Preface

The idea behind this work made its first appearance at some conferences on Liberalism made for the seminarians at Ecône. The purpose of the conferences was to enlighten the understanding of these future priests about the most serious and the most harmful error of modern times, and to permit them to pass a judgement consistent with the truth and with the Faith on all the consequences and manifestations of atheistic Liberalism and of liberal Catholicism.

The liberal Catholics convey the liberal errors to the interior of the Church and in the associations which are still a little bit Catholic. It is very instructive to re-read the teachings of the popes on this subject and to ponder the vigor of their condemnations.

It is valuable to recall the approbations given by Pius IX to Louis Veuillot, the author of that admirable book The Liberal Illusion, and by the Holy Office to the book of Dom Felix Sarda y Salvany, Liberalism Is A Sin.

What would these authors have thought, if they had ascertained, as we have today, that Liberalism reigns as master at the Vatican and in the episcopates?

Hence, the urgent necessity for future priests to know this error. For the liberal Catholic has a false conception of the act of faith, as Dom Sarda well shows.1 Faith is no longer an objective dependence on God’s authority, but a subjective feeling, which as a result respects all the errors and especially the religious errors. In his chapter XXIII, Louis Veuillot shows clearly that the fundamental principle of 1789 is religious independence, the secularization of society, and finally religious liberty.

Father Tissier de Mallerais, Secretary General of the Priestly Society of Saint Pius X, encouraged by the Superior General, has had the inspiration to complete and to organize this set of conferences and to publish them, so that this very timely teaching can benefit others as well as the seminarians.

While this work was being completed, the most abominable manifestation of liberal Catholicism was being performed at Assisi, a tangible proof that the pope and those who approve of him have a false idea of the Faith, a modernist notion, which is going to shake the whole edifice of the Church. The pope himself declares this in his allocution of December 22, 1986, to the members of the Curia.

With the purpose of keeping and protecting the Catholic Faith from this plague of Liberalism, this book seems to me to have come at the right time, becoming an echo of the words of Our Lord, “He that believeth and is baptized will be saved, but he that believeth not shall be condemned” (Mk. 16:16). It is this belief that the Word of God incarnate has demanded of all if they want to be saved. It is this that cost Him his life and then that of all the martyrs and witnesses who have professed it. With religious Liberalism, there are no more martyrs, or missionaries, but only rummage-sale dealers in religion, around the peace-pipe of a purely verbal peace!

Far be from us this Liberalism, grave-digger of the Catholic Church.

Following Our Lord, let us carry the standard of the Cross, the only sign and the only source of Salvation.

May Our Lady of Fatima, on the seventieth anniversary of her apparition, deign to bless the propagation of this book, which echoes her predictions.

Marcel Lefebvre

Ecône, January 13, 1987

Feast of the Baptism of Our Lord