The first fact to be noted about the position above is that it runs contrary to the spirit informing the entire history of the SSPX. Let us take a brief review of that history to see that such is the case.

It would not seem too difficult to establish that Pope Paul VI had strong Modernist tendencies. Yet the SSPX was canonically erected under the pontificate of Paul VI and was recognized as a pious union from 1970-75. Thus, at least in the mind of the Archbishop, it cannot be wrong, under all circuмstances, to collaborate with a Modernist Pope to the extent of having a canonical structure under him.

The events leading up to 1988 are perhaps even more instructive on this score. When one understands that Archbishop Lefebvre was waiting for signs that he should consecrate bishops and that after receiving two such signs, in the form of Modernist scandals on the part of Rome, he then went to Rome seeking canonical recognition, one should draw the general principle: Modernist scandals, of themselves, are not an obstacle to receiving canonical recognition at the hands of those who have perpetrated those scandals.

At the same time, the Archbishop withdrew his signature to the protocol that was to provide a canonical structure, because he lost trust in those with whom he was negotiating. After the trying ordeal was over, he acknowledged that a greater traditionalism on the part of the Romans—in their doctrine—would provide solid grounds for trust. Thus, for him, evaluating the faith of the Pope was grounds for evaluating the acceptance of canonical recognition—not as to whether it is possible, but rather whether it is prudent. If the Pope can be trusted to allow the SSPX to remain “as is” and exercise its ministry—the “experiment of Tradition”—with sufficient autonomy, then canonical recognition is a good for the Church and should be accepted.

This same line has been followed by the SSPX in its 21st century dealings with the Roman hierarchy. The SSPX has never gone to Rome, asking that the Pope and the hierarchy convert to traditionalism before the possibility of canonical recognition even be considered. It has never demanded a profession of faith by the Pope, a recantation of heresy, a syllabus of errors, or any such. To do so would imply that the SSPX was the superior and the Pope the inferior, that it was a question of the Pope receiving legal recognition from the SSPX rather than the other way around. In short, it would imply a schismatic spirit.

The SSPX has rather only made demands that correspond to its proper position, especially the demand to be left “as is”. It attempted to lay down in the General Chapter of 2012 six conditions—none of which concerned the Pope’s faith—to make sure that it would remain intact and sufficiently autonomous under a hypothetical canonical recognition.

This is not to say that members of the SSPX, even very high up, have not been at times tempted to hold that the true spirit of the Archbishop and so of the SSPX demands that the Pope profess doctrinal traditionalism before there can be any practical recognition. That is, after all, the stance of that loose conglomeration of ex-SSPX priests that goes under the name of “The Resistance” and which has a former SSPX bishop as one of its members.

What is being affirmed here is that the “strict unity of faith before canonical recognition” position has never, at any time, been the official position of the SSPX, neither in the time of the Archbishop nor since his death.

To this day, candidates to major orders in the SSPX must affirm before the Blessed Sacrament the night before their ordination that the Pope is the Pope.

The second principle is that Pope Francis is Pope of the Catholic Church. What this means is that he holds the highest office in an institution established by Our Lord Jesus Christ. As such, he has not decided and cannot decide the finality of that institution. The Church is the Church regardless of his personal feeling about it. This is perhaps a rare instance when it would be proper for him to say, “Who am I to judge?”

Thirdly and finally, the members of the SSPX as well as its faithful are already members of the real society of the Catholic Church over which Pope Francis is the visible head. In other words, they have a real unity with Pope Francis—not with Pope Francis in his ‘personal magisterium’, but with Pope Francis as Pope. They acknowledge him to be the governing head of the Church, they put his picture in their chapels, they mention him by name at Mass and Benediction.

In this article, Fr Paul Robinson addresses the question of whether a Pope must have the faith of a traditionalist for it to be right for the SSPX to receive canonical recognition from him.

This is the theater of the absurd. And Fr. Robinson is its Shakespeare.