[Question:]{.underline} Was the Pope’s Motu proprio Ecclesiae Unitatem a help for Tradition?
[Answer:]{.underline} This Motu proprio, issued on July 2, 2009 for the 21^st^ anniversary of Pope John Paul II’s Apostolic Letter attempting to declare the so-called “excommunications”, seems to be a well kept secret, a document not publicized in any of the official Catholic media. Yet it is an official document, announced and expected, and promised in general at least in the Pope’s letter of March 10, 2009 to the world’s bishops, in which he attempted to justify to them how he could have granted a unilateral remission of the “excommunications”, without for as much agreeing in substance with the doctrinal arguments of traditional Catholics.
DOCTRINAL DISCUSSIONS
The text of this document is very brief, since the purpose is practical, namely to reestablish the Ecclesia Dei Commission on a different foundation. In this document the Pope accepts what the Society has long stated, namely that the differences between Tradition and the post-conciliar church are of a doctrinal order, and not purely disciplinary, and that consequently there can be no other resolution than a doctrinal one. It is for this reason that he determined in this document that henceforth the Ecclesia Dei Commission will be attached to the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, instead of being a separate entity, indicating thereby that its principal responsibility henceforth will be to treat of doctrinal questions. Here is the text of paragraph #6: “Given that henceforth the questions to be treated with the Society (of Saint Pius X) are essentially doctrinal, I have decided, twenty-one years after the Motu proprio Ecclesia Dei*, and according as I had determined to do, to reestablish the structure of the* Ecclesia Dei Commission, connecting it closely with the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith”.
We cannot but laud this decision, and the determination that all the conclusions of this commission be submitted to his higher judgment, for this is an acknowledgement of the reality and seriousness of our objections to the doctrinal errors of Vatican II. However, we must confess that we cannot expect any real practical results, and this not just because the President of this commission is the Prefect of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, Cardinal Levada, who has shown himself to be no friend to Tradition.
BENEDICT XVI’S PURPOSE
Moreover, the very tone of this Motu proprio tells us that this gesture is not an effort to discover the truth at all, but yet another effort to bring about “unity” through dialogue. The very first paragraph describes the function of the Sovereign Pontiff. One would have thought that this was to teach the unity of the Faith, in whose truth alone salvation can be found. Not so for Pope Benedict XVI: “The successor of the Apostle Peter has the function of watching over the unity of the Church by supporting with all the help necessary the vocations that grace has brought. He is the perpetual and visible principle and the foundation of unity both of the bishops and of the faithful. The first and principal function of the Church is at all times to draw men to God, which is to be helped by [the common witness of the faith of all Christians.” ]{.underline}
The ecumenical inspiration here is quite clear. Traditional Catholics must be drawn to God by a common witness, which our refusal of ecumenism prevents. Without saying it explicitly, he leaves it to be understood that the faith of all Christians is essentially the same, for they agree on the same fundamental truths. This is an aspect of Modernism condemned by St. Pius X in Pascendi, where he describes their false distinction between the primitive formulas, accepted by all Christians, and the secondary formulas or dogmas, that develop according to the consciousness of believers ( 21).
Benedict XVI goes on to explain that it is “by fidelity to this mandate” that John Paul II, after the consecrations, established the Ecclesia Dei Commission. Here is implicitly but clearly stated that the Ecclesia Dei Comission was not established to promote Tradition, but to insert traditional Catholics into the unity of the modern church, or as he himself puts it “to facilitate full ecclesial communion of the priests, seminarians, communities, and individual religious until then joined to the Society founded by Archbishop Lefebvre” ( 2).
Is, then, the effort of Benedict XVI, in reestablishing the Ecclesia Dei Commission as an organ for the discussion of doctrinal questions, for any other purpose than the original foundation by John Paul II? The answer to this question is fundamental. It is given in the following two paragraphs. In 3 he explains the purpose of the Motu proprio on the traditional Mass from two years ago (Summorum pontificum) : “It was with the same purpose of faithfully accomplishing this function [of unity] and of serving the universal communion of the Church, and also its visible manifestation…” In the following paragraph, he goes on to explain that he was “moved by the same desire, indeed, and with the same commitment” that he lifted the excommunications, seeing in them an obstacle to dialogue that he wanted to remove, that the Society’s bishops “might once again find the way to full communion with the Church” ( 4). This goal is once again mentioned in his conclusion, in the final paragraph ( 7): “By this decree, I intend to show my particular paternal solicitude for the ‘Society of Saint Pius X’ that finally it might attain to full communion with the Church”.
It seems that there can be no doubt as to the Pope’s intention in this Motu proprio. It is to bring us into a discussion on doctrinal points, so that we can agree to disagree, or at least agree that they are not of such great importance, that we might experience fraternity with the Church in its path towards the true “humanism” so perfectly described in his encyclical Caritas in veritate, published just a few days before this Motu proprio. The goal of the Ecclesia Dei Commission has not changed at all, but simply its modality of action.
This is confirmed by the fact that there is no mention nor any further place, apparently, in the working of the Ecclesia Dei commission for those communities and priests who have been brought back into the “mainstream” over these past 21 years. Who is to protect and defend them against the bishops? Who is to ensure that they can celebrate the Mass and the sacraments in the traditional rites? Apparently, no longer the Ecclesia Dei commission, for it now only has a doctrinal function. They are to be left entirely to the bishops, having simply as their protection the Motu proprio Summorum pontificum. They are the real victims in this whole affair. Having entrusted themselves into Rome’s hands, they have served Rome’s political purpose to divide and conquer Tradition, and now they are cast to the wolves, the bishops, who have no real interest in their success or survival. Here we see once more a repetition of what Rome has constantly and repeatedly done for over 30 years to those traditional Catholics it has successfully separated from the protection of the Society. When will they learn to stand on questions of principle, of doctrine?
However, this does not mean that the Good Lord, who really is in control, cannot use these discussions, just as he has used the Indults of 1984 and 1988 and the Motu proprio of 2007 and the Ecclesia Dei Commission (and its communities) over the past 21 years despite itself, and just as He has used the lifting of the so-called excommunications of January 21, 2009. If these discussions cannot come to any resolution, they will certainly show that the modernists have no response at all to true Catholic doctrine, so that one day, after the consecration of Russia to the Immaculate Heart of Mary, traditional Catholic doctrine might be finally accepted as the only one that is truly Catholic. It is for all this that our Masses and Rosaries ought to be offered up.
Answered by Father Peter Scott, SSPX.