In
this edition of Oriens, we report on an argument over the status of the Society
of St Pius X. The dispute began in the French-language journal of the Priestly
Fraternity of St Peter and has been carried over into the pages of the The Latin
Mass magazine published in the
Hot
discord
In the last few months, the discord has burned hotter than usual.
Somewhere in the French countryside, an SSPX priest declares it a "mortal
sin" to attend masses celebrated by the Fraternity of St Peter. A Father de
Montjoye of the FSSP unleashes his own barrage: the SSPX, he charges, are
schismatical, non-Catholic ministers who do violence to the Eucharist by their
celebrations of the
One is reminded by these events of the non-stop political warfare waged
in 19th Century
In the same way the antagonism which has sprung up between the SSPX and
the FSSP, and, within each of them, between their respective ‘ultras’ and
‘pragmatic tendencies’, is the enemy of Catholic tradition and of that
authentic restoration and renovation for which so many Catholics hope and pray.
Oriens has never been drawn into debate about Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre and his
Society. As far as possible, our policy has been neither publicly to condemn nor
to support the late bishop or the movement he founded.
Given that the history of our readers and writers have been different,
for the most part, from those who have been drawn to the SSPX, it seemed both
unjust to harass our brethren because events had carried them along a road we
did not wish to tread, and indifferent to our own aspirations not to seize the
opportunity presented by Ecclesia Dei to chart our own course. In the meantime, we have looked forward to a
final agreement that would recall from ecclesiastical banishment the SSPX and
all those associated with it.
The recent explosion, however, of rigorist hostility toward the SSPX, at
a time when
SSPX
position
The facts of the case seem clear enough.
Some will point to their attitude to Vatican II. To be, however, a Catholic in good standing
not one of us is required to accept on faith a single canon of Vatican II since
none were promulgated. The Council’s statements on religious liberty,
ecumenism, and collegiality, which give rise to the most adverse reactions
within SSPX ranks, are at best pastoral orientations or new theological
formulations which, by their nature, are contestable and which have been
contested widely by Catholics whose communion with their bishops and with
Others
will point to the consecrations of
Mercy
What the
legalist critics rarely allude to, however, is the wonderful mercifulness of
canon law. According to its provisions, no punishment applies where alleged
offenders act out of some necessity evident to themselves; and there is no
penalty for schism where there was no intention of wishing to separate from the
Church.
Oriens has never endorsed Archbishop
Lefebvre’s decision to renege on the agreement of
Nor has it
supported the uncanonical consecrations. But the judgements of Mons Lefebvre
were not without their force and they have become more powerful – though not
compelling – with the passage of time.
When
Lefebvre drew back from the May 5 agreement, he said that he was "no longer
able to trust
When the
negotiations were done, it appeared to Lefebvre that in putting his initials to
May 5 he had accepted an invitation to hand over his movement to its
executioners.
Vexed
history
If we
examine the subsequent history of the Ecclesia Dei regime, and the chequered
story of the Priestly Fraternity of St Peter, Lefebvre’s fears have not proved
groundless, though neither have they been completely realised. The FSSP has been
subject to pressure, with the help of an insurgent group, to adopt biritualism
and participate in concelebrations using the new missal. A Roman protocol has
been issued to outlaw disciplinary measures by the FSSP to uphold its exclusive
attachment to the traditional liturgy. While the integrity of the FSSP has been
damaged by these events, the Roman prohibitions have had no effect on the issue
of chief importance to the Fraternity and to the traditional Catholics whom it
serves – the practical freedom to chose the traditional liturgy exclusively.
In the meantime, and notwithstanding the hostility of many bishops and their
officials, the traditional Mass has spread. It has entered into communities and
churches that the SSPX could never have reached. So Mons Lefebvre was right, but
not right enough.
For all
that, the remarkable bishop is winning his argument from beyond the grave. When
So while
technically Lefebvre, his coconsecrator Antonio de Castro Mayer, and the men
they made bishops, might have gone "into touch", their actual relation
to the Church is much less clear than the adversarial "touch judges"
have flagged so furiously. The ecclesiastical position of the bishops, the SSPX,
and those who cleave to them, is at worst irregular – an irregularity that was
not all of their own doing, but to which they felt compelled.
Who is
responsible?
If there
were errors on Lefebvre’s part, and on that of his followers, they were
chiefly errors of prudential judgement clouded by the fog, and cramped by the
injuries, of battle. What has yet to be recognised is the role that Popes and
bishops played, and theirs the more serious. It was they, seized by the romance
of the new and sustained by papal loyalism, who persecuted Catholics simply for
being Catholic in the traditional way and, at the same time, who turned an
indulgent eye upon the pastorally-correct workers of mayhem.
Just how
schismatic the current position of the SSPX is will not be known until
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e grave