Vatican confirms SSPX excommunication for schismatic consecration

‘Both the bishop who, without a pontifical mandate, consecrates a person a bishop, and the one who receives the consecration from him, incur a latae sententiae excommunication reserved to the Apostolic See.’

The Holy See confirmed the excommunication of six bishops of the Society of St Pius X involved in episcopal consecrations without a papal mandate.

Bishop Alfonso de Galarreta conducted the consecration during a six-hour liturgy on Wednesday in the society’s headquarters in Écône, in southern Switzerland, with the assistance of Bishop Bernard Fellay.

They ordained Pascal Schreiber, Michael Goldade, Michel Poinsinet de Sivry and Marc Hanappier “to serve as auxiliary bishops of the Society of St Pius X, without jurisdiction”, according to a statement issued by the society the same day.

Organisers said 17,000 people from 70 countries attended the liturgy in a field outside the Écône seminary.

The Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith had previously warned that the consecrations would constitute a “schismatic act” and incur excommunication.

It confirmed in a decree on Thursday that Galarreta “having performed an inherently schismatic act through the episcopal consecration of four priests without pontifical mandate and contrary to the will of the Supreme Pontiff” was subject to the penalty set out in canon 1387 in the Code of Canon Law.

This states: “Both the bishop who, without a pontifical mandate, consecrates a person a bishop, and the one who receives the consecration from him, incur a latae sententiae excommunication reserved to the Apostolic See.”

The decree also confirmed the excommunication of Schreiber, Goldade, Poinsinet de Sivry and Hanappier, along with Fellay for his part in the consecrations.

Both Galarreta and Fellay previously incurred excommunication when they were ordained bishops by the society’s founder Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre in 1988, though Benedict XVI lifted the penalty in 2009.

In an explanatory note accompanying the decree, the dicastery’s prefect Cardinal Víctor Manuel Fernández also confirmed that the more than 700 priests of the society “are in schism and must therefore be considered schismatic”.

He also said laypeople who “formally adhere” to the society would incur excommunication, referring to a 1996 note from the Pontifical Council for Legislative Texts which said formal adherence constitutes two elements: a conscience choice to “sustain the schism” by following its leadership over the Pope, and “exclusive participation in Lefebvrist ‘ecclesial’ acts, without taking part in the acts of the Catholic Church”.

Cardinal Fernández also said that the society’s priests “administer the sacraments illicitly and that the sacrament of penance administered by them and marriages solemnised by them are invalid”, ending previous permissions granted by Pope Francis.

In 2015, Francis said confessions heard by its priests would be considered valid and licit throughout the Extraordinary Jubilee of Mercy and did not subsequently halt this provision. In 2017 he introduced measures to allow for them to officiate validly at marriage rites.

“The Church, as a tender mother, welcomes with deep affection and eager care all those who wish to return to full communion,” Fernández said in his note. “Apostolic nuncios will prepare procedures that ordinaries can use in different cases.”

The previous day, the cardinal had told The Catholic Herald that although the society had refused a scheme of theological dialogue proposed by the Holy See, “we hope in future, thanks to the action of the Holy Spirit, it’ll be possible … but we’ll need time”.

During the consecrations, in place of the apostolic mandate, the society’s secretary general Fr Foucauld Le Roux read a declaration claiming that “the authorities in the Church have been animated by a spirit that is contrary to that of the faith, and have been acting against holy tradition” since the Second Vatican Council.

It said it had “the most serious duty to transmit the grace of the episcopate” to the four priests and that “every punishment and censure brought to bear against this step will have no validity”.

In its statement following the consecrations, the society said they took place without papal mandate “owing to exceptional circumstances” and would secure “the means necessary for the preservation of the sacred heritage of Tradition”

It complained that its superior Fr Davide Pagliarani was not allowed to meet Pope Leo “to set before him filially the grave reasons which rendered this ceremony necessary”.

The Pope had sent a letter Pagliarani the day before the consecrations asking the society to “turn back”, warning that “the schismatic act you are about to undertake would deprive [its adherents] of the licit and, in some cases, even valid reception of the sacraments”.

“I pray for you, because to tear the seamless garment of Christ is a sin of extreme gravity,” Leo said in the letter published on Tuesday. “May the Lord enlighten your consciences and awaken your hearts.”

In a response published the same day, Pagliarani said the society was serving the Church “by means that are extraordinary, as one would assist a mother in distress who requires particular help, even if such help is not understood by everyone”.

He also argued that despite the original excommunication of 1988, he and the Pope were “speaking together as a father and his son”, claiming that Leo was “paternally urging me to avoid a schism which, theoretically, has already taken place”.

A week before the consecrations, the society’s leadership had sent the Pope and the College of Cardinals a “profession of Catholic faith”.

In a letter dated 24 June and published ahead of the consistory, they said “the Church suffers under the pressure of new forces, coming both from within and without, which push her in every possible direction, except – it seems to us – the right one”.

They claimed that “many now regard [the Church’s Tradition] as an outdated reality, subject to perpetual development” and said the profession published with the letter was a “response to the chief errors and gravest dangers of our time”.

The profession “to enlighten souls in the face of modern errors” includes in its preamble the rejection of “all errors contrary to this faith, and in particular those of liberalism, indifferentism, modernism, ecumenism and laicism”.

View from Rome

True and false reformers

Stay updated — add us as a preferred news source on Google: