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Saturday, June 20, 2009

More SSPX men in black in Winona?

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Cue the fortune-tellers, the crystal ball readers, the Vatican nuance-gifted and impaired.

Unless there is a last minute stay of ordination, the Society of St. Pius X plans to make 13 men priests this morning at St. Thomas Aquinas Seminary in Winona, Minnesota — raising the possibility of more controversy and overt or covert conflict with the Vatican (again).

And, of course, there are divergent views not only on how to understand what the Vatican has said so far, but on what this means for the relationship between the Catholic Church and the traditionalist body going forward. For an interesting summary of how the projected ordinations have been roiling European Catholic leaders, particularly German ones,
read this story from The Catholic Herald Online.

What’s intriguing about this story is the prediction of the diocesan spokesman that the ordinations will result in excommunication — or would that be re-excommunication? Or, because, the excommunications were lifted, but there are still, as they say “issues” between the SSPX and the Vatican, would a fullscale excommunication be necessary? And what makes the Regensburg spokesman almost certain that excommunication would result — at any rate, we know this isn’t just a Schotz in the dark (sorry, I couldn’t resist). . . .

The
Guardian has apparently already judged and tried both Pope Benedict and the SSPX. Judging by this genre of story, the Catholic Church is in a constant state of “crisis.”

The pugilistic headline of Jeff Israely’s
article in Time: “Pope Benedict vs. the Lefebvrites: Round Two,” hides a rather nice analysis. . . .

But why then the apparent silence, or public silence, from American bishops? Have you seen anything in the media to date from a bishop in Minnesota or Kansas? Given that ordinations are occuring in Minnesota, it is obviously not just a problem for European bishops. . . . Get Religion

6 comments:

Adrienne said...

You don't hear anything from the bishops because they don't give a rats rear patoot what the SSPX does.

It's not their business to intervene or make comments about what they are doing and they like it that way. And that's as it should be.

As an ex SSPX'er allow me to say, they get waaaaaaaay more airtime than they deserve.

Unknown said...

Bishops seem to fear schism more than anything else. Second to that is probably conflict.

One the schism has occurred, few bishops want to work hard to have it end because once they do come back, having had a "taste of freedom", these reverts would probably still have other problems with the Church.

Terry Nelson said...

I believe the matter is the sole provenance of the Holy See, therefore local ordinaries will only address the issue as it pertains to Catholic faithful within their jurisdiction attending or participating in SSPX religious rites.

Schism is a grave sin, it rends the heart of the Church, the Body of Christ; as such it divides and creates disunity as well as confusion amongst the faithful, and very often leads to heresy. Bishops do everything possible to avoid it, sometimes even permitting the tares to exist amongst the good grain.

Adrienne said...

these reverts would probably still have other problems with the Church.

We left our local SSPX church and were "taken in" by the local diocesan Catholic Church.

Allow me to say that what ensued was approximately 7 years of the most horrendously horrible behavior by a group of people (SSPX'ers) toward the generosity and love of a parish I have ever witnessed, including actual illegal acts.

It quickly drove hubby and I out of that group and now that they have an FSSP parish as part of diocese they are still a problem.

The Post Falls contingent of SSPX is known as one of the most radical of the whole USA movement, rivaled only by St. Mary's in Kansas.

Unknown said...

That's a very interesting perspective, Adrienne.

I, and most people, just figure that all the SSPXers want to do is have the Mass in Latin, ad orientem.

But they appear to have a personal stake in "being right", too. Pride!!!

And if they try to prevent people from leaving, then this has all the required earmarks of a cult.

I wonder if Abp. Lefebvre and the other founders are "revered" as are some other founders of conservative Catholic lay movements.

Opus Dei, the Legionaries of Christ (Regnum Christi) and maybe Communion & Liberation are three groups that I am aware of that might be accused of engaging in cultish behavior. And there are many more that I am not familiar with.

Of course Democrats are guilty of the "Cult of Personality" movements too. Look at the current occupant of the White House. And you might say the same thing about the Republican occupant of the White House in the 1980s.

Some humans must need a human leader. They aren't satisfied with Jesus Christ.

I was in a New Age movement organization for maybe 10 years (while I was reverting back to the Church) that revered its founder/leader. You could hear it in the sigh in their breathy exhalations as they said his name.

What I learned there I found to be valuable, but I did not subscribe to the "cult of personality" aspect in the movement.

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