Editorial
Dear friends and benefactors of the Society of Saint Pius X in South Africa, August 2016 In this issue we are happy to provide you with some fundamental texts given by our Superior General, His Lordship Bishop Bernard Fellay. These two docuмents reiterate the fidelity of our superiors and ourSociety to the constant battle for the Faith, for which Archbishop Lefebvre founded the Society of St. Pius X in 1970. The first is the Communiqué to the members of the Society at the conclusion of the meeting of major superiors on June 28 in Switzerland. The second is the public declaration made by Bishop Fellay the following day the priestly ordinations in Ecône. Both reiterate the gravity of the crisis of Faith through which we are living, and explain why it is that the Society cannot and will not compromise
on questions of Faith.


CELEBRATION OF LUTHER
Amongst the many shocking aspects of the deepening crisis of Faith that characterizes the present Papacy, the proposed participation of the Pope in the 500th anniversary
of the Reformation cannot be ignored. It is on the Vigil of All Saints that the Pope will participate in the celebrations organized by the Lutheran World Federation in Sweden, as
an ecuмenical gesture. In fact, it was on October 31, 1517 that Martin Luther nailed his 95 theses to the doors of the collegiate church in Wittenberg.  Shocking, indeed, it is that a Pope would celebrate the act of rebellion that has since divided western Christianity,
and separated so many souls and peoples from the One True Church, its teachings and its Shepherd. Yet more shocking yet is the explanation that Pope Francis gave on
his return flight from Armenia on June 26: “Today Lutherans and Catholics, Protestants, all of us agree on the doctrine of justification. On this point, which is very important, he (Luther) did not err.” It is inconceivable that Francis should affirm that Luther did not err when his
predecessor, Leo X, condemned no fewer than 41 of his errors in his Bull of 1520, with the following censure: “All and each of the above mentioned articles or errors, so to
speak, as set before you, we condemn, disapprove, and entirely reject as respectively heretical, or scandalous, or false, or offensive to pious ears, or seductive of simple minds, and in opposition to Catholic truth” (Db 781).  Moreover, the Council of Trent in its masterful, complete and thorough presentation of the Church's doctrine on justification (Session vi in 1547), condemns in turn and at length Luther's heresies in this regard, such as the corruption and destruction of free will on account of original sin, the passivity of man under the action of grace, the impossibility of merit for good works, that Faith alone
is sufficient to be saved since man is incapable of anything good, that it is impossible to keep the commandments, that it is a sin to fear hell and to look for an eternal reward.

A MEDICINE FOR THE CHURCH?
Furthermore, in his discourse, the Pope continues: “He (Luther) made a medicine for the Church, but then this medicine consolidated into a state of things, into a state of
a discipline, into a way of believing, into a way of doing, into a liturgical way and he wasn`t alone. There was Zwingli, there was Calvin, each one of them different, and
behind them were who? Principles!” The Pope is trying to say that these opportunists followed principles, when in fact they were rebellious men trying to justify themselves.
The so-called principles of Martin Luther are contained in his last pamphlet of March 1545, entitled “Against the Pontificate at Rome, founded by the devil”, in which his
horrendous hatred finds full expression: “The Popes...are a set of desperate, thoroughgoing arch-villains, murderers, traitors, liars and the most utterly debased and
depraved beings on earth...Therefore it would be best for the Emperor and the Estates to leave these abominable, villainous scoundrels and their accursed devil`s crew at
Rome to go headlong to the devil....Therefore he (the Pope) should be seized and his cardinals and all the scoundrelly crew of His Holiness, and their tongues
should be torn from their throats and nailed in a row on the gallows tree, in like manner as they affix their seals in a row to their bulls, though even this would be but slight
punishment for all their blasphemy and idolatry...Whenever I say, `Hallowed be thy
name` I am forced to add, `Cursed, damned, dishonored be the name of the Pope” (Quoted by W.H. Carroll, The Cleaving of Christendom, p. 189). Can such irrational hatred be considered a medicine for the Church, and can such venomous attacks be the foundation
of any true reform of discipline, Faith, morality or liturgy,
as Pope Francis asserts?  Pope Francis goes on to affirm that we must place
ourselves in the context of the time: “We must put ourselves in the story of that time. It`s a story that`s not easy to understand”. Excuse me, but innumerable texts
from the time show that Luther was rebelling against divine authority, revealed truth, morality and hierarchical order. Those who embrace his teachings necessarily do
likewise  


JOINT DECLARATION ON JUSTIFICATION
Pope Francis continues: “That docuмent on justification, I think, is one of the richest ecuмenical docuмents in the world, one in most agreement.” He goes on to affirm that
there are divisions, even among the different Lutheran churches, and that full unity does not exist, and may never exist even until the end of the world.
The docuмent that the Pope refers to is the Joint Declaration of theCatholic Church and
the Lutheran World Federation on the doctrine of Justification of 1998, confirmed by the Official Common Statement of June 11, 1 9 9 9 . T h e s e docuмents contain two contradictory affirmations: firstly that “the teaching of the Lutheran churches presented in this  Declaration does not fall under the condemnations from the Council of Trent” and secondly that “they will seek further common understanding...in order to reach full church communion a unity in diversity” for the consensus is in “basic truths” only. However,
the attempt at an ambiguous compromise was clearly a failure, and the pretense that Lutheran theories no longer fall under the condemnation of Trent is a lie. This is evident from Rome's own response to the Joint Declaration, dated June 25, 1998, which points out some of the unacceptable points of the Joint Declaration. As an example, it establishes that the formula  “Believers are totally righteous...and totally sinners” is incompatible with the renewal and sanctification of the interior man of which the Council of Trent speaks (§1). It likewise points out that the statement that man is purely passive in justification by
grace is incompatible with the t e a c h i n g  o f  Tr e n t  o n  h u m a n cooperation and merit (§3). Hence the conclusion: “Divergences on other points must, on the contrary, be overcome before we can affirm, as is done generically in n. 41 that these p o i n t s n o l o n g e r i n c u r t h e condemnations of the Council of Trent”. (§5). Rome has thus contradicted the Joint Declaration, which itself signed. CAN THERE BE AGREEMENT ON BASIC TRUTHS?
It is consequently disingenuous for anyone to maintain that the Joint Declaration has resolved the doctrinal differences and brought about unity. If it had done so, the
Lutherans would have become Catholic, and would have accepted the magnificently clear and precise decrees of the Council of Trent. The vague affirmation that there is agreement on some “basic truths” in fact resolves nothing, and is much more the admission of disagreement than anything else. In fact, it was Pope Pius XI, in his 1928 encyclical on fostering true religious unity, who condemned under the name of indifferentism the idea that Catholics and non-Catholics could simply agree on some fundamental truths, and then disagree on others. This is what is condemned: “Controversies and long-standing
differences, which today still keep asunder the members of the Christianfamily, must be entirely set aside, and from the residue of doctrines a common form of faith drawn up and proposed for belief, in the profession of which all may not only know but also feel themselves to be brethren” (§7). He goes on to affirm: “It is never lawful to employ in connection with articles of faith the distinction i n v e n t e d  b y  s o m e  b e t w e e n
fundamental and non-fundamental articles, the former to be accepted by all, the latter being left to the free acceptance of the faithful. The supernatural virtue of faith has as its formal motive the authority of God revealing, and this allows of no such distinction.” (§13). He who believes in God must believe in everything He has revealed, and to refuse to do so “would be giving countenance to a false Christianity quite alien to the one Church of Christ. Shall we commit the iniquity of suffering the truth, the truth revealed by God, to be made a subject for compromise?” (§9). There could not be a clearer condemnation of Pope Francis' attempt to find common ground with Lutherans, to pretend that they now escape the decrees of Trent, and to celebrate the anniversary of such a bitter opponent of the truth as Martin Luther. Here we are at the heart of the crisis of the Faith that afflicts the post-conciliar church. It is a practical denial of the supernatural, of revelation, of the sacraments, and of the work of sanctification by grace.
Let us remember that it is the Blessed Virgin Mary who is the great protector of the entire supernatural order, “the surest and easiest means for uniting all persons with Christ” (St. Pius X), “the most powerful Mediatrix and Conciliatrix of the whole world” (Pius IX), which is why “she is impervious to all errors and with even greater reason to heresies and apostasy”, to use the expression of Archbishop Lefebvre (Spiritual Journey p. 57). Let our
response be one of fidelity to the Rosary Crusade, to our daily Rosary and sacrifices, with a special effort to do the five first Saturdays, as Our Lady of Fatima requested them, namely Confession (within 8 days), Holy Communion, recitation of the Rosary and a 15 minute meditation on the Rosary on five consecutive First Saturdays of the month.
Yours faithfully in the Immaculate
Heart of Mary,
Father Peter R. Scott