This is just my opinion, but after reading the COMMUNIQUE OF THE SSPX ISSUED IN THE LAST COUPLE OF DAYS WHICH YOU CAN READ BY PRESSING HERE, I now understand the upset that Pope Francis had as he celebrated Pope Benedict's birthday and asked for prayers for him for his consolation.
Bishop Bernard Fellay has rebuked and repudiated all that Pope Benedict in his humility tried to do so desperately during his pontificate to reconcile this schismatic branch of the Church back into the full communion of the Church and the papacy. He failed as is made clear by the arrogance of Bishop Fellay:
"The difficulties resulted, on the one hand, from requirements that accompanied the Roman proposal - to which we could not and still cannot subscribe - and, on the other hand, from a lack of clarity on the part of the Holy See that did not allow us to know precisely the will of the Holy Father or what he was ready to concede to us. The trouble caused by these uncertainties vanished as of June 13, 2012, with a clear confirmation, on the 30th of the same month, by a letter from Benedict XVI himself clearly and unambiguously spelling out the conditions that were being imposed on us for a canonical normalization.
These conditions are of a doctrinal nature; they entail the total acceptance of the Second Vatican Council and of the Mass of Paul VI. And so, as Archbishop Augustine Di Noia, Vice President of the Ecclesia Dei Commission, wrote in a letter addressed to the members of the Society of St. Pius X at the end of last year, on the doctrinal level we are still at the point where we started out in the 1970’s. Unfortunately we can only agree with this observation by the Roman authorities and acknowledge the current relevance of the analysis by Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre, founder of our Society, which was unwavering in the decades following the Council, until his death. His very accurate insight, which is at the same time theological and practical, is still valid today, fifty years after the start of the Council."
My comments: There you have it and the basis of Pope Francis heartache over Pope Benedict who is the victim in all of this with the SSPX!
If this communique is the basis of Pope Francis homily on Tuesday, it certainly is a welcomed pronouncement on the birthday of Pope Benedict who tried to move the SSPX forward but without success and because of the arrogance of the SSPX. If anyone is rebuking and repudiating Pope Benedict it certainly would be the SSPX and their intransigence as it concerns the Second Vatican Council made clear in this communique. Pope Francis is in sympathy with Pope Benedict so seriously rebuked by a bishop of the Catholic Church. Pope Francis would be guilty of malpractice if he didn’t call them “fools.”
8 comments:
Having read the entire letter, I don't see any rebuke. I see concern.
The excerpts of the documents written by Archbishop Lefebrve 30 and 40 years ago _do_ seem prophetic of the Church today. Priestly and Religious vocations are down and the NO is shot through with modernism and Protestantism. (I write this as someone who comes from heavily modernist and Protestant traditions; I know 'em when I see 'em, way better than today's average cradle Catholic.) The soul-threatening scandal Lefebrve wrote about broadens every time the media cover Biden and Pelosi talking about how Catholic they are and then profaning the sacrament with the tacit approval of everyone from their bishops to the pope.
After having very deliberately chosen the course of explaining and talking and appealing to reason and dialogue in VII, the Vatican has never, to my knowledge, adopted this approach vis-a-vis SSPX explaining rationally how the four VII positions SSPX lists do in fact fit within prior doctrinal statements. Instead, the Vatican has simply told SSPX to shut up and to accept the four pronouncements. The VII style to all appearance invites dialogue; when Lefebrve tried "dialoguing" with the Vatican on the issues that concerned him, the Vatican smacked him down hard. A similar smackdown occurred last year.
This would bother me somewhat even if taken in isolation. But when we see the Vatican acting in such a harsh way towards a relatively small movement while freely permitting rampant modernist heresy within what it defines as the mainstream of the Church, it bothers me tremendously, as well as lending a great deal of validity to Lefebrve's statements.
The difference seems to be formal organization versus material schismatic heresy. As long as you don't start up your own society and instead write deliberately confusing pastoral statements (USCCB), gut beautiful old church buildings (Weakland) and build monstrous new ones (Mahoney), infiltrate parish councils, co-opt RCIA programs, and radicalize music "ministries" (what happened to apostolates?) you can be as heretical and subversive as you please with impunity and even approval.
The hierarchy, with all of its groovy VII ways, is still being medieval by making this formal/material distinction (and I've never before used the term "medieval" as a pejorative, and certainly not in regard to the Church). It's fixated on a small formal group that has its best interests at heart even if that group is mistaken while allowing a massive informal movement to run rampant within its main body, a movement that seeks not its best interests but its perversion and destruction.
Something is truly, gravely, wrong here.
Those who refuse even to acknowledge this grave problem are themselves highly suspect.
I will start viewing the Vatican position towards SSPX more sympathetically once the Vatican shows some major signs of taking the modernism within the Church as the grave threat that it is.
To be continued . . .
Continued . . .
Those of us who seek to be orthodox are ignored and taken for granted by the hierarchy, for it knows that we must say "to whom else shall we go?" We are denounced by people in our parish for being reactionary, for wanting to turn back the clock, for being intolerant, for being--medieval. (Note to Fr. McD: I don' speak of St. Joseph here, for which I truly thank you, although I've no doubt that there are parishioners here who, if given the chance, would certainly fall into this category.) This is an environment that seems calculated to make us despair. We expect this treatment from the world; Christ warned us of it. But to get it from large numbers of our fellow "Catholics?" The C&E, pro-abortion, Kumbaya-singing, liberation theology, contracepting "Catholics" who have such a powerful influence in so many, many parishes? It's hard sometimes. Very hard.
The only thing that prevents me from despairing is my hope/belief/faith that at some point, likely decades after I'm dead, a new St. Athanasius will arise, and perhaps become pope, and he will formally and unambiguously explain away VII, declare what the modernists have done in my lifetime to be heresy, and formally and publicly excommunicate these modernists.
I write this as a faithful Catholic who has never attended or contributed to SSPX or even FSSP.
If the price that the SSPX would have had to pay for "regularization" would have been to accept V2 with all it's errors then Pope Benedict was a fool to have thought they would ever accept it, or it was his arrogance to think the SSPX were so desperate for regularization as to betray The Faith.
Recovery from any addiction requires first that the addict recognize and admit they have the problem. Until "the Church" admits it's problems with V2 it can never recover from them, and in such case I thank God Almighty that the SSPX stayed clean from the taint of V2 and remain as a hope for the future.
In a sense, the SSPX leadership (perhaps goaded on by thier laity, which seems to have a strong rebellious and sede vacante-leaning tendency)are fools. Don't they realise if they were to come into full communion with the Catholic Church, they could then work from within to correct all the problems? Just as the modernists under Karl Rahner, et al, just stayed within the Church in good standing, and slowly over time, recruiting new members to their cause, brought about, no so much Vatican II, but the "spirit of Vatican II". The SSPX could use the same tactic. But no, they are just too prideful, stubborn, and just plain stupid. They'd rather stay cut off from the tree, even though their branch will never develope deep roots. I hope and pray the SSPX clergy has more sense, and individually reconcile with Rome, if the SSPX as a whole won't.
Bret, you argue that the SSPX should have accepted regularization under false terms. To lie in effect. To accept "all of the doctrines of V2" to gain regularization, and then work against what they just accepted. To accept such terms would be a complete betrayal of all that the SSPX has stood for since their creation.
You can not do wrong even in the pursuit of right. Better to stand your ground and be martyred for it.
Cardinal Kasper remarks in an article published in the recent edition of La Osservatore Romano that Vatican 2 documents were intentionally written so that progressives and orthodox Catholics could interpret certain teaching (on ecumenism; religious liberty, etc;) each in their own way.
I am not surprised our Pope Francis speaks of the Devil so often. He is a wise man. Paul VI remarked earlier that the smoke of Satan entered the Church in the wake of the Council. It appears, he is still hiding in the details.
Likewise, Benedict XVI in his farewell remarks to parish priests of Rome named the lingering problem of the Church the Council of the media overwhelming the Council of the Fathers. The former getting implemented and the latter ignored. In my opinion, the latter is often quoted if convenient, to bolster the false interpretations derived from the Spirit of the council, notions propagated by progressive elements.
If we are to accept Cardinal Kasper's analysis of the current situation it will be a very long time before debated Vatican teaching will gain total acceptance by either side. The Holy Father can sort this situation out very well by removing the remaining ambiguities remaining in V2 documents. Absent of that the FSSPX will just stubbornly stick to pre-council teachings and who can blame them?
Anon 5 and I had most of this conversation at lunch yesterday. I agree with him whole-heartedly...the "when is the Church not the Church" dilemma still looms. I think it could become a real issue down the road if the kinds of thinking Anon 5 is talking about continue to infiltrate the Church.
Templar and Anonymous, thank you so much! May I add to your reasonable comments my own, that I have all my life been active in the pro-life and social justice apostolates, and I know from ground zero that the ecumenical 'pastoral approach' that infected us after the Council has deprived countless men and women of the truly healing invitation to serve Jesus Christ, and now get only food and diapers and whatnot. Not one word is ever said of the Faith now, in our social justice work, and we are forbidden in practice to seek legislation that would prevent abortion or contraception or divorce, relying instead on our ability to 'form consciences.' We have lost that battle so badly that we cannot even practice our Faith now, homosexual marriage is making us illegal state by state, and we have not seen the end of it at all, our tax exemption is going right this moment and the rest will follow, and we are alone, everyone else has 'gone along.' The Vatican II heresy (in collegiality, in false ecumenism, and in so-called religious freedom) is such emptiness! It abandons the poor to the wolves, even materially, since we refuse to lead any fight against their predators. Hungary is an example of where we should be going, and instead the Vatican either ignores, or condemns, Hungary for having the audacity to defy Europe and make abortion and homosexual
'marriage' illegal, and that is a direct result of the change in traditional Catholic teaching at that Council. It has ruined us and to ignore it is the same thing as those English who ignored what Henry VIII had done in order to 'get along.' They were and are apostates, and so are those who cover their eyes to what Vatican II has done. SSPX is far from perfect, it is true, but they have stood up for the poor and the halt in their refusal to abandon the sacrificial mass and the rest of traditional teaching, because the mass, and true teaching, is all the poor ever had, and it was all they needed, because all else sprang from that, the banking rules, the insistance on fair wages and available health care. Now the secular state tries to make up for what the Catholic state always provided,in a twisted version of moderate socialism, and of course without Christ at the center, fails utterly. We gave it all away at Vatican II! Vatican II caused profound social differences! It sold out the poor!
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