The Secretary General of the Society of St. Pius X has published a letter on the web stating: “We must be free to criticise and correct the errors of the Council.”
The Lefebvrian General Chapter concluded a few days ago following the Holy See’s request for a response from the Fraternity regarding the doctrinal preamble.
But the road still looks rough and rocky ahead. In a letter to District Superiors dated 18 July, the Fraternity’s Secretary General, Fr. Christian Thouvenot, provided a summary of the current situation in relations between the Society and the Vatican.
The letter contained the absolute (“sine qua non”) conditions presented by the Fraternity to leaders of the Catholic Church in Rome before they can accept the preamble and receive canonical recognition.
Here are the conditions:
1. “The freedom to preserve, share and teach the sound doctrine of the constant Magisterium of the Church and the unchanging truth of the divine tradition and the freedom to accuse and even to correct the promoters of the errors or the innovations of modernism, liberalism, and Vatican II and its aftermath.”
2. The exclusive use of the Liturgy of 1962. The retention of the sacramental practice that we currently maintain (including: orders, confirmation, and marriage).
The letter also includes other conditions which are considered desirable but not essential: the possibility of having a separate ecclesiastical court of the first instance; the exemption of the houses of the Society of St. Pius X from the diocesan bishops and a Pontifical Commission for the tradition of Rome, which depends directly from the Pope, with the majority of the members and the president in favour of tradition.
In terms of the three essential conditions, it is immediately evident that the first condition is representative of all existing problems. Since the publication of the motu proprio Summorum Pontificum, the Lefebvrians can of course continue to celebrate according to the old rite and - if relations with the Holy See are normalised - a new bishop could be nominated without any problems.
Both this letter which was sent out but not intended for publication and the concluding communiqué published at the end of the Society’s General Chapter, refer to the errors of modernism and the Second Vatican Ecumenical Council.
In the latest version of the preamble which the Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Cardinal William Levada, delivered last 13 June to Lefebvrian Superior, Bernard Fellay, the Holy See was asked not to criticise the new mass and to recognise its validity and lawfulness. The Society was also asked to accept the new Catechism of the Catholic Church, to not only see the Second Vatican Council in the light of the former tradition but to also vice versa.
During the lengthy interview held in the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith building with Levada, On 13 June, Fellay told Rome that he could not sign the doctrinal preamble. The Fraternity discussed this in their General Chapter (which traditionalist Holocaust denier Richard Williamson was banned from) and Fellay was able to reunite his community which had in recent months been plagued by internal dissent against the agreement with the Holy See.
With their response to the Catholic leadership in Rome, Lefebvrians do not intend to close the door on dialogue.
But it is hard to imagine a text that was debated and closely examined by cardinals of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith and then approved by Benedict XVI, becoming the subject of new debates and changes.
“The Second Vatican Council is binding,” said the new Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Gerhard Müller in an interview. “The declaration on relations with the media we can talk about, but the statements on Jews, freedom of religion and human rights have dogmatic implications. If these are rejected they jeopardise the Catholic faith.”
In the letter sent to bishops after the Williamson case in 2009, Ratzinger wrote: “The Church’s magisterial authority cannot be frozen back in time in 1962 – the Fraternity should get this clear. But those Lefebvrians who put themselves across as great defenders of the Council should recall that the Second Vatican Council encapsulates the Church’s entire doctrinal history. Whoever wants to obey the Council must accept the faith professed over the centuries and cannot sever the roots which give the tree life.”
This is the essence of reform according to the Second Vatican Council presented by Benedict XVI straight after he was elected Pope. But his proposal has so far fallen on deaf ears.