December 3, 1988—First Mass by Fr. Carandino

By Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre

Sermon by Archbishop Lefebvre—Feast of St. Francis Xavier—First Mass by Fr. Carandino—December 3, 1988.  

My very dear friends,
My very dear brothers,  

We rejoice today and we give thanks to God, with dear Father Carandino, on the occasion of his first solemn Mass. It is only right that seminarians and priests in charge of the seminary should rejoice. Isn’t the seminary made to make priests, holy priests?

A priestly ordination in the seminary, a First High Mass, is really the culmination of studies, the culmination of the efforts made by seminarians to become priests. We can only rejoice. And for you, dear faithful, what would parishes be without a priest, if not dead parishes.

You also expect priests. For you need these intermediaries between God and yourselves: Sacerdos sacras res dat: (The priest is) the giver of holy things.

So you also rejoice and rightly to attend these ordinations and to participate in this First High Mass of this dear Father Carandino.

For you, very dear friend, I invite you on this occasion to take a look at the past, in order to give thanks to the Good Lord for all that has prepared your vocation, for all that has prepared this day of your first solemn Mass.

If anyone can account for all the graces received, it is you. You can rewind the years from your childhood, your adolescence, your dear Christian family here, your parents, your brothers and sisters. The opportunities that have been given to you to feel within you the call of the Good Lord. And then one day to feel called to come to Écône.

What graces during all these years and undoubtedly through many hesitations, many trials—well here you have arrived at the goal you have sought, particularly during the years spent in the seminary. We congratulate you. We give thanks to the Good Lord with you today in a very profound way, in a moving way.

But if the priesthood and the first Mass are a goal, it is also a beginning. From now on, leaving the past to the Good Lord and to His Providence, you must look to the future. So if I can on the occasion of this first Mass give you some advice, give you some indications on what you are going to look for and on what your professors, your directors have oriented you during the seminary, all of this can be summed up in this adage: Sacerdos alter Christus: The priest is another Christ. So let us ask ourselves who is Jesus Christ, who is Christ?

Well then, I will insist on this fundamental concept of Our Lord Jesus Christ: Mediator.

Our Lord Jesus Christ is the Mediator. Men had broken off with God. God did not want this rupture to be final. God did not want those whom He had created for His glory; that those whom He had created for their happiness would be permanently removed from Him. So He proposed Himself, in His immense charity, in His infinite mercy, He wanted to be this Mediator.

None of the men could mediate. We were all this massa damnata, as St. Paul says, this crowd condemned by our fault. And we could no longer become such mediators with God. We could no longer find the path that led to God. Only God Himself could do that.

And then, He realized this inconceivable mystery, this mystery which is for us the occasion of incessant thanksgiving, but which is a scandal for those who do not want to believe: God became man. Yes, He was incarnated.

This whole liturgy of Advent prepares us for this reminder of the Incarnation of Our Lord. The Angel said to Mary: “Yes, a son will be born to you and you will call him Jesus.” You will call him Jesus, that is to say the Savior. The Savior, there is no other. That is to say the Mediator, the One who will make the bridge between humanity and God. Our Lord is therefore, in essence, the Mediator. And there cannot be others, since He unites in the same Person both human nature and divine nature. This intimate bond in the Person of Our Lord Jesus Christ of humanity and divinity makes Him the born Mediator of all mankind to God.

And He wanted to manifest this mediation to us, in a very special way in His Holy Sacrifice of Calvary offering Himself a Victim to His Father for the redemption of our souls.

And this is what the priest is: Sacerdos alter Christus. The priest is therefore also a mediator, thanks to the mediation of Our Lord Jesus Christ, participating in the mediation of Our Lord Jesus Christ, he will also become a pontifex [bridge builder], the one making the bridge between humanity and God.

Just as there can be no salvation apart from Our Lord Jesus Christ, who is the only Mediator; from now on, there will be no salvation without going through the priests responsible for communicating salvation to souls. This is at least the normal and ordinary way that Jesus wanted. It is He who founded the priesthood.

“But if, on the contrary, we really have faith in this unique Mediator and in all the means He has provided to save souls, then whatever the result of our efforts; whatever the success of our apostolate, we know that we are carrying out the will of the Good Lord. We know that we are continuing the apostolate of Our Lord Jesus Christ.”

It was He who wanted to associate and choose men to make priests of them, so that they could be mediators and continue the work He had begun here below.

And you are going to continue it, very dear friend, you are going to continue it above all, through the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass. Just as Our Lord offered Himself on the Cross for the salvation of souls, well, you go up to the altar to continue this Sacrifice and pour out the graces of Calvary on souls.

Because there is only one mediator, we are only participants in the Mediator. We are not essentially mediators, we cannot be. It is only by the grace of Our Lord that we participate in His mediation, by the grace of the priesthood, by the priestly character given to us.

So that will be your role in the future. What a sublime, extraordinary role. May it please the Good Lord to choose people who participate in His mediation; who participate in a certain way also, in His only Priesthood; who participate in His royalty; who participate in His holiness in order to spread the gifts of salvation, the gifts of sanctification, to souls.

This is what will be your concern from now on: to save souls. Our Lord said that without the baptism of water and the Spirit, no one can enter the kingdom of Heaven. Then you will baptize; you will do what the apostles did immediately after Pentecost: they baptized; they sanctified souls; they united them to Our Lord Jesus Christ; they communicated to them the divine life, the life of grace.

And that’s what counts. And that’s what you have to have faith in. Faith in mediation and in the only mediation and in the only Mediator. And so it is necessary that the priest have confidence in the grace of redemption obtained by Our Lord Jesus Christ. And let him trust that this grace saves souls; that this grace transforms souls, communicates divine life to souls.

When we no longer have faith, neither in the only Mediator who is Our Lord Jesus Christ, nor in the grace that Our Lord Jesus Christ came to bring to save us and the means by which He communicates this grace to us, so we look for human means, purely human means, invented by men to supposedly save men. This is a serious mistake. These are means which are not means, which are outside the means foreseen by the Providence of God.

But if, on the contrary, we really have faith in this unique Mediator and in all the means He has provided to save souls, then whatever the result of our efforts; whatever the success of our apostolate, we know that we are carrying out the will of the Good Lord. We know that we are continuing the apostolate of Our Lord Jesus Christ. And that only He can resurrect souls, only He can sanctify souls. And this is what gives consolation today to priests who have still kept the faith.

Very unfortunate are the priests who no longer believe in evangelization as Our Lord planned it and as He wanted it. That they no longer believe in the means of sanctification which Our Lord Jesus Christ has instituted is what makes the whole crisis of the Church.

This is what makes the difference between those who no longer have faith in Our Lord and those who have kept it, as we want to keep it; how we beg God to keep it for us, for the good of souls, for the salvation of souls.

Throughout the last decades we have been able to see and we still read these last weeks in the refectory, on this crisis of the clergy. We see the priest abandoning his faith in the salvation willed by Our Lord Jesus Christ and by the means that Our Lord Jesus Christ has instituted. This is the crux of the crisis we are experiencing today.

Ah! keep faith in Our Lord Jesus Christ; let us keep faith in this unique Savior.

Unus Mediator Jesus Christus!
Unus Salvator Jesus Christus!
Unus Magister Christus!

This is what we must think, this is what we must keep deep in our souls in order to do a fruitful ministry, a fruitful ministry in union with Our Lord Jesus Christ. This is what the faithful expect of us. This is what seminaries must achieve: this deep union with Our Lord Jesus Christ who is our All; without Jesus we can do nothing. He said it Himself: Quia sine me nihil potestis facere (Jn. 15:5), says Our Lord. So let’s trust Him.

And despite the difficulties in which the apostolate of our young priests is carried out today, well, dear friends, you will have consolations. There are still beautiful souls. There are still souls who seek to be united with the Good Lord. There are still souls who have faith. And that will comfort you. This will help you to maintain yourself in that faith which you have been taught here in the seminary and in that desire for holiness and sanctification so necessary to priests.

Finally, we entrust you to the Most Blessed Virgin Mary, Mediatrix too: Mary Mediatrix, it is through her that all the graces which will descend on the faithful through your hands, through your words henceforth, words of the sacraments, words of the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, all these graces which are going to descend on the faithful, will come through Mary.

So trust in Mary Most Holy, turn your eyes towards her and she will help you accomplish a beautiful apostolate.

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. So be it.