Letter of the Three Bishops

When I first heard about them, I found it really hard to believe they were authentic.  It did not seem like something the three bishops would do .. that is, write a joint letter as opposed to individual private letters that would be much less prone to a leak. However, after speaking to some folks who would know, I now believe they are authentic.

It has caused a lot of anxiety among the clergy, not so much in the content, but in the fact that it has become public and has made a spectacle of something so delicate and important.  And, absent any information to the contrary, Bp Williamson will probably get the credit for the leak, assuming the same sort of thing happened as with his “leaked” communication with Bp Fellay last year.

That said, I was moved by Bp Fellay’s justification of moving forward. 

To read your letter, one seriously wonders if you still believe that the visible Church whose seat is at Rome is indeed the Church of Our Lord Jesus Christ, a Church horribly disfigured, to be sure, a planta pedis usque ad verticem capitis, but a Church that in spite of all still has as its head Our Lord Jesus Christ. One gets the impression that you have been so scandalized that you no longer accept that it can still be the true Church. For you, it would seem to be a question whether Benedict XVI is still the legitimate pope. And if he is, there is a question as to whether Jesus Christ can still speak through him. If the pope expresses a legitimate will concerning us which is good and which does not order anything contrary to the commandments of God, have we the right to neglect or to dismiss this will? Otherwise, on what principle do you base your actions? Do you not believe that if Our Lord commands us, He will also give us the means to carry on our work?

In essence, if you don’t believe that Benedict is the pope, you have no horse in this race. If you do, then you must believe that Christ may still speak through him and that he is the Vicar of Christ’s church.  So if the SSPX wants to be successful in its mission to restore the faith, it may best do that using some of the tools that church may provide a canonically recognized Society, while holding firm to the weapons it has always used to combat modernism.  If the “deal” leads to a compromise of the faith, then we need to go where the true faith is, wherever that may be.