Schismatic-in-Chief: No Rush To Reconcile

Enjoy the mitre to your heart's delight -- but he's still excommunicated.

More from the noteworthy January press briefing with SSPX Superior-General Bernard Fellay:

Journalist: Did you set a date line with Rome?

Bishop Fellay: We are working on it. I cannot say it already exists. The only thing I can say is that precisely Rome would like to go fast, and it seems to us that we cannot go that fast....

In our circles we – in quotation marks – "do not trust" Rome and it takes quite something to overcome this mistrust, to take stocks of the present situation to see what did move, what changed, in which direction it is heading. And all this takes time".

Here comes some more Econe-style docility:

With the Roman authorities, I concluded saying: "If you want to regain our confidence, words will not suffice, it will require acts. You must regain control. You must condemn what must be condemned, the heresies, the errors. Whether they pertain to the faith, to morals, to discipline, to the liturgy, these acts of condemnation must be known. Now, there must also be positive acts. Catholic life which is presently made impossible in the official Church, the normal, traditional life must be made possible again. And this can be done only by fostering Tradition."

Two millenia of Tradition, or just the 400 years of it which tickles Tridentine ears?

"On Rome’s part, we can feel a desire to settle the problem.... On our part, for once, if I may use this term, we somewhat put on the brakes.

After the conference, to a journalist who privately asked him if he nevertheless foresaw a date for a reconciliation with Rome, Bishop Fellay answered, maybe jokingly: "Yes, in ten years from now."

I've never seen anyone revel in dissent like this. For my part, I'd just love to ask Fellay what Marcellus Wallace looks like.

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