“The Society is apostolic in its essence because this is the essence also of the Mass and because in general the members will have to exercise a pastoral ministry.” (Statutes of the Society)

In accordance with the apostolic nature of the Society, it will respond to the constant demands of the faithful scattered through the world to the best of its ability and as often as possible. The Society does this by offering the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass exclusively in the traditional rite and by making available to the faithful whatever will help them to live as true Christians seeking holiness and perfection.

The primary purpose of the Society is to develop the life of grace in the soul and thanks to this essentially supernatural aim help the faithful to resist and combat the errors emanating from the Second Vatican Council.

In fact every apostolate derives its origin from the Holy Sacrifice which represents the Sacrifice of the Cross by applying its merits to souls so as to enable them to live the divine life and free them from sin. Archbishop Lefebvre saw and intimately lived this connection between the Mass and the apostolate. For this reason he saw the need to consecrate bishops in order to have more and more priests celebrating the Old Mass, thereby feeding the life of souls and nourishing the different works of the apostolate.

With this in mind he encouraged the foundation of priories, schools, retreat houses, chapels and homes for the elderly. To assure the continuation of this apostolate our founder prudently decided to consecrate four bishops who have since traveled the world continuing the work of the Archbishop by establishing and developing the apostolate, by preaching, ordaining priests and administering the sacraments.

The aim of this chapter is to show the diverse nature of the apostolate with the help of a few introductory remarks and numerous pictures of some of the works founded and developed by the Society in the period after the episcopal consecrations.