The St Pius X Fraternity affair that has unfolded over the past few hours turns out, in reality, to be a spectacular boomerang even for those traditionalists who remain, at least “formally”, within Peter’s fold. For two reasons, which we will explain later, it is necessary to reflect on what has happened, because it will help us understand what will certainly be Pope Leo XIV’s next moves.
A preliminary note, always necessary
The reference here is not to those who love Tradition and are Catholic; it concerns, instead, those who sow discord, who insult cardinals by branding them as “fa*ot” during papal events; it concerns those who fuel psycho-blogs and whip up troubled teenagers who then barge into parishes and stage outbursts in front of parish priests, telling them they are not Catholic because they do not wear a chasuble. It concerns those lads who hang around traditionalist communities to have the tonsure conferred and then wander from one seminary to another, hunting for someone willing to ordain them “on their terms”.
It concerns those boys who, at twenty, marry under the pressure of whichever cassocked Taliban happens to be in charge, indulging their “lightning conversion”, and then spend their days on social media handing out lessons: to priests on how priests should be priests, to the Pope on how the Pope should be Pope, to Catholics on how Catholics should be Catholics; and they lunge, each time, at one target or another to scrape together a few views. Because, of course, what they live away from the phone camera is the exact opposite of what they preach: but with figures this unresolved, it has become a constant, and even revisiting it starts to feel pointless. Then there is the long list of mini-MPs, petty politicians and polling agents who preach certain values by day and do the opposite by night; but that too belongs in the same old basket. So, let it be clear: we are not talking about Catholics who love Tradition. We are among them too. We love Tradition and we do not need labels or camps to fall in behind; we do not need identity wars; we do not need the liturgy or the Churchin order to weaponise them in favour of our political ideas (which are nothing other than fascist ones). We are talking about an unhealthy drift which, unfortunately, exists in the Church and is a problem. And it is often indulged - naively, but not entirely - by cardinals and archbishops who not only benefit from the generous donations of these grown-up dandies, but also enjoy being courted and flattered. This slice of the Church, certainly a minority but very noisy - especially online - has stirred up and endorsed the decision taken by St Pius X, in the hope that it would push Pope Leointo making choices under their pressure.
It has not gone as they hoped, and the cardinal they insult morning to night - putting words in his mouth that do not even appear in his books - has, paradoxically, been far clearer than many others. He has, after all, done what Leo XIV asked of him. Leo XIV has an utterly clear view of the Fraternity question, and an equally clear view of the Church’s real condition: he knows perfectly well that unity often breaks precisely because of these sectarian groups, capable of generating real factions even within the presbyterate. Let us not forget that yesterday, with the priests of Rome, Pope Leo XIV returned to the subject - answering some questions - of priestly friendship. Many dynamics we observe on a universal scale are reproduced, identically, in smaller presbyterates, where even during clergy meetings micro-cliques of gossiping busybodies form, ready to line up against others. Pretending not to see it is convenient; tackling it decisively is necessary. Because if, on the one hand, there are the ideologues of dancing on the altar, psychedelic lights, or those who celebrate on bicycles with a stole over a cycling skinsuit, on the other hand there are these as well.
The reality that stings
What has happened with the Priestly Fraternity of St Pius X in the last few hours brings to light a truth that, for some, stings: the Dicastery for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments, and Pope Francis - and you can be sure that Leo XIV is of the same conviction - have never waged any “war” against the Vetus Ordo Mass. It is enough to read, without prejudice, the statement from the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith and the statement from the Priestly Fraternity of St Pius X to realise that the question of the rite simply does not even appear among the concerns. In both statements, the real points are elsewhere, and they are set out with a clarity that punctures many narratives.
The casus belli is the announcement of future episcopal consecrations: that is what led to the meeting of 12 February at the Holy Office, held with the Holy Father’s approval. The Holy See, through the Prefect of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, does not propose a liturgical negotiation, but a path of theological dialogue, with a defined method, to clarify what the “minimum requirements” are for full communion and, on that basis, finally to reach a canonical status. The dossier, moreover, is stated without ambiguity: the levels of assent required by the texts of the Second Vatican Council and their interpretation; the distinction between an act of faith and “religious submission of intellect and will”; the question of the divine will in relation to the plurality of religions; and other themes already listed by the Fraternity in earlier correspondence. Upstream, however, a preliminary condition is set that is non-negotiable: suspend the announced decision on episcopal ordinations/consecrations. And not because of technicalities, but because of a point of communion and law: the ordination of bishops without a mandate from the Roman Pontiff would mean a rupture of ecclesial communion - schism - with heavy consequences for the Fraternity as a whole. In short: this is not about the rite; it is about authority, doctrinal assent, interpretation of the Council, and the point beyond which an “exceptional and temporary condition” becomes a fracture.
The hypocrisy of the Holy Roman Church
Of course, someone might read that statement and object: “But come on - aren’t these the same lines repeated by the psycho-blogs, the sacked former masters of ceremonies, the lads who wear a cassock despite being shown the door by seminaries, certain Taliban in cassocks, and so on?” Yes, of course: it is true. And precisely for that reason, the St Pius X Fraternity must at least be granted a form of coherence: they have placed themselves outside ecclesial communion, formally and substantively. There are those, instead, who remain in communion “only formally” and, from within, feed a climate that has by now become unbreathable.
That, however, does not justify any “anything goes”. Because if we then consider that we count among Catholics those who every ten seconds clog up their Facebook pages - indefatigable boomers - with deranged claims about women’s ordination and against the Vetus Ordo (one ends up thinking of the children of these liturgy boffins and the poor wife: what a pity!), we count those who attack the Pope because he calls priests Alter Christus in line with the Catechism, we count those who badmouth priests to credential themselves as “historians” - historians of what, no one can say. And if among Catholics we count those priests thrown out by their dioceses, who now drift around Rome because there are not enough bishops with the guts to reduce them to the lay state, and so we leave them loose to do damage, to spit in the dish they eat from, to defame their brother priests while no one focuses on their life - because that is where you really would want to tear your hair out - then, in short, if in the Church we call all of these people Catholic, it is obvious that there is plenty of “counter-altar” already and we have more than enough internal problems as it is.
A justice system that does not work
The real tragedy - and this is an objection often levelled at us - is that two weights and two measures are applied systematically. And for that reason one strongly hopes - also thanks to Pope Leo XIV - that the Church will begin to call out and pursue, not only those who do not apply the Council because they are “traditionalist”, but also those priests who dance in front of the tabernacle, who refuse to give Communion to those who kneel, those who will not return to their dioceses despite repeated summons because they prefer to live in inherited houses, living the high life with their obedient lay attendants on the salary funded by the otto per mille. In short: some order is needed, not only in the Roman Curia but in the universal Church. The same reason also explains why many remain scandalised by the Rupnik case.
Not so much because he would have abused certain women: that has not been established at all and Rupnik is innocent until final judgement, like anyone else - despite the existence of psycho-blogs that defame for free, that label cardinals as “por*-cardinal” and former Jesuits as “abusers”. What truly scandalises the clergy is this: if any other priest, anywhere in the world, had been accused of even half of what has been attributed to Rupnik, he would already have been dismissed from the clerical state - not protected in this way. We know perfectly well that most priests do not even get to the opening of a trial: they are suspended immediately. “We’ll see later,” they are told. Here, instead, they do not even want to reach a trial: they drag this out absurdly and without justification.
The rite as an alibi, the Council in the crosshairs
In short, these groups sold Traditionis Custodes as “the persecution of the Vetus Ordo”. And as if that were not enough, some cardinals - and everyone knows who they are - passed to pseudo-journalists in the United States, fiercely loyal to Trump and rather less so to the Pope, the reports presented during the extraordinary consistory, achieving exactly what Pope Leo wanted to avoid at all costs: fuelling divisions. Those papers were circulated with a precise aim: to make the idea take root that Roche wanted to “wage war on the Old Rite”, when in reality, reading the very texts, it is clear that the knot is not the rite, but the ecclesial posture of certain communities: for many of them the Second Vatican Council would have been a disaster and the new Mass would not be as valid as the old.
Not by chance, one of the conditions set by Traditionis Custodes was crystal clear: “the bishop is to ensure that these groups do not deny the validity and the legitimacy of the liturgical reform, the dictates of the Second Vatican Council, and the Magisterium of the Supreme Pontiffs”. In short: one thing is to take seriously what Benedict XVI also denounced repeatedly, namely that the Council was pulled this way and that by different factions, often violated by those who invoked it to legitimise practices and drifts not even remotely contemplated in the conciliar documents; quite another, very different thing is to claim that the Council - that is, its texts - is a disaster. One thing is to say that the Mass of St Paul VI is often celebrated badly; another is to insinuate that it is “less valid” than the other, and that the rite is poorly structured.
The inability to discern and educate
The problem is that these Taliban-style groups end up mirroring, in reverse, the very same vice we contest in certain seminaries: twenty-year-old young clerics who arrive in settings where the atmosphere is the opposite, with rectors and formators who wield the Council to peddle absurd theories never arrived at, nor even conceived, in any conciliar document. Then, to these poor lads, the same formators throw “rigidity” in their faces. Well, of course: they are rigid - they are twenty! Try having a conversation with an enterprising young person building their future and launching a start-up, and you will see whether they are not rigid. At twenty you have to be rigid, determined. Good. Bring it on. At twenty, if someone you respect keeps telling you that you must wear a cassock even to go to bed, you wear it; and if they drill into you that not wearing a long-sleeved shirt is a sin, you wear nothing but long sleeves. As a result, you end up branding as enemies all those who do not conform. It is physiological: you are twenty. You have to grow, you have to gain experience, you have to soften, until you understand that the world is not an infantile alternation of black and white. At twenty, let us repeat it, it is normal.
The problem is that in these environments, where the only obsession is the old Mass and Trump’s political agenda, there are plenty of people whose age is four times that, but whose brain has stayed that of a fifteen-year-old. And if, instead - both among those who call themselves “traditionalist” and those who call themselves “modernist” - people approached others, especially the young in formation, with a minimum of gentleness and educational ability and a little less ideology, it is obvious that even the youngest clerics would understand and would not curl up into a defensive ball. Instead, we are used to hearing, already in the first year of seminary: “Ah, he’s not mature.” Thank God: he is twenty. But then what are the ten, eleven, eighteen years of seminary (which will keep increasing endlessly) for, if we expect them to knock on our doors already perfect “pastoral experts”?
fr.A.C. and fr.M.P.
Silere non possum