re sspx schism here is some material by michael davies on the subject of schism in general and archishop lefebvre in particular he wrote it around the first part of the two part article was on the scandalous activities of archbishop weakland in this country but i cut all that and i pared down the rest to what was relevant joe buehler schism and disobedience according to st thomas aquinas schism consists primarily in a refusal of submission to the pope or communion with the members of the church united to him on first sight it would appear that whatever the subjective motivation of the archbishop as discussed above he must be in a state of objective schism as he has refused to submit to the pope on a very grave matter involving his supreme power of jurisdiction however standard catholic textbooks of theology make it clear that while all schisms involve disobedience not all acts of disobedience are schismatic if this were so as was noted at the beginning of this article it would mean that the number of american bishops who are not schismatic would not reach double figures the distinction between disobedience and schism is made very clear in the article on schism in the very authoritative dictionnaire de theologie catholique the article is by father yves congar who is certainly no friend of archbishop lefebvre he explains that schism and disobedience are so similar that they are often confused father congar writes that schism involves a refusal to accept the existence of legitimate authority in the church for example luther s rejection of the papacy father congar explains that the refusal to accept a decision of legitimate authority in a particular instance does not constitute schism but disobedience the catholic encyclopedia explains that for a catholic to be truly schismatic he would have to intend to sever himself from the church as far as in him lies it adds that not every disobedience is schism in order to possess this character it must include besides the transgression of the command of the superiors a denial of their divine right to command not only does mgr lefebvre not deny the divine right of the pope to command but he affirms repeatedly his recognition of the pope s authority and his intention of never breaking away from rome the archbishop made his attitude clear in the july august issue of days we pray for the pope every day nothing has changed with the consecrations last june we are not sedevacantists we recognize in john paul ii the legitimate pope of the catholic church we don t even say that he is a heretical pope we only say that his modernist actions favor heresy intrinsically schismatic the principal argument used by those claiming that mgr lefebvre is in schism is that the consecration of a bishop without a papal mandate is an intrinsically schismatic act a bishop who carries out such a consecration it is claimed becomes ipso facto a schismatic this is not true if such a consecration is an intrinsically schismatic act it would always have involved the penalty of excommunication in the code of canon law the offence was punished only by suspension see canon of the code pope pius xii had raised the penalty to excommunication as a response to the establishment of a schismatic church in china the consecration of these illicit chinese bishops differed radically from the consecrations carried out by mgr lefebvre as the professed intention was to repudiate the authority of the pope that is to deny that he has the right to govern the church and the illicitly consecrated chinese bishops were given a mandate to exercise an apostolic mission neither archbishop lefebvre nor any of the bishops he has consecrated claim that they have powers of jurisdiction they have been consecrated solely for the purpose of ensuring the survival of the society by carrying out ordinations and also to perform confirmations i do not wish to minimize in any way the gravity of the step take by mgr lefebvre the consecration of bishops without a papal mandate is far more serious matter than the ordination of priests as it involves a refusal in practice of the primacy or jurisdiction belonging by divine right to the roman pontiff but the archbishop could argue that the crisis afflicting the church could not be more grave and that grave measures were needed in response it appears to be taken for granted by most of the archbishop s critics that he was excommunicated for the offense of schism and the vatican has certainly been guilty of fostering this impression there is not so much as a modicum of truth in this allegation the new code of canon law includes a section beginning with canon entitled penalties for specific offenses de poenis in singula dicta the first part deals with offenses against religion and the unity of the church de delictis contra religionem et ecclesiae unitatem canon deals with the offense of schism which is evidently together with apostasy and heresy one of the three fundamental offenses against the unity of the church but the archbishop was not excommunicated under the terms of this canon or indeed under any canon involving an offense against religion or the unity of the church the canon cited in his excommunication comes from the third section of penalties for specific offenses which is entitled usurpation of ecclesial functions and offenses in their exercise de munerum ecclesiasticorum usurpatione degue delictis iniis exercendis the canon in question is canon which reads a bishop who consecrates someone bishop and the person who receives such a consecration from a bishop without a pontifical mandate incur an automatic latae sententiae excommunication reserved to the holy see the scandalous attempts to smear archbishop lefebvre with the offense of schism are then contrary to both truth and charity a comparable smear under civil as opposed to ecclesiastical law would certainly justify legal action for libel involving massive damages an accurate parallel would be to state that a man convicted of manslaughter had been convicted of first degree murder i must stress that what i have written here is not the dubious opinion of laymen unversed in the intricacies of canon law canon lawyers without the least shred of sympathy for mgr lefebvre have repudiated the charge of schism made against him as totally untenable father patrick yaldrini dean of the faculty of canon law of the institut catholique in paris noted in the july issue of valeurs actuelles that as i have just explained mgr lefebvre was not excommunicated for schism but for the usurpation of an ecclesiastical function he added that it is not the consecration of a bishop which constitutes schism but the conferral of an apostolic mission upon the illicitly consecrated bishop it is this usurpation of the powers of the sovereign pontiff which proves the intention of establishing a parallel church cardinal rosalio lara president of the pontifical commission for the authentic interpretation of canon law commented on the consecrations in the july issue of la repubblica it would be hard to imagine a more authoritative opinion the cardinal wrote the act of consecrating a bishop without a papal mandate is not in itself a schismatic act in fact the code that deals with offenses is divided into two sections one deals with offenses against religion and the unity of the church and these are apostasy schism and heresy consecrating a bishop with a pontifical mandate is on the contrary an offense against the exercise of a specific ministry for example in the case of the consecrations carried out by the vietnamese archbishop ngo dinh thuc in and although the archbishop was excommunicated he was not considered to have committed a schismatic act because there was no intention of a breach with the church it is not simply unjust but ludicrous to suggest that in consecrating bishops without a papal mandate archbishop lefebvre had the least intent of establishing a schismatic church he is not a schismatic and will never be a schismatic the archbishop considers correctly that the the church is undergoing its worst crisis since the arian heresy and that for the good of the church it was necessary for him to consecrate the four bishops to ensure the future of his society canon law provides for just such a situation and even if one believes that the future of the society could have been guaranteed without these consecrations the fact that the archbishop believed sincerely that it could not means as canon law states clearly that he has not incurred excommunication furthermore while the vatican allows such prelates as archbishop weakland to undermine the faith with impunity it cannot expect catholics to pay the least attention to its sanctions against a great and orthodox archbishop whose entire life has been devoted to the service of the church and the salvation of souls dr eric m de saventhem president of the international una voce association is one of the best informed laymen in the church and he knows the archbishop intimately dr de saventhem like myself has no greater desire than to see a reconciliation between mgr lefebvre and the holy see during the archbishop s lifetime a quotation from a statement by dr de saventhem which was published in the february remnant merits careful study in retrospect the road leading to the consecrations of june appears more paved with grave roman and unfortunately also papal omissions than with lefebvrist obstinancies and from the eyes of an informed public this cannot be hidden by attempting to present the archbishop s act of grave disobedience as an offense against the faith it is said today that mgr lefebvre has an erroneous concept of tradition if this were so cardinal ratzinger could not on behalf of the pope have addressed to the archbishop the following words in his letter of july your ardent desire to safeguard tradition by procuring for it the means to live and prosper testifies to your attachment to the faith of all time the holy father understands your concern and shares it
