SSPX causes split among traditionalists
RORATE CÆLI: Rome and the Econe Consecrations: a Dispassionate Analysis of What is at Stake Orthodox Catholics are radically split over the Society of Saint Pius X, the consecration of its new bishops, and the excommunications that followed from Rome. Whatever one's position on whether the excommunications were just or unjust, one thing has become indisputably clear: Rome is now treating the Society as a whole as engaged in schism. The situation now resembles, at best, that of 1988, but with a far more permanent rift. Comparisons have been drawn to the Old Catholic schism in the Netherlands, in which Jansenist sympathizers were excommunicated alongside other opponents of the First Vatican Council, and the analogy appears at least partially apt. The Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith is now encouraging SSPX priests to seek reconciliation with the formal Church in the same manner employed with schismatic groups in the past. The Society's decision to proceed with ep...