ANNIVERSARY SPECIAL

What is this, the sound and rumor? What is this that all men hear,/Like the wind in hollow vallies when the storm is drawing near,/Like the rolling of the ocean in the eventide of fear? Morris

June 5 marked Pistrina's fifth anniversary. At the time,  however, our "Counterfeit Catholicism" series was in progress, so we didn't have the opportunity for a proper celebration until this week. Our nose isn't out of joint, though: a modest fête is actually more appropriate this weekend, so near, you know, to the feast of Ss. Peter and Paul, the traditional date of  SSPX ordinations.

Five years of blogging against the hypocrisy and ignorance of the malformed cult masters represents a significant milestone. It's an accomplishment deserving of something memorable, don't you think?

Sure you do! And and we think so, too.

That's why we've got a blockbuster announcement to share with you in commemoration of a lustrum of service to Catholic truth -- and laymen's wallets:

A well-connected source from abroad has made it known that a priest now swears a one-handed conferral of priestly orders occurred during the 1976 ordination ceremony at Écône!


With this fresh report, we've got what qualitative researchers term "triangulation" -- validation of the 1990 ad-cautelam letter to "One Hand" through cross verification from two or more sources. As you'll recall, in that letter, nine priests advised Dannie, "Since your ordination was done with one hand, we must hold your ordination to be dubious..."  (the full text of the letter may be found by clicking here).

The first source, which Pistrina cited in its rebuttal and refutation of Tony Baloney's error-laden defense of orders conferred with one hand, confirmed that a one-handed ordination took place and added that the archbishop was "in a panic" when he realized his mistake. Now today we have a second corroborating account from an SSPX priest who was an insider eye witness to the ceremony.

And, WOW, what a report it is! It's a game-changer.

According to this priest, who saw the one-handed imposition up close and personal,

(a) only one ordinand was defectively ordained in '76 (!!) -- the rest were ordained validly with two hands; and 

(b) the archbishop thought about curing the single defective ordination but was advised that if he did so, people would then doubt his fitness.

This newly surfaced testimony is the most detailed to date, and it answers a lot of questions. First it tells us that Bishop Williamson is decidedly not cursed with a defective priestly ordination. (Some time ago, a commenter or two challenged us on this matter; we prudently replied that we only had information about "One-Hand Dan" and thus could not possibly remark on any other case. Well, now we all know the answer. Yes, we do!)

Second, the testimony explains how a well-traveled, independent priest residing in Europe could have safely affirmed "before God" that he saw nothing untoward on that ordination day in 1976. In light of the new information, his asseveration is perfectly justifiable, and we needn't impeach his recollection:  No sophisticated European or Latin American would have paid a moment's attention to a lone and loathsome gringo troll, whose graceless and grinning presence spoiled the joyful occasion for everyone.

In those early years at Écône, the Europeans (the francophones in particular) held the seminarians from the U.S.A. in utter contempt. Deeply mistrusting the Americans' worldliness and materialism, they considered them devoid of spirituality. More than likely, on that June 29 almost four decades ago, tiny, insignificant Wee Dan was virtually invisible to this cosmopolitan affiant, who reserved his benevolent attention for the more worthy (and far better educated) ordinandi. 

Who could blame him? Li'l Dan simply can't command the attention of his superiors -- not even in squalid Sedelandia.


With this confirming testimony, it's growing harder and harder to dismiss as a baseless rumor the claim of a one-handed conferral of priestly orders in 1976. The single defective ordination of '76 is surely more than a meme circulated to vex an unloved and widely despised sede interloper. It's clear that the persistent account of a one-handed ordination is well-founded, institutional knowledge, both in the SSPX and in American traddie circles.

Surely it all boils down to this cold, hard fact: Despite being vested in pontificals and despite his intention to confer holy orders validly, the archbishop simply goofed in one case on June 29, 1976. (Was it the heat or a Freudian slip due to a priest's admonition? Only God knows!)

Worry over the opinion of men, we fear, overcame what Archbishop Lefebvre knew in his heart to be the right course of action: re-ordination. Any rational person should now accept that the only way for "One Hand" to escape the specter of doubtful one-handed holy orders is conditional priestly ordination and episcopal consecration.

It's what "Saint" Marcel really wanted 39 years ago come this Monday.  The Gerties should demand it, if His Deficiency won't.