds of souls, directed for their eternal salvation through the means of the Sacred Magisterium, and of the legislative and judicial power. They are responsible to Christ for their divine commission. At their Episcopal consecration, the power of Order endows them in particular to sanctify souls by the administration of the sacrament of Confirmation and of the Holy Orders.

Indeed, Archbishop Lefebvre by consecrating bishops has formally continued the constitution of the Catholic Church in order to keep Tradition alive. In providing the Episcopal ministry descending in direct line from the Apostolic succession without doubt, the marks of One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church are being preserve through today’s crisis of the Faith and of the world.

More than ever, there is a major conflict between Faith and authority. The normal and ordinary situation of the Catholic Church certainly is that the pope, bishops and priests must lead an orientation according to the Catholic tenets of our Faith, which have divinely revealed to us and are exteriorly commissioned to the hierarchy, or at least they should not contradict them. At the contrary, we are in the deepest of an extraordinary crisis within the Church. It is evident for us that the New Evangelization of today’s Pope, coming as consequence of the Vatican II reforms, is diametrical opposed to the Catholic Magisterium of all time; it is a “New Gospel,” which Saint Paul has warned us to let it be an ANATHEMA!

In fact, last few years papal interventions, which are leading the dramatic crisis to desecrate the Catholic Faith, such interventions have rejected the Royalty of Our Lord Jesus Christ. Thus, the Roman authorities have proclaimed Liberalism as the ruling principle of Religious Liberty in individual consciences and in public laws of institutions and Governments. The Vatican II document on Religious Liberty declares that no Government of any Country is competent in religious matter; therefore they cannot decide what religion is true, or what religion is false. State Laws must consequently let all religious errors – whatever they are – be spread out in their autonomous social domain, because Man is free to have his own Religion, with his own moral decisions and own ways of worship, including those ones done against nature.

For Tradition, Jesus Christ is true God and true Man, as well as a true King in all domains – yesterday, today and forever. Pontius Pilate asked to him, then are you a King? Yes, yourself have said: I am a King, for that I have born. I have come to the world in order to give testimony of the Truth…

So, instead of preaching about the Royalty of our Lord Jesus Christ the modern Roman authorities have constantly uncrowned and humiliated our King of Kings and our Lord of Lords. In the same token a large number of Traditional priests, including bishops, have been compromising the Universal Kingship of Our Lord by progressive public omission and by silent commission. It is precisely what Liberalism has silently engaged in the SSPX leadership in working for an agreement with today’s Roman authorities, promoters of Pope Francis New Evangelization. Here is a mystery of iniquity!

That’s why we should remind ourselves these words of the Archbishop Lefebvre:

“It is for this reason that, without any rebellion, bitterness or resentment, we pursue our work of the formation of priests under the star of all times Magisterium, in the conviction that we can thus do no greater service to the holy Catholic Church, to the Sovereign Pontiff, and to future generations….”

With integrity and fidelity to the Traditional doctrines and practices of the Catholic Church, we resist the “novelties” preached since the Second Vatican Council, those novelties were wanted, both encouraged and imposed by the highest Roman authorities. Even though, we believe against any human appearance, and hope against any human hope, that Tradition must restore all things in Christ, and rather sooner than later, today’s chaos will go away, because the gates of Hell will not prevail against the Church.

There is no question for us of separating ourselves from Rome, either of putting ourselves under any foreign government, or of establishing a sort of parallel church as the Bishops of Palmar of Troya [Bp. Din-Thuc consecrations line] have done in Spain. They have even elected a pope, have formed a college of cardinals… It is out of the question for us to do such things. Far from us to be this miserable thought of separating ourselves from Rome! (Archbishop June 30, 1988)

God alone knows how far this apostasy can go. Indeed, we have some duties of state to keep up, as Our Lady of Fatima told us to do, if we want to remain Catholic and if we want to continue the Church. Within the Episcopal ministry, we have serious obligations urging us, primarily, to multiply the priests who believe in Our Lord Jesus Christ, and in His royalty, and in His Social Kingship according to the doctrine of the Church.

After thirty years of the 1988 Episcopal Consecrations, we really appreciate Archbishop Lefebvre’s operation survival in keeping the mark of Apostolicity in the Holy Catholic Church, conferring Episcopal consecrations with legitimate validity for the continuation of the Apostolic Traditions.

Let’s us renew our consecration to the Mother of God, as Saint Cyril of Alexandria called her Theotokos, preaching that all Our Lady’s privileges derive from her Maternity. She can only have perfect faith in the divinity of her Divine Son. And we should ask from Our Lord such faith that she had in Her King and our King, in Her Lord and Our Lord. Therefore, we should believe the incredible so that we could do even the impossible – in restoring all things in Christ.

Viva Cristo Rey!