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Thanks for posting the article.
When I was MUCH younger, I went to a SSPX chapel, but I don’t remember Williamson much ... this was in the 80s.
LOL. The remarks to the article are funny ... too many people did NOT like it when the author called Williamson an idiot.. :-)
Freep-mail me to get on or off my pro-life and Catholic List:
Please ping me to note-worthy Pro-Life or Catholic threads, or other threads of general interest.
I remain cautiously optimistic but then since my first days here I have been so, even when the late and un-lamented faux deacon sinkspur would attack and calumniate me and other “trads”. Until it is done, it is not done, but I hope (and pray!) this article is correct!
http://rorate-caeli.blogspot.com/2012/04/urgentfor-record-le-figaro-rome-and.html
Urgent/For the record: Le Figaro - “Rome and Écône on the verge of reaching an agreement”
Apparently Above a Bishop’s Pay Grade?
For the record: La Croix [Updated]
Quasi modo geniti infantes, rationabile, sine dolo lac concupiscite
+ ALLELUIA + ALLELUIA + ALLELUIA + + TEMPUS PASCHALE + + + TEMPUS PASCHATIS + + ALLELUIA + ALLELUIA + ALLELUIA +
Urgent/For the record:
Le Figaro - “Rome and Écône on the verge of reaching an agreement”
From major French daily Le Figaro, in an article signed by its main religion correspondent, Jean-Marie Guénois:
Rome and Écône on the verge of reaching an agreement
by Jean-Marie Guénois
Updated on April 13, 2012 20:37 (1837 GMT)| published April 13, 2012 19:45 (1745 GMT)
The signing of a document establishing the relations between the Holy See and the disciples of Abp. Lefebvre is a matter of days.
Officially, the Vatican awaits the response of Bp. Bernard Fellay, the chief of the Lefebvrists. As soon as it is received in Rome - “it is a matter of days, and no longer of weeks”, - it will be immediately examined. If it conforms to expectations, the Holy See will very quickly announce a historic agreement with this group of faithful, known under the name of “integrists”.
But unofficially, and with the greatest discretion, emissaries have worked, from both sides, to “reach an agreement”. In the past few weeks, the final adjustments have been concluded between Rome and Écône in order to better respond to the demands of “clarifications” asked for by the Vatican last March 16.
A very delicate negotiation
It is thus that the final response of Bp. Fellay, very well pondered and well prepared, should settle - this time, for good - a very delicate negotiation which was relaunched by Benedict XVI following his election, in 2005.
The “Ecclesia Dei” commission, sheltered within the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the most important ministry in the Vatican, is in charge of this dossier. But it is also, at this point, personally followed by Benedict XVI. And he wants an agreement.
Which allows for the consideration, by well informed persons, that a positive outcome will truly come into being. Even at the cost of the permanence of profound disagreements regarding the Second Vatican Council.
Disagreements completely accepted, besides, by the Pope. He has placed his pontificate under this line of reinterpretation of the Vatican II Council. Following two axes: emptying the spirit of “rupture” of ‘68 and avoiding opposition between the highest tradition of the Church and modernity.
Fifty years of opposition
On Monday, Benedict XVI will reach 85. He is tired. His entourage do not hide this. He has had to rest this week in Castel Gandolfo from his exhausting voyage to Mexico and Cuba, then from the long services of Holy Week. He should be back in the Vatican on Friday evening. As a priority on his bureau: this decision on the Lefebvrist affair. It will be one of the weightiest of the pontificate.
For fifty years, the Lefebrvists have stood in opposition to the Holy See regarding Vatican II. And in formal juridical rupture since June 1988, when Abp. Marcel Lefebvre ordained four bishops despite the Pope’s interdict.
Joseph Ratzinger was placed at the time by John Paul II in charge of the negotiations with the rebellious bishop. He has never accepted that failure. Nor, once having become the Pope, the prospect of an enduring schism in the Church.
Benedict XVI compels the Church to reconcile with herself
One after the other, Benedict XVI has demolished, with all his papal authority, the obstacles that prevented a full reconciliation with the disciples of Abp. Marcel Lefebvre.
And, if a final agreement is announced in the upcoming days, the essential part of the work was already put in place by this pope:
- The reestablishment in 2007 - as an “extraordinary” rite of the Catholic Church - of the Mass celebrated in Latin, that is, according to the Missal of John XXIII in force before the Council.
-The removal, in 2009, of the excommunications which fell on the four bishops ordained by Abp. Lefebvre.
-The launch of the doctrinal discussions between the Holy See and the Fraternity of Saint Pius X, in that same year, regarding the Second Vatican Council
The apparent failure of the latter, one year ago, had given the impression of a complete failure of the negotiation.
The doctrinal disagreement between the Lefebvrists and Rome regarding the Second Vatican Council was effectively abyssal. But it had been forgotten that the object of those conversations was not finding an agreement, but establishing the list of divergences and of their reasons.
It is therefore knowingly and, thus, without any ambiguity, that Rome intends to seal this unity found once again with Écône, stronghold of the Lefebvrists in Switzerland.
IIt will probably be done with the creation of a special statute - a “personal prelature” - already experienced by Opus Dei. This structure grants a true autonomy of action at the same time as the Catholic faith is shared. Its superior answers directly to the pope, and not to the bishops.
But the true “revolution” that Benedict XVI intends to leave before the eyes of the history of the Catholic Church is elsewhere. It is not related to peripheral aspects of the Catholic Church. These have already enraged the groups opposed to this reconciliation. The so-called “Progressives” of the Conciliar Church who see the “gains” of Vatican II questioned. The “ultras” within the Lefebvrist ranks who see in this a betrayal and a compromise with Modernist Rome.
This revolution aims for an enlarged vision of the Catholic Church. Benedict XVI, the theologian, has never accepted that in 1962 the bimillennial Catholic Church would have cut herself from the culture and strength of her past. More than a reconciliation with the Lefebvrists, he aims, with this gesture, for a reconciliation of the Catholic Church with herself.
We had an SSPX church near our house when we lived in Ridgefield, CT, before they moved west.
The priests wore standard black suits and clerical collars all the time.
I was tempted, because I much prefer the traditional Mass. But I really feel that it is necessary to stick with the One, true, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church, even if they occasionally make a mistake. Vatican 2 was, in my opinion, a pretty useless venture. God preserved it from actual error or heresy, but some Councils are more important than others, and IMHO that one was a mistake.
But that doesn’t justify schism, or talk of Sede Vacante, or the various errors of SSPX. Even though they have preserved the old Latin Mass in all its glory, they are in schism with the Church.
It would be great if that schism can be fixed. As for the liberal dissenters and trouble makers who fear it—tough!
The contribution of SSPX toward greater orthodoxy has so far been invaluable; let’s hope that no matter what happens on April 15, they will continue to pull the Church where it belongs, to the right.
I too hope they sign. Yeah, there will be issues if they sign. It will be a bumpy road as they establish a prelature or some other juridical structure. There will be other issues to work out over time - (whether the FSSP and other Ecclesia Dei groups decide to come under the umbrella, whether Bishop Williamson will be given faculties, etc.) but these are better resolved inside the Church than outside.
And it will be nice to have more Tridentine Masses being offered in full communion with Rome. The spiritual graces will be wonderful.
I may even take in the occasional Tridentine Mass myself. (My family is Eastern Catholic).
Just mentioned by Andrea Tornielli for La Stampa:
Lefebvrists: the positive response has arrived
17.09.2012 (1900 GMT - 2100 Rome)
http://rorate-caeli.blogspot.com/