The Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter

At the general assembly of the International Federation Una Voce by Father Bissig on behalf of the superior general of the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter, Father Arnaud Devillers (October 8th and 9th 2005).

Fr. Arnaud Devillers is sorry of not being able to be present himself for this presentation but he had to remain in Fribourg to welcome our seminarians from Wigratzbad who are visiting Fri-bourg at the occasion of the 17th anniversary of the canonical recognition of the Fraternity: Solemn Mass at the Chapel of Collège St-Michel (where St-Peter Canisus is buried) et Vespers at he Cathedral.

He is delegating Fr. Bisig to speak on his behalf.

The great news this year is the introduction of a year of spirituality in France in a former noviti-ate which has just been completely renovated and refurbished by the owner in a suburb of Lyon. Padre Pio House is welcoming 7 French speaking candidates while 5 German speaking are beginning in Wigratzbad, 18 English speakers are beginning in our American seminary and 2 in our Australian Year of spirituality (Ezechiel House in Sydney, 2004). The last chapter gen-eral has made changes in our constitutions so that the year of spirituality could take place in a specific house separate from our seminaries. A Year of spirituality is a year of discernment and probation for young men who wish to try a priestly vocation with the Fraternity.

A new wing of dormitories has been added in our American seminary (Our.Lady.of Guadalupe Seminary) so we have now a capacity of up to 100 for seminarians. The only building which re-mains to be built is the Chapel. We have worked into reinforcing our faculty with two new pro-fessors: Fr. John Berg, Dogmatics and Fr. Joseph Portzer, Spirituality, Catechesis. Two other American priests are currently studying, one at the Dominican House of Studies in Moral Theol-ogy, Fr. Robert Ferguson, and one in Rome, at the Angelicum in Dogmatic Theology, Fr. Robert Fromageot who will finish next year and be available to teach in OLGS.

There are about 200 priests and 120 seminarians in formation this year.

We should have around 12 priestly ordinations in 2006, an average year.

We are receiving too many invitations in the U.S. in such a way that we are obliged to postpone some new foundations for lack of priests. This year we have expanded in Lexington, Kentucky; Phoenix, Arizona; Harrisburg, Pennsylvania. We are probably saying Mass in over 30 dioceses in North America. Our priest in Calgary is going also to Edmonton and our priest in St-Catharines is going to the Hamilton and London dioceses... The North American is still our fast-est growing district. 6 French priests are currently working in that district.

We are also invited to serve in more places in Germany and Austria. We have now a canonical house in Namur (Bishop André Leonardt) with a regular apostolate and some others in other Belgium dioceses.

Our priests in France are more and more becoming Private school Principals and chaplains: two schools in Lyon: a High school in Vaize and a Lower school in Ecully. A school in Vendées, L'Espérance (Fr. Coiffet). A school in Normandy, La Croix des Vents, Sées (3 priests). A new school in the diocese of Gap with Fr. Stemler, a lower school in Fontainebleau. We also help in various girl schools staffed by the Dominican teaching Sisters of the Holy Ghost (Poncalec) in Nantes, St-Cloud, Poncalec, Epinal, Draguignan)

Our Boarding school in Pennsylvania, St. Gregorys' Academy is at capacity. We have been fo-cusing these past years on education throughout the Fraternity and especially in our two largest districts, France and North America.

We are starting a mission in Columbia this year. Fr. Angel Alfarro but it is still the early stages.