FR. FAHEY AGAINST THE COMING NEW ORDER
By Patricius Anthony
TRADITIO Traditional Roman Catholic Network
E-mail: traditio@traditio.com, Web: www.traditio.com
Copyright 2006 Anthony. Reproduction prohibited without authorization.
Last Revised: 01/19/07
I have tried then, however feebly and imperfectly, to say some of the things I shall be glad to have said, when He shall come to sift the grain from the chaff. (1)
2005 marks the 70th and 60th anniversaries, respectfully, of the publications of Father Denis Fahey's (1883-1954) two monumental, but unfortunately much neglected works, The Mystical Body of Christ in the Modern World (MBCMW) and its companion piece, The Mystical Body of Christ and the Reorganization of Society (MBCRS).
A commemoration is certainly in order not only for these important and weighty tomes but also to celebrate the priest's voluminous writings, which have long since proven to have accurately identified the ideas, personalities, organizations, and groups that have largely succeeded in creating an almost completely secularized world. Moreover, they provide the blueprint for the re-establishment of a true Christian social order, where man's ends and the ethos of the societies that he creates are directed not toward the pursuit of worldly happiness, but instead are aimed at the attainment of heavenly bliss.
What is particularly horrific since the passing of this courageous priest has been that the enemies of Christ have successfully infiltrated His visible Church and have diabolically transformed it into a false, man-centered monstrosity, the Novus Ordo religion. It is, therefore, no surprise that Fr. Fahey's works are an anathema to Newrome and are mostly held in esteem amongst traditional Catholics.
Released in 1935, MBCMW has as its purpose, as Bishop J. Kinane wrote in the book's preface, to investigate and "deal, from the theological, philosophical and historical standpoint, with the modern revolt against the divine plan for the organization of human society." (2) A decade later, its companion piece, MBCRS sought to explain how the world could be brought back into harmony with the Divine plan for social order.
Any objective rendering of mankind's current spiritual condition overwhelmingly substantiates Fr. Fahey's analysis, as present trends continue to move away from basic Christian moral principles preached by the Apostles and their papal and saintly successors. While Modernism was certainly on the ascendancy within the Church during Fr. Fahey's days, it has triumphed by the third millennium, leaving the Faithful devoid of a true moral compass (the exception, of course, being those places where the authentic Faith is practiced among traditional Catholics).
Compared to the sacrosanct belief in religious pluralism and the "separation of Church and State," which now predominates Western political thought and practice, Fr. Fahey contrarily contended that: "As the final end of man is, however, not merely natural, the State, charged with the temporal social order, must ever act so as not only not to hinder but also to favour the attaining of man's supreme end, the Vision of God in Three Divine Persons." (3)
He added:
Political thought and political action, therefore, in an ordered State, will respect the jurisdiction and guidance of the Catholic Church, the divinely-instituted guardian of the moral order, remembering that what is morally wrong cannot be politically good. Thus the natural or temporal common good of the State will be always aimed at, in the way best calculated to favour the development of true personality, in and through the Mystical Body of Christ. (4)
Take that, ACLU!
As both an individual and as a member of society, man in his activities and decision-making was not to act autonomously, but guided and aided by the Church: "Catholic social order, viewed as a whole, is not primarily the political and economic organization of society. It is primarily the supernatural social organism of the Church, and then, secondarily, the temporal or natural social order resulting from the influence of Catholic doctrine on politics and economics and from the embodiment of that influence in social institutions." (5)
Unlike the spectrum of differing philosophies and opinions on the modern Right -- cultural conservatives, paleolibertarians, free marketeers, racialists, libertarians -- who look to human constructs and institutions such as family values, free markets, limited government, and even home-schooling as ways to bring about peaceful co-existence among men, Fr. Fahey, instead, asserted that it was the authentic Sacraments, especially the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, which were the indispensable and necessary component for man's well-being:
The centre of order in the actual world is Our Lord..., for it is through Him alone that men can be in fully harmonious relation to God and amongst themselves. The culminating expression of mankind's acceptance of order is the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. This is so because the Mass, being the renewal of the one supremely-acceptable act of submission of Calvary, is the official act of submission to God ... on the part of the Mystical Body of Christ, in union with its Head. (6)
Almighty God's rights so neglected and discarded since the supposedly "enlightened" and democratic era would be of central importance in a reconstituted Christian society. "Accordingly, God's rights are respected in the world, in proportion as love of and submission to the order established by the Blessed Trinity are expressed by all at Mass and find concrete realization in the organization of society." (7)
One would be hard pressed to find such forthright prose about the Mass and its rightful place in society throughout the vapid verbiage spilled out by popes, prelates, and "Catholic" writers of the post-Vatican II era!
For Fr. Fahey, a society and its individuals are not evaluated from the modern perspective of how diverse, prosperous, "free," or powerful they are, but rather, from how they treat the Holy Sacrifice. "The study of the philosophy (or theology) of history must comprise above all the examination of progress or regress in the world's acceptance of order in union with Our Lord in the Sacrifice of the Mass." (8)
In the MBCMW, Fr. Fahey demonstrated how certain ethnic groups and financial elites had obtained control of the money and banking system and used such influence to infiltrate and eventually dominate the mass media. "The control of money facilitates the acquisition of the power to influence all the technical agencies for the formation of public opinion -- the Press, the Radio and the Cinema." (9)
If this was true during Fr. Fahey's time, how much more has the control of the media by the avowed enemies of Christ been used to undermine and destroy Christian morality, taste, and basic manners among the masses today? In part, Fr. Fahey blamed the Faithful and their earthly shepherds, who had largely failed to admonish their flocks about the spiritual dangers that would confront them in the depraved modern era:
But it is also true that Catholics succumb to the machinations of Our Lord's enemies largely because they are not trained for the real struggle in the world. They leave school without adequate knowledge of the organized opposition they will have to meet and with their minds hazy about the points of social organization for which they must stand and against which attacks are being directed. (10)
The mass communication mediums were to be used to undermine traditional values and institutions, and Fr. Fahey urged Catholics to wrestle control of these from anti-Christian forces and/or start their own popular organs in response:
They do not realize that the opposition's ultimate aim is the disruption of Christ's order, and they are not accustomed to think that they must co-operate with other young Catholics..., that they must, for example, master the cinema and prevent it from undermining Christian marriage, the foundation of family life in their country. (11)
It would be next to impossible to argue that the breakdown in today's moral order and the appearance of such a phenomenon as the "dysfunctional family" has not been the result of the depraved and heinous nature of the television, motion picture, and music industries.
The Mystical Body of Christ remains, as when the volumes first appeared, both a threat and a challenge: they threaten the world's current power structure with exposure and explain the methods that the ruling elites use to maintain their hegemony. Since Fr. Fahey's passing, these forces remain as entrenched as ever and have now widened their reign to include Christ's Church.
The books seek to challenge man to throw off the secular shackles that have disoriented his reasoning and thus redirect his thinking and actions to pursue the true purpose of life. One hint: it is not the "pursuit of happiness," but to worship, honor, and love Almighty God in order to obtain eternal blessedness. Fr. Fahey sought to facilitate this end by providing a blueprint for social order not of his own design, but based on the study of the New Testament, papal teachings, and the writing of the Saints.
Sadly, neither the threat nor the challenge has been heeded, but instead the messenger has been calumniated. The smears that had begun even in Fr. Fahey's lifetime did not surprise the priest, because he understood that the admonitions of the prophets of old and of his Divine Master during His lifetime were ridiculed and ignored by most.
From all that is known about Fr. Fahey, it is unlikely that had he lived, he would have remained silent and not expressed vehement opposition to the wretched Second Vatican Council as it sowed its destructive seeds. It is puzzling that two other prominent priests, Frs. Feeney and Coughlin, who often preached and published on similar subjects to Fr. Fahey, were, at least in their writings, conspicuously reticent as the waves of reforms were ushered in, even though both lived into the late 1970s.
As he did in Ireland during the 1940s with the heroic Maria Duce association, Fr. Fahey would most likely have been at the forefront of a Counter-conciliar movement. If just a few more courageous souls at the time had resisted Hannibal Bugnini and his henchmen, the Neo-modernist revolution that swept through the Church would have been halted. Alas, there were not enough Fr. Faheys or, for that matter, priests such as the late and still much unappreciated, Father Gommar A. Depauw.
As an aside, it certainly speaks volumes about the Traditional Catholic Movement that so little has been written about the passing earlier this year of the gallant Gommar Depauw, yet, many have found the time to engage in "sedevacantist" debates, conduct "negotiations" with Newrome, or write tomes in opposition to the latest neocon-inspired U.S. imperialist endeavor!
It has been reported that after Fr. Fahey's death, annual pilgrimages, growing in magnitude, were made to his grave. These pious demonstrations began to raise concern among ecclesiastical authorities because many who came "were antagonistic to the changes in the church after Vatican II." (12) Such actions were frowned upon and dissuaded by Newchurch, as "people were asked to make small and private visits to the cemetery rather than coming en masse." (13)
The pusillanimous response of devotees of Fr. Fahey mirrored the type of reaction that went on throughout the Conciliar era, as the Faithful mindlessly obeyed their wayward shepherds. The result was similar to what happened to Catholics in 16th century England, who, by accepting the Anglican "reforms," gradually had their entire Faith taken from them.
If present trends continue, it is unlikely that Fr. Fahey's works will receive much, if any, acknowledgement from the powers and principalities of this world, and especially from the cretins now in control of the Church that the priest so loved and toiled for at such great lengths. However, as the Church and civilization continue on their downward spiral, those who seek the re-establishment of true Christendom will undoubtedly find the Mystical Body of Christ of much benefit.
This article is dedicated to my late father, another determined Irishman.