A Catholic’s Dubia for the SSPX

The SSPX has been in the news recently, given their announcement that they plan to consecrate bishops without papal approval. This, of course, raises the question of whether such consecrations are justified and what, if anything, Rome should do in response. Related questions are whether Catholics should attend Mass at SSPX chapels and, more fundamentally, whether SSPX priests should be celebrating Mass in the first place. Very intelligent and holy people have disagreed on how to answer these questions.  

Rather than attempt to answer these questions, I would like to frame them by asking more questions. I think the answers to these additional questions bear significantly upon how we answer the prior questions. The problem, though, is that only the members of the SSPX can answer the questions that I want to ask. And I do not have ready access to clerical representatives of the SSPX. Hence, with a sincere desire for clarity, I publish these dubia and ask the leaders of the SSPX for their honest answers and explanations.  

Before giving my dubia, I do want to clarify a few things. I am a Catholic who loves the Traditional Latin Mass and who thinks that it is theologically, liturgically, and evangelically superior to the Mass of Pope Paul VI. But I have never attended an SSPX chapel or conversed with an SSPX priest. In that sense, I am a real outsider who acknowledges his complete ignorance and who is honestly seeking to understand the SSPX. 

Yet my desire to understand the SSPX is not merely speculative but also practical: I have friends and family members who, despite being raised in Novus Ordo parishes, have become faithful attendees at SSPX chapels and have married lifetime members of SSPX chapels. I thus now have in-laws who grew up exclusively attending SSPX Masses, and all indications are that they are intelligent, virtuous people with a strong Christian faith. Consequently, I want to better understand the beliefs and teachings of this group which has now entered the life of my extended family. 

Hence my dubia, or, questions in need of clarification. 

Dubium I: Why does the SSPX stay in irregular canonical communion with Rome when other groups that exclusively celebrate the TLM, such as the Priestly Fraternity of St. Peter and the Institute of Christ the King, currently exist? Why does Rome approve of the FSSP and the ICK but not the SSPX? 

Dubium II: Why did Pope Benedict XVI state, in a letter to all Catholic bishops, that the reason the SSPX “do not legitimately exercise any ministry in the Church…is not, in the end, based on disciplinary but on doctrinal reasons?” What are these doctrinal reasons and “doctrinal questions”?  

Dubium III: Does the SSPX teach that the following are intrinsic evils—i.e., actions which are always and everywhere evil in virtue of their object and which, thus, can never be justified regardless of intention or circumstances: (1) reception of the Eucharist under the species of bread by the laity on the hand, (2) distribution of the Eucharist by a lay extraordinary minister during or outside of Mass? 

Dubium IV: Does the SSPX deny the sacramental validity of the Eucharistic consecration in the Mass of Pope Paul VI? 

Dubium V: Does the SSPX think that priests and laity commit a sin, either due to object or circumstances, by celebrating and assisting at a Mass of Pope Paul VI? 

Dubium VI: Does the SSPX think that Catholics should attend a Mass of Pope Paul VI on a Sunday or holy day of obligation if that is the only Mass which they have access to? 

The first two dubia seek to identify, in a general way, why the SSPX does not have full papal approval. From an outsider’s perspective, the fact that other traditional groups such as the FSSP and ICK are fully approved by the pope suggests that a love for the TLM and all of the traditional liturgical rites is not the issue. So what is the issue? Is it doctrinal, disciplinary, both, or neither? The second dubium identifies Pope Benedict XVI’s answer to these questions. Benedict claimed that doctrine, not discipline, was the reason why he did not approve of a ministry for the SSPX within the Church. 

This was a significant charge by Benedict, since doctrine is what defines Catholicism and unites one Catholic with another. Doctrine refers to truths about faith and morals which are divinely revealed by Christ and handed on and clarified by Scripture and the magisterium. All Catholics are meant to profess the same doctrine, the one universal Catholic faith. We do distinguish between infallible and non-infallible teachings of the magisterium, but even the latter are binding upon the faithful unless there are grave and evident reasons to question such a teaching (see Vatican II’s Lumen Gentium 25 and the CDF’s Donum Veritatis 24-31). 

What unites Roman Catholics and Byzantine Catholics, for example, is doctrine, not discipline. We are all Catholic despite our very different liturgical and ascetical practices. Conversely, Byzantine Catholics are not in full communion with Orthodox churches—with whom they share liturgical and ascetical disciplines—precisely because Orthodox Christians reject aspects of our Catholic doctrine. 

And so dubia III-VI seek to clarify matters of faith and morals and distinguish them from disciplinary issues. These dubiafocus on questions regarding sacramental theology and the morality of liturgical acts. From what I can tell, these are the prominent topics which divide members of the SSPX from the wider Church. 

So, what are the bare minimum doctrinal truths which Catholics must affirm in these areas? What are the bare minimum doctrinal truths which all Catholics—SSPX or otherwise—must agree on? 

It seems to me that all Catholics must affirm the following: (1) lay reception of Communion on the hand and service as an extraordinary minister, while perhaps less fitting, is not evil in itself—its morality depends upon intention or circumstances; (2) the consecration at Novus Ordo Masses is valid; (3) the official prayers and actions of the Novus Ordo Mass, while perhaps less fitting than the TLM, are not intrinsically evil, and so they can be celebrated and assisted in without sin; (4) Catholics must attend Mass on Sundays and holy days so long as they can do so at a Eucharistic liturgy which is approved by the pope and celebrated in a licit and non-sacrilegious manner; failure to do so is a grave sin. 

I am sincerely open to correction, but it is not clear to me how denial of any of the above statements would be consistent with Catholic doctrine. At the same time, one can affirm all of these statements and still have ample room for argument regarding important disciplinary issues. For example, one could argue that, given that reception of Communion on the hand is a less fitting act of reverence toward the Lord, then the Church’s discipline should never permit it, and that the decision to permit it is a prudential error. Such an argument would not in any way contradict the view that lay Communion on the hand is not an intrinsic evil. Analogously, the Roman Rite requires kneeling during the Eucharistic prayer—one could insist upon this discipline without insisting that standing during the Eucharistic prayer (as Byzantine Catholics do) is sinful.  

I want to emphasize that I want all baptized Catholics to be united in professing the one, holy, catholic, and apostolic Faith. In order to do that, we need to share certain doctrinal commitments, including commitments regarding the nature of the sacraments and the moral character of liturgical acts. My hope and prayer is that the SSPX share the above commitments with me. And if they don’t, I humbly ask them to explain why.