Nothing to Negotiate

by Thomas A. Droleskey

News of the "lifting" of the "excommunications" imposed by Karol Wojtyla/John Paul II upon the four bishops of the Society of Saint Pius X who were consecrated without a "papal" mandate by the late Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre and his co-consecrator, the late Bishop Antonio de Castro Mayer, on June 30, 1988, has been expected for some time.

There was, as noted last year in High Church, Low Church, a belief that the "excommunications," which the Society of Saint Pius X never accepted as legitimate but which its current Superior-General, His Excellency Bishop Bernard Fellay, requested Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI to "remove" in a letter dated December 15, 2008, might be "lifted" on the occasion of the seventeenth anniversary of Archbishop Lefebvre's death, March 25, 2008. That turned out not to be the case. The "excommunications" were in fact "lifted" on Thursday, January 21, 2009, the Feast of Saint Agnes, and announced publicly yesterday, January 24, 2009, the Feast of Saint Timothy.

Obviously, there is great rejoicing among those traditionally-minded Catholics who are attached to the structures of the counterfeit church of conciliarism and who labor under the misapprehension that this effort on the part of Ratzinger/Benedict represents a important step in the direction of "restoring" Tradition when it is part of a very calculated strategy to neutralize all resistance to the Protestant and Masonic Novus Ordo service and to finish building the planks of the One World Ecumenical Church so that the Society of Saint Pius X can take its place alongside the Catholic Charismatic Renewal, Focolare, The Neocatechumenal Way, Cursillo, the Sant'Egidio Community, the Shalom Catholic Community, the Chemin Neuf Community, the International Community of Faith and Light, Regnum Christi, Communion and Liberation, the Emmanuel Community, the Seguimi Lay Group of Human-Christian Promotion, among many others, including, of course, the existing "Motu" communities, to which the Society of Saint Pius X has been in bitter opposition since the establishment of the Priestly Fraternity of Saint Peter in 1988. The "lifting" of the "excommunications" is but another step in the neutralization of Tradition, not its restoration, in the confines of the counterfeit church of conciliarism.

The "lifting" of the "excommunications" presents several interesting questions about the current status of the four bishops (Bernard Fellay, Richard Williamson, Bernard Tissier de Mallerais, Alfonso de Galaretta) who were consecrated by Archbishop Lefebvre, whose "excommunication" from the counterfeit church of conciliarism still stands, it appears, as does that of the late Bishop Antonio de Castro Mayer.

The Society of Saint Pius X now has true bishops in "partial communion" with the conciliar Vatican but without a "papal" mandate from the false pontiff, Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI. Such a mandate will have to await the upcoming round of "negotiations" between representatives of the Society of Saint Pius X and those of the conciliar Vatican, meaning that the Society's bishops have a status similar, although perhaps not identical, to the schismatic and heretical Patriarch of Constantinople, whose excommunication was "lifted" by Giovanni Montini/Paul VI on December 7,1965, but whose church is still not in communion with the conciliar Vatican. It is as though the "clock" has been turned back to June 29, 1988, the day before the episcopal consecrations.

I know. I know, Some will point out there there is a "difference" now, that Summorum Pontificum has "changed" the landscape, that Ratzinger/Benedict XVI is showing a courageous willingness to anger his "left flank" in order to end the "wounds" caused by the June 30, 1988, episcopal consecrations and to give full "membership" to Tradition in the conciliar church. However, Summorum Pontificum is a trap based on false premises in order to quiet all criticism of the deficiencies of the abomination that is the Protestant and Masonic Novus Ordo service, and its issuance has proved to be quite an instrument to convince at least some traditionally-minded Catholics that the man they formerly criticized for his adherence to the New Theology and the New Ecclesiology, Joseph Ratzinger, is really their friend and that he does not mean that is it necessary resist the "integralists" with firmness as he said in Principles of Catholic Theology was necessary.

(Although the subject of the next commentary on this site, Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI, while willing to take heat from his "left flank" from "progressive" "bishops" in the counterfeit church of conciliarism in order to neutralize the voices of opposition in the Society of Saint Pius X, will not suffer such heat from Talmudic sources without making it clear, whether formally or informally, that he did not know of Bishop Richard Williamson's television interview in which he gave an exposition, in response to questioning from his interviewer, on the nature and extent of the genocide imposed by the Third Reich of Adolf Hitler upon European Jews.)

Contrary to the press reports in the secular media and "liberal" Catholic journals such as National Catholic Reporter, Ratzinger/Benedict desires a concept of "unity" within the confines of the conciliar church that does not depend upon perfect agreement of minds and union of wills, as Pope Leo XIII taught in Satis Cognitum, June 29, 1896, was necessary for membership in the Catholic Church. There can be, Ratzinger/Benedict believes, enough latitude to permit some divergences here and there as he propagates the philosophically absurd and previously unheard of notion called the "hermeneutic of continuity and discontinuity."

Ratzinger/Benedict is not seeking to end the conciliar revolution with alleged strokes of "conservatism." He is seeking to preserve the doctrinal and liturgical revolutions of conciliarism by neutralizing the most identifiable source of "resistance" affiliated with his conciliar structures, the Society of Saint Pius X, as all other voices belonging to clergy in the Motu communities have been muted to such an extent that they cannot be raised in defense of the honor and majesty and glory of God when he, Ratzinger/Benedict commits, objectively speaking, Mortal Sins against the First Commandment such as occurred on Thursday, April 17, 2008, in Washington, District of Columbia, as he esteemed with his own priestly hands the symbols of five false religions. Then again, where was Bishop Fellay's voice when this blasphemy against God took place on April 17, 2008? The neutralizing effect of the "process" of the Society of Saint Pius X's regularization is already being evidenced.

Although the late Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre said different things at different times, he did on at least one occasion protest the blasphemous behavior of Karol Wojtyla/John Paul II in no uncertain terms:

And most recently, the Pope has been in the synagogue of the Jews in Rome. How can the Pope pray with the enemies of Jesus Christ? These Jews know and say and believe that they are the successors of the Jews that killed Jesus Christ, and they continue to fight against Jesus Christ everywhere in the world. At the end of the Pope's visit, the Jews sang a "hymn" that included the line "I believe with all my heart in the coming of the Messiah," meaning that they refuse Jesus as the Messiah, and the Pope had given permission for this denial of Christ be sung in his presence, and he listened, head bowed! And the Holy See announces that in the near future that he will visit Taize to pray with the Protestants, and he himself said in public at St. Paul Outside the Walls that later this year he will hold a ceremony gathering all of the religions of the world together to pray for peace at Assisi in Italy, on the occasion of the Feast of Peace proclaimed by the United Nations due to take place on October 24.

“Now all these facts are public, you have seen them in the newspapers and the media. What are we to think? What is the reaction of our Catholic Faith? That is what matters. It is not our personal feelings, a sort of impression or admission of some kind. It is a question of knowing what our Faith tells us, faced with these facts. Let me quote a few words - not my words - from Canon Naz’s Dictionary of Canon Law, a wholly official and approved commentary on what has been the Catholic Church’s body of law for nineteen centuries. On the subject of sharing in the worship of non-Catholics (after all, this is what we now see Pope and bishops doing), the Church says, in Canon 1258-1: ‘It is absolutely forbidden for Catholics to attend or take any active part in the worship of non-Catholics in any way whatsoever.’ On this Canon the quasi-official Naz Commentary says, and I quote, ‘A Catholic takes active part when he joins in heterodox; i.e., non-Catholic worship with the intention of honouring God by this means in the way non-Catholics do. It is forbidden to pray, to sing or to play the organ in a heretical or schismatic temple, in association with the people worshipping there, even if the words of the hymn or the song or the prayer are orthodox.’ The reason for this prohibition is that any participation in non-Catholic worship implies profession of a false religion and hence denial of the Catholic Faith. By such participation Catholics are presumed to be adhering to the beliefs of the non- Catholics, and that is why Canon 2316 declares them ‘suspect of heresy, and if they persevere, they are to be treated as being in reality heretics.’

 

“Now these recent acts of the Pope and bishops, with Protestants, animists and Jews, are they not an active participation in non-Catholic worship as explained by Canon Naz on Canon 1258-1? In which case, I cannot see how it is possible to say that the Pope is not suspect of heresy, and if he continues, he is a heretic, a public heretic. That is the teaching of the Church.

 

“Now I don’t know if the time has come to say that the Pope is a heretic; I don’t know if it is the time to say that. You know, for some time many people, the sedevacantists, have been saying ‘there is no more Pope,’ but I think that for me it was not yet the time to say that, because it was not sure, it was not evident, it was very difficult to say that the Pope is a heretic, the Pope is apostate. But I recognize that slowly, very slowly, by the deeds and acts of the Pope himself we begin to be very anxious. I am not inventing this situation; I do not want it. I would gladly give my life to bring it to an end, but this is the situation we face, unfolding before our eyes like a film in the cinema. I don’t think it has ever happened in the history of the Church, the man seated in the chair of Peter partaking in the worship of false gods.

 

“What conclusion must we draw in a few months if we are confronted by these repeated acts of partaking in false worship? I don’t know. I wonder. But I think the Pope can do nothing worse than call together a meeting of all religions, when we know there is only one true religion and all other religions belong to the devil. So perhaps after this famous meeting of Assisi, perhaps we must say that the Pope is a heretic, is apostate. Now I don’t wish yet to say it formally and solemnly, but it seems at first sight that it is impossible for a Pope to be publicly and formally heretical. Our Lord has promised to be with him, to keep his faith, to keep him in the Faith - how can he at the same time be a public heretic and virtually apostatise? So it is possible we may be obliged to believe this Pope is not Pope. (The Angelus, July 1986, transcripts of talks given by Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre on March 30 and April 18, 1986.)

 

No, there was no such talk given by Bishop Fellay following the American visit of Ratzinger/Benedict last year, which included his second visit to a Talmudic synagogue, where he sat as an inferior to his Talmudic host and listened patiently to a "hymn" that denied the Sacred Divinity of Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ that explained the Jews were awaiting the Messiah, who, they believe, has not come. Bishop Fellay was silent. His promise the sign the Creed with his blood is very eloquent. Such eloquent words must be backed by actions in defense of the honor and majesty and glory of God and they must be backed by denouncing an apostate as a pretender to, not a holder of, the Throne of Saint Peter.

We have seen what has happened with Bishop Fernando Areas Rifan of the Society of Saint John Mary Vianney in Campos, Brazil, as he, who played a prominent role at the June 30, 1988, episcopal consecrations presided over by the late Archbishop Lefebvre and his own superior at the time, Bishop de Castro Mayer, has transformed himself from a critic of the "Second" Vatican Council and of the Protestant and Masonic Novus Ordo service, whose validity was put into question by Bishop de Castro Mayer (see BISHOP ANTONIO DE CASTRO MAYER'S LETTER TO PAUL VI) into a defender of the conciliar "pontiffs" and an occasional "celebrant" of the Novus Ordo that the website of his own community used to condemn by listing sixty-two reasons to avoid it (see Not Important At All? for fifty-two of those sixty-two reasons). The conciliar Vatican will not accept any less from Bishop Fellay and the other bishops and priests of the Society of Saint Pius X. The March to Oblivion that has been engineered by Bishop Fellay in the past few years is almost, although not quite as of yet, complete.

Indeed, Bishop Fellay has in recent years softened, at least in some venues on some occasions (usually when interviewed by the secular media), his criticism of the Novus Ordo that was skewered in the most unsparing terms by Archbishop Lefebvre, who referred to the Novus Ordo as a "illegitimate [actually the French word for illegitimate child] rite," and who called the conciliar church a "schismatic church:"

“That the Conciliar Church is a schismatic Church, because it breaks with the Catholic Church that has always been. It has its new dogmas, its new priesthood, its new institutions, its new worship, all already condemned by the Church in many a document, official and definitive.

“This Conciliar Church is schismatic, because it has taken as a basis for its updating, principles opposed to those of the Catholic Church, such as the new concept of the Mass expressed in numbers 5 of the Preface to (the decree) Missale Romanum and 7 of its first chapter, which gives the assembly a priestly role that it cannot exercise; such likewise as the natural — which is to say divine — right of every person and of every group of persons to religious freedom.

“This right to religious freedom is blasphemous, for it attributes to God purposes that destroy His Majesty, His Glory, His Kingship. This right implies freedom of conscience, freedom of thought, and all the Masonic freedoms.

“The Church that affirms such errors is at once schismatic and heretical. This Conciliar Church is, therefore, not Catholic. To whatever extent Pope, bishops, priests or faithful adhere to this new Church, they separate themselves from the Catholic Church.”(see The Holy Ghost and the Church by His Excellency Bishop Mark A. Pivarunas, which discusses the late Archbishop's frequently contradictory remarks concerning the nature of the conciliar church).

 

Bishop Fellay has written a letter to the laity who assist at the Society of Saint Pius X's chapels, some of which are served at present by men who are dubiously "ordained" in the conciliar structures according to the conciliar "rites," to explain that "talks" can now begin concerning the "doctrinal" questions concerning the "teaching" of the "Second" Vatican Council and of the conciliar "pontiffs:" Here is an excerpt:

The decree of January 21 quotes the letter dated December 15, 2008 to Cardinal Castrillon Hoyos in which I expressed our attachment “to the Church of Our Lord Jesus-Christ which is the Catholic Church,” re-affirming there our acceptation of its two thousand year old teaching and our faith in the Primacy of Peter. I reminded him that we were suffering much from the present situation of the Church in which this teaching and this primacy were being held to scorn. And I added: “We are ready to write the Creed with our own blood, to sign the anti-modernist oath, the profession of faith of Pius IV, we accept and make our own all the councils up to the Second Vatican Council about which we express some reservations.” In all this, we are convinced that we remain faithful to the line of conduct indicated by our founder, Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre, whose reputation we hope to soon see restored.

Consequently, we wish to begin these “talks” -- which the decree acknowledges to be “necessary -- about the doctrinal issues which are opposed to the Magisterium of all time. We cannot help noticing the unprecedented crisis which is shaking the Church today: crisis of vocations, crisis of religious practice, of catechism, of the reception of the sacraments… Before us, Paul VI went so far as to say that “from some fissure the smoke of Satan had entered the Church”, and he spoke of the “self-destruction of the Church”. John Paul II did not hesitate to say that Catholicism in Europe was, as it were, in a state of “silent apostasy.” Shortly before his election to the Throne of Peter, Benedict XVI compared the Church to a “boat taking in water on every side.” Thus, during these discussions with the Roman authorities we want to examine the deep causes of the present situation, and by bringing the appropriate remedy, achieve a lasting restoration of the Church. (Response of SSPX Superior General to the Lifting of the Excommunications)

 

Note that the "restoration" of the reputation of Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre is not a precondition to the upcoming "negotiations." That can wait for the full surrender of the Society of Saint Pius X to the false church with which it has been dancing for the last thirty years.

More substantively, however, what is the "Magisterium of all time"? This is but another invention of the Society of Saint Pius X that has no grounding in any teaching of the Catholic Church. There can never be a division between what the Catholic Church teaches in one era and what she has taught in previous eras. There is no "governing magisterium" and an "authentic magisterium," as some in the Society of Saint Pius X have been maintaining for decades now. The Catholic Church can never be stained with falsehood or imperfections in her teaching, as Pope Pius XI made clear in Mortalium Animos, January 6, 1928:

So, Venerable Brethren, it is clear why this Apostolic See has never allowed its subjects to take part in the assemblies of non-Catholics: for the union of Christians can only be promoted by promoting the return to the one true Church of Christ of those who are separated from it, for in the past they have unhappily left it. To the one true Church of Christ, we say, which is visible to all, and which is to remain, according to the will of its Author, exactly the same as He instituted it. During the lapse of centuries, the mystical Spouse of Christ has never been contaminated, nor can she ever in the future be contaminated, as Cyprian bears witness: "The Bride of Christ cannot be made false to her Spouse: she is incorrupt and modest. She knows but one dwelling, she guards the sanctity of the nuptial chamber chastely and modestly." The same holy Martyr with good reason marveled exceedingly that anyone could believe that "this unity in the Church which arises from a divine foundation, and which is knit together by heavenly sacraments, could be rent and torn asunder by the force of contrary wills." For since the mystical body of Christ, in the same manner as His physical body, is one, compacted and fitly joined together, it were foolish and out of place to say that the mystical body is made up of members which are disunited and scattered abroad: whosoever therefore is not united with the body is no member of it, neither is he in communion with Christ its head.

 

These two paragraphs from Bishop Fellay's letter to the faithful of the Society of Saint Pius X demonstrate the fallacious nature of the ecclesiology that has provided the foundation for the Society of Saint Pius X's novel contentions that the Catholic Church can promulgate liturgies suspect of being defective and doctrinal teachings that are unclear or ambiguous and thus in need of "clarification" offered by those who arrogate unto themselves the "right" to "sift" which decrees of a "council" or a "pope" are problematic and which can be obeyed. Fathers Francisco and Dominic Radecki, CMRI, made this very clear in their impressive study, Tumultuous Times:

A legitimate pope cannot contradict or deny what was first taught by Christ to His Church. An essential change in belief constitutes the establishment of a new religion.

The attribute of infallibility was given to the popes in order that the revealed doctrines and teaching of Christ would remain forever intact and unchanged. It is contrary to faith and reason to blindly follow an alleged pope who attempts to destroy the Catholic Faith--for there have been 41 documented antipopes. Papal infallibility means that the Holy Ghost guides and preserves the Catholic Church from error through the succession of legitimate popes who have ruled the Church through the centuries. All Catholics, including Christ's Vicar on earth, the pope, must accept all the doctrinal pronouncements of past popes. These infallible teachings form a vital link between Christ and St. Peter and his successors.

If a pope did not accept and believe this entire body of formulated teachings (the Deposit of Faith), he could not himself be a Catholic. He would cease to belong to Christ's Church. If he no longer belongs to the Catholic Church, he cannot be her Head. (Fathers Francisco and Dominic Radecki, CMRI, Tumultuous Times, p. 274.)

"Do not be misled by various and passing doctrines. In the Catholic Church Herself we must be careful to hold what has been believed everywhere, always and by all; for that alone is truly and properly Catholic." (Saint Vincent of Lerins, quoted in Tumultuous Times by Frs. Francisco and Dominic Radecki, CMRI, p. 279.)

 

Articles of the Catholic Faith are non-negotiable. No Catholic, let alone a bishop, needs to engage in "talks" with a true pope or his representatives about how to understand certain elements of Catholic teaching, no less those teachings promulgated by apostates who believe that dogmatic pronouncements are necessarily contingent because the language in which they are expressed are conditioned upon the historical circumstances in which they were made. This is in and of itself a proof of the apostasy of conciliarism as to deny the perpetually binding and eternally same meaning of dogmatic pronouncements is to deny the very nature of the immutability of the Most Blessed Trinity and to blaspheme the work of the Third Person of the Blessed Trinity, God the Holy Ghost, in guiding the Church infallibly and directing the precise language to be used in her dogmatic decrees.

Some have speculated the Society of Saint Pius X will get a different kind of "deal" than that which has been given to the existing indult/Motu communities in the counterfeit church of conciliarism in that the Society's bishops will not be asked to explicitly affirm the decrees of the "Second" Vatican Council, that "Vatican II is not a dogma of faith," according to a French writer who has cited anonymous Vatican "sources" for the speculation that an "implicit" acceptance of the Council and the Novus Ordo service would suffice for the Society.

In other words, the conciliar Vatican can't even be consistent about the demands it places on different traditional communities seeking full admission to the One World Church. The Institute of Good Shepherd in France was required to make an explicit vow to avoid all "controversy" concerning points of the "Second" Vatican Council and the Novus Ordo. Such a demand may not be made of the bishops of the Society of Saint Pius X, which would in this scenario, be able, at least according this speculative report, to preach against the separation of Church and State while the conciliar "pontiff" preaches in its behalf. Talk about the "hermeneutic of continuity." This is the "hermeneutic of madness. This is truly an ape of the schismatic and heretical Anglican Church.

Unfortunately for the Society of Saint Pius X and others of the "resist and recognize" approach to ecclesiology, adherence to the "Second" Vatican Council is mandatory. Giovanni Montini/Paul VI decreed this so on December 8, 1965, at the close of the council that was convened following Angelo Roncalli/John XXIII's call for it fifty years ago this very day, that is, on January 25, 1959:

APOSTOLIC BRIEF "IN SPIRITU SANCTO' FOR THE CLOSING OF THE COUNCIL - DECEMBER 8, 1965, read at the closing ceremonies of Dec. 8 by Archbishop Pericle Felici, general secretary of the council.

The Second Vatican Ecumenical Council, assembled in the Holy Spirit and under the protection of the Blessed Virgin Mary, whom we have declared Mother of the Church, and of St. Joseph, her glorious spouse, and of the Apostles SS. Peter and Paul, must be numbered without doubt among the greatest events of the Church. In fact it was the largest in the number of Fathers who came to the seat of Peter from every part of the world, even from those places where the hierarchy has been very recently established. It was the richest because of the questions which for four sessions have been discussed carefully and profoundly. And last of all it was the most opportune, because, bearing in mind the necessities of the present day, above all it sought to meet the pastoral needs and, nourishing the flame of charity, it has made a great effort to reach not only the Christians still separated from communion with the Holy See, but also the whole human family.

At last all which regards the holy ecumenical council has, with the help of God, been accomplished and all the constitutions, decrees, declarations and votes have been approved by the deliberation of the synod and promulgated by us. Therefore we decided to close for all intents and purposes, with our apostolic authority, this same ecumenical council called by our predecessor, Pope John XXIII, which opened October 11, 1962, and which was continued by us after his death.

We decided moreover that all that has been established synodally is to be religiously observed by all the faithful, for the glory of God and the dignity of the Church and for the tranquillity and peace of all men. We have approved and established these things, decreeing that the present letters are and remain stable and valid, and are to have legal effectiveness, so that they be disseminated and obtain full and complete effect, and so that they may be fully convalidated by those whom they concern or may concern now and in the future; and so that, as it be judged and described, all efforts contrary to these things by whomever or whatever authority, knowingly or in ignorance be invalid and worthless from now on.

Given in Rome at St. Peter's, under the [seal of the] ring of the fisherman, Dec. 8, on the feast of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary, the year 1965, the third year of our pontificate. APOSTOLIC BRIEF - IN SPIRITU SANCTO

 

Not an article of the conciliar "faith"? Sure. Just like the Novus Ordo does not represent a rupture with the Roman Rite of the Catholic Church. Simple positivism from theological relativists concerned about achieving the goal of "unity" with the conciliar truth at the price of the truth of what was taught by one of the chief revolutionaries, Montini/Paul VI himself.

If the Society is left alone to chart their own "interpretation" of the "Second" Vatican Council, then this would be a real manifestation of the fact that the conciliar church is a hodgepodge of groups that are permitted to hold divergent views of the Faith. This is a false ecclesiology.

Unfortunately, however, the Society of Saint Pius X is itself steeped in multiple errors, some of which were reviewed by Father Antony Cekada in a sermon delivered at Saint Gertrude the Great Church on Sunday, July 9, 2006 (The Errors of the Society of St Pius X). As I noted in High Church, Low Church eleven months ago now, the ecclesiology of the Society of Saint Pius X is nothing other than the recrudescence of the Gallicanism that was condemned by Pope Pius VI in Auctorem Fidei, August 28, 1794:

The Society of Saint Pius X's "resist and recognize" approach to the Church and to papal infallibility and papal authority is an expression of the condemned errors of Gallicanism, that bishops can "pick and choose" which orders of the Roman Pontiff they can obey. It is really no different than the approach to "papal" authority taken by those conciliar "bishops" and "priests" and theologians who believe that they have the "right" to go beyond the "approved" novelties of conciliarism and to "authorize" "unapproved" liturgical novelties as well to sponsor conferences in support of women's ordination. The principles are the same: we will decide which conciliar Roman edicts we will obey. This was condemned by Pope Pius VI in Auctorem Fidei, August 28, 1794:

6. The doctrine of the synod by which it professes that "it is convinced that a bishop has received from Christ all necessary rights for the good government of his diocese," just as if for the good government of each diocese higher ordinances dealing either with faith and morals, or with general discipline, are not necessary, the right of which belongs to the supreme Pontiffs and the General Councils for the universal Church,—schismatic, at least erroneous.

7. Likewise, in this, that it encourages a bishop "to pursue zealously a more perfect constitution of ecclesiastical discipline," and this "against all contrary customs, exemptions, reservations which are opposed to the good order of the diocese, for the greater glory of God and for the greater edification of the faithful"; in that it supposes that a bishop has the right by his own judgment and will to decree and decide contrary to customs, exemptions, reservations, whether they prevail in the universal Church or even in each province, without the consent or the intervention of a higher hierarchic power, by which these customs, etc., have been introduced or approved and have the force of law,—leading to schism and subversion of hierarchic rule, erroneous.

8. Likewise, in that it says it is convinced that "the rights of a bishop received from Jesus Christ for the government of the Church cannot be altered nor hindered, and, when it has happened that the exercise of these rights has been interrupted for any reason whatsoever, a bishop can always and should return to his original rights, as often as the greater good of his church demands it"; in the fact that it intimates that the exercise of episcopal rights can be hindered and coerced by no higher power, whenever a bishop shall judge that it does not further the greater good of his church,—leading to schism, and to subversion of hierarchic government, erroneous.

 

The leadership of the Society of Saint Pius X does not like the omission of the second Confiteor in the 1961 Missal? Just ignore the omission and insert the second Confiteor into Masses without including it in a hand missal. Simple enough, huh? Unsure about the priestly pedigree of a priest-refugee from the Novus Ordo? Well, maybe he should be conditionally ordained and maybe he shouldn't. It's all to the priest in question. There's no particular problem in conditionally ordaining a man who has been "ordained" according to the new rite that was approved by the authority of the ones they have recognized as popes, right? The Catholic Church can give us rites of priestly ordination and episcopal consecration that are questionable, right? It's up to the leadership of the Society of Saint Pius X to "determine", in consultation with a particular priest, if there is a need for conditional ordination for some and not for others, right?  After all, the conciliar "popes" have been so very busy destroying the Faith that one can't expect them to have gone over all of the fine details contained in the new rites of priestly ordination and episcopal consecration, right? The leadership of the Society of Saint Pius does not like the "revised" Good Friday prayer? Just condemn it, as Bishop Bernard Fellay has done in part and Bishop Richard Williamson has done in blistering terms, and use the prayer that was revised by Angelo Roncalli/John XXIII (who removed the word "faithless" from this most ancient of prayers in the liturgy of the Catholic Church).

This is no different than the attitude of many of the American "bishops" prior to the approval of "Communion in the hand" and "altar girls" by the conciliar Vatican. The conciliar "bishops" ignored every instruction from the conciliar Vatican to enforce the few binding rules that govern the offering of the Novus Ordo service, scoffing at John Paul II's Inaestimabile Donum in 1980. One priest told me when I complained that he was not doing what the "pope" wanted, "So? He's got no authority over the liturgy. I follow my bishop." Those "bishops" did as they pleased without regard to the "rules" of the conciliar Vatican. So does the Society of Saint Pius X in many instances. (See the then Father Robert Neville's Letter to Bishop Bernard Fellay for amplification on this point.) None of this has anything to do with Catholicism, which demands a perfect communion with a legitimate Supreme Pontiff and a humble submission to his decrees, something that Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI will insist upon once the final "reconciliation" with the Society of Saint Pius is accomplished.

As His Excellency Bishop Robert F. McKenna, O.P., who was kind enough to review this article [High Church, Low Church] and to pass along his approval of its contents, noted to me yesterday, Monday, February 25, 2008, "The Society of Saint Pius X wants to have their pope and eat him, too! I say, if he is your pope, why would you want him?"

 

Bishop Fellay has laid the groundwork for the "lifting" of the "excommunications" by engaging in quite a song-and-dance routine in the past three and one-half years since meeting with Ratzinger/Benedict in his summer residence in Castel Gandolfo southeast of Rome on August 29, 2005, the Feast of the Beheading of Saint John the Baptist. He went from using a conference he gave at Saint Vincent de Paul Church in Kansas City, Missouri, on November 10, 2004, to criticize Bishop Rifan's gradual acquiescence to the Novus Ordo following the latter's "reconciliation" to the conciliar Vatican to expressing in a 2007 visit to Argentina a more nuanced view of the "Second" Vatican Council and of the "pope" who approved the Novus Ordo:

I just would like to give you some steps on one person who is the head of Campos. Before he was consecrated a bishop, Fr. Rifan, just a few months before, said in Rome to the Vicar General —who repeated it to Fr. Schmidberger, so we have it from a direct source —said, "I have no problem with celebrating the New Mass, but I don’t do it because it would cause trouble to the faithful." So when Rome is consecrating Rifan a bishop, they know already that he has no objection to celebrating the New Mass. I think it is important to see that. That is the first step.

I may say that there is even a step before. Before that, he goes with the diocesan Corpus Christi procession, and he says to those who oppose it, "If we would not have done that, we would have jeopardized the agreement with Rome." It shows you the direction.

The next step will be the jubilee of the diocese of Campos. For that occasion, of course, the local bishop is having a great ceremony, and Rome invites Bishop Rifan to go to that New Mass, to be there. And Bishop Rifan goes there. He does not participate in the sense of concelebrating the Mass, but he is there present with all his ecclesiastical ornaments, with a surplice and so on. He is really there at this New Mass.

The next step will be the Requiem [i.e., the Novus Ordo "Resurrection"] Mass for the bishop who had kicked them out, Bishop Navarro. At that Requiem Mass, you have Bishop Rifan there, and also the nuncio. The nuncio invites Bishop Rifan to go to Communion, and Bishop Rifan receives Communion at this New Mass.

The next step will be the Mass of Thanksgiving of the new cardinal of Sao Paolo. This time, Bishop Rifan is there again present at that New Mass; he is in the choir. He is not in his surplice; nevertheless, at the time of consecration, with the other priests and bishops celebrating, he raises his hands and says the words of consecration. A seminarian saw him.

And now, the 8th of September this year, we have photos and even a video of the Mass concelebrated by Bishop Rifan on the occasion of the centennial of the coronation of Our Lady of the Aparecida, who is the patroness of Brazil. He is concelebrating the New Mass, a New Mass where you have really scandalous happenings: ladies giving Communion in the hand, a ceremony of coronation where, among all the cardinals and bishops, there is a lady who is crowning our Lady, and so on. Trying to defend himself, he said "But I did not say the words of consecration." I may say, that makes it even worse, because that means he is cheating.

That’s the evolution: now he is two years a bishop, and he is already concelebrating the New Mass. You see, and that is the natural development which was announced from the start by the officials in Rome, Cottier, now Cardinal Cottier and Msgr. Perl. At the time of the agreement between Campos and Rome, Cottier said: "Now they have recognized the Council. The next step will be the new Mass." He even said, "There is a natural, psychological dynamic." And you see in Bishop Rifan a real, natural, clear demonstration of this phrase. EXTRACT from Bishop Fellay's November 10, 2004 conference in Kansas City, MO regarding Bishop Rifan's actions

On August 11, 2007, I attended the talk given by Bishop Bernard Fellay in Cordoba, Argentina.

I was surprised to hear him stating that Vatican II can be accepted if interpreted according to tradition, as the Vatican and Benedict XVI want us to believe. I positively don’t think so. I believe Vatican II was a revolution in the Church, as Cardinal Suenens qualified it. Actually it opened the doors for all the destruction of the Catholic Church we witnessed in the last four decades.

He also tried to justify Paul VI and presented him under a good light, saying that everything he did was the responsibility of the counsel of secretaries, who really decided what to do in his pontificate. Bishop Fellay went so far as to exonerate Paul VI for the Novus Ordo Mass he approved. According to him, Paul VI signed it without reading it, since he entirely trusted those secretaries.

It gave me the impression that this talk was meant to create an atmosphere of distension among traditionalists toward Vatican II and the “reform of the reform” of Pope Benedict XVI, in order to soften reactions. (An Eyewitness Account: Fellay, Buddhism, Text and Context )

 

With "Stage Two" of the orchestrated "reconciliation" of the Society of Saint Pius X with the One World Ecumenical Church of conciliarism now completed ("Stage One" was the issuance of Summorum Pontificum on July 7, 2007), the stage is now set for "Stage Three," which will involve the "negotiations" between the Society of Saint Pius X and the conciliar Vatican on the "understanding" of the "Second" Vatican Council. "Stage Three" will go on long enough for a "purification of memory," to borrow one of Karol Wojtyla/John Paul II's and Joseph Ratzinger/Benedict XVI's favorite lines, within the membership of the Society of Saint Pius X. so that the "hardliners" will be driven out now just as they were in 1983 when "The Nine," who have been calumniated ever since within Society circles, were expelled for refusing to equate loyalty to the various and ever-varying positions of Archbishop Lefebvre as loyalty to the Faith.

Meaning no disrespect at all to the priests or the laity of the Society of Saint Pius X, the time has come to recognize that there is never any need to "negotiate" with authorities in the Catholic Church about articles contained in the Deposit of Faith. The counterfeit church of conciliarism is an ape of the Catholic Church headed by men who defect from the Faith in numerous ways and who offend God mightily by their words and their deeds. These men have fallen from the Faith by virtue of violating the Divine Positive Law and have thus expelled themselves from the Catholic Church, whose teaching they mock by claiming to be able to turn the Deposit of Faith on Its head and to make contradictions of dogmatic decrees and papal encyclical letters appear to be consonant with upholding the integrity of the Faith. The counterfeit church of conciliarism has no authority from God to impose penalties on any member of the Catholic Church as its officials are outside of her ranks.

Saint Paul, whose conversion, effected by the prayers of the martyr at whose stoning he presided, Saint Stephen the Protomartyr, we commemorate today, the Third Sunday after Epiphany, told us that we cannot be "una cum" unbelievers. We had better follow this teaching, which comes from none other than the Third Person of the Blessed Trinity, God the Holy Ghost:

 

Bear not the yoke with unbelievers. For what participation hath justice with injustice? Or what fellowship hath light with darkness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial? Or what part hath the faithful with the unbeliever?

And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols? For you are the temple of the living God; as God saith: I will dwell in them, and walk among them; and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. Wherefore, Go out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing: And I will receive you; and I will be a Father to you; and you shall be my sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty. (2 Cor. 6: 14-18)

 

"And what concord hath Christ with Belial?" Well, according to the scions of the counterfeit church of conciliarism, a great deal. It cannot be that way with us. Indeed, the counterfeit church of conciliarism is continuing its "dialogue" with false religions, such as Anglicanism and Methodism (see Dialogue Forges Ahead With Anglicans, Methodists), at the same time that a new round of "talks" is visualized between conciliar officials and representatives of the Society of Saint Pius X. This is madness, my friends. Madness.

It was just a little over three years ago that I began to re-read the articles at Traditional Latin Mass Resources that had been pricking at my conscience from the time of Ratzinger/Benedict's "election" to succeed Wojtyla/John Paul II as the head of the conciliar church. These articles, including--but not limited to-- Letter of 'the Nine' to Abp. Marcel Lefebvre, The Crux of the Matter, The Mountains of Gelboe, Faith or Apostolic Authority: Which Comes First?, The Dissent of Faith, Is Sedevacantism 'Pope-Sifting'?, Resistance and Indefectibility, An Objection to Sedevacantism: 'Perpetual Successors' to Peter, Did Bellarmine Condemn Sedevacantism?

The Novus Ordo service is evil. One either recognizes this or he does not. This is not to condemn those who remain in the conciliar structures and who assist at the Novus Ordo, just as it is not to condemn individual Protestants for adhering to the evil that is Protestantism. We pray that those in false religions sects, including conciliarism, can be led out of those sects and to come to a recognition of their evil natures. We must in no way, however, pretend that evil things, such as conciliarism, which denies the Social Reign of Christ the King and states that Catholics are in "communion" with Protestants and the Orthodox who deny articles contained in the Deposit of Faith, including Papal Primacy and Papal Infallibility and Purgatory as defined by the authority of the Catholic Church, and the Novus Ordo service, can come from the Catholic Church. They cannot. It is impossible.

 

What I wrote eleven months ago is pertinent once again:

No believing Catholic should want to be part of a "high church, low church" ape of the Anglican sect. Each believing Catholic must adhere to the totality of the truths of the the Holy Faith without taint of corruption by conciliarism, without any hint of reading Catholicism into the minds of apostates who are truly ravenous wolves in shepherds' vestments. Great examples have been established by the likes of Father Martin Stepanich, O.F.M., S.T.D., and His Excellency Bishop Robert Fidelis McKenna, O.P., the priests of the Congregation of Mary Immaculate Queen, who were among the earliest advocates of sedevacantism, and, of course, the "nine" (Bishops Clarence Kelly, Daniel Dolan, Donald Sanborn and Fathers Anthony Cekada, William Jenkins, Eugene Berry, Thomas Zapp, Joseph Collins and Martin Skierka), who were not even given a proper hearing by Archbishop Lefebvre, advised as he was by those who believed that a "deal" with "Rome" was possible in 1983 and would serve the interests of the Faith, among so many others. We must follow these examples no matter the calumny and hardship that we might suffer as a result. They have always had the cause of Truth Himself, Christ the King, on their side.

We must, as always, be very mindful of making reparation for our own many sins, which are more responsible than we would like to think for the state of the Church and thus the state of the world. We must offer up our prayers and sufferings and sacrifices and penances and mortifications humiliations to the Most Sacred Heart of Jesus as the consecrated slaves of His Most Blessed Mother's Sorrowful and Immaculate Heart, praying as many Rosaries each day as our states-in-life permit.

We are involved in a titanic struggle with the devil each day for the salvation of our own souls. We cannot be on the adversary's side by being oblivious to, if not apologetic of, the errors he has inspired in the false sect of conciliarism that does his bidding for him in so many ways, including most especially in the Novus Ordo service and by refusing absolutely to seek with urgency the unconditional conversion of all men universally to the Catholic Church. We must take the rocky road of rejection and humiliation rather than the smooth road of apostasy and betrayal that leads to the wide gate of eternal perdition, begging Our Lady's company as we keep her company at the foot of her Divine Son's Most Holy Cross every day as we assist at the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.

 

Our Blessed Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ sought out the fire-breathing hater of Christians, Saul of Tarsus, who was making his way to Damascus to preside over another round of persecutions, to convert Him to the true Faith, the Catholic Faith. Saint Paul became the Apostle to the Gentiles as he sought with great zeal to bring many souls into the Faith, enduring many hardships (including shipwreck, imprisonment, beatings, stonings), before his martyrdom at the site of what is now the Basilica of Saint Paul Outside-the-Walls in Rome, Italy. How tragic it is that this great basilica is being used by the conciliarists as a shrine to false ecumenism, blaspheming Saint Paul as God Himself is offended.

We must pay to Saint Paul to help us to remain zealous for the salvation of our own souls as we cleave only to true bishops and true priests who make no concessions to conciliarism whatsoever and who understand that the Catholic Faith is non-negotiable, something made clear by the [First] Vatican Council:

''The doctrine of the faith which God has revealed has not been proposed to human intelligences to be perfected by them as if it were a philosophical system, but as a divine deposit entrusted to the Spouse of Christ to be faithfully guarded and infallibly interpreted. Hence also that sense of the sacred dogmas is to be perpetually retained which our Holy Mother the Church has once declared, nor is this sense ever to be abandoned on plea or pretext of a more profound comprehension of the truth."

 

There is nothing to negotiate with apostates, blasphemers and heretics who make a mockery of the nature of dogmatic truth and hence of God Himself.

We ask Our Lady to help us to have the zeal of Saint Paul and never to weary of the battles in defense of the Faith as we cooperate with the graces won for us by her Divine Son on the wood of the Holy Cross and that flow into our own hearts and souls through her loving hands as the Mediatrix of All Graces to resist the enticements of human respect and the promise of a false sense of "peace" and "unity" founded on very betrayal of the Faith itself.

Sancta Maria, Mater Dei, ora pro nobis peccatoribus, nunc in hora mortis nostrae. Amen!

 

Isn't it time to pray a Rosary now?

Vivat Christus Rex! Viva Cristo Rey!

Our Lady of Fatima, pray for us.

Saint Joseph, pray for us.

Saints Peter and Paul, pray for us.

Saint John the Baptist, pray for us.

Saint John the Evangelist, pray for us.

Saint Michael the Archangel, pray for us.

Saint Gabriel the Archangel, pray for us.

Saint Raphael the Archangel, pray for us.

Saints Joachim and Anne, pray for us.

Saint Timothy, pray for us.

See also: A Litany of Saints