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As a service to my loyal readers, and since I do follow the “recognition” process between Rome and the SSPX quite closely, I am republishing for the record the latest information to appear on the SSPX US District website. (see here)
****
FOR THE RECORD:
Bp. Fellay Discusses Prelature Rumors
In a sermon given in Poland last Friday, Bishop Bernard Fellay commented on the situation between the SSPX and Rome and recent rumors.
Rome: A City of Rumor
Bishop Fellay addressed the rumor that the SSPX is purchasing property in Rome in order to relocate from its headquarters in Menzingen. This is fake news, as we earlier reported:
There have been plans for a purchase in Rome, there are some now and there will be others, as long as a firm acquisition has not been finalized. On the other hand, to respond to the ‘revelations’ in the press, there is no plan to purchase a building complex at Santa Maria Immacolata all’Esquilino, as Matteo Matzuzzi writes.”
Bishop Fellay confirmed that the SSPX intends to buy a church in Rome, but the sale of the building the SSPX is interested in, belonging to a Community of Sisters, depends on the Congregation for the Religious.
A Personal Prelature
Bishop Fellay then commented on a project of Personal Prelature which had been offered to the SSPX in the summer of 2015. As he already said on January 26, 2016, such a canonical structure fits the needs and the actual apostolate and presence of the Society all over the world. He revealed that the written proposal given to the SSPX foresees that prelate should be a bishop. How would the prelate be designated? The Pope would choose amongst the three names presented by the SSPX through its own elections. It is also foreseen, said Bishop Fellay, that other auxiliary bishops would be given to the Society.
Everything that exists now will be recognized all over the world. And the faithful also! They will be in this Prelature with the right to receive the sacraments and teachings from the Society’s priests. It will be also possible to receive religious congregations, as it is in a diocese: Capuchins, Benedictines, Carmelites, and others. This prelature is a Catholic structure which is not under the [authority of the local] bishops. It is autonomous.”
Doctrinal Steps Needed
For Bishop Fellay, however, there is a development even more important and interesting than this project of canonical structure: a change happening inside the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. The SSPX could maintain its objections to religious liberty, ecumenism, and the New Mass. These outgrowths from the Council are not considered as binding anymore or as conditions to be recognized as Catholic.
Bishop Fellay alludes here to the declarations of Archbishop Pozzo about the acceptance of the Second Vatican Council which is not anymore—according to Pozzo—required to be Catholic. The same has been repeated by those bishops (See: Cardinal Brandmüller and Bishop Schneider’s visits) who visited the SSPX seminaries in 2015 according to the plan agreed on in the 2014 meeting with the Cardinal Muller.
According to Bishop Fellay, “in the discussions we had with the bishops sent by Rome, they have told us ‘these questions are open questions.’”
Chaos and Reaction
Why did Rome change? Bishop Fellay offered his opinion that it is due to the gravity of the situation in the Church; the real chaos that is now running loose within her. Bishop Fellay illustrated it by reporting the comments of Cardinal Muller asking the SSPX to join his fight against the modernists. Meanwhile, the Congregation for the Religious still considers the SSPX as schismatic and yet Pope Francis says that the SSPX is Catholic.
There is much contradiction, there is a battle between the bishops, among the cardinals, this is a new situation…Rome is no longer one, it is divided. And in such a way that some see that things have gone too far. And they say ‘you have to do something, you have to resist.’”
Bishop Fellay mentions also the support and letters he received from Bishops. He had made the same comments to Dici earlier this year.
As for the other bishops, “there are others who speak, who resist, we are not alone.” According to Bishop Fellay “a whole work of renewal of the Church [that] has begun.”
At the same time, Bishop Fellay is not blind:
It does not mean that we go forward, we must go with great prudence and also secure our future to be able to prevent any possibility of trap. Therefore we are not running in this situation.”
Pope Francis and the SSPX
Of course Bishop Fellay mentions also the paradoxical interest Pope Francis has for the SSPX.
A pope who does not care for doctrine, who looks at the people, and who has known us in Argentina. And he appreciated our work in Argentina. And that’s why he sees us with a good disposition while in the same time he is against conservatism. This is like a contradiction. But I have been able to verify several times that he really does things personally for us.”
Concluding, Bp. Fellay says he does not know if or when a recognition of the Society will happen:
So whether or not we are going to get an upcoming recognition, I do not know, I do not think so, but the pope can make a surprise. It seems impossible, as he already did it several times. Then we must continue to pray much, to ask our Protectress, the Blessed Virgin Mary to continue to lead us.”
The Deus Ex Machina Blog 
Having met the late Archbishop Lefevre as a teenager, fully sensing his love for the Church, he would wish a union with Rome so much. As a first-hand witness to the internal struggles which the Society has undergone starting in Ridgefield before he even died, I feel dismayed listening to continued talk of potential entrapment, shares and schemes by the current leadership of the Society as continued lines drawn in the sand. The late Archbishop was a gentleman, a stateman and a leader. He would understand the help which the Society could give to a Church in crisis. Full communion would open floodgates of positive possibilities, and an ability to no longer be labeled as those on the fringe. As a parent of children in college, watching many conservative leaning priests look towards this support which a fully empowered Society could offer, there is simply no justification to delay. Nothing in this life is perfect, but we are called, within our power, to make it so to the best out human frality allows. There is a point where control for control sake is pride. Upon true reflection, I feel that this obstinancy and pride which exists within the Society is what would bring great sadness to the late Archbishop were he here today.
To Pope Benedict I would add a personal note. I observed your sadness in the breakdown of talks with the Society. I understand you knew the Archbishop personally and I feel he would have (and is from Heaven) grateful for your efforts. You could not easily have known about Bishop Williamson anti-Semitism. While Bishop Williamson was loyal and came to the aid of the Archbishop early at a most critical time in the Society’s days in Ridgefield, I don’t ever feel the Archbishop himself fully understood Bishop Williamson’s depth of issues as it pertained to his personal views on the Holocaust, women, and society as a whole. Were they simply his person held beliefs it might have been one thing, but his extremism became an engrained cultural subtext of the Society which I feel they themselves still don’t acknowledge or comprehend how it has served against them.
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R.M.: “The fact of the matter is that many traditionalist Catholics will not attend or receive sacraments in an Society chapel so long as it remains canonically irregular.”
S.A.: “This is the saddest part of all. Faithful Catholics don’t know their Faith well enough to make an informed decision.”
I use to think as the kind of Traditionalist Mr. Malcolm describes, and while I still have yet to assist at an SSPX chapel (I live many hundreds of miles from the nearest one), I think I would if given the opportunity. Yet… I still admit that I likely would feel “funny” about it.
Can either of you point me in the direction of where I can read up in order to make an informed decision about this matter?
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Perhaps this post at my own blog may offer food for discussion:
What’s Bergoglio’s Gameplan for SSPX?
Lots of people are puzzled by the extraordinarily generous treatment that Bergoglio has afforded to SSPX. After all, wouldn’t SSPX be the epitome of the “rigid” and “Pharisaical” “doctors of the Law” that he so regularly excoriates? And yet no terms of “regularization” appear too generous–it seems that anything SSPX asks for they’ll receive. However, if you keep before your mind the idea that Bergoglio has a specific goal always in view, matters become a bit more clear.
What is Bergoglio’s goal? To fully implement Vatican II–as he understands it. And he has made no bones about the fact that his version of a true Vatican II Church would be in line with the views of the most radical of the New Theologians, such as Walter Kasper. How could empowering an organization such as SSPX, which steadfastly rejects precisely those elements of Vatican II that are so central to Bergoglio’s plans–ecumenism, religious “freedom”–possibly help Bergoglio fully implement his goals?
To come to an understanding of Bergoglio’s strategy, the key provision of the proposed SSPX personal prelature is the one that allows SSPX to incorporate religious congregations.
My view is that Bergoglio wants to set up SSPX as a sort of cordon sanitaire for tradition minded Catholics–or a parallel Church, if you prefer. At this point he is faced with constant conflict and resistance to his agenda within the Church. Simply excommunicating his opposition isn’t an option, so the next best option would be to marginalize them. What appears to be an option–to allow tradition minded Catholics to join with SSPX–may in practice turn out to be a requirement. In other words, Bergoglio and his allies–to include local bishops–will in effect tell those who are tradition minded: it’s our way or get on the highway to SSPX. If you try to remain in the Vatican II Church and oppose my version of Vatican II reforms–women deacons, ecumenical liturgies, divorce in practice, etc.–you’ll be subjected to draconian disciplinary measures. SSPX beckons.
Yes, that will enlarge SSPX. But Bergoglio, in my view, is betting that most Catholics presented with this choice will succumb to his pressure, remain in the Vatican II Church on his terms by keeping their mouths shut, and that those who do make the switch will be joining a marginalized group that will remain marginalized. The proposed personal prelature will have bishops, of course. Some bishops. But don’t expect to see any SSPX cardinals. Bergoglio will continue packing the College of Cardinals with like minded prelates who will guarantee a like minded successor.
What could go wrong with Bergoglio’s gameplan? Two possibilities come to mind.
First, this Bergoglianized Church–in effect, a new Church of Man–could simply implode. It could suffer an implosion similar to what the Church suffered in the decades after Vatican II only, given the cultural changes that have occurred since those years, the implosion could be even more drastic. For instance, the current trend toward popularism that we see in both the US and in Europe could lead to rapid alienation with a Church that is ever more overtly aligned with globalist elite opinion.
Second, Fellay has openly stated that his goal in accepting regularization would be, in essence, to convert the Church–to call it back to Tradition. At the same time however, he has quite candidly admitted that this can only happen gradually. If, in fact, a Prelature of SSPX were to exhibit a creative flexibility in even relatively minor ways, it might well offer a welcoming environment to growing numbers of serious and (in a manner of speaking) dues paying Catholics. Vernacular liturgies, for example, might be an accommodation that such a prelature might be willing to make, and there could be other similar initiatives that would not betray the legacy of Lefebvre while offering a halfway house to a full embrace of Tradition.
Interesting times.
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Wait. Haven’t we already had, and don’t we still have, the “canonically regular” FSSP since 1988? While the Society has indeed grown, I think we can agree that the experiment of “from inside the Church” has already failed. How anyone could possibly think it will be different with a “regularized” SSPX is truly beyond me. There seems to be no logic in that whatsoever.
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Dear V513:
You write:
“While the Society has indeed grown, I think we can agree that the experiment of “from inside the Church” has already failed.”
Far from it, the Restoration inside the Church is progressing quite well.
As someone who on the one hand tracks the Restoration, while on the other hand tries to understand the forces that are trying to stop it, I can say that I am quite hopeful.
What you have is a proper religious rite that is going head to head with an ideology. And a post-Modernist ideology at that. An ideology that has not rules or doctrines and basically just panders to the “convenient” and any other slogan that appears appropriate at the time.
I will not go too much further, because I could go on and on, but I will put up this link to a recent First Things post that says it all.
To understand just how successful the Restoration is, a good place to start is to gauge how far First Things had to come to actually post something like this.
https://www.firstthings.com/article/2017/03/return-to-form
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“Haven’t we already had, and don’t we still have, the “canonically regular” FSSP since 1988? While the Society has indeed grown, I think we can agree that the experiment of “from inside the Church” has already failed.”
As someone frequents FSSP Masses when possible – I’m a Juventuem board member – I am puzzled at why you think the FSSP is an example of how “canonically regular” has failed.
In 1988, when the original core of 12 priests left the Society after the consecrations, they had…twelve clergy, a couple fistfuls of seminarians, and not a lick of property to their name. Today, 28 years later, they have two large seminaries, will hit 300 priests this summer (they are ordaining 24 this year), with about 160 seminarians, 117 houses across five continents. The priestly attrition rate has been quite low. None of them celebrates the Novus Ordo (no, they don’t), not even after a serious effort (thanks to a set of problematic French priests within) to force them to do so in 1999. Honestly…in terms of the lived reality of FSSPX chapels and FSSP parishes, I haven’t sensed much difference at all (and in some places, a fair number of trads who bounce back and forth between both).
Other Ecclesia Dei societies and orders have had impressive growth as well. And in the U.S, we have gone from under 200 regular TLM’s when Summorum Pontificum was issued to over 500 today. That’s a lot more Catholics exposed to tradition who did not have it before – and more priests, too. Not all are full-on trads, but they’re making the journey.
I don’t want to turn this into the umpteenth FSSP-SSPX scrum, though. I support both. Without the courageous effort and witness of Archbishop Lefebvre and his collaborators in the Society, we wouldn’t have any of this today. I would like to see the Society regularized, but not at the cost of their integrity or orthodoxy – and I support it because I think they can reach a lot more Catholics than they do now (however unfair that might be). But it’s all out of my control.
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What is missing in the understanding of the Restoration is the asymetric nature of going from Latin to vulger and going back to Latin. They are not the same.
Returning back to Latin is hard, even in my family. My dad, requiescant in pace, had no problem. My mom, she likes her Polish mass.
So it’s no wonder that it is the young that are returning in droves.
I will have more on this tomorrow…
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What I meant to say is that people seem to think that if the SSPX is regularized that Catholics will flock to the SSPX chapels seeking refuge in Tradition, when in fact they have not flocked in great numbers, statistically-speaking, to the FSSP chapels which are sparse in number as compared to the Novus Ordo churches. If it has worked as some say, then we must also take note of the current state of the Church, or what we like to believe is the Church. It’s far, far worse.
The fact of the matter is that as Christ stated, there will always be FEW who are truly of good will and who want the unadulterated Truth, and that therefore in the end, few will be saved. The majority of Catholics today are Catholic in name only, do not want anything to do with Latin or anything “ancient” much less too demanding, and unfortunately that is not going to change because the SSPX gets “approved” by Conciliarists whose own Catholicity is in question.
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“What I meant to say is that people seem to think that if the SSPX is regularized that Catholics will flock to the SSPX chapels seeking refuge in Tradition, when in fact they have not flocked in great numbers, statistically-speaking, to the FSSP chapels which are sparse in number as compared to the Novus Ordo churches.”
Oh. I see.
That’s entirely true.
I think there was a time, early on in the Conciliar era, where large numbers might flocked. I think it was Mary Ball Martinez who suggested that had Archbp. Lefebvre kept up his public campaign in France in the late 70’s, it might really have caught fire. Of course, France is not like other countries…
But today, we get modest numbers. It does grow; new people come steadily, but typically because they found their own way to it, in spite of its low profile and indifference or hostility of the local church. Much of the growth is of the procreative kind, of course. My Juventutem chapter started a Sunday 10:30am Sung TLM over a year ago; we started with perhaps 20 or so, and now we’re around 70 – though there are two other earlier morning long-established TLM’s in competition, which pull about 300-400 and 100 respectively, and several afternoon TLMs (and a Resistance and regular SSPX chapels) not far away in a neighboring diocese.
So there’s growth, but no one is going to confuse us with a suburban megachurch (for which I am grateful in other ways). Even being generous, the number of Catholics attending TLMs in the US (SSPX included) cannot be more than 1% (probably closer to half that). A lot better than what obtained 20 or 40 years ago; but still quite small.
I do think that, if the TLM suddenly were made normative – at least more common than the N.O. – there’s a significant (I will not quantify it) percentage of Catholics who would just take it. But that is obviously a more dramatic and unlikely circumstance than the SSPX being made canonical. I think a regularized Society might give a modest boost to Tradition; but expectations should be kept modest. We’re swimming upstream against too many noxious developments, many within what is left of the Church. Which, I agree, is very grim shape.
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Sir
I come back to my earlier comment on another post on the negotiations with the Society. Why is the good bishop making these overtures to conciliar Rome? This is vacillating weakness not bold and decisive. The leadership displays evident psychological signs of an inferiority complex. He says that the Prelature would make them feel valued and respected:-
“Everything that exists now will be recognized all over the world. And the faithful also! They will be in this Prelature with the right to receive the sacraments and teachings from the Society’s priests.”
Doesn’t that right exist now? Are they not Catholic more so than Rome?
“It will be also possible to receive religious congregations, as it is in a diocese: Capuchins, Benedictines, Carmelites, and others.”
Does he really feel that these congregations will be willing to set up home in the new SSPX Prelature? They have all the autonomy they need provided by the conciliar church. I feel that this is a specious argument.
“This prelature is a Catholic structure which is not under the [authority of the local] bishops. It is autonomous.”
Ergo they were not Catholic before?! It is a conciliar construct, is it not? Not Catholic. It seems to me this whole desire to accept the Prelature is all about “allowing ourselves to feel good about ourselves” to “feel accepted” “valued”. I am sorry but these are all the wrong reasons to be negotiating in the first place.
In one argument you say that the Congregation of the Faith wants them in, and in the next the curial structures are fighting like cats and dogs. And the good bishop wants to enter this fray with his fragile society and its psychological neurosis? So, let’s enter a gravely divided conciliar church, or remain in unity as we are with Eternal Rome? I don’t see the logic. Sorry.
So the bishop looks at the disaster that is Bergoglio and says that he was very nice to us in Buenos Aires, he must be truly Catholic; all the while ignoring his marxist put down of the Franciscans of the Immaculate.
Because Archbishop says one day one thing does not hold as being watertight the next day with a different head. That is the modus operandi of the left. When Muller’s tenure is up in July will we see the new head of the congregation a Tagle? a Schönborn? a Madriaga?
And no word of negotiations on doctrine, all the while that the conciliar church is being torn apart by a faithless pope undermining doctrine on marriage and ripping three sacraments to shreds. The good Archbishop Lefebvre was a wise shepherd! He knew that it was all about doctrine. And don’t say, oh well if the conciliar church is going to be beastly to us, we will pick up our ball and run away again. Because a) that is not leadership, and b) it is probably more likely that like salami slices the Society will gradually bend to the conciliar wishes à la Campos!
The good bishop really needs to look into the mirror that is the Church and say “is this really where we should be?” Sedes Sapientiae ora pro nobis!
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“He says that the Prelature would make them feel valued and respected”
The fact of the matter is that many traditionalist Catholics will not attend or receive sacraments in an Society chapel so long as it remains canonically irregular. And Bishop Fellay knows this. He knows the status of the Society both affords independence but also restricts its outreach.
Now, you may deplore the attitude of such Catholics; you may even be willing to forego those who might otherwise come to the Society, because you would not pay the price you fear comes with that advantage. But the reality remains, even so.
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This is the saddest part of all. Faithful Catholics don’t know their Faith well enough to make an informed decision.
But it is what it is. What is very encouraging is that the ordinaries and the auxiliary bishop and the priests do.
Which is why I am not that pessimistic in any eventual recognition process.
Yet having said that, I am sticking to my guns that only a unilateral recognition from Francis will get the Society inside.
PS Interesting about how under a PP, the Society would be outside the jurisdiction of the ordinaries. Another debilitating situation, along side the episcopal conferences arising from the “spirit of the new springtime”.
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“Canonically irregular” according to Conciliarists. So the entire SSPX flock should be compromised for the sake of those on the outside who have been misled and are in ignorance?
Our Lord’s words about the “few” constantly ring in my ears.
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How true.
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I question whether they would be “compromised.” I think the Society gets compromised only if it allows itself to be. And there are all sorts of circumstances in which they could compromise themselves.
And that has been the problem everywhere in the Church over the past 55 years. Sheep and shepherds alike so willing to be led meekly to the wolf pen.
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Hi:
This was Bp. Schneider’s point.
The problem is that Francis can’t be trusted. And under him, no matter how virtuous and holy you are, Francis will find a way to crush you.
So what we are in essence looking at is that we know Francis’ words don’t mean anything. Question is do his words on paper mean anything?
That is the question that the SSPX are grappling with. Provided that those words are down on paper already.
And from the sound of Bp. Fellay, they are not.
S.A.
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I’d just as soon have Francis regularize them on his own initiative – just do it. Nothing to sign. Nothing to change. “Accept us as we are.” Because what what they are is, well, “Catholic.”
There’s a risk even so; but there is always a risk – which as you say is the point Bishop Schneider was trying to make. Nothing can ever be 100% certain in this false-seeming world, even if we brought Pius V back to become supreme pontiff. I don’t trust Papa Bergoglio farther than i can throw him (some of the men around him even less, if that is possible), but I would have had lowered trust for some pre-conciliar popes as well, albeit for somewhat different reasons.
But I hope and pray that God has plan for the Society, and Bishop Fellay and his confreres can discern it and be obedient to it.
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