CARTA DEL SANTO PADRE FRANCISCO
CON LA QUE SE CONCEDE LA INDULGENCIA CON OCASIÓN DEL JUBILEO EXTRAORDINARIO DE
LA MISERICORDIA
Una última consideración se
dirige a los fieles que por diversos motivos frecuentan las iglesias donde
celebran los sacerdotes de la Fraternidad de San Pío X. Este Año jubilar de la
Misericordia no excluye a nadie. Desde diversos lugares, algunos hermanos
obispos me han hablado de su buena fe y práctica sacramental, unida, sin
embargo, a la dificultad de vivir una condición pastoralmente difícil. Confío
que en el futuro próximo se puedan encontrar soluciones para recuperar la plena
comunión con los sacerdotes y los superiores de la Fraternidad. Al mismo
tiempo, movido por la exigencia de corresponder al bien de estos fieles, por
una disposición mía establezco que quienes durante el Año Santo de la
Misericordia se acerquen a los sacerdotes de la Fraternidad San Pío X para
celebrar el Sacramento de la Reconciliación, recibirán válida y lícitamente la
absolución de sus pecados.
John Thavis (ex periodista de Catholic News Service para Usa today) comenta que no le sorprendería que lo dispuesto para el "Año de la misericordia" se extienda más allá: "si ello está destinado a mostrar la misericordia de la Iglesia no tendría mucho sentido que tuviera una fecha de vencimiento"
Now, to be serious. Francis has just regularized the Society of Saint Pius X by unilateral decree. That’s right: regularized. Why? Because he has granted its clergy universal power to administer the Sacrament of Confession with no grant of faculties from any local ordinary. Does anyone seriously think that on the day before the Year of Mercy ends, Francis or any Vatican official will direct the SSPX clergy to cease absolving sins at 12:01 am on the next day? That isn’t going to happen. It would be the very sort of Pharisaical legalism Francis is constantly condemning. No, something else is going happen: at the very least, the arrangement for confessions will be made permanent. Any other outcome would be too absurd even for the continuously degenerating farce that is the governance of the Church since Vatican II.
ResponderEliminarMoreover, the decree implicitly regularizes attendance at SSPX Masses, for it can hardly be the case that it will be licit for the faithful to go to Confession at an SSPX chapel but illicit to stay for the Mass, or that one could do both licitly, but only for a year. Are we supposed to believe that the same priests who, according to this decree, can validly and licitly absolve sins during the Year of Mercy can only validly, but not licitly, celebrate Mass at the same time and in the same place? That kind of hairsplitting would make even the Pharisees laugh.
And what of the suspension a divinis that supposedly affects all of the SSPX priests? Are we to infer that Francis has lifted the suspension for one year, but only as to the Sacrament of Confession, not the administration of the other sacraments? And then the “full” suspension will kick in again at 12:01 am on December 8, 2016? When in the history of the Church has there even been a partial suspension of a priest’s suspension, but only for a year? Utter nonsense.
And here’s another thing: the marriages performed by SSPX clergy are likewise implicitly recognized as valid by this decree. Or would the hounds of the Society now suggest that Francis has authorized the absolution of hundreds of thousands of people living continuously out of wedlock? A stealthy implementation of “the Kasper proposal,” perhaps? I don’t think so. Francis simply doesn’t believe the marriages are invalid. Neither does the Vatican, which has never said they are but rather treats them as presumptively valid in annulment proceedings coming to the Vatican on appeal by the party opposing annulment. They just can’t tell us that.