The Holy Father Removes Excommunication of SSPX BishopsDear friends:
This may appear as a blip on many Catholic websites… but it is really HUGE positive news even if you think it does not affect you.
This simple act of charity & bravery by the Holy Father (the lifting of the excommunications) corrects the false assumption that SSPX is a schismatic group. The process of regularization will continue… and the effects on the local Church will be positive. There will be many who will try to derail this process of reconciliation on both ends of the ecclesial spectrum.
Let us pray that the valid doctrinal concerns that members of the SSPX have with the present modernist interpretation of the Council documents is addressed in honest and frank discussion and continued reform.
The demographic decline of Catholic culture is evidence itself of the vacuous theology that seminaries have been pushing for the last 40 years). And yet the SSPX communities are filled with young & growing families and numerous vocations! Why is that? John Paul II himself stated that the loss of faith among Catholics today amounted to a "silent apostasy". Any of us who are paying attention know that false ecumenism, defective historical criticism,tacit acceptance of contraception and sodomy and even rejection of certain parts of scripture by the many bishops & priests have essentially created a "hermeneutic of rupture".
The SSPX has much to teach the Universal Church. Their priests maybe suspended (ironically), but they know more about Catholic doctrine than most bishops do… and yet for them to help reform and reorient the faithful, these priests must become regularized.
Pictured above a young and older Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre, founder of the Society of Saint Pius X.
In an age where your average bishop is likely to go out of his way to meet & pray with Hindus, Seikhs, Moslems, Jews & Protestants… and yet where he will predictably shrink away from meeting regularly with any serious lovers of Catholic tradition , this olive branch by the HolyFather sends a signal of paternal love and authentic ecumenism (if there is such a thing).
The Holy Father seems interested in engaging in a real two way discussion which will help both parties. This is indicative of the `papacy of reason' which he has now become famous for.
We as individuals should also engage in that discussion. An honest appraisal of the loss of sacred tradition is not just within the purview of a bishop… it is also essential for the individual Catholic layman and lay woman if we intend to deepen our own understanding of the life, death and resurrection of Our Lord Jesus Christ in imitation of His Most Holy Mother (who pondered these mysteries in her Immaculate Heart).
