Bishop Fellay – I
Did
the Society think it would save all?
That
was the pride which goes before a fall.
After the June
26–28 meeting of SSPX Superiors in Switzerland, the Superior General made not
only for the general public the Communiqué of June 29, already examined in
these “Comments” three weeks ago, but also a Statement on June 28 for the
benefit of SSPX members, i.e. primarily SSPX priests. The Statement is in
itself cryptic, but once deciphered (with the help of Fr Girouard), it is heavy
with significance for the future of Catholic Tradition. Here is the merest
outline of the first six paragraphs of the Statement, and the full text of the
seventh:
(1–4) Church
and world are in crisis, because instead of turning around the Cross of Christ,
they turn around man. The SSPX opposes this “deconstruction” of the Church and
human society. (5) God’s own remedy for this disorder was to inspire an
Archbishop to found a hierarchical Catholic Congregation turning around the
sacrament of Holy Orders – Jesus Christ, his Cross, Kingship, sacrifice and
priesthood, source of all order and grace, are what the Society founded by the
Archbishop is all about.
(6) So the
SSPX is neither Conciliar (it turns around Christ) nor rebellious (it is
hierarchical).
(7) “Has the
moment come for the general restoration of the Church? God’s Providence does
not abandon God’s Church whose head is the Pope, the Vicar of Christ. That is
why an indisputable sign of the general restoration will be when the Pope gives
a sign of what he wants by granting the means to restore order in the
priesthood, Faith and Tradition. This sign will in addition guarantee the
Catholic unity necessary to the family of Tradition.”
Clearly the
first six paragraphs lead up to the seventh. And it is not unreasonable to take
the seventh to mean that when Pope Francis gives official approval to the
Society, then that will be the proof that the moment has come at last for the
whole of the Catholic Church to g et back on its feet, for the Catholic
priesthood, Catholic Faith and Catholic Tradition to be restored, and for all
Traditionalists to join with the Society of St Pius X behind its Superior
General. Bishop Fellay would seem to be repeating here for the benefit of all
Society priests his steady vision of the Society’s glorious role, because at
the Swiss meeting, as we hear, at least some of their Superiors had just
questioned that glory coming in the form of reunion with official Rome. But
those Superiors in opposition were right, because Bishop Fellay is here
dreaming! It is a noble but deadly dream.
The dream is
noble, because it is all to the honour of Our Lord Jesus Christ, of his Church,
of his sacrifice, of Archbishop Lefebvre, of the Catholic priesthood and so on.
The dream is deadly because it turns rather on the priesthood than on the
Faith, and while it credits quite correctly Pope Francis and the Romans with
being the holders of Church Authority, it takes no account of how far they are
from holding the Catholic Faith. If Archbishop Lefebvre can be said to have
saved the Catholic priesthood and Mass, that was for him only as a means of
saving the Faith. The Faith is to the priesthood as end to means, and not as
means to end. What would the priesthood be without the Faith? Who would believe
in the Sacraments? Who would need priests?
And as to that
Faith, the present Pope and the Roman officials who hold sway around him have
lost their grip on Truth as being one, objective, non-contradictory and
exclusive, and therewith they have lost their grip on the true Faith, not to
say, lost the true Faith. That means that if Pope Francis did indeed approve
officially of the Society, it would by no means be a sign of the Society
restoring the Church to sanity, but rather of the official Church absorbing the
Society into its insanity.
Kyrie eleison.
