We were surprised by "feel" of SSPX chapel

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RoryMcKenzie56 said:
Good answer. I am wondering about this…

Were the priests who left the SSPX (Society of St. Pius X) at the time of the consecrations of the bishops required to reconfess all of the sins that had been allegedly confessed invalidly when they were in the SSPX? When a penitent approaches an FSSP (Society of St. Peter) priest and acknowledges having confessed previously to a SSPX confessor, does the FSSP priest explain that supplied jurisdiction does not apply to the SSPX and require reconfession of all mortal sins confessed to a SSPX priest before giving absolution?

Rory
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Great question. I have a friend who broke from the Society faithful in '88 to follow the FSSP. They had a conference and a layman asked the FSSP priest if they all had to re-confess their sins or make general confessions.The priest said “the Church supplied”. In other words, the Church supplied the jurisdiction so they were valid. No need to re-confess.

Similarly, I know of no priest of Campos Brazil requiring people to re-confess after they were regularized.
 
stevusmagnus said:
Great question. I have a friend who broke from the Society faithful in '88 to follow the FSSP. They had a conference and a layman asked the FSSP priest if they all had to re-confess their sins or make general confessions.The priest said “the Church supplied”. In other words, the Church supplied the jurisdiction so they were valid. No need to re-confess.

Similarly, I know of no priest of Campos Brazil requiring people to re-confess after they were regularized.
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Excellent. I have heard the lay apologists claim that SSPX marriages are invalid too. Doesn’t what the Church does when people return from the SSPX demonstrate beyond all doubt what the Church teaches? If confessions are not reconfessed and marriages ceremonies are not repeated now, what is going to happen when there is an agreement with Rome and the SSPX clergy are regularized and the faithful in the chapels follow in great numbers? Do the lay people who are denying supplied jurisdiction really think that the Church is preparing to teach these millions of souls that they cannot receive communion until they get their marriages validated and reconfess every mortal sin?

This would be a bigger practical obstruction to regularization at this point than Vatican II. No one in the Vatican, nor even any of the liberal bishops who hate the SSPX are sounding a peep about it. Why? They know there is supplied jurisdiction, even if they are stingy enough about God’s grace as to be sorry about it for now. I see no indication that there is the slightest obstruction along these lines. I am nearly certain that the Catholic Church herself, with Pope Benedict’s blessing, is preparing to teach that SSPX priests have supplied jurisdiction now, as we speak.

It will be the same thing that will happen when the Orthodox Russians, who are really schismatic, return to Rome after the conversion of Russia follows the long awaited consecration and triumph of Our Lady’s Immaculate Heart to that great nation. Do the people who are convinced that SSPX confessions are invalid think that all Russian Orthodox who will like to return to Rome will be told that their confessions and marriages are invalid?

Is there an example in history where “supplied jurisdiction” of Sacraments from valid priests was ever denied by the Catholic Church on the occasion of someone’s desire to enter full and regular communion with Rome?

Rory
 
I am so fortunate because my local church (6 min. to get there) is so special. Loving & reverant. Respect for each person. In the last week I have been to confession, Palm Sunday, Holy Thurs where we had washing of the feet, Good Friday today where we had the Litany of the Saints & Reverance of the Cross & a Procession today & on Holy Thurs.
Palm Sunday we all went outside & the palms were blessed & we processed back in.
Also last night (Holy Thurs) the homily was given by our 89 yr old priest & he has such wisdom & he talked to us about the scandals. Very honestly & very reassuring.
We have so many groups & ministries for all ages.
I would hope & pray that all could be in a parish as wonderful as ours.
 
Rory,

The key is that the overriding first rule of Canon Law is the salvation of souls, not their damnation. Especially the '83 Code which is the most liberal the Church has ever had.

If there are any penalties attached to Society confessions (which I don’t believe there are due to necessity) it would be with the priest, not the penitent. The Church is not going to punish the penitent by putting his soul in jeopardy due to a technicality of jurisdiction.

The law SERVES souls, it doesn’t work towards their destruction. The same with the faith. The law serves the faith, not the other way around. If laws serve to destroy the faith or souls they are no laws at all. This is a principle that some well meaning Novus Ordo Catholics simply do not grasp.
 
Is this an agenda driven post? I find it strangely odd that you felt the Church was empty, even though Christ was sacramentally present…CULT??? They are something starts with a C allright…but that word is CATHOLIC
D0UBTFIRE said:
On Palm Sunday we stopped by the local SSPX chapel to see things there firsthand. We didn’t realize the mass was going to take so long compared to the one we regularly attend (we’re just dumb converts lol) so it started at 8:30 and we thought we’d have enough time to leave from there when it finished which we thought would be 9:30 and make it to the 10am mass we go to usually. Anyway, my point is we had to leave early. They really weren’t planning on getting done until 10:30!

Anyway, all we got to see was the priest enter and give announcments and then they started to chant and have people go to the front to get the palms and walk outside for the procession…we had to leave at this point (the announcents took forever and i think they also started late!). So we didn’t actually get to see the mass, which is what we had gone there for in the first place. This might have been the reason why things seemed so strange. BUT…they definitly seemed strange. Now, I wasn’t expecting that at all. I thought it would have been like the TLM that I’ve attended before. I was expecting to like it. But there is something we can’t quite describe about the chapel - it just felt empty. There was an emptiness to it compared to our usual Church and all the other Catholic Churches we’ve ever been to. I don’t mean that there was no one there. They were full of people. And the TLM at the Catholic Church we’ve gone to is usually empty of people (about 20 ppl) but you don’t feel that “emptiness” while your there. Versus this SSPX Chapel was smaller than the church I’m talking about but probably had 100+ people. And I know that even though it is illicit, that the Eucharist is valid, so I’m not saying that I’m thinking that the Real Presence was not there…i have no idea how to describe it though…it was just not what I expected and quite strange. What was even stranger about it is that it reminded me of my Jehovah’s Witness days. It kinda felt cult-like. To me it felt more like a Kingdom Hall than a Catholic Church. Why on earth would that be??? Has anyone had a similar experience? Honestly, I really expected to like it! Granted, I will give it another try on another day that I don’t have to leave early now that I know that mass there will take longer than i expected…
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RoryMcKenzie56 said:
I have heard the lay apologists claim that SSPX marriages are invalid too.
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I’ve often wondered about this. Does this mean the couple doesn’t have to file for an annulment if the “marriage” doesn’t work out?
 
No that is wrong…in the Sacrament of Marriage, the celebrant are the two getting wed to eachother…not the priest. That is why it is possible to have a valid marriage outside of the Catholic Church…unless you are a Catholic who willingly chooses not to…but since the SSPX are validly ordained priest, their marriages ARE valid.
ProVobis said:
I’ve often wondered about this. Does this mean the couple doesn’t have to file for an annulment if the “marriage” doesn’t work out?
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michaeldaniels said:
No that is wrong…in the Sacrament of Marriage, the celebrant are the two getting wed to eachother…not the priest. That is why it is possible to have a valid marriage outside of the Catholic Church…unless you are a Catholic who willingly chooses not to…but since the SSPX are validly ordained priest, their marriages ARE valid.
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I might be mistaken, but I believe that a marriage outside of the Catholic Church requires a dispensation from the bishop, as in the bishop of his geographical diocese, not of some order.

I only wish to ask on this point. I thought that last time SSPX Sacraments came up, Marriage was never one that was in question.
 
stevusmagnus said:
2.) I have no earthly idea what could have possessed an SSPX priest to call THIS an abomination. No clue! He must be crazy! 😉
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Did you notice that they disabled voting and text comments? I don’t think they’d do that if all the responses were good ;).

Personally, I was looking for the negative star rating…
 
michaeldaniels said:
Is this an agenda driven post? I find it strangely odd that you felt the Church was empty, even though Christ was sacramentally present…CULT??? They are something starts with a C allright…but that word is CATHOLIC
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Can’t someone share their feelings without being accused of having an agenda? 🤷
 
pro_multis said:
Wow this is quite an accusation…almost unbelieveable. What church was this at?

BTW…the priest is not constrained by what the choir is saying; he says the canon at his own pace.
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Our Lady of Victory SSPX Chapel, Las Vegas, Nevada.
 
D0UBTFIRE said:
To clarify, I didn’t stay for the whole mass because I had to be at my regular one at 10am. And I HAD to be there because I’m in RCIA and I’m getting baptized on Saturday and our RCIA class meets during the 10am mass.

Someone mentioned something about my religion status saying “unsure”. I don’t know if it was intended but those comments came off very negatively. I didn’t think that it was necesary to explain that when I joined this forum I was in fact unsure about my religion, and that now I’m formally converting to Catholicism and that I simply haven’t bothered to update my profile because I didn’t think of it.

I am a woman. (Someone refered to me as “he” or “him”)

Someone mentioned going somewhere and getting what you expect, but like i said, I expected to like it, I mean really I thought I would love it, and I simply didn’t. Someone else said maybe it had something to do with the fact that I didn’t know anyone there, but I’ve visited many Catholic churches where I don’t know anyone and I haven’t experienced that emptiness.

Perhaps “empty” isn’t a good work to describe it, but I don’t know of a better one. My fiance put it this way: it felt like everyone there was “playing” church, and not actually at church. Really, it had more of a fundamentalist protestant feel to me than anything else. Maybe it was the architecture - I frankly don’t know. I was just curious if anyone had experienced anything similar.
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Thank you for sharing these things with us. It is possible to share one’s stories of ‘particular feelings’, but not to explain them, because in a sense the feeling comes before the explanation: whatever is said about it, the feeling is still there.

Over the years I have attended SSPX, “freelance” TLM (Traditional Latin Mass), “Indult” TLM (with bishop’s permission), ‘reverent’ Novus Ordo and decidedly ‘irreverent’ Novus Ordo. I have found a very wide range of reactions to all these things from different people. What I have just called a “decidedly ‘irreverent’ Novus Ordo” was clearly being well appreciated by some of those there. For others, pain and embarrassment were quite obvious.

As for the SSPX Masses: There is a complete spectrum. I know personally of some people who go to just one SSPX Mass and afterwards never willingly go anywhere else. Apart from the SSPX itself, there are now numerous Religious congregations who accept SPX priests & bishops. One hears of a young person who was overwhelmed after his first Mass, considered a Vocation for the first time that very day, and had entered such a community within 18 months of his first SSPX Mass, leaving a promising Worldly Career. On the other end, I know of a man who was very committed to the TLM. When he persuaded his wife to go, she replied, “it’s like the Mass with everything left out”.

At our SSPX Mass Centre (a converted Anglican Church) I have seen newcomers come in, hang around at the very back, and then leave during the Offertory (when there is a chance to slip out). Nobody knows their intentions, but I would always wish they would at least stay through one whole Mass. When somebody suggests to me that they might come, I usually say, “Go for at least three Masses.”

Back to one’s feelings. Most Catholics who are not used to the SSPX set-up would go there with some hesitation. It does go very much against the grain to put yourself out on a limb like that. In fact, I never pressurise people to go. I have said (on occasion), “It is no small matter to ignore the known requests of the bishop and the Pope. But if you can see the reasons, it is a legitimate response to the Crisis in the Church.”

That mysterious experience called ‘falling in love’ or even ‘infatuation’ can be discussed. Partly the Smitten One is seeing who is really there; partly they are seeing only the reflection of their own love. As the song has it: “Who can explain it? Who can tell you why? Fools give you reasons; wise men never try”. When we attend a ‘different’ religious ceremony, I suppose most of us are on our guard. We need to beware of feelings of disinclination: they might be only a reflection of our own feelings, rather than something that truly comes from the outside.

Peter walked on the water. So long as he was looking at Christ, he walked in safety. But the moment he started looking around him, he sank. I advise people to concentrate on why we go to Mass: it is to be – literally – at Calvary. Our Lord on the Cross can actually see us, and He is consoled. This gift is not given to all, but only to Catholics. It is The Pearl of Great Price. Do not be too put off by the other parishoners; they will be a mixed bunch, and not all of them will be “our type”. In fact, I do rather like the fact that a huge effort is not made where we are to “love-bomb” prospective new members; I am suspicious of ulterior motives if I think that is being tried on me.

Welcome Home to the Catholic Church, D0UBTFIRE. Hilaire Belloc speaks movingly of how She is the natural home and hearth of humanity: “Outside it is night”. I hope you will come to the TLM, and also to try the SSPX again on a day when you are not under pressure, and there is just a “normal” Mass. And: don’t be put off by negative comments of other ‘non-trad’ Catholics. There has been a huge amount of misrepresentation of the Trad. position in general, and of the SSPX, and such people are usually only repeating the distortions they have been fed. I hope you will talk to the SSPX priest there. And I really will have to warn you against “the over-zealous layman” who often hangs around after Mass, buttonholing people with his own version of things. GKChesterton, writing in the 1930s, long before Vatican II or anything else, found such people a barrier to the progress of converts like himself.

Go n-éirí an bóthar leat! Good luck on the road!
 
pnewton said:
I might be mistaken, but I believe that a marriage outside of the Catholic Church requires a dispensation from the bishop, as in the bishop of his geographical diocese, not of some order.

I only wish to ask on this point. I thought that last time SSPX Sacraments came up, Marriage was never one that was in question.
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What I have heard is that the bride and groom, if they decide to be “witnessed” by an SSPX priest, sign a written document affirming that they genuinely feel they are acting under a State of Necessity in not going to a “mainstream” diocesan priest. This ‘regularises’ them under Canons 1321 – 1324, which respects their integrity without demanding the whole SSPX situation be resolved before they are married. These marriages are recognised as valid by the Vatican and therefore would require an annulment if the couple wished to separate.
 
It was Palm Sunday, and the chapel was doing all of the traditional rites. You could have stayed and fulfilled your obligation, and you would have experienced the Pre-VII Palm Sunday way of doing things, as every parish would have done then.

Best Attorney
 
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