SSPX Reconciliation Update: Is a Positive Response Coming? General Chapter Statement Released
As usual, the statements from the Society of St Piux X and the Vatican are nuanced, pregnant with meaning that no one can decipher. Is the SSPX laying down the groundwork for accepting the prelature? Or are they establishing a basis for their upcoming “no”? Both the Vatican and the Society are extremely careful in how they phrase things. Only the Lord knows.
Please keep praying!
From CNS:
VATICAN CITY (CNS) — Hinting at a willingness to continue discussions with the Vatican and recognizing the full authority of the pope over the church, the traditionalist Society of St. Pius X said it must defend church teaching from error.
“As for all the novelties of the Second Vatican Council, which remain tainted with errors, and for the reforms derived from it,” the statement said, “the society can only continue to uphold the affirmations and teachings of the constant magisterium of the church.”
The statement from the society’s general chapter meeting, which ended July 14, was posted in French, Italian, English, German and Spanish on the society’s website July 19.
Chapter participants “determined and approved the necessary conditions” for an eventual, full reconciliation with the Vatican, it said. If the conditions are met, “an extraordinary chapter with deliberative vote will be convened.”
The website said the statement had been sent to the Vatican prior to publication.
Jesuit Father Federico Lombardi, Vatican spokesman, said the Vatican does not consider the statement to be “a formal response” by the SSPX to the last document it asked Bishop Bernard Fellay, the society’s superior general, to sign.
Because “we do not consider it — and it is not — a formal response,” Father Lombardi said, the Vatican would not comment on the statement’s content.
“The Holy See has taken note of this declaration, but awaits the forthcoming official communication” of the society as its “dialogue with the Pontifical Commission ‘Ecclesia Dei’ continues,” he said. “Ecclesia Dei,” now headed by U.S. Archbishop J. Augustine Di Noia, is handling the discussions with the SSPX under the guidance of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.
Read the whole statement on the SSPX site:
Related posts:
- SSPX Reconciliation Countdown
- SSPX Reconciliation Countdown: New Bishop Fellay Interview: “All Ambiguity Has Now Been Resolved Among Us.”
- SSPX Says Preamble Not Acceptable
- Why Doesn’t the SSPX Support Other Traditionalists?
- SSPX Told to Stay Out of Philippine Diocese by Archbishop of Davao in Open Letter to SSPX
