[SSPX USA] On December 5, 2014, Cardinal Walter Brandmuller, president emeritus of the Pontifical Committee for Historical Sciences, met with Bishop Bernard Fellay, superior general of the Priestly Society of St. Pius X, accompanied by several priests. The meeting was held at the Herz Jesu Seminary of Zaitzkofen, in Bavaria.
This meeting was a follow-up of the September 23, 2014 meeting in Rome, during which all had agreed to pursue the doctrinal discussions “in a broader, less formal framework than in the previous discussions.” (see DICI #302, Oct. 10, 2014). The theme was the Council and its magisterial authority.
The goal of these meetings is to make the Church’s authorities more aware of the Society and the works of Tradition, and at the same time to expose to them the serious objections and points of divergence that remain concerning the Second Vatican Council and its reforms. In this perspective, two more meetings are scheduled in the coming months, one at the St. Cure de Ars Seminary in Flavigny (France), and the other at St. Thomas Aquinas Seminary in Winona (USA).
(Source: fsspx/MG–DICI #307, Dec. 19, 2014)
Would hope to see the SSPX arrive at a canonical normalization. Many of us would love flee to them especially in the worsening and confusing condition of the modernist Church.
ReplyDeleteFrom your lips to.... well you know the rest....
DeleteIt's rather ironic that the group you would rather belong to in these 'worsening and confusing condition(s)' requires normalising by the institution which, in your opinion, generates the problems in the first place.
DeletePlease explain?
You might as well flee now. The NO is a spiritual concentration camp filled with gas chambers. Going to the NO in 2014 is even more stupid than volunteering to be a prisoner in Auschwitz in 1944 (assuming you have access to a TLM/SSPX chapel).
DeleteI'm a millennial and none of the people I know or knew from Catholic high school kept the faith after entering adulthood. None, zero, zilch. The only young people I see actually practicing the faith are in the SSPX chapel in my region.
I don't know about you but all this torrential rain in the Church is kinda bothering me, the water level just rose a few feet after Francis' latest controversial speech and I'm feeling uncomfortable. If you need me I'll be in Marcel's Ark, it was designed to withstand the floods of modernism and sacrilege. I'm just hoping Rome doesn't turn into lake Tiber anytime soon.
I deeply would like the current unfortunate canonical status of the FSSPX to be resolved. I hold the FSSPX in high regard, even if its chapels are not my home, but I do visit when seeing friends. I, however, do want to warn any who have ears to hear that the current canonical structure of the personal prelature is deadly and illusory in its benefits and should be rejected. Would that Bishop Fellay, FSSPX, for whom I have great affection, having dealt with him personally and by email on some occasions, would see this danger. I would quote at length from someone who has thought much more about this than I, but I give two, as brief as possible, excerpts:
ReplyDelete*I note that some wording used by this person more knowledgeable than I would not be how I would have phrased things.
***A) Concerning the limits and dangers of prelature:***
Canon 296 allows laics to co-operate with the Prelature in agreements made in the statutes of the Prelature. Yes, laics can be associated with it but do not belong as members. In the case of Opus Dei, the laics belong to Opus Dei which, in turn, is associated with the Prelature. Laics will not be subjects of the Prelate as their proper Bishop. This is important!
Canon 297 is the kicker:
"The statutes are likewise to define the relationships of the Prelature with the local Ordinaries in whose particular Churches the Prelature, with the prior consent of the diocesan Bishop [emphasis added!], exercises or wishes to excercise its pastoral or missionary activity.
In other words:
1. The Prelature may not move in to serve its lay supporters by opening any chapel or church for them or even flying in on the week-ends without the prior consent of the local Mahony.
2. The Prelature may not even continue an existing apostolate without the consent of the local Daneels.
Now, on this latter point (2), there are other provisions of Canon Law which can protect existing Society chapels and apostolates. In fact, Rome can and would make a special arrangement to protect existing S.S.P.X apostolates. I point to the Campos deal of 2002 as evidence for this. When they were confined to a tiny gilded cage covering the territory of just one Diocese, they were allowed to keep their three or four chapels existing nearby outside that territory, such as the one in the Diocese of Volta Redonda.
But it is the first point that matters, eh? There is presently no S.S.P.X apostolate in the populous Archdiocese of Cambrai, in France, and none for most U.S. dioceses. Prelate Fellay decides to open up shop in one of these countless dioceses around the world. No way, José, says the local bishop with glee. Gotcha! Hahahahahahaha! You're skewered, you rat! You loser! Luuuuuu-ser! Marxist NewChurch Bishop wins, Prelate Fellay loses.
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The rest follows in a 2nd part.
The 2nd part of the same argument.
ReplyDelete***B) Concerning the safer and acceptable structures:***
Here is the canon of the correct structure, and look esp. to §2:
Canon 372 §1: "As a rule, that portion of God's people which consitutes a diocese or other particular church is to have a defined territory, so that it comprises all the faithful who live in that territory.
§2: If, however, in the judgement of the Supreme Authority in the Church, after consultation with the episcopal conferences concerned [which, again, can be waived if it pertains to all of them or a large number of them--as was the first case for Opus Dei], it is thought to be helpful, there may be established in a given territory [which could mean the entire earth: for that is also a given territory] particular Churches distinguished by the rite of the faithful or by some other similar [e.g. liturgical] quality."
Comment: Note esp. that the plural number is given here for episcopal conferences. Each episcopal conference covers a country or a group of small countries (e.g. in the Caribbean). So what is envisioned here is an international structure. It might cover several countries, whole continents, even the entire world.
Secondly, read §2 back into §1: a particular church comprises lay faithful and not just deacons and priests. That means that the laics of the S.S.P.X would be subjects of a proper Ordinary instead of the local Ordinaries. They would have it all; they would be 100% independent from the local bishops but subject to Rome as the local dioceses are.
I was raised novus ordo & by grace of The Holy Trinity discovered the truth.Pre-1950 missal Latin Mass and not acknowledging The New Order religion.Like you,only 1 out of 50 former classmates practice the new order religion.Its slowly imploding on itself.
Delete