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.
As Canonists explain, Current and former Officials of the K of C are not expected to comply with the no drinking on a school night norms
Apart from their antisemitism; their hatred of the Living Msgisterium; their hatred of the most recent Ecumenical council; and their hatred of the normative Mass, I don't really know what attracts their followers :)
Dear bornacatholic,
"As Canonists explain, Current and former Officials of the K of C are not expected to comply with the no drinking on a school night norms"
ROTFLMAO!!!
DGK S/K sitetest, PGK
Taxachusetts Man: As an excommunicated schismatic, Fellay is certainly not the pope. In fact, he and his pretentious followers are not even Catholics. What part of EXCOMMUNICATED do they fail to understand????? Your take on this is sensible.
Charity is telling these ecclesiastical criminals what they NEED to hear, not what they WANT to hear. Charity is love (i.e. what is BEST for the beloved) not cowardly make believe that seeks only not to offend the SSPX in their practice of evil. No Kumbayah, now or ever.
I couldn't agree more!
Apoplectic???? Not at all. I despised dead excommunicated schismatic Marcel's attitude and pretensions when the old miscreant rebel was alive. I despise him and his love slaves now that he is dead. Total humiliation of the schismatics and profound penance should be the only path to Rome for the schismatic excommunicati.
Do you suppose that the SSPX admires the "Chinese Patriotic Church" because it is a naked tool of the Chicoms used for agitprop against the Vatican or only because the CPC uses the Tridentine Mass???? Maybe it is the CPC's contempt for all things Vatican? Or maybe because the Chicom bosses of the CPC have martyred so many priests, bishops, nuns and lay Catholics who died in communion with the Vatican???? SSPX is already very much like the CPC in that both are institutions of the excommunicated. Fellay is admitting entirely too much for his own good.
You forgot their hatred for NFP, John Paul II and Benedict XVI. I was told recently in one conversation the we "neo-Catholics" worship JPII and Benedict XVI. And JPII's Theology of the Body was "drivel and petty." Of course my all time favorite comment was how JP the Great (they have a heart attack if you call him that) only taught against abortion because of the liberal views about man he had. See, honestly this is what the guy said, JP the Great thought that man was so wonderful "and had all this dignity and that's why he opposed abortion."
VF: Get back to us AFTER the SSPX excommunicati have individually and collectively taken back each and every attack and slur on Pope John Paul the Great, upon the papacy itself, upon the Church and upon Jesus Christ's guarantees to His Church (hint: that is NOT SSPX). Also get back to us when the SSPX bishops have resigned their status since they are illicit, agreed to permanent cloister and done profound personal public penance for their evils while renuncing Marcel and the schism.
You are welcome, dearie. If you never repent and never return, it wioll be no skin off the noses of Catholics.
wioll=will
Thank you. God bless you and yours!
If we are driving the excommunicated schismatics away from pretending to be Catholics, then we perform a worthwhile service. We aren't allowed to burn them at the stake any more in this wimpy world but at least we get the satisfaction of having schism recognized as schism and excommunication recognized as excommunication. You are welcome, dearie.Then again 'dearie' you are not the Holy Father, you cannot decide the state of the soul of those you claim to be "pretending to be Catholics" and your job is NOT to 'drive away' anyone from the One True Church. That you think it is shows your problem. I will pray for you and the many who will attack the Holy Father for these courageous steps to fight Modernism and heresy. + If you want on (or off) this Catholic and Pro-Life ping list, let me know!
The most credible French national newspaper, Le Figaro, publishes today an article on the possible removal of the excommunications that followed the events of 1988, which led to the consecration by Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre (with Bishop Antonio de Castro Mayer as co-consecrator) of four bishops for the Priestly Fraternity of Saint Pius X (FSSPX/SSPX).
I'll "get back to you" when I have the inclination to do so, and not before. Then again, I might just send you the news when Pope Benedict announces that the Mass of Ages is authorized to be offered anytime, by any priest, without restrictions by Modernist American Bishops. He might also lift the so-called SSPX excoms, which I'm sure you and BC will be overjoyed to hear about given your obedience to all things from Rome and your daily prayers for peace and tranquility in matters pertaining to our faith.
Very funny.
Maybe with prozac?
Roasted near the river - the River deNile.
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