Editorial, continued
[Pages 6-22 of 22]
Webster: Validity?
With that in mind, perhaps we ought to take a little look at the thorny question of validity. Validity is not the most important thing, it comes a long way second the public profession of the Catholic Faith, but that does not mean that it is a matter of no importance at all. It does matter, after all. There are at least two controversies wrapped up in this. The first is the question of “Bishop” Neal Webster’s own holy orders. The second is the question of whether he did, in fact pass on anything to Fr. Pfeiffer, even supposing he had any orders to pass on. Only a bishop can ordain priests or consecrate a new bishop -even if the correct form is followed, nothing happens if the one ordaining is himself not a valid bishop. The same is therefore automatically true if the one who had consecrated the ordaining bishop were himself not really a bishop, and the one who consecrated him in turn, and so on. A chain is only as strong as its weakest link, in other words. It is for this reason, for example, that Anglican orders have long been held by the Catholic Church to be invalid (because serious changes were made to the ritual in the consecration of “Archbishop” Parker, the Protestant pretender to the See of Canterbury, in the mid-1500s).
So, to the first question: does “Bishop” Neal Webster have episcopal holy orders to pass on to Fr. Pfeiffer? If he does, where did they come from? Neal Webster was consecrated by one “Bishop” Slupski, whose orders derive from the retired Vietnamese Archbishop Ngo-Dinh Thuc, via Guerard des Lauriers and Robert McKenna. Both the latter were Dominican priests from before the Council, and Thuc was a diocesan ordinary before the Council. For that reason, I suspect that most people would not have a problem presuming validity as far as the episcopal orders go. Even though there may have been irregularities and the ceremonies weren’t perhaps done perfectly (Guerard des Lauriers, for example, was consecrated in a tiny living room, with a telephone on the table which served as altar; it is also reported by those who were there that Thuc, continually forgetting that he was meant to be a sedevacantist, more than once invoked the name of John Paul II, with des Lauriers interrupting him to tell him off!) the proverbial ‘bar’ for validity is a lot lower than for something ‘good’ or ‘pleasing to God’ and the men involved ought to have been able to tell what a valid sacrament looked like and what an invalid one looked like. So most, I suspect, would say that that episcopal line is valid, or at any rate, likely to be so. But that is not where the problem with Webster lies.
Who was this man whom Slupski thought he was consecrating? “Father” Neal Webster was ordained a priest by “Bishop” Timothy Hennebery who was himself consecrated by “Bishop” Maurice Terrasson. Whether or not Terrasson was himself a bishop or even a priest must surely be a matter of some serious doubt: he was, it seems, “ordained” a priest by Jean Laborie in 1974 and later consecrated bishop by Clemente Dominguez y Gomez. Laborie was, it is said, a notorious homosexual, a travelling beer salesman and, moreover, not even a Catholic. By all accounts he lived and died outside the Catholic Church and was already involved in schismatic sects well before Vatican II. He was putatively “consecrated” in 1966 by a “Bishop” Jean Pierre Danyel of the “Holy Celtic Church” and then again in 1968 by a “Bishop” Calvinet of the “Old Catholic Church,” which many readers will know to be a schismatic sect dating from c.1870 and whose members managed to obtain holy orders only from the Jansenists, a sect which left the Church in the mid-1600s. In 1977, Jean Laborie was again conditionally “consecrated” (his third attempt!) by Archbishop Ngo-Dinh Thuc, the same Vietnamese bishop already mentioned above. The fact that he submitted to a third attempt at consecration must surely mean that he himself doubted whether the first two “consecrations” were at all valid. Laborie’s ordination of Terrasson, however, took place three years prior to this third attempt to be consecrated validly, making Terrasson’s priestly ordination doubtful even in the eyes of the supposed “bishop” who had “ordained” him! Can a doubtful priest be made into a bishop without conditional re-ordination to the priesthood? Probably not, it seems. Therefore, if Terrasson was doubtfully a priest at the hands of Laborie, he will have been made doubtfully a bishop at the hands of Dominguez.
As for Clemente Dominguez himself, by the time he supposedly “consecrated” Terrasson, he had already for some time established himself as a “seer” of fake “apparitions” and purveyor of bogus “prophecies” in a little place called Palmar de Troya, in Spain. The “apparitions,” in fact seem to have begun with some children in 1968 but when word started to get about and people began to gather there, Clemente and his sidekick Maunuel Alonso Corral muscled their way in and by late 1969 had completely taken over the business, so to speak, with Clemente becoming the “seer”. By the year we are interested in, he had been receiving a large number of terrifyingly apocalyptic “messages,” “revelations” and instructions for all true believers (“hand over your money so we can build a basilica”, being one of them!) for the best part of a decade already, and had by all accounts become rather like the Medjugorje of his day (only without the ecumenism!). Said by many to have been a notorious homosexual since even before this newfound career, he seems also to have given himself fake “stigmata” and used animal blood and other such bogus devices for greater effect. My old friend Ronald Warwick knew people from the SSPX over here who travelled to Palmar in the early days to see for themselves if it was real -they came home convinced that it was fake, not least because they had discovered the “seer” smoking a cigarette in the back during Mass!
Not long after “consecrating” Terrasson, Clemente Dominguez announced that the Virgin Mary had made him Pope-elect directly from heaven, and upon the death of Paul VI (1978) he affirmed that heaven had decided to move the Church from Rome to Palmar de Troya and that henceforth it would be known as the One, Holy, Catholic, Apostolic and Palmarian Church. Since the Blessed Virgin Mary had appointed him Pope, he styled himself Gregory XVII (“the Very Great”!). One of his first “Papal” acts was to canonise “Saint Paul VI” (who for years had been held prisoner drugged and in chains in the Vatican, you see?). There are plenty more ghastly details which one could add besides, but I think you get the idea. It’s horrific and at the same time fascinating, like watching a motorway pileup: horrible, but one can’t look away! To say that anything originating with Palmar de Troya is very bad news, both from the point of view of the public profession of the Faith and from the point of view of sacramental validity, is something of a gross understatement. After a few years this new “Pope” called his own “Council” (“The First Palmarian Council”) which, rather like it’s “Vatican” archetype a few years earlier, abolished the Tridentine Mass and all traditional Roman Rites, and invent-ed new “Palmarian” sacramental rites with which to replace them.
How did the fake “seer” and soon-to-be Pope, Clemente Dominguez, get to be a priest and bishop in the first place without ever having studied a single day for the priesthood? It was, once again, the very same Archbishop Ngo-Dinh Thuc, who in 1976 had ordained Clemente [See pages 8-9 of this Issue for a photographic chronology of the Palmar de Troya fiasco. - The Catacombs] Dominguez priest and consecrated him bishop all within a few short days, despite the man’s objectionable moral character, despite his obvious opportunism and status as a “seer” of fake “prophecies” and leader of an already-emerging personality cult, and despite his complete lack of any kind of priestly training or seminary formation. In an ironic twist, Providence did not let this ‘visionary’ go unpunished. A few months later he was involved in a car accident and lost both his eyes, leaving the “seer” blind for the rest of his life. (Despite “prophecies” to the contrary, he never regained his sight by the time of his death in 2005, nor did he end up physically battling the anti-Christ; nor, come to think of it, did he die by being crucified in Jerusalem... it’s almost as though his “prophecies” weren’t true!)
To make matters worse, after leaving Palmar de Troya following the consecrations in 1976, Thuc, not wishing to be declared “excommunicated latae sententiae” (like Archbishop Lefebvre in 1988), promptly sought the forgiveness of Pope Paul VI, recanted what he had done and, it is said, even claimed that he had withheld his intention during the ceremony (which would mean that the consecration had been invalid and Clemente Gomez was really no bishop at all) -something extraordinary if true, for it would raise serious questions about the kind of man who is capable either of withholding his intention during public ordinations, simulating the sacrament (a very serious sin), deceiving all those present and sowing confusion for years to come; or on the other hand, who is capable of lying about having done so! Either way, it does not exactly inspire confidence. At any rate, Pope Paul VI lifted his “excommunication” after that and the Vietnamese Archbishop returned to being in good standing with the conciliar church -at least for the time being, for this was not to be his last episcopal “adventure.
Those who doubt every “Thuc bishop” and all their successors, including the more “clean” lineages (such as that of des Lauriers, already mentioned above, for example, or that of Caromona) may well be mistaken: after all, it is true that the Church always presumes validity all other things being equal. But I somehow cannot find it in my heart to condemn those who feel tempted to doubt the whole lot, even if it were to turn out that they are mistaken. There is after all something decidedly odd about Archbishop Ngo-Dinh Thuc: consistency seems not to have been his strong suit and the level of conviction one might expect to find seems to be alarmingly absent from his actions throughout. He seems not even to have been a convinced sedevacantist or even Traditionalist; he was not one of the few hundred bishops at the Council who belonged to the Coetus Internationalis Patrum, but on the contrary made a speech at the Council in favour of greater empowerment for women in the Church; in the midst of his various “adventures” in the 1970s he concelebrated the New Mass with the local conciliar bishop in the cathedral, he argued in favour of liturgical “inculturation” in his autobiography and in the 1980s he ended his days in a Vietnamese Novus Ordo religious house in the United States. However hard today’s sedevacantists hagiographers may try to make him into some sort of proto-sedevacantist, Traditionalist hero by emphasising the “good” he did and down-playing the bad, the fact remains that he was no Lefebvre; not even close! The irony is that many of the same sedevacantist leading lights who have spent so much time and energy trying to build up the reputation of Ngo-Dinh Thuc have the sheer audacity to accuse Lefebvre of inconsistency and flip-flopping! Self-interested partisanship knows no shame! But we digress...
Doubtfully a Priest, Doubtfully a Bishop
If the whole history of Terrasson’s holy orders has made your head spin, fear not. The main point to take away from it is that he was (to put it mildly!) doubtfully a priest and bishop. And since he is, as it were, the father-but-one of Neal Webster’s priesthood, that must surely make Neal Webster’s priestly orders doubtful too.
But what about Webster’s episcopal consecration by Slupski -the one concerning which such doubts do not exist -wouldn’t that supply for the defect?
The answer, from what I can tell, is not necessarily. Which, in practice, means not at all, since what we are talking about is doubt vs. certainty. We find ourselves asking the same question which we already asked concerning Terrasson. Can a man who is not already a priest be made into a bishop through episcopal consecration alone, i.e. without being a priest first? And in the same way, can a doubtful priest be made into a certain bishop, through episcopal consecration alone? The traditional teaching is that there are seven holy orders: Porter, Lector, Acolyte, Exorcist, Subdeacon, Deacon and Priest. Notice that the episcopacy is not one of them.
St. Thomas Aquinas dedicates an article to “Whether the Episcopate is an Order” and answers that, no, unlike priests, deacons and the rest, it isn’t. Therefore, says he, only a priest can become a bishop:
Now, it ought to be added in fairness that one does occasionally come across a differing opinion on this point. But that very fact alone ought to be acknowledged as grounds for doubt, even by someone who holds the view that episcopal consecration can potentially transform a non-priest into a bishop. Such a one must surely admit that
at best the matter is capable of question, and that the very uncertainty itself causes the matter to be grounds for doubt. I am not aware of the question being settled by the Church definitively, in the teaching of a Council, for instance, unless one wishes to accept the teaching contained in
Lumen Gentium 21 (see also footnote 8 of Bishop Fellay’s 2012 Doctrinal Declaration). [See
here this Declaration -
The Catacombs]
Thus it follows that both Terrasson and Webster, being doubtfully priests are also doubtfully bishops. Fr. Pfeiffer may like to claim otherwise, and I have no doubt will try. But he is hardly a disinterested party in the case and will, I think, struggle to convince many, if any at all.
Webster Bungles the Ceremony
Most laity will rarely if ever witness a priestly ordination, let alone an episcopal consecration, the sacraments they witness will be mostly the other six, primarily Mass and Confession. Yet rarely will they ever see a sacrament bungled as badly as Webster managed to bungle this one. Were everything else in order, the video of the ceremony alone would be enough to cause anyone watching it to have serious doubts about the validity of the consecration. (See for yourself:
From the very start, it is clear that Webster is very infirm and even appears almost unable to walk, having to lean heavily on Fr. Poisson for support. At the very end of the ceremony, when he is about to descend the altar steps, he totters and almost looks as though he were about to fall sideways, and again manages to stay standing only thanks to being physically supported by Fr. Poisson.
Infirmity is one thing, but Webster’s obvious ignorance is another. He clearly has little or no clue as to what he is supposed to do or what is supposed to happen next, or how he is supposed to do it. He continually mispronounces the Latin in the way that one might expect of someone who does not understand a word of it and has no familiarity with it. He twice (during the preface) appears to use both the singular and the plural form in succession, suggesting that he is unaware that they are alternatives and that one ought to use only one (depending on whether only one candidate is being consecrated or more than one). As with the sacrament of baptism, with which many laity will be familiar, the plural form is given in brackets after the singular form, as an alternative option, should the circumstances require it. How did Webster not realise this - has he never done a baptism? Has he never done a blessing from the Roman Ritual where a plural form appears in brackets next to the singular form? Since he is a “garage bishop” with who-knows-how-many faithful (if any at all!), it is of course perfectly possible that he never has. Either way, it bespeaks a scandalous ignorance -it would be scandalous in a priest or deacon, it is the more so in a supposed “bishop.” The whole video of the ceremony is more than two-and-a-half hours long, but to give just one more example, at one point [1:13:20] Fr. Poisson can be seen having to intervene to physically demonstrate the correct way to bless the crozier and ring. It’s all so embarrassing, one hardly knows where to look!
If he were only unfamiliar with the rite of episcopal consecration, one could perhaps make some allowance (even though, one could argue, it is a ceremony which most normal bishops before the Council would per-form rarely if ever, and yet they still managed not to bungle it!). But it is not just that he is ignorant of this particular ritual. The ignorance is much worse: he seems even to be ignorant of the Mass. At the consecration, for example, just before the consecration of the chalice [1:49:52], Webster he can be heard saying: “Accipite et mand -et bibite...”, he almost gets the words wrong in other words, and is corrected only by overhearing Fr. Pfeiffer who is right next to him. Is this infirmity, or is he unfamiliar with the canon of the Mass and the words of consecration? Again, at the end of Mass [2:15:05], he seems to be completely unfamiliar with giving the final blessing and does not remember to take hold of his own crozier or offer his ring to be kissed. It is only a small thing, but it is also some-thing which ought to be relatively common and happens at the end of any Pontifical Mass, not just ordinations or episcopal consecrations. But then, who knows, perhaps Webster, being a garage bishop, never has Pontifical Mass? One internet user beneath the video commented that: “The sole consecrator’s Latin seems to be quite rusty. And the rubrics aren't on point.” But again, one suspects that it isn’t that his Latin is just “rusty” -it’s that it was never there to begin with! And as to the rubrics, well... no further comment. All of that would not matter so much, had Webster been capable of performing the essential form of the ritual correctly. Like the words which begin “Hoc est enim...” during Mass, the last sentence of the preface is what constitutes the essential form. Webster is standing throughout his recitation of the preface, which doubtless does not help his concentration.
Fr. Poisson shows “Bishop” Webster how to do a blessing..
Nevertheless, what is clear is that he does not understand a word he is saying, and has a great deal of difficulty in even pronouncing the words out loud. He stumbles, he stammers and stutters, he repeats words unnecessarily and mispronounces others so badly that they are unrecognisable. Fr. Pancras Raja’s hand can be seen more than once pointing him to the right place in the book and at one point, right in the middle of the essential form, there is an excruciating five or six second pause, during which Fr. Poisson can be seen visibly to intervene, to point to the place in the book and to whisper the words to Webster. But it is no good. The sixteen words which form the last sentence of the preface and which constitute the essential form, the words which make the consecration happen or not happen, come out so hopelessly mangled and garbled that it is almost certain to have been invalid. Every sedevacantist who has seen it seems to think so, every Resistance Catholic that I am aware of, who has watched the video, thinks so too. Even Fr. Pfeiffer himself must surely think so, which would account for his assertion that they did the essential part of the ceremony again afterwards, something which is not permitted except in case of doubt.
...forgetting to take the crozier offered him at the final blessing.
“Bishop” Webster bungles the essential form of consecration over Fr. Pfeiffer... [59:10]
This is precisely why there are many who, rightly or wrongly, have doubts about the validity of ‘Thuc bishops’ per se. As mentioned above, validity should be presumed all other things being equal. But when you have ignorant men with no training and knowledge or experience of the rites attempting to ordain and consecrate, it can easily turn into a scandalous fiasco, as in this case. Consider the fact that we only know just how cringingly bad (not to say, almost certainly invalid) this one attempt at an “episcopal consecration” was due to the presence of someone with a digital camera who filmed the whole ceremony and put it on youtube. But digital cameras and youtube did not exist back in the 70s and 80s (or even 90s), so if such a car-crash ceremony as this had taken place when Clemente Dominguez attempted to consecrate Terrasson, for instance, or when Terrasson in turn attempted to consecrate Hennebery, how would anyone be any the wiser? Is there even a video of Hennebery attempting to ordain Webster to the priesthood? Who knows whether that was done properly or even validly? To be clear, I am not advocating this as the main argument -but it does deserve some consideration, nonetheless.
A Dangerous Lack of Honesty
As though all that weren’t bad enough, there was one final scandal, one which was wholly unnecessary and could easily have been avoided, but which was brought about by Fr. Pfeiffer himself. In a sermon on 31st July, but released on 2ndAugust, Fr. Pfeiffer (vested as a bishop) said that the essential form of consecration had been done again, conditionally:
“And that we, we make sure that all things are done according to the way of Holy Mother Church, even going so far that, err, the bishop, and, and after re-, repeating the essential parts of the ceremony afterwards, so that, so that we, err, have the err, the cere-, the err, the repeti-tion of the cere-, the matter and form of the sacrament, to make sure that all things are well.” (See:
Although the rest of his sermon, both before and after this point, is spoken with total fluency, the stammering which takes place here has to be heard to be believed and is accompanied by fidgeting, glancing downwards and generally looking very uncomfortable -and so he jolly well should be! He knows as well as anyone that it is always a sin to repeat an ordination or consecration without having a serious reason to do so! By admitting that he at least consented to having it done again (or was it his idea, was he the one who asked for it to be done again?), he is admitting that there was some legitimate doubt concerning the first attempt. [Continues after insert below. - The Catacombs]
These words were no doubt spoken by Fr. Pfeiffer in order to settle doubts and inspire confidence, but they have only really had the effect of raising further questions –for example, when exactly was “afterwards”? Was it immediately after entering the sacristy, or was it, as some suspect, a whole day or two later, after the video had been released and after various people on the internet had pointed out that Webster’s unbelievable bungling had rendered the first attempt invalid or at best doubtful? More importantly, how certain can we be that it was done properly the second time?
But things didn’t end there. The very next day, another video sermon went up, during which Fr. Pfeiffer attempted to defend the validity of his own episcopal consecration by claiming -incredibly! -that, even though the essential part of the ceremony had been repeated after-wards, there had in fact been no need for it to be repeated, because it turned out that “Bishop” Webster had said the words correctly the first time all along!
Oh my. Where to begin. First of all, notice Fr Pfeiffer’s insistence that everything was done absolutely correctly and his stubborn refusal to accept that there even might be a problem. Fr. Pfeiffer is clearly in denial. He goes from: “...there might have been a mistake in a couple of the words” to: “he did say each of the words of the form of the consecration correctly and validly” to: “...because one word may have been slightly mispronounced. It turned out that it wasn’t” -all within the same sermon, in the space of only a few minutes. That last remark (“It turned out that it wasn’t”) means that, according to Fr. Pfeiffer, not one word was even slightly mispronounced. How’s that for being in complete denial? How’s that for lies and spin which would make any of our modern, godless politician blush for shame?
And even if “one word may have been slightly mispronounced” -which one? Was it “ministerii” which was said “mysterii” (a totally different meaning and not even the same number of syllables!) perhaps? Or “summam” (the fullness) which was pronounced “sanum” (healthy)? Or is he thinking of “rorare” instead of “rore”..? Or “ecce structis” which appears to be Webster beginning to say “caelestis” before breaking off and going back and saying the plural form “instructos” but getting it wrong so that it sounds like “structis”..? Or could it be the pronouncing of both the singular and plural forms, one after the other in succession: “in sacerdote tuo (sacerdotibus tuis)”..? Perhaps others will spot more, but I count at least seven clear mistakes, three of which appear to be serious and not one of which could be called a “slight” mispronunciation.
As for the vaunted “lapel mic” recording to which he refers more than once and upon which he appears to be relying as though it is the thing which proves everything -it is worth noting that to this day the alleged “cleaned up” recording has not been released. So you just have to take his word for it when he tells you that it proves that not one word was even slightly mispronounced! Great. Why might it be that this vitally important recording has not been released? Two obvious answers suggest themselves: either it does not really exist; or it doesn’t show what he claims it shows. In fact, the normal video recording is quite good enough, the sound quality is more than clear enough. The “outside sound of the fans” is little more than a background hum, and as for the supposed “outside noise of the people,” well there really isn’t any, which is hardly surprising since one can see in the video that there were hardly any faithful present to make noise, you can almost count them on your fingers! The truth, as anyone who takes the trouble to listen and see for himself will instantly discover, is that one does not need a “cleaned up” “lapel mic” recording to see what is going on. Webster clearly does not have a clue what he’s doing and manages to completely bungle the form.
The reader will also notice several empty rhetorical devices. Be slow to wrath like St. Paul, be slow to wicked judgement. Whether Webster got the form correct or bungled it simply is not a question of being “wicked” or “kind” -it is entirely neutral, a question of sacramental validity and nothing to do with morals or behaviour one way or the other. If we say that he bungled it, that is because one can clearly see and hear him bungling it on the video, no other reason. The implication that those who say it was botched are somehow being “wicked” is entirely fatuous and comes off as rather desperate. People aren’t saying that it’s doubtfully valid because they’re trying to be mean to you, Father. They’re saying it because that’s what the evidence of their senses tells them. Likewise, none of us are “trying to create confusion and spread it throughout the world.” On the contrary, we are trying to make sense of the mess with which you have presented us all and see clearly through it. If anyone is creating and spreading confusion it is you. You are the one who seems to have radically changed your position on whether the Faith or sacraments come first; you are the one who invited this bungler in secret, without announcement; you are the one uniting yourself publicly with Feeneyism and sede-vacantism and then claiming afterwards that you aren’t; you are the one who first said that the form was repeated to remove doubt but then claimed that there was no doubt to be removed; you are the one citing secret ‘evidence’ about which people are supposed to just trust you!
The reference to St. Thomas doesn’t seem to make a lot of sense either -perhaps Fr. Pfeiffer is taking a decidedly liberal interpretation of St. Thomas in his own favour? To be sure, the minister can stumble a little in saying the words and the sacrament remain valid, but he does have to say the actual words! If a priest were to say “Hocust Any Gorsebush Mayor” over the host at the consecration, I’m fairly certain that most people would regard it as invalid, even if he was clearly trying to say the words in big bold type in the Missal in front of him. Webster says at least three nonsense words, two of which said were instead of words necessary for validity, and at one point he becomes so badly confused and tongue-tied that he just stops altogether, mid-phrase, at which point Fr. Poisson has to intervene. I’m not sure that St. Thomas would agree with Fr. Pfeiffer that it was certainly valid! Furthermore, St. Thomas -from what I can make out from Fr. Pfeiffer’s rather liberal paraphrasing -seems to be talking about intention. It is true, if a normal man can observe that the minister is trying to say the words in the book, that in itself ought normally to demonstrate that he was intending to do what the Church does. But we are not talking here about a defect of intention. Nobody has yet suggested that the “consecration” was invalid due to defect of intention. What everyone is saying (and quite rightly, too) is that it was most likely invalid due to defect of form, which is another matter altogether. The intention can be there, but if the form is wrong then nothing happened, however badly the minister, the candidate, or anyone else wanted it to happen.
Need one add that since Fr. Pfeiffer is not actually quoting from St. Thomas and does not even indicate which article he has in mind, where, which part of the Summa even, we cannot look it up and check for ourselves, so there really isn’t a great deal more to be said. Like the magical “lapel mic recording” which makes all doubts go away and proves that Fr. Poisson did not have to intervene (even though you saw it with your own eyes and heard it with your own ears!), this important place in St. Thomas which proves that Fr. Pfeiffer is a bishop exists simply on his say so and you will have to take his word for it -don’t hope to be able to see for yourself. So, Fr. Pfeiffer’s argument is, in essence: 1. There’s a recording which you won’t get to hear, you’ll just have to take my word for it, which proves that Webster said all the words perfectly first time around; 2. We did the essential part of the ceremony again the next day, even though we didn’t need to. But there’s no recording, so you’ll just have to take it from me that it was done properly the second time; 3. St. Thomas agrees with me that it’s certainly valid, but don’t ask me for a reference, just take my word for it; 4. The angels in heaven and the devils in hell know that I’m a bishop. So there.
Notice the inherent contradiction in what Fr. Pfeiffer says about the ceremony being repeated. Repeating the essential part of the ceremony the following day would be justified if there were any doubt concerning the first attempt. If there is no grounds for doubt and the first at-tempt was done without fault, as he claims, then there was no need (or justification) for it to be done again. Either it was done again to be certain and remove all doubt, or the validity was already certain the first time around and there was no doubt to begin with (and thus no need to do it again and nothing to be gained by doing so). Pick one!
Worse still, until the above sermon emerged, it might yet have been possible for Fr. Pfeiffer’s remaining few supporters to have claimed that the second attempt removed any doubt. Now, however, they cannot even claim that, since we cannot even be certain that the second attempt wasn’t bungled too. There is no recording of that second attempt and the only assurance any-one has that it was done right is the word of Fr. Pfeiffer -who insists that it was done right the first time! -and that of the incompetent and bungling “Bishop” Webster, the very man who made such a mess of it the first time around. In other words, if Fr. Pfeiffer can insist with a straight face that Webster “did say each of the words of the form of the consecration correctly and validly” the first time, why would any sensible person take his word for it that it was done properly the second time? As things stand, it is Fr. Pfeiffer’s own insane and incredible denial of even the tiniest mispronunciation in the first attempt which entirely undermines the security which the second attempt ought to have given him. Ironically, it is his own refusal to face facts, his own inability to treat the faithful with a minimum of basic candour and honesty, which has ensnared him. Had he come clean from the start and admitted that there was a problem with the first attempt, that, yes, the essentially form had been bungled and that there were grounds for doubt, then his assurance that all went well the second time would ring less hollow and would doubtless reassure at least some. As things stand, all he has achieved is to unwittingly undermine his own credibility and trustworthiness before the whole world and to demonstrate that there is no reason for anyone to believe a word he says.
My, what a lot of words this has turned into! Apologies to the faint-of-heart or short-of-concentration! Still, it is as well to deal thoroughly with an issue if one is to deal with it at all. And please don’t let anyone try to say that we are somehow being “mean” to “poor” Fr., -sorry, “Bishop” -Pfeiffer. He’s a big boy and ought to be capable of taking responsibility for his own actions. One ought not to say bad things, about people, especially in print or on the internet, unless 1. it is true; and 2. it is necessary. Sadly, it seems more than necessary to speak out against this scandal. No good will come of it and potentially a great deal of harm. At least nobody will be led astray by our silence on this matter, whatever else may happen.
In summary, then, here are what we see as the main problems.
Firstly-and most importantly of all! -The Public Compromise of the Faith and Insult offered to Our Lord by a priest who preaches against Sedevacantism and Feeneyism having himself publicly consecrated by a Feeneyite and Sedevacantist. And this, when he himself for the past twenty-six years has told his own faithful not to go to Sedevacantists or Feeneyites for the sacraments due to the compromise it would entail.
Secondly-The Doubtful Validity of that same Episcopal Consecration based on several different factors, any one of which can easily be verified by any of the faithful from anywhere in the world, namely:
1. Terrasson’s ‘Old Catholic’ priesthood. There is doubt concerning the priesthood of “Fr.” Terrasson, coming as it did from the schismatic and heretical “Old Catholics” who in turn got their holy orders from the Jansenist schism of Utrecht in the mid-1600s. For this reason, the Church has never simply assumed that Old Catholic holy orders are valid but regards them as doubtful.
2. Laborie’s own doubts concerning the validity of the holy orders which he had given to Terrasson. The very fact that Laborie, the “bishop” who ordained Terrasson to the priest-hood, got himself conditionally consecrated three years later, suggests that he himself doubt-ed the validity of his own orders (and by extension, the priesthood which he had attempt-ed to confer upon Terrasson in 1974). If he doubted whether he had validly conferred the priesthood upon Terrasson in 1974, are we not allowed to doubt it too?
3. Clemente Dominguez’s competence and ability to transmit what he had received. There is also doubt concerning the episcopacy of Terrasson “received” from Clemente Dominguez y Gomez, given that neither of them had had a single day’s seminary training. We have seen how badly the ignorant “bishop” Webster bungled the ceremony. What are the chances that Clemente, a man equally as ignorant, did not have the same problems? And if Clemente had bungled it too, would Terrasson necessarily have noticed? There may have been “co-consecrators” but most “Palmar bishops” had no seminary training or time spent as a priest either but were ordained and consecrated right from the ranks of the laity. One or two “Palmar bishops” had been priests from before the Council (Estevez, for example). But confidence in former priests such as Estevez is not helped when one realises that he accepted the new “Pope’s” abolition of the Roman Rites altogether and their replacement with grossly simplified rites of his own, only a few years later; or that he accepted idiocies such as the “real presence” of the Blessed Virgin Mary in the Eucharist, or the teaching that God had removed not only liceity but even validity from all sacraments outside the Palmarian Church! The obvious ignorance present in such teachings does not inspire confidence in those who accept and propagate them. Add to that the fact that former priests such as Estevez were not necessarily co-consecrators at all seventy-plus consecrations, that the only consistent thread running through them is Clemente Dominguez, and the picture becomes even worse. Remember, Archbishop Ngo-Dinh Thuc was long gone and did not stick around to supervise any of the hundreds of episcopal consecrations which ensued (seventy-plus in the two years before Clemente Dominguez became “Pope”!) and make sure they were done correctly. How sure can we be, then, that they were done properly or validly? The answer, I fear, is “not very.”
4. Webster’s bungling of the ceremony in Boston KY. Even if Terrasson really was a priest when Clemente Dominguez consecrated him, and even if Clemente Dominguez in turn did manage to confer the episcopate upon him validly, meaning that Terrasson really was a bishop, meaning in turn that Henneberry really did become a bishop too, meaning in turn that Webster really was a priest, and therefore really did become a bishop at the hands of Slupski -even if all that is true, there still remains a very serious reason to positively doubt Fr. Pfeiffer’s episcopal orders, a reason which has to do with Webster himself. Anyone who watches the ceremony recorded in the chapel at Boston, Kentucky will see this. Webster stum-bles and fumbles right the way through the ceremony. Apart from looking very ill and infirm, he seems to have great difficulty pronouncing the consecration preface, especially the sixteen words necessary for sacramental validity. That Webster appears doddering and senile cannot be held against him; God grant him a speedy recovery of his health and repentance before he dies. But even a very infirm and elderly bishop can still perform ceremonies correctly. Archbishop Lefebvre was 83 years old when he consecrated four bishops flawlessly. What is going on here is something more than just infirmity: it is ignorance. To watch Webster bungle the rite of episcopal consecration is to be taught an unforgettable lesson in why “Thuc garage bishops,” men who obtain holy orders without any training, are such a bad idea and the cause of so much scandal! One who has spent no time in the study of scholastic philosophy, who has very little theology, who does not even have a decent grasp of the Latin language, who does not know what the prayer he is saying actually means and who even struggles to pronounce the words correctly -such a “bishop” will find it infinitely harder to do what a bishop who has spent several years as a priest, and before that six or seven years in seminary, will take in his stride. Webster’s bungling of the words of the essential form, on its own would be serious ground for positive doubt.
5. Fr. Pfeiffer himself implicitly acknowledges doubts concerning the ceremony. In a sermon only a day or two later, Fr. Pfeiffer himself said that the ceremony had been done again “to make sure” that the essential words were said properly. It is a sin to repeat such a sacrament without having a positive reason for doing so. Thus, if Fr Pfeiffer agreed to the ceremony being done again “to make sure,” the very fact alone implies that he acknowledges doubt concerning the validity of the first attempt. 6. Fr. Pfeiffer’s lack of reliability/honesty. This would not matter so much, if we weren’t left having to take his word for it that the second attempt was done properly. However, only a video of the bungled first attempt was released. We know about the second “to make sure” attempt only because Fr. Pfeiffer said so in sermons afterwards. To this day, no recording of it has been released, and we don’t know for certain whether it was recorded at all. Can we be certain that the candidate, Fr. Pfeiffer himself, will have satisfied himself that this second attempt was done properly and the words spoken correctly? Normally one would be able to say “yes” and leave it at that. The problem is Fr. Pfeiffer has also been maintaining more recently that the consecration was done validly the first time around and that not even one word was even slightly mispronounced. That is absurd and anyone who watches the video for himself can see that that is not the case! Fr. Pfeiffer’s lack of honesty and refusal to face facts concerning the first attempt undermines his credibility when it comes to the second attempt.
Procul, o procul este, profani...!
The scandal against the Faith, the compromise on a doctrinal level and Trad-ecumenism entailed by Webster’s Feeneyism and sedevacantism, the deeply questionable provenance of “Bishop” Neal Webster’s own holy orders, Webster’s unfortunate bungling of the essential form in Fr. Pfeiffer’s own “consecration,” the lack of any sermon by “Bishop” Webster, the lack of any prior notice or announcement, the lack of candour and basic honesty shown by Fr. Pfeiffer in the days and weeks since this unfortunate event, the fact that Fr. Pfeiffer, in seek-ing his own episcopal consecration (it should be the Church who chooses and not the candidate who seeks) and in becoming both ‘Superior General’ and ‘Bishop’ at the same time, has shown himself little better than the leaders of so many other sedevacantist sects... all add up to a gigantic scandal, far, far from which the faithful ought to flee. I am convinced that it is a great mercy of Almighty God that he allowed the whole thing to be such an obvious scandal: had the ceremony been slicker and the orders of “Bishop” Webster less questionable it is pos-sible that more souls would have been taken in and led astray; had a sedevacantist Feeneyite bishop of impeccable antecedents performed the ceremony flawlessly, the danger to souls would have been that much greater and the consequences for the Church potentially far worse in the long run; this way, Divine Providence seems to have done everything to make it look as bad as possible, so that the faithful are given every opportunity to see this for what it is and are not ensnared through innocent naivety.
The icing on the cake, and perhaps the most offensive to Catholic sensibilities is the way in which both Fr. Pfeiffer himself and certain of his followers have attempted to thank Our Lord and his Blessed Mother for this. I recall hearing in the past Fr. Pfeiffer’s seminary in Kentucky referred to as “Our Lady’s Resistance” and it seems that Webster is, according to some at least, incredibly, the bishop sent by Our Lady -what an insult to the Mother of God, to credit her with sending a Sedevacantist Feeneyite garage-bishop of questionable lineage, one who can’t even get the words right!
This may be the last we have seen of Bishop Bungle, but it is certainly not going to be the last we have seen of the highly dubious holy orders which will now start coming out of Palmar del Pfeiffer. Already, in a long ceremony held at night (by the way, why was that necessary? If you’ve waited years already, couldn’t you have waited a few hours until morning, or even another day or two?), Fr. Pfeiffer tonsured and ordained his seminarians to various minor orders. Three of them, he ordained as far as deacon. There is already a video of these dubious ‘deacons’ distributing communion. One year more and they will presumably become dubious ‘priests.’ It is to be hoped that if and when that day arrives, nobody will go to their ‘Masses’ and they will find themselves without an apostolate. Perhaps that will prove the wake-up call they need. Perhaps that is what will get Fr. Pfeiffer to snap out of it, mend his ways and do penance. Better still would be if they didn’t get as far as receiving dubious priestly orders, but got clear of the ungodly mess before that happens. If they do have genuine vocations -and they might have -they will not be fulfilled this way: one cannot do evil that good may come of it and the end does not justify the means. Compromising with Feeneyism, with sede-vacantism and with the scandal of ignorant, self-elected “garage bishops” is never going to be justified, no matter what “good” Fr. Pfeiffer thinks he has acquired. If any of those young men still do have a vocation, let us hope and pray that Divine Providence provides them with a serious alternative and gives them the prudence to see what they ought to do and the fortitude to do it. If we pray enough, some good may yet be salvaged. If the only bishops around today are no good, then that is doubtless because we don’t deserve a good one. I honestly doubt whether we ever deserved to have Archbishop Lefebvre. But if Almighty God is allowing us to live through this, then one reason might be simply to get us to pray and sacrifice more. One silver lining in all this is that most -from what I can tell, almost all -priests and faithful have seen it for what it is, thank God. God bless all The Recusant’s readers, friend and foe alike.
-The Editor
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