The Vatican Thursday announced the imminent start of talks with a traditionalist splinter group that includes a bishop prosecutors in Germany want fined for denying the Holocaust. The talks with the Society of Saint Pius X (SSPX), whose four bishops were readmitted into the Roman Catholic Church in January after two decades of excommunication, aim to rehabilitate fully these staunch critics of modernizing reforms undertaken since the 1962-1965 Second Vatican Council.
The first meeting will be on October 26 in the Vatican's Palace of the Holy Office, the former headquarters of the Inquisition that now houses the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the Church's main doctrinal watchdog.
"The contents of the conversations concerning open doctrinal questions will remain strictly confidential," Vatican spokesman Federico Lombardi said in a statement.
The announcement coincided with news from Germany that state prosecutors in Regensburg had asked a court to fine British-born Richard Williamson, one of the SSPX bishops, for incitement linked to his denial of the Holocaust in a Swedish television interview. Denying the Holocaust is a crime in Germany.
A spokesman said the court would decide in a week or so whether the undisclosed fine sought by the prosecutors was fair punishment.
If the court approves the fine and Williamson accepts it, he will not have to face a court hearing. If he appeals against it, there would be a public trial, the spokesman said.
The Vatican caused uproar in January by lifting the bans on the four SSPX bishops days after Williamson had denied Jews had died in Nazi gas chambers. In the interview, he said he knew he could be prosecuted in Germany for saying that.
This angered Jewish groups already critical of the SSPX because it rejects the Second Vatican Council's decisions to stop calling Jews killers of Jesus Christ and to seek good relations with Protestants, Jews, Muslims and other faiths.
The wave of criticism, including a rare reproof from German Chancellor Angela Merkel, prompted the German-born Pope Benedict to insist on SSPX acceptance of the reforms before its bishops could be fully reintegrated into the Church.
For now, they are considered invalidly ordained bishops and cannot exercise any official role in the Church.
The SSPX has about 600,000 followers worldwide.
Pope Benedict values their stress on tradition but not their doctrinal rigidity and challenges to papal authority.
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SIC: Reuters