I’ve written this before, but I think the hysteria about the FSSPX from the Vatican to local dioceses is overblown and so very unecumenical!
The estimate about the number of Catholics in the USA going to FSSPX chapels either for Mass or actually joining this schismatic sect is about 25,000 Catholics.
Yet, no one is hysterical over the millions of Catholics in the USA who have joined non-denominational Protestant sects—-millions!
WHAT’S UP WITH THAT????
At least the schismatic Catholics going to the FSSPX are in more full communion with the Church than the non-denominational schismatics and certainly the millions of Catholics who have become “nones!”
Let’s get real about this!
Read the NcR article by pressing the title:
2 comments:
I think it has to do with fealty. The FSSPX was/is deliberately undermining the Church and authority of the Pope from within. People who leave the Church have usually chosen a specific issue that they honestly cannot support, e.g. abortion, birth control, clergy sex scandal, immigration, the Triune God, salvation through faith alone, sola scriptura, etc.
Speaking of the SSPX:
Various Catholics have continued to beat Pope Leo XIV verbally in regard to the Holy Father having refused to grant an audience to SSPX leaders.
Pope Leo XIV last week had granted a 40-minute audience to Patti Smith, the pro-abortion "Godmother of Punk."
Various folks, such as John Henry-Westen, responded with...
"Leo took the time to meet with the “Godmother of Punk,” but “couldn’t meet with the SSPX."
Father McDonald has made it clear that attendance at SSPX chapels is at the microscopic level. But the problem is that the SSPX has long punched far above its weight.
As then-Cardinal Ratzinger had noted, the influence that Archbishop Lefebvre/the SSPX wielded extended "far beyond the narrow circle of the Fraternity of Lefebvre."
We see that today as folks who do not populate SSPX chapels have sided with the Society, rather than Pope Leo XIV.
Therefore, I disagree respectfully with Father McDonald's comment that "the hysteria about the FSSPX from the Vatican to local dioceses is overblown and so very unecumenical!"
Rome, as well as bishops — bishops most certainly whose dioceses contain SSPX chapels — have good reason to concern themselves with the SSPX.
Various folks who attend SSPX chapels, as well as folks beyond SSPX's boundaries who, nevertheless, sympathize with the SSPX, have expressed anger at Pope Leo XIV.
In addition, there are folks who while having refrained from having beaten His Holiness verbally, have insisted that his supposed "hammering" of the SSPX has broken their hearts.
The following also is in play:
As Father McDonald noted last month, "we have bishops galore, some newly appointed, suppressing the TLM in their dioceses."
Pope Leo XIV, for whatever reason(s), has, at least publicly, not employed his awesome authority to halt the suppressions in question.
Archbishop Cordileone insisted last week that there are Latin Mass Catholics who if not permitted access to Church-approved Latin Masses will not hesitate to "seek spiritual nourishment outside of the family in union with Rome."
SSPX chapels are at the top of the list for various above-mentioned Catholics.
That is among the reasons why I believe that "the hysteria about the FSSPX from the Vatican to local dioceses" is warranted.
Pax.
Mark Thomas
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