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MikeLurie
Guest
Caveat: This is going to be long, so if you don’t like reading, you might want to skip over this thread. As it stands, I had to break it into two separate posts to fit it into the text limit.
I have been studying any and all resources I can find on the Traditional Latin Mass for the past few months, in preparation for the conversion to the Extraordinary Form, but it’s one of those things that you really have to expose yourself to (several times) to really get. Reading about it just isn’t going to fully prepare you for what to expect or what is expected of you.
If anybody is interested in more background on my decision or why I am doing this, you can read the recent thread I started “Trapped in TN”.
So anyway, we made a dry run on Saturday to find the exact location of the church, see how long it takes to get there, parking, etc… We met the parish priest and also a very nice older man that opened the church for us and showed us around. He was a member of the SSPX who lives on Church property for free in return for maintenance services etc…
It’s sort of a wierd situation. The guy is a member of the SSPX, but this particular church is not an SSPX church. It’s a NO church that offers the Tridentine Mass on the 3rd Sunday of every month. So while this guy does maintenance for this Church and is technically a member of the parish, he really doesn’t attend Mass there, he travels to the closest SSPX Church instead.
We got to talking, and he asked me what compelled me to seek out the Tridentine Mass. I told him that my wife and I were seeking something more reverent than the NO Mass we were currently attending in our home town and also explained some of the concerns I have been having about the current state of affairs with the USCCB and liberalism in the church etc… I explained that I was also concerned with the language changes that were made at VII regarding the Consecration and with Eucharistic Ministers distributing the Host etc… Basically all the items that many traditional Catholics are concerned about.
He asked me if I knew about the SSPX, and I told him I did and that my brother was a member of the SSPX. I also told him that my wife and I support the FSSP with monetary donations, and although there isn’t an FSSP church in our area, we do plan on relocating to a place where the FSSP is available to us.
After I explained all of this to him, I could kind of sense that he disapproved of the FSSP. I asked him to explain his stance on this, and he really couldn’t articulate it with anything substantial. He said something to the effect of “the FSSP is in the Pope’s pocket” (whatever that means) and that they are still not in communion with the true teachings of the Universal Church and basically alluded to the fact that anything short of the SSPX is no good…
I didn’t press the issue. As I said, I have experience with my brother being a member of the SSPX, and I have been subject to the “apologetics” employed by members of the SSPX, so I understand how passionate they are about their beliefs and that you probably won’t move them off of any stance they currently hold. So I redirected the conversation to something else.
But it sort of left me with a bad taste in my mouth.
I was under the impression that the bulk of what the SSPX is opposed to is the Novus Ordo’s use of the new Missal, the changes made in the language of the consecration and the overall liberalism that seems to be running rampant in the Church. But I also thought that if I could find a Church that used the 1962 Missal, had proper consecration and adhered to all of the same standards as the SSPX, but was ALSO in full communion with Rome, I would be okay.
Now it seems like even that isn’t good enough.
What does “In the Pope’s pocket” mean? Is it just one of those things that no matter how much an organization adheres to the same teachings as the SSPX, it will never be good enough? It will never be “traditional” enough? I’m starting to wonder if the SSPX isn’t happy unless you are against the Pope. And if that’s the case, then I am even more scared of the SSPX then I was before. Because that would mean that everything they preach is a bunch of nonsense. It would mean that they hide behind the cloak of traditionalism, when what they really want is sedevacantism.
Obviously I don’t want to take one person’s word about these things, so I called my brother when I got home and, much to my surprise, he essentially echoed what this guy was saying. He couldn’t provide any more clarity on why the FSSP is not a good option however and he was about as vague in his explanation as this guy was.
Can somebody please explain to me what problem the SSPX has with the FSSP?
I also want to apologize in advance for starting what could be another “SSPX vs. Novus Ordo” or “SSPX vs. FSSP” thread. The last thing I want to do is start more drama on the subject. I did do a search on the forum to see if this has been addressed yet, but I couldn’t find anything that touched on exactly what I am looking for. So here goes:
I attended my first Tridentine Mass today. Well, not my first ever, but my first in a very long time. I had attended a few Latin Masses about a decade ago when my older brother (SSPX) got married and then again when I visited my brother for the holidays and attended Mass with his family. I was very young back then however and I didn’t really retain anything from the experience other than the basic idea of how it works.I have been studying any and all resources I can find on the Traditional Latin Mass for the past few months, in preparation for the conversion to the Extraordinary Form, but it’s one of those things that you really have to expose yourself to (several times) to really get. Reading about it just isn’t going to fully prepare you for what to expect or what is expected of you.
If anybody is interested in more background on my decision or why I am doing this, you can read the recent thread I started “Trapped in TN”.
So anyway, we made a dry run on Saturday to find the exact location of the church, see how long it takes to get there, parking, etc… We met the parish priest and also a very nice older man that opened the church for us and showed us around. He was a member of the SSPX who lives on Church property for free in return for maintenance services etc…
It’s sort of a wierd situation. The guy is a member of the SSPX, but this particular church is not an SSPX church. It’s a NO church that offers the Tridentine Mass on the 3rd Sunday of every month. So while this guy does maintenance for this Church and is technically a member of the parish, he really doesn’t attend Mass there, he travels to the closest SSPX Church instead.
We got to talking, and he asked me what compelled me to seek out the Tridentine Mass. I told him that my wife and I were seeking something more reverent than the NO Mass we were currently attending in our home town and also explained some of the concerns I have been having about the current state of affairs with the USCCB and liberalism in the church etc… I explained that I was also concerned with the language changes that were made at VII regarding the Consecration and with Eucharistic Ministers distributing the Host etc… Basically all the items that many traditional Catholics are concerned about.
He asked me if I knew about the SSPX, and I told him I did and that my brother was a member of the SSPX. I also told him that my wife and I support the FSSP with monetary donations, and although there isn’t an FSSP church in our area, we do plan on relocating to a place where the FSSP is available to us.
After I explained all of this to him, I could kind of sense that he disapproved of the FSSP. I asked him to explain his stance on this, and he really couldn’t articulate it with anything substantial. He said something to the effect of “the FSSP is in the Pope’s pocket” (whatever that means) and that they are still not in communion with the true teachings of the Universal Church and basically alluded to the fact that anything short of the SSPX is no good…
I didn’t press the issue. As I said, I have experience with my brother being a member of the SSPX, and I have been subject to the “apologetics” employed by members of the SSPX, so I understand how passionate they are about their beliefs and that you probably won’t move them off of any stance they currently hold. So I redirected the conversation to something else.
But it sort of left me with a bad taste in my mouth.
I was under the impression that the bulk of what the SSPX is opposed to is the Novus Ordo’s use of the new Missal, the changes made in the language of the consecration and the overall liberalism that seems to be running rampant in the Church. But I also thought that if I could find a Church that used the 1962 Missal, had proper consecration and adhered to all of the same standards as the SSPX, but was ALSO in full communion with Rome, I would be okay.
Now it seems like even that isn’t good enough.
What does “In the Pope’s pocket” mean? Is it just one of those things that no matter how much an organization adheres to the same teachings as the SSPX, it will never be good enough? It will never be “traditional” enough? I’m starting to wonder if the SSPX isn’t happy unless you are against the Pope. And if that’s the case, then I am even more scared of the SSPX then I was before. Because that would mean that everything they preach is a bunch of nonsense. It would mean that they hide behind the cloak of traditionalism, when what they really want is sedevacantism.
Obviously I don’t want to take one person’s word about these things, so I called my brother when I got home and, much to my surprise, he essentially echoed what this guy was saying. He couldn’t provide any more clarity on why the FSSP is not a good option however and he was about as vague in his explanation as this guy was.
Can somebody please explain to me what problem the SSPX has with the FSSP?