Wow.

Why oh why didn't these bishops rally the support needed to replace Bp Fellay the minute he made it clear he was headed down this disasterous path?   :sad:

The rest of the SSPX members, realizing this meant they were all faced with fracturing the Fraternity if they opposed the liberalism of Bishop Fellay, decided to rally around him, rather than suffer an even bigger split by choosing doctrine.

"To move towards a practical agreement would be to deny our word and our commitments to our priests, our faithful, and Rome in front of everyone.  

This would have hugely negative consequences as intra and ad extra.  

There is no change in the doctrinal point of view from Rome that would justify ours.

On the contrary, the discussions have shown that they will not accept anything in our criticisms.

It would be absurd for us to go in the direction of a practical agreement after the result of the discussions and findings...

Such an approach would show a serious diplomatic weakness on the part of the Fraternity, and indeed more than diplomatic.

It would be a lack of consistency, honesty, and firmness, which would have effects like loss of credibility and [the] moral authority we enjoy.

The mere fact of going down this path will lead us to mistrust and division.

Many superiors and priests have a problem of conscience and will oppose it.

Authority and the very principle of authority will be questioned and undermined...

Accordingly, this is not the time to change the decision of the Chapter of 2006 (no practical agreement without resolving the doctrinal issues), and it is neither right nor prudent to embark on preparing minds otherwise, before we ourselves have the conviction, consensus, and the resolution to change...

For the good of the Society and Tradition, this 'Pandora's Box' must be closed as quickly as possible, to avoid the discredit and demolition of authority, the disputes, dissensions and divisions, perhaps with no return."

-Quoted in Fr. Rioult's "The Impossible Reconciliation," (English language edition), p. 32.

The SSPX is favored by God today because we have the truth. But if a day ever comes when the SSPX compromises, and we no longer fight for the truth, then God will abandon the SSPX and she will be cast out like salt that has lost its savor. As for who will carry on the fight, God can raise up children of Abraham from the very stones...   The SSPX isn't special because we're the SSPX, we're special because we have the truth. God doesn't need the SSPX.

"To move towards a practical agreement would be to deny our word and our commitments to our priests, our faithful, and Rome in front of everyone.  

This would have hugely negative consequences as intra and ad extra.  

There is no change in the doctrinal point of view from Rome that would justify ours.

On the contrary, the discussions have shown that they will not accept anything in our criticisms.

It would be absurd for us to go in the direction of a practical agreement after the result of the discussions and findings...

Such an approach would show a serious diplomatic weakness on the part of the Fraternity, and indeed more than diplomatic.

It would be a lack of consistency, honesty, and firmness, which would have effects like loss of credibility and [the] moral authority we enjoy.

The mere fact of going down this path will lead us to mistrust and division.

Many superiors and priests have a problem of conscience and will oppose it.

Authority and the very principle of authority will be questioned and undermined...

Accordingly, this is not the time to change the decision of the Chapter of 2006 (no practical agreement without resolving the doctrinal issues), and it is neither right nor prudent to embark on preparing minds otherwise, before we ourselves have the conviction, consensus, and the resolution to change...

For the good of the Society and Tradition, this 'Pandora's Box' must be closed as quickly as possible, to avoid the discredit and demolition of authority, the disputes, dissensions and divisions, perhaps with no return."

-Quoted in Fr. Rioult's "The Impossible Reconciliation," (English language edition), p. 32.

Meanwhile, +De Mallerais is more attached to the SSPX than to the purity of Catholic doctrine.

Now do you see why +Lefebvre valued +Williamson so much (as to pick him first)?

Then there was the Chapter.  I cannot give you too many details, since we are bound by confidentiality, but Bishop Fellay himself has already revealed certain things, and some elements were specified in the Final Declaration.  These are the conditions that you already know.  What I can tell you is that Divine Providence helped us during the Chapter clearly and perceptibly.

It went very well, I tell you quite frankly;  we were able to speak calmly, freely, openly;  we were able to address the crucial problems, even though we had to omit other questions that had been on the initial agenda.  We took all the time necessary to debate and we compared points of view, as is fitting among members of the same congregation, of the same army.  That causes no problem;  the Society is not a girls’ school, right?  Then if from time to time there are debates among us, one should not make a big thing out of it either.  Read Cardinal Pie when he supports public debate with the bishops, in France, in the nineteenth century.  He justifies them, he explains why, he says that it is a combat, and so there you have it!  

That is to say, one should not make a tragedy out of it either.  The tragedy would be to abandon the Faith, but it is normal that there are debates on questions of prudential judgment about one thing or another.  There are different aspects, there are temperaments, there are situations….  It is extremely complicated, and one cannot draw a sword to cut the Gordian knot by saying:  “There, I resolve the question in one fell swoop.”  No!  The Chapter took place, as I told you, and I think that we really drew some useful lessons from the trials that we have had, even though it is not perfect, which is another aspect to keep in mind.  In our life, everything happens in imperfect circuмstances;  read the history of the Church!  We must not demand a perfection that is not of this world, but we must have our eyes fixed on the essentials, on what counts;  afterward you can let a lot of things slide.  Don’t you do that in your family life?  Yes, you do that.  Otherwise nothing stands in this world, in this life, and even among us.

Some people worry:  “Oh, yes, but…!”  It is necessary to see the complexity of the problem, of the situation.  And don’t forget that there is also the part played by the passions.  They exist even among us.  All this is to say that in my opinion we must not carp about these questions.  We have to see whether the essentials are there or not.

As I see it, we have truly overcome the crisis, we got through it, and in the way that we were supposed to, especially in the practical measures, thanks to the debates that allowed us to clarify some points face to face, to weigh the arguments well, under all their aspects, to sort through them, to arrive at a more perfect insight and clarity about the situation, which is the good thing about trials if you learn from them.  Based on these extremely important and productive discussions, we have established some conditions that could allow us to envisage hypothetically a canonical normalization ...

Besides, if we think about it, if a pope one day grants us these conditions, he is the one who will be dealing the first blow to the edifice of Vatican Council II and the conciliar Church, for he would be admitting by this very act that the Council contains errors, that we can refuse it, and that a return to Tradition is necessary.  As soon as a Pope takes into consideration these demanding conditions, all but impossible from a human point of view, there would be war in the conciliar Church.  The so-called conciliar Church would be blown up, that is for sure.  And that is why the canonical question is nothing but a little detail in our eyes.  For if a pope decides to grant us the first two points, that means that he is ready to grant us everything, including on the canonical level; and we are of course going to ask for it.