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 Vatican need neither confirm nor deny whichever version of Fellay's lies is published in whatever venue.
The argumentative trope of "X said it and no one denied it" is like "As everyone will surely concede....", "Certainly no one will disagree....", "As everyone knows...." These are phrases that are salted throughout the Daily World (nee the Daily Worker) and not a marker for honest argument. If you disagree, then document Fellay's denial that he has arrived from the planet Hades.
If and when Benedict XVI formally acts (as John Paul the Great did in justly excommunicating and declaring schismatic the SSPX cult and its leaders in Ecclesia Dei), be sure to let us know. Meanwhile they are, ummmm, excommunicated and schismatic until further papal action.
As to #135: megadittoes!
And as to #136: Megadittoes as well!
That is why you root for the schism as I do not.
No, the answer is that the Vatican owes the schism and its excommunicated leader absolutely nothing much less confirmation or denial of his every lie!
COD: Also, for those interested in pretending that unanswered questions suggest concessions, let's hear your answers to the questions posed to pyro7480 in #87.
I do not root for the schism, I pray for a charitable end to it.
Just for the record--"venerable" doesn't always mean that one is a candidate for sainthood, just as a judge is called "honorable" when maybe he/she isn't..
Sorry, you are wrong. The CCC is not an infallible document. There are good catechisms and poor catechisms, the CCC is a poor one.
Yawn.
And when he is canonized all will know the "excommunication" was never valid.
The CCC itself is not an infalible document. The Church uses it to teach and the teachings of the Church are infaliable and protected by the Holy Spirit.
Please explain why this is so.
Right. Pope BXVI doesn't know what he is saying. Thankfully he has the modernists on FR to advise him.
I venture to think that you have no evidence of who, on this forum, is "modernist" and who is not. It would all be speculation on your part unless you specify who these "modernists" are by name and then have them declare that it's so in their own words and of their own accord.
OK, so far so good.
So, being that it is not infallible the CCC, or any catechism for that matter, can in fact contain error, right?
It's pretty evident from the posts. Heresy is a way of thought and practice. Words posted on a screen have meaning. This isn't rocket science.
I'm not sure what there is to explain. I don't really understand what you are asking.
You said the CCC was a "poor" catechism.
By what standard do you make this qualifying statement.
Where's the heresy?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.