When Resistance Catholics attending SSPX Masses become indifferent and like the 'frog in boiling water', we should likewise ask what the root cause of that is. It's not because they are attending the Traditional Mass and frequenting the sacraments and hearing the almost exclusively edifying sermons (that is still the rule in the SSPX, perhaps not in Germany?). No, it is for the reason you cite for your cause: they lack catechism and zeal... and they have not understood the crisis.
Fr Pivert answers the question "And what do you think are the biggest errors of the society of St. Pius X?" with this succinct response: "The silence. And that's what it is very difficult to understand, because silence is not an error. It is not a fighting error. It's an easier way to fall in error when you do not know it.". Now whether you resist the slide of the SSPX by continuing to attend and voicing your concerns, or by staying at home and depriving yourself of the sacraments, the same void exists, the same silence - unless you actively take measures to educate yourself about the crisis. And this is the answer to this problem, understanding the battle we are in. You can just as well go off the rails with any other Resistance priest as you can with the SSPX. Just look at what has transpired already in the Resistance in less than 15 years...
It is a grave sin to not fulfill your Sunday obligation. It requires a proportionate reason not to do so. Be careful trying to bind consciences. Catholic Tradition does not need more popes making dogmas where they do not exist. Prudential decisions change with circuмstances. Leave it to directors of souls.
Plenus Venter, I am very surprised at your response. May I ask you to consider a few things in counter balance to what you just said?
"The Silence" - When Father Pivert talks about this it means this: That a person goes to a Catholic Mass with the rightful expectation that they will receive instruction through the pulpit on how to understand and resist the errors of the time. Errors mainly of the Novus Ordo religion, but also of the world around us, which the Conciliar Religion has capitulated to. They receive silence instead when going to the SSPX. This silence by the priests is scandalous. The faithful there are slowly suffocated. The sheep are not fed.
So if you are with me so far, answer me this: How can it therefore be good for any Catholic soul to go to such a Mass? You say that if they have catechism and zeal then it's okay. That may be so for grown adults like ourselves with good catechism. But it is not true of children, many women led by emotions and intuition, and other poorly educated people.
Should it all be left then to the father of the family to instruct his wife and children as you imply? Is he not owed some support by the priest in this duty? How can such a situation be good in the long run for families? Is it surely not better for the family to wait even a few months for a visit from a resistance priest who can then help them, and strengthen them in the Faith?
Consider also what message this sends the children. Dad lets them fraternize with children who are pro SSPX. Should he tell them not to? But he has already told them effectively, (by his actions) that they are Catholic. What manner of confusion might this cause in fragile minds of the young!
And you say the two silences are the same. In a way yes, but in another way no. Because you go into an SSPX Mass expecting it to be Catholic, and it is not. It is an unnecessary occasion of sin. At least by staying at home, the faithful soul has the consolation that they have done everything in their power to avoid occasions of sins to their faith. Any right minded Catholic should want to meet their maker in this state, wouldn't you think?
Because what manner of derangement drives a person to want to attend at all costs, a Mass where nobody even understands the fight anymore, including the priest? To "voice their concerns". Will that be effective? How often might they do that? Saying "voice your concerns" sounds tough on paper, but when you work out the practicalities, you realize pretty quickly its a pretext when SSPX Mass attenders say this to us, while calling themselves resistance.
And why does it not work? I will tell you why. Because nobody in the SSPX milieu, including the priest would take that person seriously. The first thing they would quite rightly say is "Well if you like the resistance so much, why don't you go there! You are coming here to the SSPX and our position is reconciliation with Rome" And the person sinks back down into themselves continuing to go for years on end. Getting no encouragement from the mileu around them, and eventually their original experience with resistance clergy gets forgotten, they have no incentive to invite them to say Mass because they are getting Mass already, and they fade out of view.
I have lost count of the number of people I have known since 2012, that talked tough and faded out. Losing interest in the resistance clergy. Maybe logging onto cathinfo or youtube occasionally to get a tickle from a Bishop Williamson sermon, but that's about it. And many of these people were well formed. As the years have gone on, I have become even more hardened on this point watching my friends lose spiritual consciousness like they are taking some kind of anesthetic.
You are right Plenus Venter, that you can go off the rails with a resistance priest. Well this is surely true because so many are ambivalent now on the SSPX! But secondly, there can be all manner of moral issues, and we know this with certain members of the clergy driving faithful away through inconsiderate (to put it very mildly) behavior. Some clergy of ours ought even to be avoided depending on the situation. But this is all relatively rare and in no way applies across the board.
What does apply across the board is the SSPX position which priests within are obliged to comply with, at least through their external actions. So no matter where you go as a lay person, you can be guaranteed the same silence and indifference to the world and modernism. So no, it is not "just as well" that you can go astray with a resistance priest.
Finally, I think we should talk about these circuмstances. For the formation of consciences.
Topic: Interview with Fr. Pivert (Read 14035 times)