Posted on 10/16/2006 8:27:21 AM PDT by NYer
Pope Benedict XVI celebrates the canonization ceremony of Italian nun Rosa Venerini, Mexican bishop Rafael Guizar, Italian priest Filippo Smaldone and Indiana nun Theodore Guerin in St. Peter's square at the Vatican, October 15, 2006. REUTERS/Giampiero Sposito
By Tom Heneghan, Religion Editor
PARIS (Reuters) - After almost two decades of schism, Catholic traditionalists hope the Vatican will soon take them back into the fold by granting two key concessions and leaving unresolved the main issue that drove them away.
Bishop Bernard Fellay, head of the Society of Saint Pius X (SSPX), says the expected revival of the old Latin mass that was replaced in the 1960s by modern liturgy in local languages would be a "grand gesture" meeting one of his demands.
The Swiss bishop, successor to the late SSPX founder French Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre, also expects the Vatican to lift the 1988 excommunications of Lefebvre and four bishops -- including Fellay -- whom he consecrated without Rome's approval.
"Things are going in the right direction. I think we'll get an agreement," Fellay told journalists in Paris at the weekend. "Things could speed up and come faster than expected."
Getting an agreement now would mean the Swiss-based SSPX and its 470 priests could return to the Roman fold without resolving a dispute over its opposition to the modernising reforms of the Second Vatican Council (1962-1965).
Claiming a million followers, the SSPX is the vanguard of traditionalists among 1.1 billion Catholics worldwide. Its return would have no direct effect on most parishes but high symbolic value for arch-conservatives in the Church.
The excommunications by the late Pope John Paul created the first schism in the Church in modern times. Since his election last year, Pope Benedict has been trying to hold out an olive branch to the SSPX.
Fellay envisages the SSPX would be an independent group within the Church, free of control by local bishops, while it continued to advocate rolling back other Vatican II reforms.
"We would be a bit like the Chinese Patriotic Church, in the Church without really being there," he explained. "There could be a relationship between Rome and us, but it would not yet be a juridical relationship."
"INTERMEDIATE STATE"
Speculation about an SSPX return arose last week when Vatican sources said Pope Benedict would soon allow wider use of the old Tridentine Mass in Latin that went out of favour when the Church switched to praying in local languages in the 1960s.
Priests can say the old mass if they get permission but few bishops grant it and demand for Latin rites is minimal. Most Catholics under 50 years old have never heard Latin spoken.
The SSPX thinks the post-Council liturgy, which stresses participation by worshippers in open praying and singing, has lost the sacred character and beauty of the traditional mass.
The Tridentine rite it prefers is solemn, with the priest and altar boys quietly reciting the prayers in Latin with their backs to the silent congregation.
The traditionalists also reject the Council decision that the Church, which long saw itself as the only path to salvation, should respect and work together with other faiths.
Echoing this, a senior SSPX official sparked controversy last year by urging the Pope to tell Jews and followers of other religions to convert from their "false systems" to Catholicism.
Fellay said the SSPX sought an "intermediate state" in the Church so it could continue to oppose what Lefebvre called "neo-Modernist and neo-Protestant tendencies ... in the Second Vatican Council and in all the reforms which issued from it."
"We don't want a practical solution before these doctrinal questions are resolved," he said. "The focus should be on these discussions."
Benedict, who sparked protest across the Muslim world last month with a speech hinting that Islam had been spread by the sword, has frequently stressed his support for Vatican II reforms including cooperation with other faiths.
The sspx, Neo-Pharisses all, deserve no less
I know my way of being suggests excitement and adventure but I cannot and will not entertain any of your requests for a date.
The chances that statement is true are LESS than the chance the next Pope will be an Japanese woman named Suki.
There are those who forget that so great an early Church figure as Tertullian, in spite of all of his "Doctor of the Church" level brilliance as a theologian, nevertheless died an UltraMontane heretic when he of all people certainly knew better. Whoops, there I go again. Next incoming from Tertullian's UltraMontanists!
Did the Vatican publicly deny his statement?
A simple yes or no will suffice.
Need I remind you that the Angelus is a publication of the excommunicated SSPX schism. And yes, they lie regularly. It is the nature of the excommunicated scimatics when attacking Rome, as you well know. The Angelus: Not a Catholic source at all but an excommunicated and schismatic one.
Fellay does not deny that he comes from the planet Hades. Does that mean that.....
That the gates of hell will not prevail is evidenced by Marcel dying excommunicated.
Are you????
Meant to ping you to #128.
Maybe Suki will take over SSPX?????
Aw, shucks, shifts forelegs back and forth, blushing!
You don't suppose that Soros is funding Fellay?
Latin Mass Magazine is not a SSPX publication.
Again, did the Vatican deny the statement? Yes or no?
They do have a life and Fellay is not at the center of their lives.
I seriously would not be surprised to hear that Soros is funding Fellay. Okay, maybe a little. I mean, they spout the same stuff as DU and they hate John Paul the Great just as much as the leftmoonbats. Women can't wear pants and they shouldn't drive, lace on underpants is sinful. Sounds pretty Talabanistic. Satan will attack the Church any way he wants.
You guys are truly Catholic men, and do the Church proud.
Thsnks for the kind words. Welcome to the dark side :)
If Pope Benedict XVI wishes to be more merciful, he has the keys. As ever, I will observe the ancient truth: Roma Locuta, Causa Finita! If he chooses to burn them at the stake, likewise! Meanwhile, we can wait until Benedict XVI acts and not take the word of an illicitly consecrated, excommunicated schismatic bishop as though it were Benedict's. One pope at a time.
If your softheartedness leads the schismatics to be comforted and NOT change, are you willing to shoulder the moral burden of such defectve "charity?" The SSPX have NO valid criticisms any more than did Arius, Luther, Calvin, Zwingli, et al.
It is beyond question that Jesus Christ loves each and every human being. Nonetheless, He drove the moneychangers from the Temple when they deserved it. His whip fell upon them (lovingly) again and again. He did NOT say: Hey, defile My Father's House as you please. No big deal!"
God probably loved all of His created angels but He drove the fallen ones out of heaven and later Christ drove those known as Legion out of the man possessed and into the herd of pigs that promptly suicided by jumping off a cliff. God is Justice as well as Love.
Your third paragraph is absolutely correct so long as they remember that Roma Locuta, Causa Finita and Ubi Petrus, Ibi Ecclesia.
So the answer is no.
The quote stands correct.
Thank you.
Just as one Pope dismissed the edict of Pius the V, I'm sure it's a far lesser deal to dismiss the edict of jpII.
Sorry.
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