Problems With the SSPX

©Prax Maskaren. The following query was received in response to my post on the Traditional Catholics' Club D-List on the subject of the validity of attending SSPX services. The post on the SSPX, and my post in response, are reproduced at the bottom. I keep my correspondent's name secret as he desires so.
As Traditional Catholics, if we take your position not to attend SSPX mass, where are we to go to mass besides a Sedevacantist church? There aren't many of these around.

Dear Friend,

To consider your query: Attendance at SSPX Mass - If we avoid it, we cannot have other masses, because the other are more rare.

I take things from the Catholic viewpoint.

It was in 1993 that I became a Sedevacantist. I did so by going directly from the New Church, without going through the intermediatory phase of being a 'Conservative', such as a Lefebvrist.

When I did, I was persuaded to make a trip to the SSPX centre in India, in the far south at St. Thomas' Town, Thailapuram in the district of Tirunelveli, Tamil Nadu. Here too, I asked, as I had asked for long: Since the SSPX literature itself demonstrates that the New Church and its 'Popes' are heretics, how did they justify themselves remaining in union with him?

Fr. Eric Simonot was the in-charge of India at the time, and he told me that he refused to answer that query.

Now, his refusal to answer did not absolve me from asking it and seeking an answer to it. And so I conclude, taking Catholic theology, that the Lefebvrists, because they adhere to an outright and incontrovertible heretic, acknowledgeing him as their 'pope', were in fact not Catholics but, at the least, schismatics.

Moreover, they are also implicitly culpable of Papal Indefectibility - which I classify as a heresy, which implicitly denies that Popes, following their election as popes, retain their free will, and implicitly teaching that they are incapable of doing anything whatsoever that would constitute themselves as heretics and thus outside the Church.

Now, taking this logic further, since the Lefebvrists are, at the least, schismatics, one who would wish to be a Catholic is under the grave obligation to avoid at all costs participation and complicity in any act of liturgy conducted by any schismatic.

But what if there is no other mass available?

The Church has already spoken on this issue a long time before the present situation came about: And it insists that disregarding all factors, no Catholic may, for any reason, attend a schismatic service. The prohibition is total and final.

Those who persist in attending such services are considered to have incurred schism under Catholic law.

But let us look at things in a logical manner. If the Lefebvrist services are valid, then certainly also those of the Nestorians, Jacobites and Byzantine schismatics and heretics, besides those of the 'Old Catholics' - Jansenists, Dollingerites, etc., are valid. The same is also true of many 'High Church' or 'Anglo-Catholic' Anglican, or as they are styled in the US, Episcopalian services.

And, if the Lefebvrist service is not available, these are usually well accessible, whether in India or in America (I believe, at least in the major cities?): A Jacobite church is within five minutes walk from my home, just about as much as the New Church's church. So should I not attend the Jacobite Mass?

That is, if it is justifiable to attend Lefebvrist services, is it not also justifiable to attend these services?

But, from the Catholic viewpoint, the answer to both is no: No to Lefebvre as much as to any other heretical and or schismatic sect.

That leaves us with the further question: What if we have then nothing else?

The Church has answered this also from long before this situation arose. Certainly, throughout history such situations have existed, largely in the missions, where priests were unable to attend to every community in their parishes on every Sunday.

To cater to such a situation, the Church instructed the faithful to gather at the chapel or church, even if only a makeshift one, or otherwise in a private home or oratory, and conduct the service under the leadership of a trusted church elder or catechist, always and necessarily a male of good standing. There is and can be no real consecration in such a service, nor was it claimed or pretended that there was one. Instead, the congregation was led to conduct a spiritual communion. Now, for Catholics in such a position, because they have not culpably failed to assist at Holy Mass, they are positively incapable of incurring the penalties that come with failure to attend and assist at Holy Mass. And, while not a true Mass, strictly speaking, nevertheless these services do convey grace, unite the participants to the Universal Church, and also bind together the community of the faithful of that district.

This is the only legitimate means available today, just as it always was.

Moreover, this is also the ONLY legitimate means open to those who genuinely doubt the validity of the orders of Sedevacantist priests and bishops, and the HOME ALONE position is positively excluded as being sinful and as being destructive of the Catholic community...

I hope that I have answered your queries adequately.

Thanking you,

Yours sincerely,

Prax Maskaren
Message 1005 TraditionalCatholicsClub
From:�"shootist17"
Date:� Sun�Mar�16,�2003� 10:04 pm
Subject:� The Validity of SSPX Masses

I read the letter from Msgr. Perl of the Pontifical Ecclesia Dei Commission concerning Society of St. Pius X (SSPX) Masses, which was posted on the unavoce.org website.

From what I can gather from the letter (with direct quotes from the Letter):

1. The Masses of SSPX are valid, but not licit (which would actually be the case with any Novus Ordo Mass that was not celebrated in strict accordance with the General Instruction on the Roman Missal).

2. "In the strict sense you may fulfill your Sunday obligation by attending a Mass celebrated by a priest of the Society of St. Pius X."

3. "If your primary reason for attending were to manifest your desire to separate yourself from communion with the Roman Pontiff and those in communion with him, it would be a sin. If your intention is simply to participate in a Mass according to the 1962 Missal for the sake of devotion, this would not be a sin."

Are any others of you familiar with this letter? Does anyone have any comments about it?
Message 1011 TraditionalCatholicsClub
From:�Prax Maskaren
Date:� Tue�Mar�18,�2003� 10:25 am
Subject:�The Validity of SSPX Masses

Dear Friends, - As a Catholic, I work from Catholic teaching, theology, etc., that Charles Wojtyla is not the pope. Therefore, I consider it sinful, excepting invincible ignorance, to celebrate and participate in a service "una cum" Wojie, as much as a service "una cum" the Dalai Lama would be.

What I want to know is: Is there justification for attributing Invincible Ignorance to Lefebvrists? I seriously doubt it, given the furious controversy and their vicious anti-sedevacantism: Remembering that Bishop Dolan, Frs. Sanborn, Cekada, etc., broke off on precisely this point.

The Lefebvrist position is a house built on sand - and it is precisely for this reason that it is comparatively easy for the rise of the Fraternity of St. Peter or for the apostacy of Campos, etc.

The Lefebvrist whom I know personally, and who introduced me to the thought of Dr. Rama Coomaraswamy - one of the chief ideologues of Sedevacantism, quakes in his boots that one day sooner than latter, the SSPX is going to do a Campos.

I too believe that given its ideological position, it will do this, barring a small minority who will in probability be forced to become Sedevacantists. What I regret and what pains me is the loss of so many more souls to the Modernist apostacy!

Prax Maskaren, Bombay.