Dear Mr. Guimaraes,

In your article Awakening from a False Obedience you say you are telling about how there is resistance to the SSPX agreement with the Vatican because a strong effort is being made to prevent the people from hearing about priests who do not agree and their arguments.

These are your words: “It is really surprising that an organization like SSPX which pretends to be open and honest is systematically preventing their grassroots from knowing what is going on inside their own walls. Their heads have established a draconian embargo over these news reports. Why raise such an obstacle except to lead as many persons possible into accepting an eventual compromise?”

What can I say except you are right! Here is a proof. When a person posted your article on one of the main forums of the SSPX, the topic was immediately locked – that means no one can comment on it. And the moderator posted this picture with the comment:

More of this [circle the wagons], less of that [bird’s eye view]!

Yessiree! Circle the wagons and don’t let anyone inside know the facts or truth. Too dangerous. There might be a reaction! The picture says it all!

     In the Sacred Heart of Jesus and Mary,

     J.J.F.

Dear TIA,

You are right about the conspiracy of silence in SSPX circles! The Gestapo is here and getting tough! Recently, on Angel Queen forum of debates, your last Bird’s Eye View of the News article was immediately removed. It was that article that showed the SSPX priests who were expelled or censured because they object to “interpreting Vatican II in light of tradition.”

The Moderator gave the following excuse:

MODERATOR'S NOTE:

This article has been redacted by AQ [Angel Queen] middle management for the umpteenth time. In order to save as much time as we can for busy AQ readers, we have replaced the original lengthy piece with an image that acts as an executive summary for the "Bird's Eye View of the News" contained therein.

The article was replaced by this photo of a pigeon [at right]. Then the moderator openly threatens the one who “dared” to post the article:

This is going to go over like a load of bricks. I thought you were recently warned not to post this kind of junk.

The moderator says “this article has been redacted by AQ middle management for the umpteenth time.” Truth is, I only saw it once on Angel Queen [the one mentioned by J.J.F. above], and even then it was LOCKED within 45 minutes! Maybe the moderators are receiving so many posts on the subject which they don’t allow to go through that, for them, the article feels like it’s been posted “umpteen times.”

Also, moderators usually just LOCK something they don't want to discuss. This time they actually removed the article. They don’t even want people to see the article. They just want the whole thing to go away... But it won’t!!

The only “junk” I see is this cover-up of the truth.

Keep up the good work.

     JMJ,

     G.J.

TIA,

Thanks to the courageous Fr. Sretenovic for his article on the exorcizing effect of Vatican II.

I enjoyed the metaphor – from infestation, to obsession, to possession. That pretty much describes the process all right.

And if SSPX capitulates – as it seems they will from the things Bishop Fellay has said – what a sad step it will be. The malevolent spirit will rejoice, that is for sure, as it silences another sector of the Catholic clergy and faithful on the errors of Vatican II.

No, not full possession – which is impossible because of the promise Our Lord gave His Church. And not as long as there are some faithful clergy and faithful who will take the position of resistance in its full integrity.

     Thank you Father. Thank you TIA.

     P.H.

Dear TIA,

First, I wish to thank you for posting Fr. Meramo’s beautiful reply to his accusers. Men like Fr. Meramo are rare these days. I hope that all priests and laity associated with the SSPX read his reply carefully, and act as he has.

For those who continue to defer to the cataclysmic “authority” of Bishop Fellay, I wish to express my extreme sorry and bewilderment:

• Is it for convenience and comfort that you cling to this “New SSPX”?
  
  
• Do you now care, or have you ever really cared about the lessons to be learned from those who “stuck it out” in the Novus Ordo?
  
  
• Do you really wish to follow in their footsteps?
  
  
• Do you really believe that all is well now?
  
  
• Are you willing to take a courageous stand like Fr. Meramo?
  
  
• Will you take up your crosses and walk with him to Calvary?

I had expected so much more from you of the SSPX. But no, I see so few of you even acting as if anything has changed. You are falling off the cliff now, and only speaking of how much you are enjoying the cool breeze.

I find a striking parallel between the images of President Obama shaking hands and smiling with our nation’s enemies, and Bishop Fellay smiling and shaking hands with the architects of the Church’s auto-demolition. There exists a similar naive egotism that says: “No one else knows how to solve these problems but me. I know how to make friends of my enemies.” But perhaps I am being too kind.

Regardless of this lamentable outcome, I realize God’s will is being done. There will be no excuses for those who will claim they didn’t know what was happening when their Judas went to collect his silver. All has been made abundantly clear. For this we can be grateful.

I will continue to pray that Our Lord will open the eyes of and ears of SSPX devotees to men like Fr. Meramo. I truly desire the best for those I have know in the SSPX, and count many friends among them. I am just bewildered at their inaction.

     In Jesu et Maria,

     J.S.

Dear TIA,

I write in a state of almost total confusion regarding the recent events in the SSPX. I am hoping that you will kindly drop me a line and offer me your opinion on what course I should take, and pray this request doesn’t put you on the spot. If so, please forgive me.

I was baptized (conditionally) by a dear SSPX priest in [name omitted] in 2005. The nearest true Latin Mass to me is three hours away (although there is now a monthly Motu Mass in my town).

At the time of my baptism, I could not bear the insults offered to Our Lord by the frequently disrespectful Novus Ordo Masses in my home Diocese. The lies and heresy being taught under the RCIA program that I visited a few times made my hair stand on end. I could not in conscience enter a “Church” that behaved as these people claimed it was right. Hence this kind priest brought me into the Catholic Church in the rite of Baptism, before which I read the abjuration of heresy that people raised as Protestants have read for centuries upon being received into the Church. Since 2005 I have not set foot in a Novus Ordo church, until...

Now, with the compromise of Bishop Fellay and his apparent acceptance of the Conciliar Church, I am thrown into total disarray. If the SSPX has accepted Pope Benedict and the Vatican II Council all along, how can they have had the authority to baptize, and absolve, and perform marriages? This acceptance of the lifting of the excommunications – what I believe to be invalid – seems to say that the SSPX has been disobedient, and now they admit it! They are as much as admitting that they should not have been ordaining, baptizing, etc, without faculties. It has made me wonder if I am really in the Church or not!

To add to my quandary, a close friend told me about the Abbé de Nantes, who taught that the present hierarchy is valid, and that the Novus Ordo Mass is valid and licit. He convinced me that I should attend Novus Ordo Masses to fulfill my obligations on Sunday and Holy Days. Yet, when I do this, I can feel my faith being weakened. These Masses are like a little voice in my ear telling me that the old Saints were too extreme, that I should relax and accept everything easily, that too much prayer will make me unbalanced, etc.

Now, I don’t know what to do. Do I go to the local Novus Ordo pastor and ask him to bring me into the Church? To whom may I make a confession? Where do I belong?

Please, any word you may have will be most appreciated as I know all about your devotion to Our Lady, and your love for the Church. I trust you to be objective. But I am losing my ability to figure this out, and don’t know to whom I should go for advice.

     In Jesus and Maria,

     K.M.



TIA responds:

Dear K.M.,

We thank you for the confidence shown to us by opening your soul and telling us your problems of conscience. Be sure that we deeply understand and respect your affliction and we are praying to Our Lady to help you at this difficult crossroads.

We will try to offer the advice you requested. First, let us distinguish the topics you dealt with in order to be clear and make our help more efficient. We believe they can be summarized in the following questions:

1. Does the acceptance of the lifting of the excommunication of the four Bishops change the status of the orders of the SSPX priests? Does it make the Sacraments they administered invalid?
   
   
2. Is the Novus Ordo Mass valid? Is it licit? Should we attend it?
   
   
3. Should I abandon SSPX? Should I go to the Motu proprio Mass?
   
   
4. To whom should I make a confession?

We will address these items one at a time.

1. The lifting of the excommunication and the validity of Sacraments

There are two realities being confused in this issue.

1. One is the power of orders that all validly ordained priests of SSPX received and which never changes throughout their lives. They are priests forever. Therefore, the Sacraments they administered are valid. This – which holds fast for the priests – is certainly true for the Bishops, who received the plenitude of the power of orders.
   
   
2. Another thing is the power of jurisdiction that depends on the Pope and the local Bishop. The SSPX Bishops as well as its priests were deliberately in a state of disobedience to the Pope and the Hierarchy. The Vatican called this situation Schism, and characterized it as being a rupture with the law and discipline of the Church. The SSPX members called it a State of Emergency, and try to justify it as a need to maintain the organization and allow its faithful to receive true Catholic Sacraments in the present day crisis of the Church.

Keeping this distinction in mind, we are able to answer your first question: The lifting of the excommunication of the Bishops does not have anything to do with the power of orders that they or the priests received. Therefore, the Sacraments they administered in the past or will administer in the future are valid.

The discussion about the lifting of the excommunication belongs per se to the realm of the power of jurisdiction, with most serious implications in the realm of the power to teach, as far as the orthodoxy of the Faith is in question.

2. Is the Novus Ordo Mass valid? Is it licit? Should I attend it?

We believe that, generally speaking, the Novus Ordo Mass is valid. One or another Mass can be invalid insofar as either the translation to the vernacular is faulty or the priest omits or changes the correct words of the Consecration, uses incorrect matter, or does not have the intention to consecrate.

Is it licit? In common language the words licit and legitimate are more or less interchangeable.

In TIA vocabulary we use the word licit for moral issues. Accordingly, an action that represents a violation against the Ten Commandments is illicit. Thus, it is illicit for a single man to have sexual relations before marriage; it is illicit for a businessman to falsify his accounts to make a larger profit; it is illicit for a mother to have an abortion, etc.

Legitimate is a word that we reserve for those actions that maintain and develop the past doctrinal and traditional patrimony of the Church. Anyone who preaches these doctrines and maintains the traditional customs of the past is a legitimate heir to our ancestors in the sign of the Faith. Thus, it is illegitimate to preach a doctrine that violates or damages the past Catholic Magisterium. It is illegitimate to promote the past or present enemies of the Church. It is illegitimate to destroy her liturgy, Divine Office, the Rules of her religious Orders, etc.

Based on this, we affirm that the Novus Ordo Mass is illegitimate because it favors Protestantism as much as possible. Doing so, it contradicts the constant teaching of the Church since the Council of Trent that shaped Catholic dogma and liturgy during the 400 years prior to Vatican II.

Should one attend the Novus Ordo? We believe that everyone should avoid attending the New Mass to prevent having his soul polluted with Progressivism and Protestantism.

3. Should I abandon SSPX? Should I go to the Motu proprio Mass?

It is up to you to attend a SSPX Mass or a Motu proprio Mass. Both are valid and legitimate. We have dealt with this issue in answers to other readers. You may read them here and here.

4. To whom should I make a confession?

If you are looking just for the Sacrament, that is, to return to the state of grace, you can make your confession to any validly ordained priest. As long as he says the formula of absolution and you have the purpose to not sin again and you carry out the penance he prescribes, your soul is cleansed from sin.

However, if you are looking for a spiritual director who will orient you not only in that one confession but for a long period, then the answer is a little more complicated.

Indeed, when an impartial observer considers the crisis in the Church that results from the infiltration of Progressivism, in addition to the pedophile and homosexual outbreak in the clergy – which hasn’t spared the traditionalist institutes – he can easily conclude that the strong, solid prestige of the clergy of the time of Pius XII has been smashed to pieces. Today no good Catholic approaches a priest without some degree of caution to check out whether he is infected by some of these scourges. Further, the present day situation of the SSPX – your letter expresses it very well – shows that we can be very badly surprised even by those Bishops/priests we held in the highest esteem. Thus, experience has shown us that to consider all traditionalist priests as living saints does not lead indisputably to good results.

Does this mean that one should not have a spiritual director? No, it does not. It only means that one should be more cautious before adopting a position of unconditional obedience. A respectful analysis of what the priest is counseling us cannot in any way be considered insubordination.

We hope and pray that these lines, written with the sole intent to help on this difficult road you are walking today, will assist you to keep resisting Progressivism inside the Catholic Church.

     Cordially,

     TIA correspondence desk

Dear TIA,

Thank you so much for being faithful, traditional Catholics. You do Holy Mother Church proud.

In Christ and Mary,

     S.C.

Dear TIA,

Your site brilliantly navigates very precarious waters: challenging the sede-vacantists, moderates, and liberals, and clearly supporting the traditionalists who are faithful to the Holy See but dismayed by many of the actions flowing from the “Robber Council” of Vatican II.

My major concern is what more and more people are grasping: the imminent chastisement that will be “ours” because Russia has not been consecrated in the manner requested by Our Lady of Fatima on June 13, 1929 – 80 years ago this June.

I feel, along with many others, that time has just about run out and that Our Lady of Akita’s warning about “fire falling from the sky” in a catastrophe worse than Noah’s flood will be unleashed on the world and very soon.

I have sent numerous petitions to the Holy Father but his agenda and Modernist leanings will not permit this consecration to be made until the 11th hour, if then.

Some Fatima scholars say that the rest of the Third Secret must first be revealed as Our Lady’s honor was defamed by the Vatican’s failure to reveal the Secret in 1960, and even until now, a crucial section is missing: the interpretation of the “vision of the bishop in white” given by the Vatican in 2000.

Please help us keep this matter in the forefront of our minds and hearts with TIA continuing to run articles, as it [Fatima] appears to have been lost in the wake of all the tragedies that the US and the world are now facing.

     In Jesus and Mary,

     R.D.

Follow us

  Awakening from a False Obedience

  Exorcistic Role of Resistance to Progressivism

  Fellay's Decision to Merge Confronted by Intellectual Priest

  The Progressivist Challenge to Fatima

  Rumblings from the SSPX Pews

  My Experience in Angelqueen

  The Blind Hatred of Angelqueen Moderator

  The ‘Anathemas’ of John Grasmeier

  Fascist Infiltration in Angelqueen