Mere Tradition with Kennedy Hall

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List of sources consulted in the video:
Definition of a sacrament — Baltimore Catechism; Roman Catechism, Pt. II, ch. 1; Lombard, Sent. IV, dist. 1
Threefold signification — ST III, q. 60, a. 3; Roman Catechism, Pt. II, ch. 1
Seven sacraments defined — Tre…

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Preamble
To begin, it must be put into the public record that this is NOT an attack against Tim Flanders as a person. Tim and I have been friends for a long while, and I owe a debt of gratitude to Tim for helping me get started as a writer and podcaster. He helped me to publish my first two books, and we have recorded a number of shows together. Tim and I have shared zillions of text messages and voice notes over the years, and we have supported each other, as friends do, through personal life traumas and obstacles. I have nothing but respect for Tim as a friend and as a man.
Nevertheless, Tim is a writer, and so am I. We agree on a lot of things, and we disagree on some things. His views are public, and my views are public — which makes our work fair game. So, given that the SSPX is, clearly, very important to me, and the fact that Tim has begun publishing and broadcasting opinions that I believe are incorrect about the SSPX, I have decided to address some of them here. Let it be known that I spoke to Tim and told him I was going to do this before publishing.
In any event, with the preamble out of the way, the majority of this essay will concern what Tim published in his article The SSPX and the Lay Nobility, and a couple of comments will be made about some of Tim’s opinions expressed in recent podcasts.
Also, because Tim and I are so familiar with one another, I have decided to refer to him as simply “Tim” throughout the piece, because calling him Mr. Flanders, or using some other formality, seemed cold to me as I was writing, given our personal relationship. So, I hope the reader understands that by referring to him by his first name, it is, in this case, a sign of respect and fraternal affection.
Where We Agree
Tim says the SSPX confesses dogmas that a great many bishops will not confess. He says the Society defended the right of every Catholic to the Ancient Rite when almost nobody else would. He says that all of us owe a debt to Archbishop Lefebvre for his defence of the Kingship of Christ. He says the Society’s guardianship of the Deposit of Faith and the liturgy is its strength, and that the whole Church should be grateful for it. He says the excommunications of 1988 were disproportionate and did harm.
I agree. I would strengthen the claim about the 1988 affair and add that the excommunications were unjust and invalid when considered in light of Canon Law as it should be understood with the canonical tradition. Also, I tend to agree with a lot of what he says about the topic of the Lay Nobility, as far as it goes, and he makes a number of interesting points about how Catholics used to act in the past. I believe Tim’s greatest strength is his command of Catholic history, and he demonstrates his deep knowledge of Catholic history in the article.
The piece is offered as thirty-seven theses. It accuses the Society of an error against the Church’s teaching on sacramental grace, of a position that “seems schismatic,” of spiritual abuse, and other things.
The charges are serious, so we will assess the charges seriously, and to do so we must put our feelings aside and be objective, even if the response seems severe.
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There is no thesis in the Theses
Tim presents the article as a Thesis, hence the numbering of the assertions.
A Thesis is a form of argumentation wherein the thing itself is offered for disputation. For that to be possible, it must make sense as a whole, and each assertion must be defensible on its own, while also building on the statement that came before. It is a perennial method, and figures like Thomas Aquinas give us the best examples.
Now, when examined, we find that Tim’s Thesis is not really a Thesis, but is instead a collection of assertions that argue different points, some of which build on the previous points, and some of which can be completely stricken from the piece and change nothing about the argument as a whole.
The comment in number twelve about Pico della Mirandola at Lateran V can be deleted, and it has no bearing on his comments on the SSPX. Number twenty-one can be deleted — where he speaks about dioceses reporting criminal priests — and changes nothing. Fifteen can be deleted — wherein he speaks of Rome becoming the seat of the Antichrist — and we have the same result.
The numbering of the assertions is helpful as far as it goes, but the order of most of the assertions is arbitrary, even if there is a loose chronological timeline followed. Perhaps Tim sees this all making sense in his own mind, and perhaps he should write a lengthy treatise on how the issue of the Lay Nobility applies to the SSPX controversy, but whatever that argument could be, it is not evident that the two topics have much, if anything, to do with one another.
Now, the numbering is consistent with the method of the scholastic form, but the presentation is not consistent with that method. At one point in the piece, Tim asserts that the SSPX demonstrates an imperfect imitation of true Scholasticism, but that is precisely what his piece does.
Also, the piece is essentially two essays stapled together. Theses eleven through twenty-two argue that the exclusion of the lay nobility from Church governance is the root of the modern crisis. This is not proven or even argued throughout, but merely asserted. I will have to disagree with him and go with Pope Saint Pius X, who, after receiving a magnificent corpus of work from his predecessors, distilled for us the true root of the Crisis, which is Modernism.
Again, perhaps there are causal links in Tim’s mind, but they are not demonstrated. As I said earlier, I believe Tim’s greatest strength is as a historian, but a historian does not a theologian or philosopher make.
Theses twenty-three through thirty-four argue that the SSPX errs about sacramental grace, among other accusations. Neither half needs the other.
The first half could be removed, and nothing would change in the second, and vice versa. No premise in the one does any work in the other.
The Humility Provisos Don’t Match the Content
Tim opens by quoting St. John Climacus: “the man whose desire in conversation is to establish his own opinion — even though what he says is true — is sick with the devil’s disease.”
This is a great quote, but it is not a teaching of the Church. What I mean is that, in the opinion of this particular saint, and in the context it is uttered, I am sure it is a very useful maxim to live by. Certainly, in our personal lives, it is a good thing to keep our mouths shut, even if we know the other person is wrong. Nevertheless, the Bible tells us, “But sanctify the Lord Christ in your hearts, being ready always to satisfy every one that asketh you a reason of that hope which is in you,” (1 Peter 3:15).
Of course, it would be absurd to argue that following Saint Peter’s instruction would make us sick with the Devil’s disease. Imagine a scenario wherein an atheist challenges you on your beliefs, and you respond to what he has said with the truth. You would not be sick with the Devil’s disease for establishing your opinion — the true opinion — in that conversation.
And Tim gives us this maxim immediately before trying to establish his opinion over dozens of short paragraphs. I do not believe Tim is sick with the Devil’s disease — I just believe he is using a useful quote for personal spiritual growth in the wrong context. If that quote were a maxim applicable in a general sense, then the entire paradigm of Catholic apologetics and preaching would have to cease, which would be absurd.
Tim begins with that disclaimer, and ends the piece with another disclaimer about how his opinion is worthless, and in between the two we find: an accusation of doctrinal error against a religious society, a charge of schism, a charge of spiritual abuse, a call for public recantation, a verdict that a beatified pope broke with Tradition, a verdict that a canonized pope broke with it twice, the claim that the papacy has been corrupted by Freemasonry since 1773, the claim that Rome became the seat of Antichrist in 1870, and two flat declarations about why God punished Christendom.
Again, I do not doubt Tim’s sincerity or question his motives; nevertheless, I do believe the humility disclaimers function as a sort of defence mechanism: if Tim is challenged, the response can be, “my opinions are worthless anyway,” and if Tim’s words are not challenged, then they stand as severe assertions and accusations on their own. If Tim truly believed his opinions were worthless, then he would not have spent so much time trying to argue them.
There is a related problem with his second assertion, which is consequential for the rest of the piece. The lay nobility, he says, may not adjudicate quaestiones disputatae; it may only recognize dogmas.
Very well. Nonetheless, Tim then proceeds to adjudicate a number of disputed questions.
At thesis twenty-six he writes: “It is beyond the competence of the lay nobility to dispute about a responsum from the Holy Office.” However, while there is truth to this statement, it does not apply to the context wherein we find the statement. The effect is that the reader is dismayed from disagreeing with Tim’s adjudication, but his use of the Holy Office responses — which are not cited or presented — is incorrect, as will be seen below.
In essence, the rule binds the reader but not the author. This is not acceptable practice for a Thesis.
Thesis twenty-six is structurally vital for his accusations about the SSPX. Theses thirty-three and thirty-four depend on it explicitly. Here is twenty-six:
“They [SSPX] erroneously assert that a doubtful faith in a priest creates a doubtful intention for the validity of the Sacrament. This opinion has been explicitly excluded in responsa by the holy Office before Vatican II.”
Nothing is cited or presented, only asserted. He says “responsa,” in the plural, so we should have a number of responses. The footnote goes to an article about the 1988 consecrations. On the single claim that the entire prescriptive half of his essay rests upon, the reader is asked to accept an unverifiable appeal to an unnamed document — by an author who has just informed him that he lacks the competence to dispute it.
He also cites no SSPX text. He attributes a position, and then he refutes the attribution.
There are a number of statements from Lefebvre and the SSPX which would caution Tim against making his assertion.
What the Archbishop actually said
In his sermon at the consecrations on 30 June 1988, Archbishop Lefebvre asked from whom his seminarians would receive the sacrament of Holy Orders — from conciliar bishops, who, because of their doubtful intentions, confer doubtful sacraments.
Now, Archbishop Lefebvre expressed his doubt in the validity of sacramental functions in the post-conciliar period, and he stated that a doubtful intention could lead to doubtful sacraments. Of course, this is manifestly true, as will be seen below. In any event, Lefebvre did not say that because the post-conciliar bishops lacked faith that their actions would be invalid. He spoke of intention, which is one of the three pillars of sacramental validity.
On this topic, the Archbishop said in 1986: “I cannot say, myself, that for all sacraments in the Conciliar Church, these three conditions [of validity] are never met. I don’t think we can say that.” And he said: “But I think with new priests, with priests who no longer have Catholic intentions, they don’t know what the proper intention is, the intention of the Church, so that perhaps the validity of their sacraments is at least doubtful.”
Perhaps. At least doubtful.
Lefebvre expressing qualified doubts about the validity of sacraments in the New Springtime is not the context of the unnamed responses from the Holy Office.
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Doubts About Fact and Laws
A dubium iuris is a doubt of law. It is a doctrinal thesis: that the rite as such, or its ministers as such, are defective. The Society does not argue this.
A dubium facti is a doubt of fact. It is a judgment that in particular cases what actually occurred cannot be verified. The Society does argue this.
These are different maxims; they belong to different categories, and they are governed by different principles.
The principle governing a doubt of fact in sacramental matters is the perennial rule of the moral theologians: in sacramentis tutior pars est eligenda. In the sacraments, the safer course is to be chosen.
This is reflected in the current code of Canon Law. Canon 869 §1 directs that those about whose baptism there is doubt are to be baptized conditionally if, after serious investigation, doubt about the fact or the validity remains.
That there could be defective sacraments — because of form, matter, or intention — is not an invention of the SSPX.
So a responsum settling the speculative question — that a minister’s personal unbelief does not of itself invalidate — tells us nothing whatever about what a bishop ought to do during an immense crisis wherein the whole sacramental order has been tampered with, often in an ad hoc manner.
Tim answers a question of fact with an answer about law and believes he has addressed it.
He refutes a position that the SSPX doesn’t hold. Namely, that a minister’s sin, unbelief, or heresy invalidates. That would be consistent with Donatism, and the SSPX is not Donatist, because it is not a heretical organization.
That a minister’s positively contrary intention invalidates is not Donatism at all.
Council of Trent, Session VII (3 March 1547), Decree on the Sacraments, canons on the sacraments in general, canon 11 states:
Si quis dixerit, in ministris, dum sacramenta conficiunt et conferunt, non requiri intentionem saltem faciendi quod facit Ecclesia: anathema sit.
If anyone says that in ministers, when they effect and confer the sacraments, there is not required at least the intention of doing what the Church does: let him be anathema.
Canon 12, immediately following it states:
Si quis dixerit, ministrum in peccato mortali exsistentem, modo omnia essentialia, quae ad sacramentum conficiendum aut conferendum pertinent, servaverit, non conficere aut conferre sacramentum: anathema sit.
If anyone says that a minister who is in mortal sin, though he observes all the essentials which pertain to effecting or conferring the sacrament, does not effect or confer the sacrament: let him be anathema.
Two details in the Latin of canon 12 are worth consideration.
Modo … servaverit: “Provided he has observed.” It is a conditional clause with the subjunctive. The canon protects the minister in mortal sin on the condition that the essentials were kept. Validity is not guaranteed without qualification; it is an exemption granted within a boundary, and the boundary is omnia essentialia.
Omnia essentialia, quae ad sacramentum conficiendum aut conferendum pertinent: Everything essential pertaining to effecting or conferring. This phrase covers matter, form, and the intention required by the canon immediately preceding. So canon 12 does not sit apart from canon 11, as the preceding canon is presupposed.
Trent gives us an example of the Scholastic method, as the canons are like theses that build off of the preceding one.
After Trent, we have more information from the Holy See that can help us to understand the intention question as it pertains to validity.
In 1690, Alexander VIII had the Holy Office condemn a proposition from Louvain: that baptism is valid when conferred by a minister who performs the whole external rite and form, while resolving interiorly in his own heart, I do not intend what the Church does. The theologian who defended it, Farvacques, appealed to Saint Augustine. Augustine had argued against the Donatists that if the minister’s hidden holiness were required for validity, God would have to signal it somehow; Farvacques extended the same reasoning from hidden holiness to hidden intention. Rome rejected the extension: the minister’s sanctity stands outside the sacrament; his intention does not; and Trent had already numbered it among the essentials. So the Church has formally repudiated the notion that correct external performance is by itself a guarantee of a valid sacrament.
Now, this does not mean that we are in a position to arbitrarily judge internal intentions. Pope Leo XIII added to the debate about how intention could invalidate a sacrament, or even the sacramentality of a given group of priests in the Anglican context.
In Apostolicae Curae, examining Anglican orders in 1896, Leo said that the Church does not judge the mind as interior, but as it is externally manifested. In the case of the Anglicans, the rite itself is the manifestation. Where a rite has been deliberately reshaped so as to exclude what the Church means to do, the required intention is wanting, and no appeal to the private sincerity of the men using it can supply for the defect.
Given what we have read, any appeal to a Donatist-esque reasoning on behalf of the SSPX is incorrect. Nobody in the Society is proposing that we audit the interior life of individual priests, which would be both impossible and forbidden. The argument has always run along Leo’s line: that a rite constructed on a defective account of what the Mass is, administered by men formed on that same account, can manifest something other than what the Church intends — and that where it does, the presumption in its favour weakens.
After Vatican II, we have a completely reformed liturgical system, which engendered widespread, documented abuses that did lead to invalidity in some cases, and the whole affair, especially in the 70s and 80s, was, in a word, a gong show. Lefebvre and his priests responded to said gong show with Catholic principles, which rightly allow us to doubt — not declare as such — the validity of sacraments conferred in the new rites in certain cases.
No error is present in the thinking of the SSPX on this when rightly considered, despite Tim’s claim.
The doubt is not hysteria
In 2020, the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith declared that baptism conferred with the formula “We baptize you” is invalid, and that those so baptized must be baptized again.
Deacon Mark Springer used that formula at St. Anastasia in Troy, Michigan, from 1986 until 1999. Thirteen years with no correction from any oversight.
Fr. Matthew Hood was baptized by him in 1990. His baptism being invalid, so was his confirmation, and so was his ordination. His ordination being invalid, so was every Mass he offered, every confirmation he attempted, every absolution he pronounced, etc. Fr. Zachary Boazman of Oklahoma City discovered the same thing that September.
Baptism is the sacrament any layman, even a pagan, can confer validly in an emergency. A deacon got it wrong for thirteen years as a cleric! If you think these are the only two examples, then you are in outer space. These are merely two examples that we know of. Lefebvre, in his book Open Letter to Confused Catholics, relays what was being told to him by faithful from all over the world. We can say with confidence that there have been innumerable invalid sacraments in the New Springtime. Sometimes it is because of form, sometimes because of matter, and sometimes because of intention.
Lefebvre’s and the SSPX’s ultimate point is: Erroneous formation reliably produces occasions for invalidity through one channel or another, and the man who has it cannot detect it in himself.
And, the background to this debate about improper intention is related to the original instructions from Rome on the New Mass.
The 1969 Institutio Generalis defined the Mass, in article 7, as the cena dominica — a sacred assembly of the People of God gathered under a priest to celebrate the memorial of the Lord.
This definition was contested by men like Lefebvre and Ottaviani, and it was replaced by a definition that included the perennial understanding of the Mass as a sacrifice. Nevertheless, the fact that any document meant to explain the meaning of the New Mass included such a blunder is not arbitrary. The men who formulated that definition must have, as all men must, written what they believed about the Mass. So, we can confidently say that the understanding of the Mass in the New Springtime can at least be called into question, and to do so is not to appeal to mind-reading because it was written down and published, even if quickly retracted. Questioning the intention behind New Rite sacraments is a reasonable position, and having a doubt about those intentions is not an error.
The unnamed responsa from the Holy Office that Tim appeals to address the fact that Catholics ought to presume the validity of sacraments following the logic of Trent, etc. However, they do not address what has happened in the New Springtime, and a response from the Holy Office from long ago cannot be extended into the future to respond to a controversy that did not yet exist.
The Paschal Mystery, and a method that would have condemned Nicaea
Thesis ten runs like this. The SSPX says “Paschal Mystery” is only a minor patristic concept. But paschale sacramentum appears in the pre-55 Holy Saturday. Therefore, the SSPX lacks depth in the Tradition.
The inference is the whole problem. It assumes that a term’s presence in the tradition settles whether a given use of it is orthodox. The Church has never reasoned that way.
The synod of Antioch rejected the word homoousios in 268, because Paul of Samosata had been using it in a way that did not properly express the nature of the consubstantial relation between Father and Son. Fifty-seven years later, Nicaea made the same word the test of orthodoxy, chosen because the Arians could not bring themselves to sign it. A very important theological term was used wrongly in one instance, and rightly in another. Athanasius had to explain as much, at length, to bishops who remembered Antioch and were concerned.
Now apply Tim’s method. On his reasoning, the Fathers at Nicaea were superficial, since homoousios had a bad history and they should not have used it. And the Fathers at Antioch were superficial, since it was a perfectly good Greek word with respectable pedigree and they should not have rejected it. Of course this makes no sense.
What the Society actually argued was never that the phrase is absent from the tradition. It is that the reformers imported a particular theology — among other things, the death-and-resurrection unity taken as the organizing principle of the whole liturgy — and let it absorb the character of the Mass as the propitiatory re-presentation of Calvary. The argument is that the modern usage of the term has used a term found in Tradition in a way that is not consistent with Tradition. This sort of thing has happened with many other terms, like the term Charismatic, in our day, but to question the contemporary usage or inflation of the term is not to question its meaning in Tradition.
Tradition Never Defined
A fundamental accusation in the essay is that the SSPX’s treatment of Tradition is superficial. The essay never once defines Tradition.
Tradition has multiple senses, and it has been categorized accordingly.
To quote Dr. Peter Kwasniewski, who summarizes the issue:
“One of the best twentieth-century textbooks, the Manuale Theologiae Dogmaticae of Jean-Marie Hervé, distinguishes four kinds: dominical, divino-apostolic, humano-apostolic, and ecclesiastical. ‘Dominical tradition’ is that which was established by Christ Himself, such as the indissolubility of marriage and the need for fasting. ‘Divino-apostolic tradition’ comprises that which the Holy Spirit inspired the Apostles to introduce as part of the Church’s constitution, such as the ordination of deacons and the initial determinations of liturgy that would develop, over time, into the families of Eastern and Western rites; ‘humano-apostolic’ refers, in contrast, to that which they themselves deemed fitting to institute as Christ’s representatives, such as determinate periods when Christians should practice fasting and abstinence. Lastly, ‘ecclesiastical tradition’ refers to everything that the Church has instituted or adopted after the time of the Apostles (e.g., the exact duration of the seasons of Advent and Lent, the octaves of Christmas, Easter, and Pentecost, the Rogation Days, and the vestments to be worn by the clergy at the altar).” (The Once and Future Roman Rite, pg. 8)
These distinctions are extremely important.
In Tim’s essay, for Pius IX, Tradition means inviting lay noblemen to a council. For St. Pius X, Tradition means the Habsburg ius exclusivae — the imperial veto over a papal conclave, which was never a right in law, was a tolerated custom, was last exercised against Cardinal Rampolla in 1903, and stands against a millennium of papal legislation forbidding lay interference in elections, from In Nomine Domini in 1059 through Lateran III. Tim asserts that its abolition was a rupture with Tradition.
Tim calls Pius X’s decrees on frequent Communion a liturgical revolution and a break with centuries of Tradition. Those decrees were aimed at Jansenist rigorism. They were framed as a restoration of primitive practice and appeal to Trent’s own stated desire that the faithful communicate at every Mass. In the same document in which he warns the Society against neo-Jansenism, he labels Pius X’s anti-Jansenist reforms as a break with Tradition!
In some of Tim’s public words in podcast form, he has spoken about a “False Spirit of Trent,” although I don’t know what that means. In any event, it would seem that Pius X’s reforms were in keeping with the true spirit of Trent, yet somehow keeping with the true spirit of Trent is… a break with Tradition.
Also, a quick word on this notion that Jansenism has somehow been resurrected in Traditionalism. There is this widespread belief, as far as I can tell from the popular commentary, that the constitutive substance of Jansenism is related to rigorism or legalism. However, this is putting the cart before the horse. The heretical element about Jansenism stems from a debate about the State of Nature of man, and whether the spiritual gifts were owed to him, or freely given. Jansenism grows out of the Baian error about the State of Nature — the claim that the gifts of original integrity were owed to man rather than freely given. The consequence being that the Fall no longer strips a gratuitous elevation but corrupts nature in itself, and from that corrupted anthropology follow the propositions Innocent X condemned in 1653: that grace is irresistible, that freedom is merely freedom from coercion, and that Christ did not die for all.
At any rate, when you look into the debates, they are quite high-brow, and the theological disputes personified by intellects like Pascal’s were very “ivory tower” in spirit. This is not to excuse Jansenism, but only to say that it originated as an elitist movement, and was not a popular movement like Traditionalism after Vatican II.
The Jansenists were not heretics because they preached austerity as such; they were heretics because they preached heresies, some of which find a home in the New Springtime. Even some traditional authors have fallen into the trap of labelling elements of the so-called Traditional Movement “Neo-Jansenist,” which is regrettable, because it doesn’t follow at all. Jansenist authors were vehemently opposed to, among other things, frequent reception of Holy Communion, and they were proponents of liturgical antiquarianism; also, they sought to “purify” the devotional life from things like the Sacred Heart devotion, among others. If the term Neo-Jansenist is used as an accusation, because some writers believe that Traditionalists can fall into a sort of scrupulosity or rigorism, then they are correct about some Trads being rigorist, but are not using the term Jansenism properly.
All Catholics can fall into those spiritual and intellectual traps. Whatever a Neo-Jansenist is — which is not a doctrinal term — it does not pertain to the SSPX as a group; a group that preaches frequent reception of Communion, devotion to the Sacred Heart, and the right for Catholics to reconcile their troubled consciences with the spirit of the law when the letter is used to bring death to souls.
Catholic historian Darrick Taylor gives a good, layman overview of the Jansenist controversy, and my only disagreement with him is that he believes that the accusation that Traditionalists are Jansenist is a fringe accusation that is used by uber-liberals. Unfortunately, Taylor was wrong on that point, as the long-time editor of the traditional Catholic journal OnePeterFive is throwing around the accusation.
We have established that rigorism is NOT the main problem with Jansenism in that it is not unique to Jansenism. That being said, Jansenist rigorism shows up not only in questions of morality, but of law. Without going too deeply into it here, I would recommend the reader consult the Catholic Encyclopedia on the topic of Probabilism. Simply put, it is the perennial wisdom of the approved authors and theologians that when there are disputes about laws — both moral and legal — liberty is owed to the man who makes a decision in good conscience, even if the right answer is not obvious. In essence, we are not supposed to extend the letter of the law beyond a reasonable limit.
As we will see below, Tim charges the SSPX with schism based on a hypothetical about its reluctance to celebrate the Novus Ordo and the fact that the Pope says the Novus Ordo. Tim’s thought experiment, which results in the SSPX being schismatic, is extremely rigorist, in that the concept of schism, which is a moral and legal penalty, is stretched to the point wherein a man, or entire group of priests and faithful, should be considered schismatic based on Tim’s personal interpretation of how schism could manifest in the hypothetical and psychological disposition. This mentality is seriously “rigid” and does not represent the teaching of the Church. Ironically, it is an interpretation of morals and law that would be more consistent with the rigorism of Jansenists, and is not representative of the SSPX in the slightest.
Finally, on the Jansenist theme, while I am not accusing Tim of Neo-Jansenism, there are few public voices who have done more to encourage rigorous fasting protocols more than Tim Flanders, even though the Church does not require them. Tim asks Catholics to be more rigorous in their spiritual disciplines than a century of Popes have.
Respectfully, I think we should cool it with the Neo-Jansenist trope.
Who, exactly, is the Schismatic?
Thesis twenty-six tells us that the layman lacks the competence to dispute a responsum of the Holy Office.
Thesis fifteen asserts, as accomplished historical fact, that in 1870 the city of Rome lost the faith and became the seat of Antichrist — presenting as fulfilled a private revelation whose text the Holy Office condemned in 1923 and whose discussion it had prohibited in 1915. The Holy Office decree of 21 December 1915 prohibited publications concerning the so-called Secret of La Salette. The decree of 9 May 1923 condemned the reprint of Mélanie’s 1879 text outright. Publications concerning the Secret went on the Index.
He invokes the authority of the Holy Office to silence his opponent eleven theses after disregarding it himself.
If the SSPX is schismatic, then what is the following?
That the papacy has been corrupted by Freemasonry since 1773. That Rome became the seat of Antichrist in 1870. That Blessed Pius IX broke with centuries of Tradition. That St. Pius X broke with it twice, once on a matter he calls more significant and spiritually graver than the Novus Ordo. That God destroyed His own liturgy before the Council ever opened.
Every one of those is more radical than anything in the Society’s official positions. The SSPX has never said that Rome is the seat of Antichrist, or that God destroyed the liturgy.
Tim has adopted positions considerably harder than his target’s, and convicted his target of schism, based on accusations that they are in error when they aren’t, while at the same time declaring as established facts things that cannot be concretized as fact, especially by a layman.
Papal Communion Hypothetical
Thesis 27 states: “They officially advocate that a Catholic should never attend even a ‘Reverent Novus Ordo,’ which means they would refuse even the Pope’s own Mass. Therefore they have no real Sacramental communion with the Holy Father.”
A number of things are wrong with this.
First, the SSPX advocates that the faithful do not participate, but attendance for a good reason is another matter. Attendance for things like weddings, funerals, etc. is not condemned, but the faithful are warned to not participate in the New Mass for reasons pertaining to spiritual danger. Now, Tim obviously disagrees that the New Mass can be a danger as such, but the SSPX is not alone in advocating non-participation in the New Mass. Also, it should be known that the words “attend” and “participate” are used equivocally by basically everyone online, but when tested, the SSPX makes the distinction.
In any event, Dr. Kwasniewski devotes considerable ink to why a Catholic can refuse to attend the New Mass, even for Sunday obligation, in good conscience. And, he appeals to numerous works from before Vatican II that were considered standard fare in common theological manuals. I hope Tim does not think Dr. K is also a schismatic.
Second, the notion of a “Reverent Novus Ordo” is a muddled statement, even contradictory, and it does not apply to the positions of the SSPX. The SSPX does question the legitimacy (not validity) of the Novus Ordo not because of liturgical abuses, but because of the theology inherent therein, and the effect that it has on souls and priests who say it. To say that the Novus Ordo can be done reverently in some cases and irreverently in others is imprecise, because it suggests that better music and better vestments, with maybe some Latin thrown in, change what the New Mass imbibes substantially, but this is untrue. The New Mass is the New Mass whether it is done with a reverent aesthetic or posture, and the critique that the SSPX levels at the reform — as do numerous other Traditionalists, even those who don’t support the SSPX — is not about the abuses but about the missal itself. It is undeniable that the backstory of the New Mass is riddled with appeals to Protestants, among other things — and Tim knows this because he was featured in the Mass of the Ages, which demonstrated the history of the liturgical rupture adequately.
Tim may disagree with the stance, but that disagreement does not mean the SSPX is schismatic because, in Tim’s mind, he has imagined a scenario wherein the SSPX would not receive Communion from the Pope during a Novus Ordo. Furthermore, the more likely scenario, if one could ever manifest, is that the bishops or priests of the SSPX would be invited to concelebrate and they would refuse. They would refuse just like FSSP priests who refuse to concelebrate with their local bishops on Holy Thursday.
By Tim’s logic, those FSSP priests are in schism from their local bishop, or at least harbour some sort of crypto-schism, and at least half of the editorial board of OnePeterFive (which includes me) is schismatic in some way.
So, Tim can make declarations about multiple popes being in contradiction to Tradition, and about Rome being the Seat of the Antichrist, and not be in schism, because he would receive Communion at a Novus Ordo celebrated by Pope Leo.
Furthermore, shared Communion as demonstrated by participation in a liturgy is a mode of demonstrating a communion already had, but it does not make communion happen. It is also wrong to say that the SSPX has “no real Sacramental communion with the Holy Father,” because every baptized Catholic belongs to the Church by the same sacrament, and every time Mass is offered, and the Pope is named, that is literally a sacramental function wherein subjection to the Pope is demonstrated publicly during Mass.
In addition, the way Tim phrases the accusation is that because they wouldn’t participate in a New Mass with the Pope, they have no communion. This is illogical, and it would make anyone who has never communed with Pope Leo a schismatic, at least in potential, because they have never had the “real” communion Tim speaks of.
Spiritual Abuse Accusation
Tim accuses the SSPX of spiritual abuse in assertion twenty-eight by referring to an edition of the SSPX prayer book Christian Warfare, which, among other things, lists attending a New Mass in a section devoted to examining one’s conscience.
This accusation confused me, because I have told Tim the history of this book, as he asked me about it years ago. This particular book began as a Christian manual for members of the Third Order of the SSPX, which I belong to, and we all make promises to fulfill our Sunday Obligation at the Traditional Mass. Therefore, failing to do so, by attending a New Mass, would be the breaking of a promise or an oath.
Now, the book has become wildly popular for general readers in recent years, so the later editions no longer have this particular element, precisely because of how people can use it as a weapon against the SSPX, which Tim has done, even though he knows the history.
Furthermore, an examination of conscience is just that, an examination, and there are plenty of things listed in any examination that could be a sin in one context and not in another. For example, virtually every good examination will ask if the penitent has read “bad books,” but obviously certain people must read bad books, or even expose themselves to certain bad situations for good reasons. A police officer may have to chat with prostitutes or enter a bar of ill repute to make an arrest, but he has not sinned like the man who goes there to engage in sinful behaviour.
If we are being honest, and not emotional, the average New Mass is certainly an occasion for sin, which Tim admits, at least implicitly, when he speaks of “wicked clerics” mishandling the Eucharist and doing all sorts of evil things during Mass. All of this happens during the New Mass, and Tim readily admits that it is done by bishops, who he calls “evil wolves in clerical clothing [who] destroy the faith of the little ones by desecrating the Blessed Sacrament.”
There is nothing spiritually abusive about asking Catholics if they attend a liturgy where such things are commonplace, or at least have been commonplace for decades. It would be spiritually abusive not to have penitents look into the matter further.
The SSPX Fails a Test Tim Created
Tim faults the SSPX for not treating Lateran V, the “false spirit of Vatican I,” the Two Swords dogma, the ius exclusivae, lay investiture, and the appointment of bishops.
Silence does not constitute a position. To convert an omission into an error, you must show either (a) that the subject falls within the Society’s stated competence and it has misrepresented it, or (b) that its actual positions logically entail an error concerning it. Tim does neither. He simply notes an absence and calls it a deficiency.
And, the subjects he faults them for omitting are, by his own thesis 2, quaestiones disputatae — precisely the class he says the laity may not adjudicate. A seminary founded for the formation of priests and the preservation of the Roman Rite is not thereby obligated to publish on the Habsburg veto. Every institution is silent on nearly everything. Silence is only a failure where a duty to speak has first been established, and he never establishes one.
The Reconciliation Claim
Assertion 25 states: “nearly EVERY other Latin Mass priestly society has reconciled with Rome, except the SSPX.”
This is historically false. They did not “reconcile.” The FSSP (1988), the ICKSP (1990), and the IBP (2006) were erected as canonically regular institutes, most of them constituted in the wake of 1988 and several of them out of SSPX clergy. The condition of their erection was acceptance of the New Mass’s legitimacy — this has been demonstrated, most recently by Cardinal Fernandez.
Regarding dialogue, Tim states in thesis 23: “the SSPX is wrong to refuse dialogue.” Thesis 24 cites Archbishop Pozzo, whose role and statements exist because of the dialogue. The evidence in 24 falsifies the premise in 23. And the premise is false on the record anyway as the SSPX has dialogued with Roman officials a zillion times, and, recently, after being ignored numerous times, merely refused a single invitation to dialogue with the man who is known for writing theological erotica.
I would also not want to dialogue with Fernandez, and I would also not want Fernandez or Pope Leo to catechize my children, for obvious reasons, which, would likely make me a schismatic in Tim’s estimation, at least according to the essay. However, I guess I could, hypothetically, express my desire to dialogue in the future, and to have Leo catechize my kids and say Mass for us using the Novus Ordo, while I accuse numerous Popes of breaking with Tradition; I could call the bishops of the Church evil and accuse them of sacrilege; I could mislabel a group of priests as spiritually abusive; I could accuse God(!) of destroying his own liturgy, but I would at least not be a schismatic…
I am sorry if I sound snarky, but this is where the logic leads.
Frankly, Tim’s arguments are not really arguments, and they are incoherent at best. Furthermore, the type of schism he has created for the SSPX is in the psychological register, and the majority of the evidence he cites are his own articles, so it is self-referential.
Tim’s logic has placed the majority of Traditionalists at risk of schism, and the essay is untenable and should be retracted.
Kyrie Eleison


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