SSPX Calgary: Important Clarification re St. Dennis Church
Important Clarification re St. Dennis ChurchSt. Michael's Catholic Church has moved and is now located at 800 - 85th Street SW. The building just off of Bow Trail and 45th Street, formerly known as St. Michael's, has been purchased by the St. Pius X Society and is named St. Dennis Catholic Church. However, St. Dennis is not a Catholic church and the fact that they are identifying themselves as a Catholic church is problematic and confusing for many people.
Historical Context:
I. The Society of St. Pius X (SSPX) was founded by Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre in order to perpetuate the Tridentine Mass. He did not reject Vatican II, or even the reform of the Mass (he voted for the Council document that called for it) but he did reject the current rites, promulgated in 1969, though he did not argue they were invalid. He started a seminary in Ecône, Switzerland, to train priests, which he then ordained. As a bishop who was not an Ordinary (bishop of a diocese) at the time, he was not permitted to ordain priests. Pope Paul VI suspended his priestly faculties, and those he ordained, for defiance of Church law. Time going on, the Lefebvre movement rejected ecumenism and the statements of the Council on religious liberty, as contrary to Tradition.
Within the Traditionalist movement, which is certainly dominated by the Society, other branches developed. For example, the SSPX uses the 1962 Missal, which includes changes made by John XXIII. Some in the movement reject any changes, and thus will use only the Missal from Pius XII's time. Others argue that the See of Peter is vacant since Pius XII (sedevacantists). Others have elected their own popes (there were, at last count, at least 3 antipopes).
In 1989, Archbishop Lefebvre, fearing that he would soon die and leave no one to ordain priests for the SSPX, sought an agreement with the Holy See for the lawful continuation of the Society. After first reaching one, with Cardinal Ratzinger acting for the Pope, Lefebvre reversed himself, and in an act which was ipso facto schismatic consecrated four bishops without a papal mandate and incurred an automatic excommunication, confirmed a few days later by Decree of the Holy See.
2. In these circumstances, some number of seminarians at Ecône and priests of the SSPX, not wanting to go into schism, sought an agreement with Rome, which concluded with the founding of the Priestly (Sacerdotal) Fraternity of St. Peter (FSSP). This immediate erection of the Fraternity by the Holy See, without all the preliminaries of time and formality usually required of time, was a tremendous charity by the Pope toward the former members of the SSPX, who have returned it with loyalty and faithfulness, as well as the devotion to the Tridentine rites which is their proper charism. On the other hand, the SSPX has gotten more strident over time, harboring sedevacantists and others with positions more extreme than Archbishop Lefebvre would have tolerated.
3. On January 21, 2009, the Congregation for Bishops remitted the excommunication of four prelates of the Society of Saint Pius X. The very grave penalty of latae sententiae excommunication, which these bishops incurred on 30 June 1988, was a consequence of their having been illegitimately ordained by Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre.
The remission of the excommunication has freed the four bishops from a very serious canonical penalty, but it has not changed the juridical status of the Society of Saint Pius X, which presently does not enjoy any canonical recognition by the Catholic Church. The four bishops, even though they have been released from excommunication, have no canonical function in the Church and do not licitly exercise any ministry within it.
A full recognition of the Second Vatican Council and the Magisterium of Popes John XXIII, Paul VI, John Paul I, John Paul II and Benedict XVI himself is an indispensable condition for any future recognition of the Society of Saint Pius X.
Practical Consequences:
1. According to Canon 300 - No association may call itself catholic except with the consent of the competent ecclesiastical authority.... St. Dennis Church does not have canonical status within the Roman Catholic Diocese of Calgary.
2. Roman Catholics of the Diocese of Calgary should not attend St. Dennis Church, nor receive sacraments from any priest who is a member of the Society of Saint Pius X unless in dire emergency or danger of death.
3. Roman Catholics of the Diocese of Calgary who wish to worship according to the Tridentine Rite are invited to celebrate the Traditional Latin Mass, approved by the Diocese, at St. Anthony's Parish, 5340 - 4th Street SW Calgary. A priest from the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter has been appointed Associate Pastor of St. Anthony's Parish.
September 21, 2012
Bishop Henry