Immaculate Heart of Mary,
triumph soon...
Dear
Father Gruner:
Your crusade for making known to as
many as possible the whole truth about
The Ill-fated
Vatican II revolution, falsely called a "renewal." put and to my activities in behalf of
And
now, in these latter years, by the grace of God, you have appeared on the scene
to broadcast far and wide the whole Fatima Message to a dying; world, which
seems to have long gone past the point of no return, so that one wonders how it
can possibly avoid a terrible divine punishment, which more and more appears
inevitable. Only some kind of special divine intervention of mercy could wake
up mankind, particularly the Catholic world, and bring it to its senses.
But whatever can be justly said in praise of your work in behalf of Of Lady of Fatima and her Message, the same cannot be said
equally of your treatment of certain issues closely connected with the Faith,
and particularly such issues as those of John Paul II and Vatican II. The whole
truth on such issues as these must also be brought out. In other words, the
whole truth about
What I have especially in mind here, though not exclusively, is the error
of false ecumenism, which is so widespread today, as you well know. Whether or not you, who are rightly so intent on exposing error,
have ever as much as mentioned false ecumenism in any of your articles and
speeches being one of the big errors of the day. I have no way of
knowing, as I do not know everything that you have said. But I would like to
know.
At this point, since it comes to mind at the
moment, I would ask you to allow your esteemed and talented collaborator,
Father Paul Leonard, to read this letter of mine also,
and possibly let him have a copy of it. since what I
am saying is of interest to both of you). And wherever I say to "you"
In this letter, it may apply to either of you or to both of you.
To
get back to the false ecumenism of today - you know that it is heresy and you
know what the consequences and. penalties are for it. And you also know who is the No. 1 promoter and defender of false ecumenism,
namely John Paul II. It just isn't possible that you could be unaware of this.
Never in the history of the Church has such quick and. such
widespread publicity been given to a heresy. You need. not
even be given examples of the heretical actions and words of John Paul II,
since the whole world has seen and heard, among many other scandals, the likes of..the
This
is the same John Paul II of whom you boast as being “one of his strongest supporters." It should be clear to you that,
if you are one of the strongest supporters of John Paul II, you are in danger
of being taken one of the strongest
supporters of his error of false ecumenism also, since he and his errors are
inseparable, as long; as he leaves it that way. Put, seeing it in this light,
you will no doubt be rightly horrified at the very thought of it, and you
should surely have some second thoughts about John Paul II.
I strongly suspect that you two,
Father Gruner and Father Paul Leonard. have privately, just between yourselves, faced the agonizing
dilemma of how to react publicly to a John Paul II who represents such manifest
heresy. But, whatever may have been the disturbing thoughts that might have
agitated you, the obvious fact, as far as I know, is that you have kept silent
about the whole truth about John Paul II and his heresy of false ecumenism. You
know that any mention of this publicly would have caused an instant loss of followers
and. supporters, so that you might have found yourself facing your dwindling
remaining followers and supporters and saying to them, "Will you also go
away?"
You
have shown unmistakably that you dread-having-anyone-accuse you of
"blaming the Pope" or of being "against the Pope." But,
Father, Father, do not let the unthinking critics intimidate you with such
charges! Note well how generalized and
vague their charge is: "You are against the Pope," as if to say that you are against the
Papacy Itself. They do not even bother to name the Pope against whom you are
supposed to be speaking. They dare not say that "you are against John Paul
II because of his heresy or false ecumenism.” And, least of do they dare say
that "you are against the false ecumenism of John Paul II," because
that would immediately tell them that you are right and that they are wrong.
And when it comes to such a manifest
act against the One True Faith, is the notorious false ecumenism of John Paul
II, we cannot take refuge in the excuse that God alone is the One Who is to
blame John Paul II for this, and not we. The fact is that God has given us the gift of the True
Faith, with the obligation to profess it openly, even in the face of an
occupant of the Chair of Peter, as is shown in the admittedly rare ease of the
You may be interested in
knowing that I began praying for the conversion - yes, conversion! - of John Paul II to the True faith as soon as he was elected,
and I am
still doing so.
As to Vatican II, the
"monumental" article, "Let Catholics Have the Traditional
Mass," clearly and emphatically upholds Vatican II as a genuinely good,
and authoritative, Ecumenical Council whose decrees must be accepted and
obeyed. This is the position that you hold.
There have been many like that, But
there have also been those who at first thought that Vatican II was fully
orthodox and in conformity with the Faith, and therefore acceptable, even if
they may have been uneasy about what it taught and commanded, only to find. on further study and reflection, that it was by no means
what they at first thought it was. To take an example - among
those who. after a time, began to see the
Council in a clearer light was the NEW JERSEY CATHOLIC NEWS, with which you may
be acquainted. The author of some jarringly frank articles (maybe Father Wickens?) on Vatican II pointed out as many as ten
"time bombs’ in the document on the Sacred Liturgy alone! And among these
"time bombs" were some of the very passages that you quoted so
authoritatively in the "monumental" article, “Let Catholics Have the
Traditional Mass."
3.
I believe that both of you, who are so
eager to discover the whole truth and make it known, would also, on further
study and reflection, detect the "time bombs" in the Liturgy document
of Vatican II. and elsewhere.
Your article on the Traditional Mass
was in a hurry to declare emphatically, and with an air of ex cathedra
finality. that the Council did not decree
that there should be a new rite of the
"The rite of the Mass is to be revised"
means, beyond any shadow of a doubt, that the Traditional Mass is no longer to remain what St.
Pius V gave to the Church and what we had known so well before the late Vatican
Council. "Revised" means "changed, " and you yourselves
stated in one of your talks that the Council did net say just what was to be
changed, and that is the way the demolition "experts" wanted it, so
that they could interpret and maneuver everything at will.
The "revision" was supposedly
intended to make things "more clear", as if the St. Pius V Missal had
not already made things clear enough in preserving "the intrinsic nature
and purpose" of the parts of the Mass. And some unnamed
"elements" were to be discarded, while others, also unnamed, were to
be "restored," as if that isn't exactly what St. Plus V had done
through his specially chosen commission of learned men. And here it is well to
remind. you that the Council of Trent did not appoint
a commission to examine the Roman Missal, as you have the unfortunate Michael
Davies saying. St. Plus V is the one who appointed that commission well after
the Council of Trent had already adjourned.
The Vatican II Council adds that those unnamed
"elements" to be "restored" are to be restored
"according to the pristine norm of the Holy Fathers," as if ignoring
the fact that this is exactly what St. Plus V had already done. His commission
RESTORED the ancient Roman Missal "according to the pristine norm
and rite of the Holy Fathers." as is clearly stated in Quo Primum. There is so much confusing and
contradictory talk about "revising" and "preserving” and “reviging” and “restoring” and “Preservig”
and “restoring” in the article that one wonders what was really done by St.
Plus V and what it was that Vatican II wanted done.
It must be made as clear as could be
that St. Plus V, in response to the command of the Council of Trent. RESTORED the ancient Roman Missal, as is very plainly indicated on
the very title page of the traditional Latin Missal As a result, the current
Roman Missal, with all its local variations, in use at the time of the Council
of Trent. was replaced by the ancient Roman
Missal with only a few exceptions being allowed to continue, so that uniformity
was thus established throughout the
And Vatican II comes along to destroy
what St. Pius V had done! The restored ancient Roman Missal was to be
"revised", that is, "changed," so that we would no longer
have the traditional Roman Missal with its traditional Latin Mass, which was a
"'Lawfully recognized rite" that even Vatican II supposedly
"wishes to preserve."" Then comes the sudden about-face,
with Vatican II "also desiring" to "revise carefully" that
"lawfully recognized rite" which it had just said It wanted "to revise.”
And the excuse for that? To make the
"lawfully recognized rite" conform better to "sound
tradition" - as if St. Plus V had not already done that.
But what, pry tell, does
Anyone acquainted with the
dubious thinking of modernists know
that they are fond of talking
about a "living" tradition, which to them means a
"changing" tradition that adapts itself to "present-day
circumstances and needs." This is nothing else but evolutionary tradition.
The modernists detest what they call. with a
derogatory connotation, “statatis" tradition, that is, an unchanging and stable
tradition based upon the immutable
truths of the Faith. John Paul. II himself has spoken of a "living"
tradition in criticizing traditionalists who insist on preserving the
traditional Latin Mass of St. Plus V, as well as other
Catholic traditions. And this is the same John Paul 11 who has graciously conceded that traditionally-minded Catholics should
have the traditional Mass!?
If you still do not believe that Vatican
II, with its demand for a "revision" of the rite of the Mass “in the
light of sound tradition" and to fit It to the "circumstances and
needs" of the day, did not open. up the way wide for such a rite as the Novus Ordo, then consider further
and more thoughtfully this time, what else you quoted from Sacrosanctum
Concillum.
"In order that sound tradition be retained ...
there must be no Innovations unless the good of the Church genuinely and
certainly requires them...” Is that one ever loaded.
First,
there is the categorical-sounding declaration that "there must be no
innovations..." Sounds great. But then comes another sudden reversal. The "Innovations,” on
second thought, may be Introduced, if "the good of the
Church"
certainly requires them. And all this for the sake of
"sound tradition?"
"Innovation" means
"change.” Innovation means introducing something new, something that was
not there before. And it means that what was before,
shall be no longer. It means that genuine, unchanging tradition must give way
to a changing, evolutionary type of tradition, mistakenly called
"sound" tradition - the idea being to justify and cover innovation
with good-sounding terminology, and with a pretense at fidelity to the
"forms already existing.”
The Nouus Ordo Is an innovation, as you yourselves have rightly made clear. Yet It Is fully justified by the contradictory and meandering wording of the Vatican II document on the Liturgy. This new rite, this innovation, was expressly introduced in order "to meet the present-day circumstances and needs," and because this “innovation” was “required," supposedly, by the genuine good of the Church. What we cannot deny is that it was Vatican II that opened up the wary for all this, the Council Fathers with their unawareness and sleepiness and blindness notwithstanding.
The title
given to your "monumental" article, "Let Catholics Have the
Traditional Mass," is a monumental misfit, considering all that you say already
on the first two pages (42 & 43) of the article, and considering all that you quote from the Council, whose words you
take to be authoritative and binding. If you mean by that title the
"unrevised" Traditional Mass, as it came to us from St. Plus V, then you are
contradicting the Council, which called for a "revision" of the
Traditional Mass, end you are contradicting yourself, for you demand that the
decree of the Council calling for that revision be obeyed. Put if you mean a
"revised" Traditional Mass, you are again stating a glaring
contradiction, for a “revised” supposedly "traditional" Mass is no
longer the Traditional Mass.
You
know how the revision of the Mass prescribed by Vatican II (though you did not
perhaps live through It the way we did) turned out to
be a slow, gradual. but accelerating. process. beginning 1under John
XXIII and continueing more rapidly, then finally
concluding with the Novus Ordo
under Paul VI.
What
you do not indicate is whether the first cautious revisions would have been
acceptable to you, and you would have been satisfied that we still had the
"traditional" Mass - or whether
perhaps also all the other revisions the
preceded the Novas Ordo would still have fit your
idea of a "traditional" Mass. Or, does your plea for the Traditional
Mass mean just what it seems it say, that is, the unrevised Mass of St. Plus V, the Vatican II decree of revision not withstanding?
You make much of certain carefully chosen
statements of John Paul II. For
example, regarding the Traditional Mass, you show yourself impressed by the
concession granted to traditional Catholics to have their Mass and thus satisfy
their legitimate spiritual needs and preferences. And yet you cannot possibly
fail to see that the gracious John Paul II continues to be the No. performer of
the Novas Ordo in the
I don't know in how many other places
John Paul II has put on such "artistic" Noviis
Ordo displays, but I do know that he did it in
Indonesia, because my brother sent me the English language Jakarta Post from
Java, telling the story of John Paul's visit there, with a large picture on the
front page showing John Paul blessing the many dancers scattered all over in
front of the Novus Ordo
stage.
If some
This letter is already painfully long,
so I will conclude by saying the Your Fatima Crusade needs to be by all means
continued, but I do hope that you will take a better look at what is really
happening in the Conciliar Church and that its leader and his collaborators really
stand for. May God give you the light and guidance you need.,
and may Our-Lady help you do what is right and good in God's sight.
Needless
to say, this letter received no response from Fr. Gruner
who continues to propogate both Fatima and the post-Conciliar Church.
Pax et Bonum!
Father Martin Stepanich, O.F.M., S.T.D.