Matt Gaspers: Amen. Thank you, Your Excellency. All right, you just recently published a new statement last week entitled The Core Question Regarding the Priestly Society of Saint Pius X, and that was published by our mutual friend Diane Montagna on her Substack. It’s also available on The Remnant website, as I saw over the weekend.
In this statement, you pose what I believe is really the central question that must be addressed by the authorities in Rome, something that has been going on for decades now. This is the question that you pose:
“Why is the unconditional acceptance of the text of Vatican II presented as a conditio sine qua non for full communion with the Holy See, while no comparable requirement exists with respect to the pastoral, disciplinary, or non-definitive teachings of the preceding twenty ecumenical councils?”
As you may recall, when we spoke last year, just a few days after Pope Leo XIV’s election, I mentioned to you his exhortation to the cardinals at that time to, quote, “renew with him their complete commitment to the path that the universal Church has now followed for decades in the wake of the Second Vatican Council.”
My first question is, why is it, do you think, that he and so many others in the hierarchy insist on following this path that has proved to be so disastrous for the Church? And why do they demand this unconditional acceptance of Vatican II as a kind of litmus test for deciding whether or not someone is truly Catholic?
Bishop Schneider: I think there can be different factors as to why they are demanding acceptance of pastoral council affirmations, or even non-definitive teachings, as an absolute requirement to be Catholic, and in this sense, to be in union with the Holy See.
I think there can be different positions among those who require it. I would say first that maybe the Pope, or the past popes who did the same, also Paul VI, all the popes demanded from Archbishop Lefebvre and the Society of Saint Pius X exactly this, to accept the council with all its teachings, maybe only trying to do a kind of hermeneutic or interpretation that would substantially not change the teaching, but simply explain that it is all in continuity with tradition.
In this case, one has to do violence to reason, or as I say, to do an exercise of mental acrobatics.
I think that the popes from Paul VI up to the current Pope, and I hope this is so, had good intentions and good will. As it says in Latin, bona fide, with a good intention. They are sincerely convinced that these new teachings are a call of the Holy Spirit. This is a kind of message or illumination of the Holy Spirit to the Church of our day, to go this path with ecumenism, interreligious dialogue, religious freedom, and the new Mass, as a kind of new Pentecost, as John XXIII proclaimed it.
Especially Pope John Paul II stressed that the Second Vatican Council is the greatest grace which God gave to the Church in the twentieth century, and that this is the work of the Holy Spirit. Pope John Paul II was convinced of this and repeated it.
Then, also Pope Francis, with all his so-called reforms, which were very questionable, also doctrinally, was convinced that this is the ultimate development, a natural and coherent development of the teaching of Vatican II. Pope Francis even declared this several times.
In this sense, obviously, Pope Leo continues and understands it in the same way. So I think that this is the interior conviction of these popes, and this conviction is what motivates these demands, both for the Society and for the entire Church, to follow this new way, which they believe is the will of God and the voice of the Holy Spirit.
But objectively, we see that it is a disaster. The fruits are confusion and ambiguity. How can ambiguity be the voice of the Holy Spirit?
Matt Gaspers: Right.
Bishop Schneider: How can there be ambiguity, even ambiguity? No one gives their life for something which is ambiguous.
Matt Gaspers: Yes.
Bishop Schneider: One gives his life for what is crystal clear and true.
Matt Gaspers: Yes.
Bishop Schneider: Without any doubts. For this, I give my life for a Catholic faith which is crystal clear.
Matt Gaspers: Yes.
Bishop Schneider: And so did all past generations for two thousand years. So I think that when we interpret these popes in a positive, benevolent manner, they are bona fide spiritually deceived, but with good intentions, believing that this is the will of God.
At the same time, I will now conclude what I want to say. At the same time, I think a remarkable number of other high-ranking clergy, cardinals, bishops, and so on, no longer truly have the Catholic faith. They want another Church, a half Protestant Church, half adapted to the fashion of the world, or even they have lost the faith entirely.
No longer the Catholic faith, even though they hold the titles of cardinals, bishops, and so on. There is a remarkable number of them over the past sixty years, and they have had influence in the Church as nuncios, influential cardinals, diocesan bishops, and so on.
They have promoted this as well, but with an interior conviction and desire to truly change the Catholic faith, to adapt it completely to the world, and to create a new religion which is relativistic, a kind of syncretism.
So these two attitudes are present. It is difficult to specify who concretely has which attitude. Only God knows. But what we can state is the result, the fruits.
We see a tremendous general confusion, obscurity, and darkness in the Church regarding doctrine, morals, and liturgy.
Matt Gaspers: Right. And I think the analogy of the fruit is so important. It reminds me of our Lord’s words in the Sermon on the Mount about judging a tree by its fruit. A bad tree cannot produce good fruit, and vice versa, a good tree cannot produce bad fruit.
So that is all we have to go by, the fruit that we see as a result of the council, and most of it is not very good, it seems.
And as regards those in the Church, in the hierarchy, who have the intention of wanting to change things, I think it is summed up pretty well by our friend Dr. Taylor Marshall in his book Infiltration. The Church has been infiltrated.
So we definitely need to pray for the Pope to realize that.
I wanted to move on to just recalling the meeting that took place in February between Father Pagliarani, the SSPX Superior General, and Cardinal Fernández, the head of the Vatican’s doctrinal office.
I am sure you recall they met in February after Father Pagliarani announced that the SSPX would be consecrating more bishops, and His Eminence responded by proposing what his office called, quote, “a pathway of specifically theological dialogue, following a precise methodology on issues that have not yet received sufficient clarification, including the distinction between an act of faith and the religious submission of mind and will, as well as the differing degrees of adherence required by various texts of the Second Vatican Ecumenical Council and their interpretation.”
But according to the SSPX, in a communiqué released after the meeting, the Cardinal stated orally that while it would be possible to engage in dialogue about the council, its text could not be corrected.
So if the council documents contain ambiguous statements, and I think it is undeniable that they do, as you and others have demonstrated over the years, why is it that Cardinal Fernández apparently holds that the text cannot be corrected?
Maybe you could give us a couple of examples of historical precedent for conciliar documents being corrected by a future pope or council.
Bishop Schneider: Well, first, I think the statement of Cardinal Fernández that the text cannot be corrected demonstrates the intention of this cardinal and similar churchmen. They elevate a pastoral council or non-definitive teachings to the level, de facto, not de iure, of infallible declarations of the Church.
Only infallible ex cathedra declarations cannot be changed, and he is basically placing it at that same level. Over the last sixty years, those in authority in the Church have treated and understood the Second Vatican Council as a de facto infallible teaching. So, in practice, it cannot be touched, even though formally they say it is not ex cathedra and not definitive, as Paul VI said.
In spite of this, the introduction of the formulation you quoted, concerning the submission of intellect and will even to non-definitive teachings of the Pope and the Magisterium, is excessive. It includes pastoral statements that are not definitive, and I think this expression is wrong.
Unfortunately, this formulation occurs already in the First Vatican Council, where it refers to ex cathedra pronouncements, and ultimately to God who reveals Himself. We must submit our intellect and will to God, who reveals, not to a Pope or bishop who makes non-definitive statements.
I think this is a misuse of the authority that must be given to God alone, and to definitive ex cathedra teachings. There, we must submit our intellect and will. This was a very wrong decision of Paul VI, who, until 1967, introduced this formula in the profession of faith.
Before that, the Church never used this expression or demanded that Catholics submit intellect and will in this way, except in reference to divine revelation itself. Therefore, this may have been a method to force, de facto, all Catholics to accept non-definitive and even ambiguous teachings of Vatican II and subsequent ordinary magisterium.
For example, we are told we must submit our intellect and will to decisions such as Pope Francis allowing divorced and remarried persons to receive Holy Communion, expressed in his letter to the Buenos Aires bishops, later published in the Acta Apostolicae Sedis and called authentic magisterium by the Secretariat of State.
We are also told that Fiducia Supplicans belongs to the so-called ordinary magisterium of the Church, and therefore we must submit our intellect and will. This is impossible. How can we switch off our intellect and accept such decisions?
This is violence against the intellect and an abuse of papal authority and Roman authority in recent decades to force people to “switch off” their intellect.
Here I recall the words of G. K. Chesterton, when he said that upon entering the Church, we are asked to take off our head, not our hat.
Then they say, just apply the hermeneutic of continuity, make a few acrobatics, and everything is fine. This is intellectually not honest. It is an outrage against the intellect.
This was never asked when something is clearly revealed by God and definitively taught by the Church. Then, of course, submission is required. But when it is not definitive, it must be expressed differently, not with such a strong demand as if it were divine revelation.
Matt Gaspers: My understanding, and you can correct me if I am wrong, is that the difference between the act of faith and the religious submission of intellect and will is this:
The act of faith, as I understand it, is based on the theological virtue of faith, which has God as its immediate object. Therefore, it is unconditional because God cannot deceive or be deceived.
But the religious submission, or religious assent, is based not on the theological virtue of faith, but on the moral virtue of obedience to a human superior. Therefore, it is conditional because human authorities are not always infallible. The Pope is infallible only in very narrow circumstances.
Is that a correct understanding?
Bishop Schneider: What is happening when we make an act of faith? What is happening internally? I repeat: what is happening in our interior at the moment we make an act of faith? We must do it with our conscience. We are human beings. We must do it with reason and will.
Matt Gaspers: Yes.
Bishop Schneider: So therefore, when I believe and accept the revealed truth of the authority of God, what is happening interiorly in my soul? I submit my reason to the revealed God. I submit my will. And this is the substance of the act of faith, supernatural faith.
Matt Gaspers: Right.
Bishop Schneider: Yes. And therefore, there must be another expression for obedience or acceptance of the non-definitive or ordinary teachings of the Magisterium, but not such a strong expression, which I repeat, refers to the interior act of faith.
We must believe with our reason and also with our will. We are not simply blind. We do not accept revelation blindly. This would not be in accordance with human nature.
Matt Gaspers: Yes. So actually that brings me to someone who I think is very sincere and wanting to defend the faith, but is also very convinced that Vatican II does not have any problems, Cardinal Gerhard Müller. He gave an interesting interview in Communio magazine in March. I am not sure if you have seen it.
He said, and I will give a couple of quotes and let you respond. He said the Council in its entirety must be accepted by every Catholic. He also went so far as to say that the statements of Nostra Aetate, the Declaration on the Relation of the Church to Non-Christian Religions, are binding like a dogma. That seems like very extreme language to me.
Bishop Schneider: This is wrong. This is not correct. First, it is only a declaration, not even a decree or a constitution. A declaration is the lowest level. Then the Council itself, and Paul VI, declared that the Council did not intend to proclaim anything as dogma of faith or as binding on all Catholics in the sense of definitive teaching.
These are the words of the Secretariat of the Council in 1964, repeated and confirmed by Paul VI on 12 January 1966, almost one month after the conclusion of the Council.
This is evident. I cannot understand it. Cardinal Müller directly contradicts the Council itself and Paul VI.
Matt Gaspers: I mean, it certainly seems to be the case to me as well. And when I read that, and also, if he is saying that the statements in Nostra Aetate are binding like a dogma, how do we reconcile that with what Pope Pius XI taught in Mortalium Animos?
He said that the Apostolic See cannot on any terms take part in non-Catholic assemblies, nor is it lawful for Catholics to support or work for such enterprises, for if they do, they will be giving countenance to a false Christianity quite alien to the one Church of Christ.
That was in reference to ecumenism.
And more generally, regarding the idea of treating all religions as paths to God, which Pope Francis very regrettably said in 2024, Pius XI said that this attitude leads to naturalism and atheism and is tantamount to abandoning the divinely revealed religion.
So my question for Cardinal Müller, and for you as well, is what then are Catholics obliged to hold today? Are we supposed to hold the prohibitions of Pius XI or Vatican II’s exhortations to actively participate in ecumenism and interreligious dialogue?
It is an example of contradiction that the hermeneutic of continuity does not seem sufficient to resolve.
Bishop Schneider: Here it does not work. This is an abuse of the hermeneutic of continuity, an outrage against reason. Simply, it is against reason.
This statement is even against the statement of Paul VI.
Matt Gaspers: Yes.
Bishop Schneider: And against divine revelation itself, and against two thousand years of tradition. Until Vatican II, all the popes and Church Fathers taught that those who are not Catholic must accept the fullness of truth and return to the Church, and that there is only one way of salvation, Christ and His Church, as Christ Himself proclaimed through the apostles.
Even Saint John the Apostle of love wrote that if someone comes with false teaching, you must not even greet him or receive him into your house. This shows how strict the apostles were in avoiding contamination of false doctrine and ambiguity in faith.
So all the Church Fathers, all the popes, with few exceptions such as Honorius I, and John XXII, and then since Vatican II, the popes up to Leo have unfortunately made certain affirmations, thanks be to God, not definitive, but ambiguous and difficult to reconcile with the clarity of the entire two thousand year tradition of the Church.
Matt Gaspers: Yes, yes. So while we are discussing this, I wanted to mention and quote from your new statement again, because you said something very powerful, and it is contrary to the position of Cardinal Müller.
You say that since the Council, with some of the mentioned ambiguous teachings, such as religious freedom, ecumenism, and interreligious dialogue, a process has been underway to establish, with the authority of the Roman Pontiff, a so-called Church of Vatican II, or the conciliar Church.
As I am sure you know, this phrase was used by Archbishop Benelli in his letter to Archbishop Lefebvre, and Lefebvre later used it in reference to Archbishop Benelli’s expression, the conciliar Church.
You say in your statement that this tendency in our day, under the new name of the synodal Church, basically aims to be a relativist religion adapted to the world. As you were mentioning earlier, attempts to disguise this new trend toward an ambiguous, relativistic, and worldly form of the Catholic Church through a hermeneutic of continuity are dishonest and unconvincing.
On that note, there are some who hold that the Council texts are not merely ambiguous or erroneous on certain points, but that they are the founding documents of an entirely new religion. What do you think of that claim?
Bishop Schneider: I would not put it in that way, because the Council texts contain many quotations of past dogmas and traditional teaching. There are many affirmations in the Council texts, in the entire corpus of the Council, and these we can, of course, use.
The Council also made a kind of doctrinal progress in a good sense, in that it stated, though not definitively, that the ordination of deacons has a sacramental character, and that the ordination of bishops also has a sacramental character.
Formally, this was still under discussion, so it was the first time that the universal Magisterium, within a Council, made these statements on the sacramentality of ordination and episcopal consecration. The priestly ordination had already been dogmatized at the Council of Trent, but not specifically that of the diaconate and episcopate, and the Council did this.
I think this is a certain progress in a sense, because already Pius XII prepared it in 1947, when he established in an apostolic constitution the matter and form of the three ordinations, deacon, priest, and bishop. He specified the words and said the matter is the laying on of hands, the imposition of hands.
In this text of Pius XII, it is implicitly expressed that the diaconate and episcopate have a sacramental character, because matter and form refer properly to the sacraments. Then Vatican II made this explicit.
Matt Gaspers: Right.
Bishop Schneider: Not yet, I repeat, not as a dogma or definitive teaching, but as a teaching.
So of course, there are also tendencies in the texts of Vatican II toward naturalism, toward a religion centered on man, anthropocentrism, and a primacy of temporal realities, to the detriment of the primacy of the supernatural life of grace and eternity.
This is the weakness of these tendencies in Vatican II. Of course, there are also texts that speak about eternal life, which is also present, but it is mixed.
In particular, the document Gaudium et Spes is, I would say, a manifesto of naturalism and anthropocentrism.
Matt Gaspers: Right. I think that is the one that then Cardinal Ratzinger, back in the 1980s, or maybe earlier, referred to Gaudium et Spes, Dignitatis Humanae on religious liberty, and Nostra Aetate on non-Christian religions, those three texts as a so-called counter syllabus to the Syllabus of Pius IX in 1864, if I remember correctly.
Bishop Schneider: Yes, and even the famous Cardinal Suenens of Brussels…
Matt Gaspers: Yes.
Bishop Schneider: One of the most liberal cardinals during the Council, and afterwards as well, even stated that Vatican II was the so-called French Revolution inside the Catholic Church.
In some sense, he was correct. It was a revolution that started a process toward naturalism and anthropocentrism, in spite of the presence of some good texts. I repeat, it is a mixture.
But the Church never did this in two thousand years. The Apostles and the Church in the past did not place such stress on anthropocentrism or give primacy to temporal realities. The emphasis was always on the supernatural, on eternity.
Even though the Church in previous councils also made concrete norms of Christian life, behavior, and morality for priests, and even statements about emperors and temporal authorities, these always had a practical and temporal character.
Matt Gaspers: I think I want to read to our viewers something from your book with Diane Montagna, Christus Vincit. You sum it up very well in the chapter on Vatican II.
You say: “The Council was a catalyst for bringing out all that was latent in the Church before it in the modernist movement.”
I think that really sums it up very well.
Bishop Schneider: Yes, and modernism is a very, how to say, masterful system whose essence is relativism. There is nothing stable. This is the essence of modernism.
The essence of modernism is also to avoid definitive statements and instead to formulate things in an ambiguous way, so that different meanings can be promoted, and multiple interpretations can be held with the same value. It is relativism.
Modernism was also inspired partly by Hegelian philosophy, Hegel, who states that what was considered true in the past can be considered false today, and that future generations can produce a synthesis or mixture of these positions.
This way of thinking is very present in the modernist movement. These modernist theologians and bishops, then, I would say, took over during Vatican II.
Therefore, the documents, although thanks to the traditional-minded minority in the Council led by Archbishop Lefebvre, there was a constructive opposition. This is his historical merit: during the Council, he united around 250 bishops to oppose ambiguous or erroneous formulations.
Thanks to the presence of this group, some of the worst formulations were avoided in the Council texts. If this group of bishops had not opposed and corrected them, and had simply accepted everything, we would have even more dangerous texts today.
We must recognize this as a historical fact and a merit of Archbishop Lefebvre during the Council. Afterwards, through his work with the Society of Saint Pius X, time has shown ever more clearly the confusion that followed, and now the current height of confusion.
We must recognize this as part of divine providence. Archbishop Lefebvre will go down in history as a great bishop in a very difficult and confused time.
Even Pope Benedict XVI, in his first audience in 2005 with Bishop Fellay, then Superior General of the Society of Saint Pius X, said that Archbishop Lefebvre was a great bishop. This is a statement attributed to Cardinal Ratzinger and later to Pope Benedict XVI.
I think Archbishop Lefebvre had no other intention than what is written on his tomb: Tradidi quod et accepi, I have handed on what I myself received, and nothing more.
This is the substance of his life and his work with the Society of Saint Pius X. Nothing other than what was received from all times, from the saints, from the popes of centuries and millennia, and what the Church believed, celebrated, and commanded before the Council.
The Society of Saint Pius X seeks to do exactly that and nothing else.
Matt Gaspers: So I know we are getting short on time, and I want to make sure we let you go when you need to go.
My last question regarding a pastoral solution to the SSPX situation. You address this in your new statement.
You say that the Holy See should give due consideration to the Declaration of Catholic Faith and the Message to the Faithful issued by the Superior General of the SSPX, and should recognize these documents and acts as sufficient and satisfying the minimum conditions for ecclesial communion.
In light of these documents, the Pope, with a paternal heart, could make an exception and permit episcopal consecrations through a truly generous pastoral gesture.
Unfortunately, as you probably know, it does not seem that such recognition or permission will be granted on May 13. Cardinal Fernández released a statement in which he warned that the unauthorized consecration scheduled for July 1 will constitute a schismatic act, quoting Ecclesia Dei from John Paul II, and that formal adherence to schism constitutes a grave offense against God and entails excommunication established under canon law.
So, in light of this warning from Cardinal Fernández, what is your advice to the faithful who currently attend SSPX chapels and receive the sacraments from SSPX priests, with this threat looming?
Bishop Schneider: I think the faithful and the Society simply profess the faith of all times. They profess it, accept the Pope, pray for him, and profess the Catholic faith. This is the minimum really required to be in communion.
If this is not the minimum, then what shall the minimum be? At the same time, the German synodal way and other bishops around the world openly proclaim heresies and permit blasphemies during liturgies, all unpunished and not corrected.
So this admonition I consider unjust. We must continue to pray for Pope Leo, that God may illuminate him so that he recognizes this minimum, which they already fulfill in the profession, in the declaration of faith of Father Pagliarani.
When we read this declaration of faith, we must accept it if we are Catholics. I think even all so-called traditional Ecclesia Dei communities and others who celebrate the traditional Latin Mass would, of course, accept this declaration, because it is Catholic. I cannot imagine that they would not accept it.
And therefore, to excommunicate those who profess this faith and repeatedly express that they recognize the Pope and want to serve the Roman Church would be unjust.
If there is no other solution, it is because of a dilemma of conscience. Otherwise, if they do not carry out the consecrations, their work will come to an end, and this would be a damage to the entire Church.
The Society of Saint Pius X, as Archbishop Lefebvre understood it, exists only as a work for the Church, not for itself, and for souls, simply to transmit the treasure of the integrity of the Catholic faith without ambiguity, with the integrity of the liturgy and priestly formation to the next generations.
They understand it as a service even for the Holy See and for the Popes. But unfortunately, the authorities in Rome currently do not see or recognize this, probably because they desire a different style of Church, not the traditional one.
And so the Society, with this uncompromising clarity in doctrine, liturgy, and priestly formation, is probably not welcomed by some authorities in Rome. In the end, it is always the same issue: the demand to accept Vatican II and the current path of the Church since the Second Vatican Council.
This is the root of the problem, the core question.
We must return again to the core question. The Lord has His Church in His hands. He will intervene again and give us again Popes who are fully Catholic and traditional. This will truly come.
Why? Because the Holy See is a foundation of the Lord, and the gates of hell will not prevail.
Now we are only experiencing a temporal obscuration, a kind of exile, similar to the Avignon exile of about seventy years. Perhaps we are now in a sixty-year exile of clarity in doctrine and liturgy, and this will end.
It is not for us to know the time. The Lord knows it, and He will intervene.
Matt Gaspers: Amen. Well, thank you so much, Your Excellency, for your time today.
I want to put a link on the screen in the video description. I encourage people to read the full text of His Excellency’s statement, available on Diane Montagna’s Substack. I will also place a link in the live chat.
I encourage everyone to read it in full. Before we part ways, Your Excellency, would you give us all a blessing?
Bishop Schneider: Yes. Dominus vobiscum et cum spiritu tuo. Et benedictio Dei omnipotentis Patris, et Filii, et Spiritus Sancti descendat super vos et maneat semper. Amen.
Matt Gaspers: Thank you very much. And thank you to everyone who has been watching. I hope you enjoyed the discussion. If you did, please like the video, subscribe, and share it widely with your family and friends. And who knows, maybe people in the Vatican might even watch it. We hope.
God bless you all, and until next time, take care. We will see you later.