The Priestly Society of Saint Pius X, also known as the SSPX, revealed on Monday that it plans to consecrate new bishops in July, even if the Holy See does not authorize it to do so. The move could ultimately trigger automatic excommunication for all the bishops who participate in the decades-old split with Rome.
The SSPX exclusively celebrates the traditional Latin Mass and holds several other major doctrinal differences with the Second Vatican Council’s reforms. The sect hasn’t consecrated any bishops since the late 1980s, when its founder, Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre, consecrated four bishops without Rome’s approval. The Vatican opposed the consecration as it violated canon law and excommunicated the bishops. The Vatican also excommunicated Lefebvre.
However, in 2009, Pope Benedict XVI remitted the 1988 excommunications, and the Vatican declared that the SSPX exists in a state of “institutional irregularity” or “imperfect communion” with the Holy See, citing a lack of recognized canonical structure. Doctrinal disagreements between Rome and the SSPX currently prevent the Holy See from granting such a structure.
The SSPX reportedly has over 700 priests and a total of 600,000 members worldwide. The organization stated on Monday that its leader, Superior General Father Davide Pagliarani, requested a meeting with Pope Leo last summer to present the current situation within the SSPX, including its need for additional bishops.
The statement from the society said, “After having long matured his reflection in prayer, and having received from the Holy See, in recent days, a letter which does not in any way respond to our requests, Father Pagliarani, in harmony with the unanimous advice of his Council.”
According to a report from The National Catholic Register:
The SSPX has only two serving bishops: Bishop Bernard Fellay, 67, a former superior general of the Society, and Bishop Alfonso de Galarreta, 69. The Society expelled Bishop Richard Williamson in 2012 for persistent disobedience and open opposition to the superiors and their policy toward Rome. He died last year at age 84. Bishop Bernard Tissier de Mallerais died in 2024 at age 79. Consecrating new bishops will allow the Society to ordain priests in the years ahead as the remaining two bishops approach retirement.
One has to wonder whether the SSPX and the Vatican will ever reach an agreement, given the apparent disdain many of Rome’s bishops show toward the Traditional Latin Mass and traditional Catholics. For example, Bishop Michael Martin of the Diocese of Charlotte imposed heavy restrictions on the TLM, allowing it only in one location in Mooresville, South Carolina.
Progressive Catholics, both laity and leadership, seem to do everything in their power to alienate traditional Catholics, almost turning them into villains who supposedly want to hold the Church back. They are right. Traditional Catholics do indeed want to keep the Church from evolving when that evolution abandons established traditions and doctrines in favor of modernism.
Bishop James Martin, for example, fully embraces the LGBT agenda, despite thousands of years of Church teaching on homosexuality drawn directly from Sacred Scripture. It is no wonder that so many traditional Catholics are turning to the SSPX. When bishops and cardinals vilify the faithful, the Church appears to turn away from the sacred, infallible teachings of Sacred Scripture and the Magisterium.
Father Pagliarani emphasized on Monday that the SSPX prioritizes serving the Church and preserving its traditions, including a reflection from 2024 on the fiftieth anniversary of Archbishop Marcel Lefebvre’s declaration formally setting out the SSPX’s position.
“The Society of Saint Pius X is not primarily seeking its own survival,” Father Pagliarani stated. “It seeks the good of the Universal Church and, for this reason, performs work of the Church, responding to the needs of an unprecedentedly tragic era… Without any spirit of rebellion, bitterness, or resentment, we pursue our work of forming priests, guided by the timeless Magisterium.”
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