I met him only once, in the Chartres Cathedral back in the late 1990s. Most amusingly at the time, he asked me how the Minnesota North Stars were doing as, aside from being a holy priest, he was also a big hockey fan.
A long time before that, Father's book "Pastor Out in the Cold" had become part of my coming of age as a Traditional Catholic. The autobiographical work details Father’s struggle to defend the Traditional Latin Mass in the turbulent days after the close of the Council—a holy cause for which Father Normandin sacrificed everything, even his pension.
By the early 1970s, he'd became an outcast from his diocese of Montreal, thus the “pastor out in the cold”, which set the precedent for many heroic priests that we recognized, even as children, as the spiritual sons of the great underground priests of the past, such as Saints Edmund Campion and Miquel Pro.
He was one of the first post-conciliar priests to put Christ, His Mass and the holy priesthood ahead of the guitars, felt banners and Modernist madness that plagued that era. Throughout the 1970s, Father Normandin was a travelling priest who brought the old Mass, sacraments and catechism to traditional Catholic families like mine at a time when there was nothing else.
The SSPX credits Father Normandin with having laid the foundations for most of the Canadian traditional Latin Mass chapels now served by the Society of St. Pius X.
Father Normandin
In justice for all he did for the holy cause of Tradition back before "Tradition was cool", we owe it to Father Normandin to pray for the repose of his soul and to beg God to welcome His good and faithful servant into paradise without delay.
Tu es sacerdos in aeternum secundum ordinem Melchisedech.
Father Yves Normandin, RIP.