Taken from SSPX.org:


Cardinal Koch on the SSPX

A fair assessment?

2-20-2013



We present here some extracts of a lengthy article by professor of theology, Dr. John Lamont, the entirety of which will be published on the new Angelus Press blog [to be launched shortly].

Dr. John Lamont holds a degree in philosophy from Oxford University and in theology from Ottawa University, both in Canada. He is an honorary fellow in the Faculty of Philosophy and Theology at the Australian Catholic University. Dr. Lamont has taught at the University of Notre Dame Australia and the Catholic Institute of Sydney, where he had the canonical mandate to teach theology from the Sydney Archdiocese.

His article takes Cardinal Koch to task on the dilemma at hand: if Vatican II is really in line with Tradition, why should the SSPX which champions that Tradition not be recognized canonically? We make much of Dr. Lamont's forceful argumentation our own.

Cardinal Kurt Koch, President of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity, recently made the following statements about the theological positions of the SSPX:
It is only the group of Lefebvrists that doesn't accept... ecuмenical dialogue, relations with the Jєωs and religious liberty... One must ask how it can present itself as Catholic...

These are central points of the teaching of the Holy Father, and if [there is] a group that does not accept a council and does not accept a teaching, one must ask how they see each other as Catholic... This is the fundamental problem...

Cardinal Koch has also made a broader criticism of traditionalists as a whole:
The progressives profess a hermeneutics of discontinuity and break. The traditionalists profess a hermeneutics of pure continuity: only that which is already noticeable in the Tradition can be Catholic doctrine, therefore, practically, there cannot be a renewal.
These criticisms of traditionalists are often made. Cardinal Koch's high curial post, and the fact that he was one of the members of the Vatican committee that ruled that the Society's proposed doctrinal preamble was unacceptable, makes it desirable to offer a response to them. As a traditionalist and a theologian myself, although not one affiliated with the SSPX, I will attempt to do so.
(...)
There is a basis... for punishing those who deny authentic magisterial teachings that are not infallibly defined. The crucial question, therefore, is whether or not the positions of the SSPX can be judged to be punishable according to that canon. A clear and accurate evaluation of the Society's positions shows that this is not the case...
(...)

Since neither the SSPX's religious positions nor its claims about the Second Vatican Council are objectionable or subject to canonical penalty, it is unjust to deny canonical regularization to the Society on the basis of them...

(...)
Since Cardinal Koch has a responsibility for promoting Christian unity, it is especially disappointing that he should have opposed the canonical regularization of the SSPX on plainly inadequate grounds...

It is only the group of Lefebvrists that doesn't accept... ecuмenical dialogue, relations with the Jєωs and religious liberty... One must ask how it can present itself as Catholic...

So I guess St. John Chrysostom wasn't Catholic either, eh Cardinal Botch... I mean, Koch?

It's ok if you reject Our Lord Jesus Christ as the Jєωs do, but if you're a Traditional Catholic, you're just terrible. Everything today is upside down!

if Vatican II is really in line with Tradition, why should the SSPX which champions that Tradition not be recognized canonically?

Why would you want to be recognized by them, Bishop Fellay?