century. As I read the entry in Butler's Lives of the Saints this morning I came across this statement which immediately put me in mind of Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre:
Throughout his life, he made a rule never to advance any doctrine which he had not learnt from the ancient fathers.
Would that those bishops who love introducing novelties and errors adulterating the faith were followers of St. Cyril. And what did Archbishop Lefebvre say? Unlike our dissenting and scandalous bishops, the archbishop wanted to pass on faithfully what he had been given. I think he and St. Cyril have much in common, both Catholic in the fullest sense, both lovers and defenders of the Blessed Virgin Mary and enemies of heresy. Archbishop Lefebvre was never looking for a fight. He simply wanted to pass on the faith as he had received it, protecting Sacred Tradition:
“I want to be and to stay Catholic. So why am I required to suppress our seminary? Why am I required to suppress our Sacerdotal Fraternity of Saint Pius X? Why am I required not to perform these ordinations? There is only one reason: to bring me into line with this policy. They want me to lend a hand in this destruction of the Church, to join in this communion which, for the Church, is adultery. I will not be an adulterer. I will keep my Catholic Faith!”
St. Cyril also lived in a difficult time for the faith. Nestorius was promulgating his heresy denying that Jesus was true and true man. His divinity, he claimed did not reside in Him as man and Mary was mother, not of God, but only of the human son. Cyril also faced persecution since the emperor favored Nestorius. The controversy resulted in the Council of Ephesus in 431 which supported St. Cyril and condemned the errors of Nestorius. That, indeed, was a council that defended the teaching of Holy Mother Church, unlike much of Vatican II.
This week the SSPX bishops will meet with the scandalous head of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, Cardinal Fernandez. This purveyor of pornography is likely to threaten the SSPX with severe measures if they go ahead with the ordinations in July. To understand the depth of what's at stake, I recommend reading Chris Jackson's Why the SSPX Must Consecrate Bishops.
The order has multiplied exponentially since 1970 when it was founded with the approval of the local bishop. Only two of the bishops ordained in 1988 are still living. The order has chapels all over the world where the bishops travel for ordinations and confirmations. In order for mere survival, the consecration of new bishops is essential.
Keep in mind that without the SSPX, the traditional mass and sacraments would be museum pieces. It was the fidelity of Archbishop Lefebvre to pass on what he had been given that saved the Sacred Tradition of the apostles, Fathers of the Church, and thousands of saints and martyrs up until the watering down of the faith during and after Vatican II.
Today, I'm praying through the intercession of St. Cyril for the meeting this week between the Vatican and the SSPX bishops. I have little hope for a reconciliation, especially when the Vatican representative is, from all evidence, a poor excuse for a Catholic. That Fernandez, with his sickening and scandalous history, was placed in that sensitive position says nothing good about Pope Leo.
Nevertheless, I applaud the SSPX for attempting to keep the relationship with Rome alive. After all, Jesus Himself named Judas, a man He knew would betray Him, as one of His apostles. Is it really a surprise that we have Judases in the hierarchy today?
Sacred Heart of Jesus, have mercy on us.
Our Lady, Co-redemptrix and Mediatrix of all Graces, pray for us.
St. Cyril of Alexandria, pray for us.
As one who, while not attending their chapels, has had nothing but very positive and encouraging contacts with the SSPX, and who has been to a number of historic faith jurisdictions over my pilgrimage, I could offer this thought: even if it trains out that the consecrations occur without Rome’s mandate, and the Roman authorities declare all the bishops excommunicated latae sententiae, and if, further, Rome distances itself from the Society more than is the case today, causing some to yell “schism”, we can look to recent religious history in the East and see where the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia (ROCOR) and the Moscow Patriarchate (MP) re-united in the early 2000s after 60 some years of schism, following the dissolution of the USSR and the MP’s acceptance of some of ROCOR’s terms, including glorification (canonization) of the Romanov Royal Martyrs. ROCOR have been the adherents to the strictest traditional faith in Russian Orthodox terms (if you exclude the Old Believers, some of whom are now reconciled to the MP and ROCOR also, and of whom Solzhenitsyn wrote so favorably in the Red Wheel series) and so have a kind of analogy to the SSPX, so we can see that the passage of time, and events, can favor reunifications even if they seem hard to imagine now.
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