The French Resistance forum is reporting that the SSPX house in Montgardin (which depends directly on the General House in Menzingen) is distributing a leaflet declaring that:

"...in 1988, its founder, Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre (1905-1991) consecrated four bishops without the approval of Rome, in order to ensure the continuity of the Catholic priesthood.  For this, he was excommunicated.  It took 21 years for Pope Benedict XVI to declare this 'excommunication' invalid by decree on January 21, 2009."
https://resistance.vraiforum.com/t1538-Excommunications-de-1988-invalides.htm

It is not the first time the SSPX has made this claim.  Three years ago, on FSSPX.news website published (in French) this surprising claim (DeepL translation):

"It was in his capacity as prefect of bishops that Cardinal Re had signed the decree dated January 21, 2009 raising the unjust excommunications which had been brought against the founder of the Fraternity Saint-Pie X, Mgr Marcel Lefebvre ( 1905-1991 ) and the four sacred bishops by him, without forgetting Mgr Antonio de Castro Mayer, co-consecrator bishop of the sacred episcopals of June 30, 1988."
https://fsspx.news/fr/le-sacre-college-nouveau-doyen-54990 

Confused by this claim, I wrote to His Eminence, Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re (i.e., the author of the Jan. 21, 2009 Decree remitting the excommunications of the four SSPX bishops).  A copy of my letter is pasted here:



Four months later, I received the following response from His Eminence (envelope and letter pasted here):





There can be no doubt, therefore, that whatever Menzingen may wish to say on the matter, the 2009 Decree neither "lifted" nor annulled the 1988 "excommunications" of Archbishop Lefebvre and Bishop de Castro Mayer.

As the SSPX surely understands this, the only question is why they are saying otherwise.

Please also post a copy or link to Cardinal Re's 2009 decree for this thread, thanks.

https://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/cbishops/docuмents/rc_con_cbishops_doc_20090121_remissione-scomunica_en.html

Note: CI doesn’t allow the word “docuмents,” so you’ll have to manually type this address into your browser (or simply Google “Cardinal Re January 21 2009 Decree”).

As the SSPX surely understands this, the only question is why they are saying otherwise.

Propaganda.  The whole purpose of the new-sspx's leadership (not the many good priests still there) is to "soften" the layfolk/priests to accept new-rome's deal, when a formal offer is given.  So anything which makes new-rome seem "nicer" and "kinder" to the new-sspx/Tradition will "warm up" the laity to "join the ecuмenical club".  

For the first time in 7 years I heard a sermon last week in which the SSPX priest stated "we are not sedevacantists and that Francis is the pope we say his name and the local bishop in the Mass" blah, blah, blah.....to me it was a sign that an announcement of some kind of deal will be soon.

Is it not interesting all the nonsense that comes out of Rome?  Whenever a priest or bishop, a.k.a, Abp. Lefebvre or Fr. Feeney, does something to buck the system, like telling Protestants and Jews that they must become Catholics, or consecrating bishops to preserve the faith, they get excommunicated by the modernists in Rome.  Bp. Williamson told us in seminary that on the day of the consecrations a car arrived from Rome, requesting that Abp. Lefebvre go to Rome, that the "Holy Father requested his presence."  Think about how ridiculous that is, several thousand people to witness the consecrations, and the old Archbishop is going to get in the car for Rome.  The modernists are so ridiculous as to be laughable!

Nevertheless --

Let's not lose sight of the main issue with the SSPX:

They have changed (past tense)

- not -

"Dare gon' be a deal wif Rome."

The latter? We could be wrong. They could drag it out for years. They could stick to a de-facto, unofficial capitulation on the part of the SSPX, for the next 20 years.

But if the SSPX *has* changed -- for example, their seminary formation has drastically changed (it has!) and keep in mind the SSPX is first and foremost a society for the formation of Traditional priests -- then we're all in trouble. More specifically, we all need to Resist, regardless of our "chances", the numbers in the Resistance, the current state of it, etc. We have no choice but to oppose the Novus Ordo-ing of the SSPX. And it has already begun, and is actually far advanced at this point!

For that matter, most of you are too young to remember the immediate aftermath of Vatican II (and yes I'm a bit cheeky for bringing up this point, since I was born in the mid-70's myself) but at least I learned from books after the fact... Anyhow, my point is: there were plenty of "good" or traditionally-minded priests here and there, at churches here and there, for many years after the Novus Ordo was released. They were formed "the old way", just as many SSPX priests today were formed before 2003, when the big changes started hitting in their seminaries. The % of "good priests" back then might be only slightly less than the % that we see in the SSPX today.

I don't know much about the SSPX, what was their seminary training like before the changes and what is it like now?