Press Release from
the Superior General
of the Priestly Society of Saint Pius X
The excommunication of the bishops consecrated
by His Grace Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre, on June 30, 1988,
which had been declared by the Congregation for Bishops
in a decree dated July 1, 1988, and which we had always
contested, has been withdrawn by another decree mandated
by Benedict XVI and issued by the same Congregation on January
21, 2009.
We express our filial gratitude to the Holy
Father for this gesture which, beyond the Priestly Society
of Saint Pius X, will benefit the whole Church. Our Society
wishes to be always more able to help the pope to remedy
the unprecedented crisis which presently shakes the Catholic
world, and which Pope John Paul II had designated as a state
of “silent apostasy.”
Besides our gratitude towards the Holy Father
and towards all those who helped him to make this courageous
act, we are pleased that the decree of January 21 considers
as “necessary” talks with the Holy See, talks
which will enable the Priestly Society of Saint Pius X to
explain the fundamental doctrinal reasons which it believes
to be at the origin of the present difficulties of the Church.
In this new atmosphere, we have the firm hope
to obtain soon the recognition of the rights of Catholic
Tradition
Menzingen, January 24, 2009
+Bernard Fellay
Letter of the Superior
General
of the Priestly Society of Saint Pius X
Dear faithful,
As I announce in the attached press release,
“ the excommunication of the bishops consecrated by
His Grace Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre, on June 30, 1988,
which had been declared by the Congregation for Bishops
in a decree dated July 1, 1988, and which we had always
contested, has been withdrawn by another decree mandated
by Benedict XVI and issued by the same Congregation on January
21, 2009.” It was the prayer intention I had entrusted
to you in Lourdes, on the feast of Christ the King 2008.
Your response exceeded our expectations, since one million
seven hundred and three thousand rosaries were said to obtain
through the intercession of Our Lady that an end be put
to the opprobrium which, beyond the persons of the bishops
of the Society, rested upon all those who were more or less
attached to Tradition. Let us not forget to thank the Most
Blessed Virgin who has inspired the Holy Father with this
unilateral, benevolent, and courageous act to. Let us assure
him of our fervent prayers.
Thanks to this gesture, Catholics attached
to Tradition throughout the world will no longer be unjustly
stigmatized and condemned for having kept the Faith of their
fathers. Catholic Tradition is no longer excommunicated.
Though it never was in itself, it was often excommunicated
and cruelly so in day to day events. It is just as the Tridentine
Mass had never been abrogated in itself, as the Holy Father
has happily recalled in the Motu Proprio Summorum Pontificum
of July 7, 2007.
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 First Vatican Council.
Yet we can but express reservations concerning the Second
Vatican Council, which intended to be council “different
from the others (cf. Addresses by Popes John XXIII and Paul
VI).” 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.
Dear faithful, the Church is in the hands
of her Mother, the Most Blessed Virgin Mary. In Her we place
our confidence. We have asked from her the freedom of the
Mass of all time everywhere and for all. We have asked from
her the withdrawal of the decree of excommunications. In
our prayers, we now ask from her the necessary doctrinal
clarifications which confused souls so much need.
Menzingen, January 24, 2009
+Bernard Fellay
from dici.org
