Pope Leo XIV has excommunicated members of a breakaway group of traditionalist Catholics after they consecrated bishops without Vatican approval.
The pontiff warned the Society of St Pius X (known as the SSPX) on Tuesday that its plans to consecrate four new bishops would be a “sin of extreme gravity”. After the consecrations went ahead on Wednesday, “the Vatican responded aggressively”, going “above and beyond the minimal sanctions foreseen by the church’s canon law”, said The Associated Press.
Six bishops and hundreds of priests belonging to the society have been excommunicated. The Pope also warned the estimated 600,000 Catholics who attend its services that the order is no longer sanctioned to carry out sacraments like confession and marriage.
What is the Society of St Pius X?
Founded in 1970 by French archbishop Marcel Lefebvre, the SSPX is a traditionalist group that purports to practise a “pure” form of Catholicism, untainted by modernising or secular influences. It rejects much of the so-called Vatican II reforms of the 1960s, “which revolutionised the church’s relations with other Christians, Jews and people of other faiths and allowed Mass to be celebrated in the vernacular”, said AP. The order continues to adhere to the Latin Mass and uses pre-Vatican II liturgy in its services.
According to SSPX figures, it has 751 priests, 264 seminarians, 145 religious brothers, 88 oblates and 250 religious sisters representing 50 nationalities. It has a presence in 77 countries, with the largest being in France and the US.
Throughout its history, the society has had a rocky relationship with the Vatican. In 1988 Archbishop Lefebvre consecrated four bishops without the approval of Pope John Paul II. The Vatican ruled that this was illicit and stated that those directly involved had incurred excommunication.
In 2009, Pope Benedict XVI rescinded the excommunications of the surviving bishops as a gesture towards reconciliation. However, despite years of talks aimed at bringing the society back into full communion with the Church, the society’s official status has remained unresolved.
What has it done now?
On 1 July, the SSPX consecrated four new bishops at its international seminary in Écône, Switzerland, the location of the 1988 consecrations that caused the previous schism. Creating new bishops without papal approval is regarded as a “schismatic act” in canon law.
However, an SSPX priest told the more than 16,000 worshippers who gathered for the illicit consecration Mass that, since Vatican II, “the authorities of the church have been animated by a spirit that is contrary to that of the faith”, said National Catholic Reporter. Therefore, the consecration of bishops “entirely faithful to her holy tradition” were justified as “a sacred duty toward the holy church”.
Can they be reconciled?
Since becoming Pope in May last year, Leo XIV “has reached out especially to the conservative and traditionalist wing of the church that was in many ways alienated during the Pope Francis pontificate”, said AP.
However, last month he told a reporter that, “while division among Christians is always a painful matter”, the society could not remain in good standing if it rejected “certain fundamental elements of the Church”, said Vatican News. “If that is the choice they make, I am sorry, but we must move forward.”
The group “is ignoring the doctrinal elephant in the room”, said Eric Sammons, editor of traditionalist Catholic magazine Crisis: being in communion with the Pope is “an essential part of what it means to be Catholic”. Complaints about the Church’s “lackadaisical enforcement of Catholic teaching”, however well-founded, cannot be taken seriously from “a group that itself violates a foundational principle of Catholic doctrine”.
Traditionalist Catholic group excommunicated after consecrating bishops against the wishes of the Pope
