Private discussions have continued intermittently, as the Vatican has tried to induce the leaders of the SSPX to return to Rome. Obviously, therefore, some significant SSPX-related events took place during the papacy of Benedict XVI-but even more have been going on behind the scenes. This was, of course, not an accident Pope Benedict clearly intended the document to serve to begin healing the rift between the SSPX and its supporters, and the Church. It seems reasonable to surmise that by allowing the Latin Mass to be celebrated by all Catholic priests everywhere, the motu proprio caused many of the lay-faithful to stop attending SSPX Masses, and to return to regular Mass-attendance at their proper Catholic parishes instead. If anything, it was intended to encourage the members of that Society to regularize their status in the Church. Once again, however, Summorum pontificum did not bring with it a regularization of the status of the SSPX in the Church in fact, the document doesn’t mention the SSPX at all. The members and supporters of the SSPX now found that they had been handed one of the most significant items that they had wanted all along. This had long been a key bone of contention between the SSPX and Rome-and by signing this motu proprio, Benedict instantly removed it. It asserts the right of all Catholic priests to celebrate the traditional Latin Mass, as well as the newer Novus Ordo Mass. In the meantime, Pope Benedict’s 2007 motu proprio document Summorum pontificum inadvertently confused the issue in the minds of many Catholics even further.
#Sspv vs sspx full#
A distinction has to be made between the Pope’s concern for the spiritual wellbeing of the four men who had been under excommunication, and who had respectfully petitioned the Pope to return to full communion with the Church and the canonical status of the entire SSPX, which still has never been recognized by Rome. But this did not automatically bring with it a reconciliation between the Catholic Church and the whole institute of the SSPX, which remains a separate issue. As was noted in the abovementioned column, this excommunication applied only to these individual men, and not to the SSPX as a whole.Įleven years later, as was already discussed in “ Canon Law and the SSPX,” Pope Benedict lifted the excommunications of the four bishops. Things changed dramatically in 1988, however, when Lefebvre consecrated four new bishops without papal mandate, an act which caused the four men and Lefebvre himself to be declared excommunicated by John Paul II. Nevertheless, for many years the SSPX grew (and in many areas of the world, it positively thrived) on a sort of parallel track with the Catholic Church, without being directly and formally condemned by Rome.
Sadly, however, this is not the case! While Pope Benedict was clearly hoping to reconcile the SSPX to the Church during his papacy, the fact is that this important item on his to-do list was left unfinished when he resigned in February.Īs we saw in “ Are They Excommunicated? Sanctions, Part III,” the status of the SSPX from its very inception was canonically questionable, as its founder, the late Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre, had established it in 1970 without the following the procedures and obtaining the approbations that were required at the time.
Organization The structure of authority of the SSPX, the practical organization of the members into various divisions and its essential works.Mission What does the SSPX want to achieve? A unique religious community within the Church, integrally promoting and preserving the treasures of Catholic tradition around the world.
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