Posted on 05/13/2005 1:15:36 PM PDT by NYer
KANSAS CITY, Mo. - For all its disagreements with the Roman Catholic Church - and the list is long - the Society of St. Pius X has always maintained its loyalty to the papacy.
Now, with the election of Pope Benedict XVI, the ultra-traditionalist priestly society - considered a breakaway group by the Vatican - sees "a gleam of hope" that the changes wrought by the Second Vatican Council will be undone.
One Catholic scholar doubts that will happen, though - especially given that the last time the society dealt with then-Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, he was trying to persuade its founder to accept those changes.
"To try to reconcile the traditionalists with the church would be an implicit rejection of Vatican II, and that's not going to happen," said William Dinges, associate professor of theology and religious studies at the Catholic University of America.
The Society of St. Pius X, founded in Switzerland in 1969 and first recognized by the Vatican in 1970, maintains its American headquarters in Kansas City. The movement, named for the pope who wrote against modernism in a 1907 encyclical, claims between 1 million and 2 million lay adherents worldwide, 20,000 to 30,000 in the United States.
The society's Superior General, Bishop Bernard Fellay, welcomed Ratzinger's election in a statement issued April 19 from the society's international headquarters in Menzingen, Switzerland.
The statement, which appears on the society's American and international Web sites, said Fellay "sees there a gleam of hope that we may find a way out of the profound crisis which is shaking the Catholic Church, of which some aspects have been spoken of by the former Head for the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith."
A subsequent statement reiterates the order's loyalty to Benedict.
A lay secretary in Kansas City, who asked that his name not be used because of the society's rules, said the society would have no comment beyond anything published on the society's Web sites and in its newsletters.
"He knows who we are, and we know who he is," the secretary said of Benedict.
The Society of St. Pius X's profession of loyalty to the pope sets it apart from most other traditionalist movements, who either consider the position vacant or have elected "popes" of their own.
A former society seminarian, David Allan Bawden, has claimed to be "Pope Michael I" since 1990 and maintains his "Vatican in Exile" in Delia, Kan., about 90 minutes west of Kansas City.
Still, even a cursory review of the Society of Saint Pius X's positions shows how deep the divide runs between it and the post-Vatican II church.
The order's late founder, French-born Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre, publicly rejected the church's new Mass, which replaced the 16th-century Tridentine Mass in 1971.
The new Mass may be celebrated in any language, while the Tridentine rite is celebrated only in Latin.
There are other differences: In the Tridentine Mass, the priest faces the altar - away from worshippers - and communion is given only in the mouth, never in the hand. There are no lay readers or communion servers.
The Society of St. Pius also opposes the Vatican's efforts to reach out to Orthodox and Protestant Christians and other religions. One statement on its Web site defends the Inquisition, while another expresses support for capital punishment.
The Vatican banned the Tridentine rite from 1971 to 1984, although Lefebre's followers and other traditionalist groups continued to use it. In 1984, Pope John Paul II said the Tridentine rite could be used in special circumstances.
The Society of St. Pius X dismissed the Vatican's move as a ploy to undermine traditionalists. Still, more than three dozen of the society's priests and seminarians did leave in 1988 to reconcile with the Vatican and form the Fraternity of St. Peter, which emphasizes the Tridentine Mass.
Lefebvre was suspended by Pope Paul VI in 1976, along with his newly ordained priests, and excommunicated in 1988 after consecrating four bishops - also excommunicated, along with a Catholic bishop who supported Lefebvre - against Pope John Paul II's orders.
Several months earlier, the archbishop and Ratzinger signed a protocol that made reconciliation with the Vatican seem imminent, but Lefebvre rejected the accord over a clause that gave Vatican representatives the majority on a commission to settle differences in interpretation of Vatican II documents.
He and his followers' excommunication is considered the church's first major schism since the "Old Catholics" broke from the Vatican after its proclamation of the doctrine of papal infallibility in 1870. The society denies a schism exists, however, saying Lefebvre's disobedience was necessary to deal with a crisis in the church and did not constitute an outright rejection of the pope's authority.
The Society of St. Pius X also contends that as a cardinal, Benedict agreed in principle in 1988 that the order had the right to ordain priests and bishops for service to the larger church.
However, in a 1986 letter, Ratzinger insisted that Lefebvre accept the reforms of Vatican II, "the texts of which are magisterial and enjoy the highest doctrinal authority."
And there, Dinges said, lies the stumbling block for traditionalists.
"The society is intransigent on the liturgy issue and the (Vatican) council issue," he said. "Those are two - in my mind - insurmountable issues to any long-term reconciliation."
ON THE NET
U.S. site: http://www.sspx.org
International site: http://www.fsspx.org
Society's international news site: http://www.dici.org
#180: m poss= my posts
Despite all that and more (although I'll quibble with your first sentence..) the Church will prevail.
THAT is the proof of the fact that it is the Church under the legitimate Pontiff which SHALL prevail over the gates of Hell.
It's a miracle, as GKC was wont to say, often.
Kung teaches at a sceulatr Swiss college or university. He occupied a state-funded post as a Catholic theologian. When his credentials as Catholic theologian were stripped, the college or university moved him to a non-Catholic theology seat (as was appropriate). They probably would have done the same for Marcel had he been teaching there and stripped by the Vatican of any license as Catholic theologian or, as in the life of the miscreant, Marcel was expelled from the Catholic Church.
AND you guys also have the nerve to rebels against the papacy to invoke St. Catherine of Siena and St. Athanasius when you should be invoking (consistent with your behavior) Arius or Luther or Calvin or Zwingli.
GeP, the ONLY sin that Lucifer wants is the one he got from Marcel & Co.: Non Serviam.
All the rest wasa simply dessert, served up by the SSPX on a platter, along with the souls they are taking to the wrong bus stop.
I wasn't directing my post to you, didn't mention you in my post. Contrary to what you may think, not everything involves or revolves around you.
Check out #160 and direct your misplaced whining where it belongs.
Each pope is elected as a CATHOLIC pope. Some are more thrilling than others....
Gotcha! You use the term "more thrilling" as a substitute because the words that really fit are "more tradtional than others". Anyone can see you are painting yourself into a corner when you try to actually justify your malevolent and pusilanimous writings.
but the worst of them uphold tradition as the schism (defying and denying papal authority) manifestly does not.
Wrong. You've done everything but admit it.
People who pose for (un)holy pictures
You must mean JPII and the Koran. Or the naked women reading at the Papal Mass? Or the pictures of him giving away the bodies of Saints to a group of heretics and schismatics?
while spitting upon AND vilifying and blatantly disobeying the papacy and the pope on a matter as central as the choice of and consecrating of bishops against the pope's express orders (and have thereby fallen into schism or even been excommunicated)
There was no spitting according to all accounts. The Pope had agreed to a bishop and broken that promise. The false apology written by Ratzinger for LeFebvre to sign was the deal breaker. Under the old Canon Law, Le Febrvre would have been excommunicated, but the New Canon Law provided loopholes that saved LeFebvre from that fate. No matter what JPII rules, his analysis of the facts (against which there is no argument according to St. Thomas) was as wrong as if he'd said the sea was as dry as the Sahara desert. It's amazing how God can pull good (the saving of LeFebvre and the Church ) from evil (the promulgation of a murky code of law full of the errors prevalent in the current crisis)
Ummmmm, the Holy Ghost.
BE, I think GP's beginning to show colors just like the ones displayed by the last Mighty Mouse--the 'sword of' whatever, remember?
Sort of a fixation on the nether regions and odd activities thereof.
He didn't get non serviam from the SSPX.
He got it from Vatican II and the removal of the anti-modernist oath among the many hundreds of other attacks on the Church. Leo XIII's vision was correct.
Nobody ever said the Gates of the Church would prevail against the attacks of Hell. The Church will, but not necessarily the gates.
"Ummmmm, the Holy Ghost."
You forgot the question mark. Because you are just guessing.
Schism in the Morning,
Schism in the Evening,
Schism at Suppertime....
Be a dear LeFebvrite,
Do Schism All the Time!
Please explain. Dazzle me with your analysis.
Lucifer is an equal-opportunity employer.
Rembert Weakland and Marcel are twins.
Actually, I never defended GerardP. I don't appreciate his use of terms and find it less than pleasant. I have had to disregard others on this forum who are blatently schismatic (i.e. the few sedevacanists that pop up now and again). I stated that, in my opinion, you were crossing the line and, at least, writing as if you were having a tantrum. I never remember referencing "Quo Primum", either. Please point it out. I have no problem with the changes up till 1962 in regards to the Missal. On the subject of the New Mass, I don't doubt its validity (when its validly done, of course), but I seriously think that its been abused too much and can be easily manipulated.
Your line of logic is astonishing. You expect to be taken seriously I presume?
Well, Mark, it is true that 'not all "Catholics" will' [prevail.]
Nor is it possible for ANY Pope, or ANY set of Bishops, to ensure that 'all Catholics WILL prevail.' Never has been, never will be. Judas was only the first..
I'm very sympathetic to those who grind teeth at NO Masses (I'm one of them.) I manage to find NO Masses which are devoid of conscious errors and egregious silliness--but this is a metro area, not a village or a township.
It is the business of the Catholic to save one's soul, and as many others as one can, within reason. If one chooses to dump the Church to "save one's soul," they demonstrate a clear misunderstanding of priorities--literally, first things.
SSPX has done so, or they would not have been declared schismatic. Clergy-members of SSPX are schismatic. SOME of the laity who become 'attached' to SSPX's position are also schismatic.
As to the song-parody--you may take it any way you like.
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