Less than two weeks before the episcopal consecrations announced by the Priestly Fraternity of Saint Pius X for next July 1, one of the texts published during the years of doctrinal dialogue between Rome and the Fraternity is once again relevant.
The article reproduced below was published in December 2011 in L’Osservatore Romano and signed by Msgr. Fernando Ocáriz Braña, then Vicar General of Opus Dei and one of the representatives appointed by the Holy See in the doctrinal conversations with the Priestly Fraternity of Saint Pius X.
The text appeared a few weeks after the meeting between Benedict XVI and Bishop Bernard Fellay, Superior General of the Fraternity, at a time when discussions on the interpretation of the Second Vatican Council were at the center of negotiations between the two parties.
Ocáriz addresses one of the fundamental questions of the debate: what degree of assent the teachings of the Second Vatican Council require, how its doctrinal novelties should be interpreted, and in what way its continuity with the Church’s previous Magisterium can be understood.
Fifteen years after its publication, on the brink of a schism between Rome and the Priestly Fraternity of Saint Pius X, this text retains an undeniable historical and doctrinal interest for understanding the position the Holy See then defended regarding the reception and interpretation of the last ecumenical council.
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