Seemingly Schismatic Statements of Abp. Marcel Lefebvre

"It is not we who are in schism but the Conciliar Church." -Homily preached at Lille, August 29, 1976, before a crowd of some 12,000. (These words appear in the original uncorrected version of the sermon as recorded and reported in the press)

"This Council represents, in our view and in the view of the Roman authorities, a new Church which they call the Conciliar Church." -Le Figaro, August 4, 1976

"To whatever extent pope, bishops, priests or faithful adhere to this new Church, they separate themselves from the Catholic Church." July 29, 1976, Reflections on the suspension a divinis

"To be publicly associated with the sanction [of excommunication] would be a mark of honor and a sign of orthodoxy before the faithful, who have a strict right to know that the priests they approach are not in communion with a counterfeit Church." -Open Letter to Cdl. Gantin, July 6, 1988, signed by 24 SSPX superiors, doubtless with Abp. Lefebvre's approval

"This union which liberal Catholics want between the Church and the Revolution is an adulterous union — adulterous. This adulterous union can only beget bastards. Where are these bastards? They are [the new] rites. The [new] rite of Mass is a bastard rite. The sacraments are bastard sacraments. We no longer know whether they are sacraments that give grace. We no longer know if this Mass gives us the Body and the Blood of Our Lord Jesus Christ. ... The priests emerging from the seminaries are bastard priests."

"The See of Peter and the posts of authority in Rome being occupied by antichrists, the destruction of the Kingdom of Our Lord is being rapidly carried out even within His Mystical Body here below. ... This is what has brought down upon our heads persecution by the Rome of the antichrists." -Letter to the future bishops, August 29, 1987

"We have never wished to belong to this system that calls itself the Conciliar Church. To be excommunicated by a decree of your eminence ... would be the irrefutable proof that we do not. We ask for nothing better than to be declared ex communione ... excluded from impious communion with infidels." -Open Letter to Cdl. Gantin, July 6, 1988, signed by 24 leading SSPX priests, doubtless with Abp. Lefebvre's approval