Archbishop Dominique Rey is the Bishop of the Diocese of Toulon, France. He has been in charge of the diocese for the past 23 years, and is responsible for one of the most popular seminaries in all of France, Notre-Dame de la Citade de Versailles. In this episode, he talks about the recent Vatican decision to suspend the priesthood and diaconite, and what it means for the future of these vocations.
00:07:03.460C'est une belle figure du don de soi au service des autres, dans l'amour de Dieu.
00:07:07.700C'est tout un programme, mes bien chers amis.
00:07:09.900Alors, je sollicite le soutien de votre prière pour nous aider à faire rayonner l'amour
00:07:14.940de Dieu, qui est toujours attentif aux besoins et aux souffrances de tous les hommes.
00:07:20.460So, if I can ask you, Bishop Ray, what led to this?
00:07:29.100Do you have any knowledge of why, what happened?
00:07:32.100I think the Holy See was saying to me that the diocese has received many groups, many vocations
00:07:42.380from different areas from different areas, and some of them come from traditional situations, traditionalists.
00:07:53.860Other ones, they come from charismatic groups.
00:07:58.620The dissonance about all those vocations is for some of them a problem, and so in this sense,
00:08:09.060they ask me the suspension of ordination.
00:08:12.860But all the files of this guide have been studied by the responsables of the seminaries, with information they have received from different places where this guide was before.
00:08:29.860And before the presentation for ordination, we need to have many information, recommendations, and so.
00:08:42.620And it has been done for all these vocations.
00:08:47.060So it was a surprise for us to receive this suspension, the global suspension.
00:09:29.380I've visited the rector of the seminary, I've been in Rome to discuss, but it was a difficulty also for us, because in a context where the dialogue is very important in the church, synodality, etc., we have no response to our questions.
00:09:54.380I've sent many letters without any answer.
00:09:59.380And so the silence is very difficult to leave.
00:10:06.380But we advance in the faith, we advance in the hope, and we pray for the church.
00:10:15.380In a way, it's a real suffering that you must endure and your fellow seminarians and fellow, those to be ordained, suffer for the church.
00:10:27.380The church itself is going through a time of great trial right now.
00:10:31.380There seems to be an anger or something toward tradition, as Pope Benedict used to say, how can we be against what has our own patrimony?
00:10:47.380It's what all of our fathers received and had as their mass forever, for over a thousand years in the church.
00:10:55.380How can we be against our own patrimony?
00:10:57.380And there is that sentiment right now in the church.
00:11:00.380But I think a lot of the suffering that's happening to you and your communities are emblematic of the suffering that's going on in the church.
00:11:10.380And so you're suffering in a way also for the church.
00:11:12.380And for that, we thank you. We're very grateful.
00:11:15.380It's interesting in your case because you, yourself, are not traditional.
00:11:22.380You're charismatic in a great sense of the word.
00:11:26.380There's a real thing about charismatics in the church.
00:11:29.380A great, very strong love for Christ and ready to go out and to act for Christ in the world in a way that many people might think is extreme or, you know, silly.
00:11:42.380But you're willing, charismatics generally, they're willing to be fools for Christ in the world because they love so much.
00:11:49.380And that we see in the traditional community as well.
00:11:53.380In the traditional community as well, there's all these young people, families, priests who love Jesus.
00:12:01.380And they're doing something very counter-cultural.
00:12:03.380They're going, they're having these large families and they're going to this Latin mass where they have to learn a new language or whatever.
00:12:11.380But they're doing it out of a real love, a love for Christ, for his church.
00:12:16.380And they're beautiful communities, both of them.
00:12:19.380And so it's funny because they seem quite different, you know, the charismatics and the traditionalists.
00:12:25.380But there seems to be that union that's not only here, it's all over the world that I've seen.
00:12:33.380This kind of coming together of charismatics and traditionalists, even though it seems liturgically they're very, very different.
00:12:40.380They're the same in a strength of love for Christ and a willingness to endure whatever sufferings or condemnations from the world or from brothers in the church that might come.
00:12:58.380And I do, we hope and pray for you because we've got similar situations in America with bishops under investigation and so on for being more traditional.
00:13:10.380And also similarly, I have a bishop in America who's a great and holy bishop.
00:13:17.380His name is Joseph Strickland. He's in Tyler in Texas.
00:13:20.380And he, too, doesn't celebrate the traditional mass. He's very charismatic.
00:13:25.380He does something like two hours of adoration every day before the Blessed Sacrament.
00:13:30.380But he is also open to tradition, even though he himself really doesn't say the traditional mass.
00:14:19.380Yeah, we have to be in the hope. And all these difficulties need to love more and more Christ and the church.
00:14:31.380Amen to that. And it's a time of purification, because sometimes we have made some errors.
00:14:40.380It's a fact. But to be in the sense of one always, with fidelity,
00:14:52.380and you see, to be helped also, and it is for my part, it's a good and strong reality,
00:15:03.380to be helped by many friends who pray for me, who pray for the seminary,
00:15:08.380who pray for vocations, and so it's a source of support.
00:15:15.380And I think, for me, there are three pillars for the church.
00:15:20.380First, in my diocese, the fidelity of Vatican II.
00:15:26.380Secondly, the evangelization. The church exists for evangelizations.
00:15:36.380And the third pillar is a pastoral communion with different sensibilities, expression of faith, different charism.
00:15:49.380But in the union with the church, inside the church,
00:15:55.380who have the responsibility to discern, to accompany all these ecclesial realities.
00:16:02.380So the three pillars, who are mission, the fidelity, the tradition of the church in Vatican II,
00:16:14.380and also a missionary communion with different expressions,
00:16:19.380are fundamentally the essential of my ministry and of my work.
00:16:27.380And so it is in the way that I have developed different initiatives.
00:16:34.380I was saying always, when a car stays in the garage, we have no accident.
00:16:44.380OK, I have taken risks. And the Pope insists several times, we have to take risks.
00:16:50.380And so I have taken risks. Sometimes it was with difficulties, but also there are foods.
00:16:56.380Yeah, exactly. If I could ask you as you close, would you please give our viewers your blessing?
00:17:03.380Yeah. I bless not only the Semerians, but all the Semerists, all the church, all the Christians,
00:17:15.380in this context, in this context, to be in the fidelity, humility, disponibility for the service of a church.
00:17:24.380Our Lord blesses, give for each person in this diocese, for each Christian, the strength to be in fidelity, humility, disponibility, for the mission,