Dom Gérard-Marie Lafond, OSB, Founder of the MSM

Gérard Lafond was born September 30, 1926. At the age of eighteen, on August 6^th 1945, the young man rode up to the 7^th century Abbey of Saint-Wandrille in Normandy on his bicycle. His father knew Dom Gabriel Gontard, then abbot, and he had come to the Abbey to propose a draft Rule for an Order of Chivalry.

He had formed a passion for this social phenomenon after reading Léon Gauthier’s book "Chivalry", and believed that chivalry was both necessary and possible in the twentieth century. Struck by the absolute nature of armed conflict at the end of World War II, he believed it necessary to form men able to respond in times of crisis, to lead others and full of humility, able to fight the good fight for the Kingdom of Christ, which begins in combat within themselves:

"A mission so sublime cannot be fulfilled without a total conversion of your entire being to God… You shall have no other ambition than to serve Christ your King meekly and faithfully. You will spare no effort to achieve this end, you will have to break yourself, stifle your pride, despise your life in this world. At the school of Mary, Our Lady, you will seek humility ... and you will strive to make your brother man sense the sacred. You shall ensure that nature, family, work, science, art, even politics, permit Divine Grace to shine through to all." (Rule, Prologue, 8) 

Dom Gontard was interested in the project but mainly by the strong personality of this young man 'who had gathered around him men, some older than he.' At the end of the year, the MSM was dedicated. On October 26, 1947, the feast of Christ the King, Gérard Lafond, with three of his friends, receives the Benedictio Novi Militis sacramental of the Church from Dom Gontard and is dubbed a knight. At the same time, the MSM is legally established as a non-profit association.

On July 20, 1948, Gérard Lafond entered the Abbey of Saint-Wandrille. He was professed on March 25^th 1950 and was ordained July 25^th1955. From the Abbey, Dom Lafond did not however forget the Order of Chivalry he had founded and continued to help it make the major decisions required in connection with its foundation. For instance, while the first knights were hesitant about the place of the family in the MSM, Dom Lafond insisted that the MSM should be a lay movement. When he obtained permission from his superior, he participated in the Order’s annual chapters.

It is through studies in theology that he was sent by the Benedictines to undertake at the Biblical Institute of Rome, following initial work at the Institut Catholique de Paris, that he met Bishop Michon, Archbishop of Chartres, who had come to participate in the Council, and Cardinal Ottaviani, Pro-prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith from 1959 to 1968. On the recommendation of the Cardinal, the Archbishop canonically erected the Militia Sanctae Mariae in his diocese, on the vigil of the Nativity in 1964, in the crypt of Notre-Dame de Sous-Terre. Since this time, the Knights of Our Lady have venerated 'Virgin who must give birth' of this sanctuary with special devotion.

In addition to Mgr Michon, two witnesses signed the Charter of Canonical Establishment;

Prince Xavier of Bourbon-Parma, and Mgr Marc Lallier, Archbishop of Marseille 

Procession on the Solemnity of the Assumption in Chartres in the 1960s, led by Dom Lafond,

Master Jehan de Penfentenyo de Kervéréguin, Magisterial Lieutenant since 1955, and a sword-bearing Brother-at-Arms 

Printed first as a series of articles from 1952 onward, Dom Lafond's work "Chevalerie d'hier et d'aujourd'hui' is published in 1962. In 1968, Dom Lafond published "Principes pour une Charte de la Chevalerie" (Principles for a Charter of Knighthood). He also created and oversaw the publication by the MSM of “Magistère Information”, a semi-monthly month from 1970 to 2002.

Present at Regensburg at its canonical establishment in Germany by Bishop Rudolf Graber in 1968, Dom Lafond witnessed the expansion of the Order outside France.

In Rome, Dom Lafond acquired an excellent knowledge of Holy Scripture, a doctrinal rigor and a sense of the Church which enabled him (and help many others) to fully accept the Second Vatican Council. On the occasion of the introduction of the new ordo missae, he led substantive work on compliance with these standards by the Militia Mariae Sanctae. In 1972, Dom Lafond made clear in his Rule that the word "Order" by the MSM “should not be canonically understood as a religious order or order of chivalry as defined by the Holy Apostolic See.” We are therefore, by the will of our founder, the "regularly and militant company of the Militia Sanctae Mariae, known as the Knights of Our Lady” and a private association of the faithful.

Despite his election as Abbot of Saint-Paul de Wisques, Dom Lafond came to the MSM’s annual chapter in 1995, to mark the fiftieth anniversary of its foundation, at the ‘Commandery of the Immaculate’ in that Montireau which was established in 1970 on his request on the territory of the mother diocese of the MSM.

He continued to counsel the Magisterium of the MSM, including in several letters to the current Master in 2008 and 2009, on key issues such as its faithfulness to the Church and its apostolate, subsequently included in Magisterial Directives, until the very end of his life in 2010.

Resquiat in Pacem