Father MacDonald on Apples and Oranges

JMJ

Father MacDonald wrote the following on his blog "Southern orders: Mixing Apples and Oranges"

Many Catholics who attend these chapels think they are receiving absolution in "confession" and are validly being "married" but they are not and thus when they go to Holy Communion they are doing so in a state of mortal sin compounded by their illicit civil union which is an invalid sacrament.

My comment - ~~which has yet to appear on his blog~~ - was approximately the following:

If the Catholic thought they were receiving absolution, then they were absolved and married because of their error - following Canon Law.

As an aside, the SSPX does not claim to have 'ordinary jurisdiction' - although I understand that some dioceses have provided them with faculties (don't know which - just heard on a forum ...). If they did make that claim, then they would truly be schismatic.

My comment has appeared:

Hi Father,
If this is true:
"... Many Catholics who attend these chapels think they are receiving absolution in "confession" and are validly being "married" but they are not and thus when they go to Holy Communion they are doing so in a state of mortal sin compounded by their illicit civil union which is an invalid sacrament. ..."
Then the Church supplies due to error and the noted sacraments are valid.
That the SSPX does not have hierarchical jurisdiction is not in question. If they made that claim, then they would be schismatic. They generally rely upon supplied jurisdiction due to the state of necessity in which the faithful find themselves. However, the suppliance of jurisdiction in the case of error would also suffice.
P^3

The SSPX rely upon the state of necessity caused by this crisis of the Catholic Church (please don't ask: What crisis?). In this case, because the salvation of souls is the highest law that supercedes all other canons the Church supplies jurisdiction.

I found this part very interesting:

In fact it would be better to go to an Eastern Orthodox priest, since they are in true schism and do not require canonical approbation for the validity of their Sacrament of Penance and Holy Matrimony.

Which is cute, Fr. Zed indicated that this was due to the Orthodox bishops having ordinary jurisdiction before the schism. This however falls down when they entered areas that are outside of their territorial jurisdiction.

Doing a quick search I found the following on EWTN:

"Canon 844 - §2. Whenever necessity requires it or true spiritual advantage suggests it, and provided that danger of error or of indifferentism is avoided, the Christian faithful for whom it is physically or morally impossible to approach a Catholic minister are permitted to receive the sacraments of penance, Eucharist, and anointing of the sick from non-Catholic ministers in whose Churches these sacraments are valid."In all cases validly ordained priests have the power, from ordination, to administer the sacrament of penance. In the Latin Church this exercise is controlled by the requirement that the priest receive the faculty to administer the sacrament. This faculty is conceded to Orthodox priests in certain circumstances as noted in the cited canon and in the guidelines provided in the "Directory for the Application of Principles and Norms on Ecumenism (Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity, March 25, 1993). (Source: EWTN)

So, if a Catholic finds themselves in a morally impossibility to approach a Catholic minister (with ordinary jurisdiction) - for example perhaps he's spreading heretical doctrines, malforming the words of consecration and absolution ... - would the Church not also provide jurisdiction for an SSPX priest as she does for the Orthodox (note well - this is stating something different that Fr. MacDonald). How is the moral impossibility judged?

All this is compounded with the way Rome treats the SSPX's confessions - granted that we only have Bishop Fellay's words - in serious reserved cases they have never stated that they don't have jurisdiction to absolve.

In the end Father makes this statement:

They have more in common with the fullness of the Church surrounded by Saint Peter than the Orthodox and Anglicans.

Vatican II 'speak' is lots of fun. Frankly, the SSPX is Catholic and just lacks a canonical regularity that it 'lost' earlier in its history.

It will be restored when the Church stops shunning the perspective that the SSPX represents and carries within its bosom.

P^3

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