Surely you are not unaware of the later Apostolic Visitation of Cardinal Gagnon several years later, who praised the Society, right? Yes, we know the legal difficulties, and the SSPX has been trying to make case to the Roman Authorities that the SSPX will serve the good of the Universal Church; a work in which the Resistance has not been helpful at all, in its deliberate obstruction of all canonical normalization. Even when there are injustices, says St. Thomas, and as the example of St. Athanasius, and more recently St. Padre Pio, shows, they must be patiently borne out of love for the Church with Faith that God will eventually set things right in relations with Rome. Meanwhile, your approach is practically distinguishable from ecclesia-vacantism, as if there is no Catholic Hierarchy anymore. You yourself quote +ABL in all those statements saying, we can't just say it's all finished in Rome etc, Sean, but then you want to treat it as if it is. What we can do is ask for good and friendly Bishops like Bp. Schneider or a Bp. Huonder to visit and favorably report on the Society to the Pope.
Some details of Cardinal Gagnon's Apostolic Visitation: "The 11th of November, exactly 13 years after the first Apostolic Visit of 1974, Cardinal Gagnon and Msgr. Perl arrive in Econe. In a marathon visit till the 9th of December, they visit the 3 European seminaries, chapels, general house, groups of priests, schools, convents, retreat houses, up and down France, Germany, and Switzerland. In the Book of Honor of the seminary of Econe, Cardinal Gagnon writes a testimony of admiration for the work done in the seminary.
On December 8th, Feast of the Immaculate Conception, Cardinal Gagnon assists pontifically at the Mass celebrated by Archbishop Lefebvre during which 27 seminarians make their first engagement in the Society of St. Pius X. Thus, the Holy Father’s hand-picked delegate officially attends a Mass celebrated by a "suspended" bishop who receives members into a "suppressed" society, which "officially" does not exist."
https://sspx.org/en/25-years-of-the-sspx-fr-angles-talk-part-4Also reported on here: "On February 13 Die Welt published Father Schmidberger’s interview with Paul Badde. The veteran Catholic journalist asked whether the Society’s founder, Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre, would not already have reached an agreement with the present Pope, who has made so many conciliatory gestures. Father Schmidberger replied:
Things are not that easy. During the visitation of our work by Cardinal Gagnon in 1987, Archbishop Lefebvre wrote the cardinal a letter and proposed a canonical structure for the Fraternity. At the same time, he made it very clear that current ecuмenism under the banner of religious relativism, religious liberty, the fruit of which is today’s secularism, and collegiality, that completely paralyzes the life of the Church, are unacceptable to us. Alas, even today there are still differences with the reigning Pope when it comes to these issues.
Recalling the uproar in liberal Catholic circles when the Pope lifted the excommunications of the four SSPX bishops in January 2009, Badde asked, “What does the Society offer for reconciliation with the Church?” The answer:
When it is canonically recognized, the Society will bring a large religious potential and great religious strength into the interior of the Church. I see few ecclesiastical communities that have taken up the cause of complete unity between dogmatic theology, spirituality, and liturgy, and that live by it…. Furthermore, the Fraternity will be a great support for the Pope in conquering the latent schism that is present everywhere in Europe due to centrifugal forces.
The journalist pressed the point: since the Pope has risked so much on its behalf, what is the SSPX willing to sacrifice? Father Schmidberger admitted, “We give up our relative freedom that we have used so far for the worldwide expansion of our work and we put it into the hands of the Pope. Anyway, this is not about some diplomatic agreement, but about the welfare of the Church and the salvation of souls.”
From:
https://www.catholicworldreport.com/2012/02/28/so-near-and-yet-so-far/