WHY INTERPRETING VATICAN II IN CONTINUITY WITH THE CHURCH PRIOR TO VATICAN II IS NEEDED NOW MORE THAN EVER

I will write more about this religious order below the video I post below. Please note how young and vibrant the Sisters are and compare that with modern photos of dying post-Vatican II religious orders. 

Let me be clear. I am not opposed to Vatican II and respect it as a part of the Magisterium of the Church. What I critique and criticize is how Vatican II was implemented, in discontinuity with what came before.

I lived through the transition from the pre-Vatican II Church to the post Vatican II Church as a young teenager. At the time, from about 12 years old in 1965 to about 17 years old in 1971, I matured in my excitement. 

What appeared good to begin with, in terms of my own experience of Vatican II’s implementation, seem to go off the rails by the time I was 17. I could tell that as a 17 year old! I wasn’t alone in that sentiment either. 

Thus, let us pray that Pope Leo XIV leads the Church in a honest critique of what has happened to the Church since Vatican II. Yes there is good, but yes there is some that is no good.

On Facebook, I have been getting videos of a Catholic school in Florida staffed by nuns in full habit and a very traditional Catholic education à la pre-Vatican II, something that all Catholics my age and older recall with affection and some fear and trepidation. I remember well my pre-Vatican II schools in Atlanta and Augusta with the Sisters of St. Joseph of Corondelet. We had many nuns and our Catholic eduction was like what this video shows but now in 2025. The only exception is that this “pre-Vatican II” school is very progressive in its educational hermeneutic and blends marvelously both in school and on-line Catholic education which I think is the wave of the future with all the home-schooling that there is, but homeschoolers want traditional Catholic education and they get it this way:

Now for the nuns in this Order; As I mentioned I had been getting videos feeds from their school and I was quite impressed with what I was seeing. But then I looked up the order and sadly discovered that it is completely schismatic as it is apparently a Sedevacanist group. I was greatly saddened by discovering this.

Their videos, though, on facebook did not seem ideological in terms of a fanatical sedevacantist position as they simply showed videos of educating children, choirs where Catholic children were singing the patrimony of the Church and marvelously so, not the kitsch they sing today in most Catholic schools and parishes. 

This is what their website says:

The Nature of the Congregation

 

The Congregation of the Sisters of St. Thomas Aquinas is a traditional Catholic institute of women religious who, by the observance of the vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience, apply themselves to acquire Christian perfection. 

 

The special object of the Congregation is to assist in the preservation and the propagation of the Faith in these troubled times. For this end, the Congregation is devoted to the Catholic education of the youth. The Sisters, therefore, have the teaching of truth at heart. 

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Fundamental Principles

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The Congregation is organized according to pre-Vatican II standards. The Congregation professes that Vatican II and the doctrinal, disciplinary, and liturgical reforms that have proceeded from it are substantial alterations of the Catholic Faith. It professes that these heretical, evil, and blasphemous reforms can in no way proceed from the Roman Catholic Church, since she is infallible in her doctrines, her disciplines and her liturgical worship. Thus, the Congregation rejects these reforms and adheres to traditional Catholic doctrine, discipline, and liturgy, pristine and untouched. The Congregation professes that the members of the Novus Ordo hierarchy, despite any and all appearances of authority, are not true Catholic popes nor true Catholic bishops, and do not possess the authority to rule, for they are the authors of the doctrinal, disciplinary and liturgical abominations which have invaded our holy places. 

Read the rest HERE. 

My final comments:

Although Sedevacantist, this order is attracting huge numbers of young vocations and their school is prospering. And the school, from its educational hermeneutic is progressive, oddly enough!

While they have separated from the pope and bishops in union with him, and thus this qualifies as a true schism, they have preserved the Catholic faith as it was experienced prior to 1965.  Their religious order, in terms of vocations, is experiencing in 2025 what most religious orders experienced prior to Vatican II. It is clear why that is!

In today’s world, if I were a parent living in this Florida town and I wanted my children to have a good, safe Catholic education, I would send them to this school and without hesitation. I would not, though, join this community as it is sedevacantist. 

It would be like me sending my children to a good Protestant school; I might like their education and discipline but I won’t join them as a Church.