Wednesday, May 23, 2007

Interesting letter...

I found this during a search and found it to be interesting. This is a letter from an SSPX priest on his departure. Just gives food for thought on issues within and outside the Church.

Father Marshall Roberts (marriage annulments, legal situation of the SSPX)
Here is an excerpt that is rather weighty:
I do not say that some men of the Church have not done many awful things during the last thirty years. I do not condemn the Society for wanting to preserve Tradition; it is the duty of every Catholic to do so. I exhort you to hold fast to the Faith revealed by God. Do not abandon the fight for the Faith. Yet you or I must never give up part of the Faith in order to preserve another part. The Society always rightly insisted that the Faith is a whole. No part may be sacrificed in this struggle for Tradition. That is why we must admit that the Society has done much good work in the past. However, now that it is changing the Faith to justify its separation from the hierarchy, I cannot remain within it. Let the simple words of the catechism teach you about the true Church. Do not be ruled by fear but by confidence in Christ who promised that the gates of Hell would never prevail against His Church, the Church in hierarchical communion with Rome. You do not have to trust the modernists. Trust the words of Christ and the catechism. His promises to preserve the hierarchy will never fail. Though many bishops or countries have defected in the past, such as in Germany, Greece, or Great Britain, the hierarchy as a whole can never do so. His visible Church built upon Peter is protected by God and so can never be overcome. If anyone preaches to you that the Church is found anywhere else than in the Pope and those visibly united to him, then know him as a heretic and do not believe him. He is one of those whom Christ warns us of, who say that He is to be found in the desert or someplace else. The Church, which is the Mystical Body of Christ, will likewise never be found other than where He said it would: gathered around Peter.


Powerful and great words of witness. When things look bad here, I think that it was "Christ who promised that the gates of Hell would never prevail against His Church". Amen to that.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

This centering prayer thing is so dangerous....

Simon-Peter Vickers-Buckley said...

Quite right, it is not Christian, it is Buddhist and antithetical to Christian spirituality however they dress it up: it's purpose is to centre on self.