Vatican talks with a controversial Catholic splinter group are
nearing an end without any accord on reintegrating the
ultra-traditionalists, including a bishop whose denial of the Holocaust
has embarrassed Pope Benedict.
Bishop Bernard Fellay has said his Society of Saint Pius X (SSPX)
has not succeeded in convincing Vatican officials to turn Church
teaching back half a century to where it stood before the reforms of the
Second Vatican Council (1962-1965).
Benedict sparked off a wave of protest in 2009 by lifting
excommunications imposed on the four bishops in 1988 without first
requiring them to accept his authority on Church doctrine.
His decision also prompted widespread protests, from Roman
Catholics and Jews, because one of the bishops, Richard Williamson, had
publicly denied the Holocaust. He has since been convicted and fined for
hate speech in Germany.
"We are coming to the conclusion (of the talks), because we have
made the tour of the major questions raised by the Council," Fellay told
the United States district of the SSPX in an interview posted on its
website www.sspx.org.
Asked if Vatican officials had changed their minds during the
talks, which began in late 2009, he said: "I don't think that you can
say that." He said the pope "has a certain sympathy for us, but within
limits."
AGAINST WORLD FAITH SUMMIT
The SSPX, which claims several hundred thousand followers around
the world, created the only recent schism in the Church by ordaining the
four bishops without Vatican approval in 1988.
The lifting of those excommunications meant the four were again
recognized by the Vatican as Catholics.
But without an accord, they and
their priests will not be recognized as Catholic clergy or be allowed to
exercise an official ministry.
The SSPX, which retains the centuries-old Latin Mass and other
Catholic traditions, insists it represents the true faith and the
Vatican and the rest of the 1.2 billion-strong Church went off the rails
at the Council.
Benedict shares their appreciation for tradition and lifted
limits on the old Latin Mass in 2007 as a concession to them, but has
drawn the line on other Council reforms such as its historic
reconciliation with Judaism and other faiths.
It was not clear what the
Vatican might do if no agreement is reached with the SSPX, which has
continued operating as an independent church and ordaining new priests
despite an appeal from Rome to refrain from doing so during the talks.
In the interview, Fellay repeated his criticism of Benedict for
inviting world religious leaders to meet in the Italian city of Assisi
in October, on the 25th anniversary of a similar faith summit organised
there by the late Pope John Paul.
He said the pope might have called it because of a recent wave of
anti-Christian violence in Muslim countries but said SSPX followers
should "pray that the Good Lord intervenes in one way or another so that
it doesn't take place."