The yapping of a false Chivalry

If you were about fifteen years old or more at the time, you surely remember that old 1974 television commercial, in the colors of a certain detective series ¹. The big black Plymouth smashes through the door of a warehouse. Tac-tac-tac ! The policemen make their Thompsons spit… A man in a trench coat, felt hat pulled down over his eyes, weapon still smoking under his arm, tastes the liquid pouring out in torrents from one of the barrels so radically pierced. He makes a grimace of disappointment. One hears the unmistakable voice-over of the late Jacques Thebaud : « It had the color of alcohol. Its name sounded like alcohol. The bottles looked like bottles of alcohol; but it wasn’t alcohol... »
Here is an excerpt from the communiqué of The Order of the Knights of Our Lady, dated August 13, 2025, published on Medias-Presse-Info : « A few weeks after the re-election of the Master during the 2025 General Chapter in Avrillé, the baillis of The Order of the Knights of Our Lady note, with gravity mingled with sadness, the public relapse of Mr. Father Salenave, through a message broadcast on August 6, 2025 on the Telegram channel ‘France Fidélité’, in favor of a usurping group passing itself off as our Order from the far reaches of the Philippines, deceiving sincere and credulous men in Asia. » ²

When one seeks to found legitimacy on usurpation

If that damned commotion had taken place in any ordinary commercial company (a workers’ mutiny, a boss held hostage and threatened, etc.), it would have been serious, but however dramatic, it would have been confined to the mere dimensions of a business. It is more serious when the treachery is orchestrated by those who must set the example under God’s gaze: knights, and priests. I can already imagine the reaction of our friends on the internet: “Why, dear Hector, do you work yourself into such a state over a simple order of chivalry?”
Hold your horses, this is not a simple order of chivalry, which would be like confusing the Order of the Templars with the brotherhood of raw milk camembert! Orders of chivalry, more or less serious, abound in the Gotha, and there is no need to sound the alarm each time a scandal splashes this or that order ³.
However, there exists but one Chivalry. There exists but one single order that has remained faithful to the ideal of its origins: The Order of the Knights of Our Lady, Observance of the Holy Hearts of Jesus and Mary. This order is based neither in the Philippines nor in Tahiti, but in the country that is the historical cradle of Christian Chivalry: the France of the Franks. The Vatican and the prestigious orders do not recognize the Order of Our Lady? A fine thing indeed—being unrecognized by worldlings and heretics! What would our fathers of the feudal ages say if they returned to this century? Is not the Church occupied by the modernist sect? And can you tell me what the great orders have now been reduced to, if not puerile worldly gesticulations and hospital activities—pardon me, charitable activities?
Lame de France and your servant, who are attached to this ideal, therefore wish to defend the honor of the knights, whom perjurers—like Colorado beetles on potato leaves—attack! So then, what happened?
 
In its communiqué, the Order of Our Lady mentioned the singular role of Father Mathieu Salenave. I will speak of him further on. However, it is the first Master of the traditionalist branch of the Order who lies at the root of the problem.
I will begin by paying him homage, in all fairness. The former Master had indeed deserved well of Catholic Tradition: he led the traditionalist branch of the Order of Our Lady between 1990 and 2022. The historical channel had, for its part, succumbed to the conciliar sirens as early as 1970 ⁴.
     The annual General Chapter of the Order, held in July 2022 at the Dominican convent of Avrillé, was the theater of a surreal situation. The election designated a new knight as head of The Order of the Knights of Our Lady, Observance of the Holy Hearts of Jesus and Mary ⁵, within the venerable walls of the former Grandmontain priory, now a Dominican convent of traditional obedience ⁶. The regularity of this election was duly attested by Reverend Father Marie-Dominique, an expert in canon law. Now, the former Master (kneeling before the altar, he had placed his hands in those of the newly elected, pledging allegiance to him, promising fidelity) who had applauded the result of the election—this same man then called for revolt against him!
Below you see the former Master promising fidelity to the newly elected Master, regularly chosen.

A few months earlier, brothers of the Order, knowing his personality, had already expressed their concern about his reaction if he were not re-elected—whatever he might say about his state of fatigue at over 80 years old. After all, the former Master had always been at the head of the traditionalist Order, to the point, unfortunately, of ultimately confusing himself with it.
     From the beginning of August 2022, he began vigorously contesting the new authority, attempting to annul the vote of the baillis, publishing a false Circular of the Order calling for the deposition of the elected, thus violating the Constitutions and making himself guilty of a genuine attempted coup d’état. Taking advantage of his personal friendships within the Commandery of the Philippines and elsewhere in Asia, he spread far and wide the idea that the elected was nothing but an infiltrated agent of the Society of Saint Pius X, guilty of perjury, having dissolved his Council, and ruling like an autocrat.
His crude slanders forced not only the baillis, the Council, and the ecclesiastical Censor, but also the Prior of Avrillé, to publicly restore the truth. Father Xavier Beauvais, whose name in turn was used to fuel these slanders, also had to issue a written statement manifesting his support for the Order. A most pitiful affair! Despite the repeated attempts at conciliation by the Master and the Council, the former persisted.
     Suspended, but with the possibility of rejoining the Order on condition of a public apology, he refused and, like a certain vizier dreaming of being caliph in place of the caliph, called more than ever for revolt and sedition, founding a seditious little group named “Corps de Saint Michel 1945,” supposedly working to overthrow the Magisterium and establish his own. Indeed, one or another brother, whose ambitions had until then remained secret, took advantage of this occasion suddenly to support the Revolution within the Order.
 
In union with the Council, the baillis and the ecclesiastical Censor, after months of vain appeals to reason, the new Master of the Order, in the name of the common good of the Institution, took the only necessary decision: in November 2022, he pronounced the loss of the house, directed against this knight who had gravely betrayed. The former departed, taking with him a handful of brothers, mainly foreigners and deceived by his lies and slanders.

A swarm of traitors discovered in the Philippines!

The communiqué of the traitors below: symbolism, layout, graphics—all of it matches: the colors, the name, the packaging… But it’s nothing more than Canada Dry!

Unable to impose his rebellion in France or Western Europe, where the truth was too well known, and incapable of overthrowing the legitimate magisterium of the Order, the traitor set up his group in the Philippines, and although never re-elected, carried by boundless audacity, suddenly proclaimed himself the Master of The Order of the Knights of Our Lady, before appointing, by his own authority, a supposed Filipino lieutenant general!
The group of counterfeiters began practicing strange express knightings to swell their ranks quickly, these revolutionaries believing, in their bottomless liberalism, that numbers would eventually produce legitimacy and truth.
A fake website appeared, a slavish copy of the original, insulting the Order and its legitimate Master.
In its communiqué dated last January 23, the magisterium of The Order of the Knights of Our Lady denounced, I quote, “this crude and distant counterfeit (…) which relies on a false website, a crude copy of the original, and on an improper use of our name and our symbols.”
However, since an Order of chivalry directed from far-off Philippines was ultimately not “marketable” enough in France, and mockery poured down, this group eventually managed to recruit a few individuals in Prague, with a Catholic of conciliar persuasion at their head, in order to organize a parody of the 2025 General Chapter of the Order, even shamelessly deceiving a Polish bishop on the occasion, in their unhealthy and unbridled obsession with the war of appearances.

Sinister clowns from the ends of the earth, now promoted by a priest

Nevertheless, “France Fidélité” still calmly presents the counterfeiters as “The Order of the Knights of Our Lady”! What a shipwreck… Must it be recalled once more that only the baillis of the Order have authority to say who is the Master of the Order, and that this was not only done in 2022, but again in 2025? Will this ridiculous attempt to counterfeit the Order ever cease? Case closed!
From the first salvo of Father Salenave in January 2025, some knight-councillors and knight-baillis had attempted to contact him; all in vain: the protestors found themselves ipso facto banned from Father’s Telegram channel! Three bishops of “Catholic Fidelity,” Their Excellencies Faure, Thomas Aquinas, and Zendejas, then assured the Master of their support. On this occasion, friendly and encouraging reactions from members and friends of Catholic Tradition were in fact massive: Father Joseph of Morgon, Medias-Presse-Info, Alain Escada and Civitas International, Professor Franck Bouscau and the Sainte-Geneviève Association, Action Française, Me Pierre-Marie Bonneau and Jeune-Nation, Fortress Europe, Les Nationalistes, etc. The group of counterfeiters was then seen sending out mass emails, real spam, repeating that the Order was supported by “neo-pagans” and “Nazis.” Those concerned will appreciate… Meanwhile, Father Salenave continued publicly defaming the Master on his Telegram channel, portraying him as a shady man with a mysterious past who “presented himself as the Master of the Order.” ⁸ Father later deleted his defamatory communiqués, but never offered any apology or correction, the messages continuing since then to be circulated on Telegram. Faced with such a lamentable situation, in an interview for “Transmettre la Tradition” dated February 10, 2025, relayed on the Medias-Presse-Info website, the Master was compelled to set the record straight concerning the Order, the counterfeiters, and the actions of Father Salenave…

All of it, in the name of a so-called preservation of orthodoxy, of which they would of course be the self-proclaimed guarantors… Let us laugh a little: lies, slander, sedition, and treachery—in a single word: Revolution. Let the tree be judged by its fruits! Orthodoxy is a convenient excuse… Attempting to confuse schism with usurpation—this is indeed a way of taking advantage of the fact that any schism is, in principle, an intelligible concept, while reaping the benefits of outright usurpation. Revolutionary subversion always corrupts words. That too is how one recognizes it.
For it does not hold: a schism necessarily involves the creation of a clear distinction between entities. Thus, no schismatic branch takes up the identity or the symbols of the mother house. Never does a branch claim its authority. When it does so, that is called usurpation and a forgery—not a schism. Moreover, an Order of chivalry cannot be founded by perjurers, resting upon lies and slander!

      And now the violence: noticing that their scheme was not taking hold and that support for the new Master was abundant in France, the fraudsters moved on to the next phase: intimidation. For several weeks, and after direct threats on the Telegram channel France Fidélité, the Master of The Order of the Knights of Our Lady, re-elected by the baillis in July 2025 at Avrillé (by 9 votes out of 11), has suddenly been harassed by emails (anonymous, of course) threatening to target his family directly if he does not withdraw the communiqué of the Order dated August 13, 2025, if he does not declare that the group in the Philippines is the sole and true Order, and if he does not dismantle The Order of the Knights of Our Lady, offering apologies to Father Salenave!

OCND communiqué of January 23, 2025:
https://www.medias-presse.info/communique-officiel-de-lordre-des-chevaliers-de-notre-dame-observance-des-saints-coeurs-de-jesus-et-marie/200122/

Interview granted to Transmettre la Tradition, February 10, 2025:
https://www.medias-presse.info/dans-un-entretien-audio-et-video-le-lieutenant-magistral-des-chevaliers-de-notre-dame-clarifie-une-situation-douloureuse/201026/

To conclude: many of our readers, drawn to chivalry, ask us questions about the Knights of Our Lady (curiously, it is the ladies and young women who most want to know about this Order of chivalry…). Here are the only official contacts and references:

The Order of the Knights of Our Lady (Traditional Observance)
 
Email: msanctaemariae@gmail.com
Contact form : https://militiasanctaemariae.wixsite.com/ocnd
Telegram channel : « La Nouvelle Chevalerie »
YouTube and Odysee channels: « La Nouvelle Chevalerie »
 
« With regard to one’s neighbor and to society in general, the knight commits to (…) allow no one to be slandered (…)” (Rule of the Knights of Our Lady; XVIII-1)

1. “The Untouchables” American television series from the 1960s, produced by Quinn Martin, with Robert Stack in the role of Eliot Ness. The episodes were broadcast in France from 1964 on the RTF Télévision channel. ↩︎
2. https://www.medias-presse.info/communique-officiel-des-baillis-de-lordre-des-chevaliers-de-notre-dame-en-date-du-13-aout-2025/208038/ ↩︎
3. Without overlooking the courage of the British knights of the chivalric order in question, the venerable Order of the Garter still exists in Great Britain (since its foundation by Edward III on St. George’s Day, 1348), whose origin is precisely what you know… The Order has as Grand Master the King or Queen, and includes 3 Royal Knights, 3 Ladies, 24 knights chosen from the highest British nobility, and 7 “Extra Knights”—that is, not belonging to the Commonwealth. That said, despite its gracious origin, The Most Noble Order of the Garter is infinitely more respectable than these fanciful chivalries, like the sects that, alas, abound. ↩︎
4. 1970 – The traditionalist knights had then regrouped in the Catholic Fraternity of Secular Knights (FCCS) until the salutary event of March 18, 1989, which restored the Order. Some knights of this FCCS may have been knighted by Mgr Marcel Lefebvre, founder of the Society of Saint Pius X (SSPX). ↩︎
5. The Lieutenant-Magistral is the Master of the Order, elected for 3 years instead of 7 when it is the first election to its head. ↩︎
6. Convent of La Haye-aux-Bonshommes, 6 Allée Saint-Dominique, 49240 Avrillé (Phone: +33 2 41 69 20 06 – Website: dominicainsavrille.fr) ↩︎
7. Until 2023, Father Salenave maintained very cordial relations with the current Master, before performing a volte-face in the direction of the former Master who had become a traitor (he had indeed pledged fidelity in the hands of the new Master…). ↩︎
8. As a reminder, he was elected Master by the College of Baillis in 2022, then re-elected in July 2025 by 9 votes out of 11. ↩︎