A reader writes:
I was a seminarian at the Econe, Switzerland seminary of the Society of St. Pius X (SSPX) in the late 1970s. Richard Williamson was my spiritual director and confessor. He is a very refined and cultured man in a very British way. He plays Beethoven beautifully on the piano. But his political and religious views are very rigid and extreme. He claims to be a defender of THE TRUTH. I cannot see him recanting in any sincere way. He rejects Vatican II and the Novus Ordo Missae and sees the Council and the New Mass as the subversive products of a conspiracy of liberalism, modernism, Freemasonry, and Judaism in the Church.The central tenets of Catholic traditionalism are:
- Antisemitism
- Rejection of Vatican II
- Rejection of the Novus Ordo Missae
- The Catholic Church is the only true church. No salvation outside the Catholic Church.
I do not see how Williamson or the SSPX can be reconciled with the Church.
But they have been reconciled to this Pope. Is it not relevant to ask why?
This article available online at:
http://www.theatlantic.com/daily-dish/archive/2009/02/williamson-and-the-sspx/205975/
