Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre's Meeting With Padre Pio
Padre Pio da Pietrelcina, O.F.M. Cap. (May 25, 1887-September 23, 1968) was ordained priest (Capuchin) on August 10, 1910. He received visible stigmata on September 20, 1918. The Vatican suspended him for a time and issued five decrees against him. From 1931 to 1933 he was not allowed to celebrate Mass publicly or to hear confessions. Pope Pius XI said that he had been "badly misinformed" about Padre Pio.
Even before the end of the Council, in February 1965, someone announced to him that soon he would have to celebrate the Mass according to a new rite, ad experimentum, in the vernacular, which had been devised after Vatican II by the Freemason presbyter Hannibal Bugnini (1912-1982) and his committee of six Protestant ministers for the stated purpose "to respond to the aspirations of modern man." Immediately, even before seeing the text, Padre Pio wrote to Paul VI to ask him to be dispensed from the liturgical experiment and to be able to continue to celebrate the Mass of St. Pius V. When Antonio Cardinal Bacci (1885-1971) came to see him in order to bring the authorization, Padre Pio let a complaint escape in the presence of the Pope's messenger: "For pity sake, end the Council quickly." (Rev. Fr. Jean, O.F.M., Cap., "Padre Pio," apud Angelus, May 1999, p. 31)
Thus, Padre Pio never even celebrated a Missa Normativa, or interim Mass. He never said Mass in Italian. The Novus Ordo service of 1969 was introduced more than a year after Padre Pio had died. A video exists of Padre Pio celebrating his last Mass on September 22, 1968. Some Novus Ordo sectarians try to use this video to prove that Padre Pio celebrating the modernized interim Mass of 1967.
However, a close look at the video proves just the opposite. Padre Pio was clearly in a frail condition and had to be supported in walking. Therefore, he could not ascend the traditional high altar, so a temporary altar was placed below the main altar of San Giovanni Rotondo. If one listens carefully to the audio track, one hears that Padre Pio is celebrating the Mass in Latin, in the traditional form. One segment shows Padre Pio incensing the altar at the Offertory, using the traditional form (Incensum istud a te benedictum...) This form had been abrogated in the steps leading up to the Novus Ordo of 1969. After Easter 1967, Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre, founder of the Society of St. Pius X (SSPX), met with Padre Pio. According to the Archbishop's report on the meeting, published on August 8, 1990, in answer inquiries on the event:
"The meeting, which took place after Easter in 1967, lasted two minutes. [In 1967 the Archbishop was Superior General of the Congregation of the Holy Ghost.] I was accompanied by Fr. Barbara and a Holy Ghost Brother, Brother Felin. I met Padre Pio in a corridor, on his way to the confessional, being helped by two Capuchins. I told him in a few words the purpose of my visit: for him to bless the Congregation of the Holy Ghost, which was due to hold an extraordinary General Chapter meeting, like all religious societies, under the heading of [the term that was used at Vatican II for taking the Church down the path of Modernism], a meeting that I was afraid would lead to trouble. Then Padre Pio cried out: 'Me bless an archbishop? No, no, it is you who should be blessing me!' And he bowed to receive the blessing. I blessed him; he kissed my ring and continued on his way to the confessional. That was the whole of the meeting, no more, no less."