The Vatican has sided with a New Zealand bishop who has evicted a traditional Mass community out of his diocese, despite the flourishing order strongly denying any wrongdoing.
On August 10, Bishop Michael Gielen of the Diocese of Christchurch issued a letterannouncing that the Vatican has formulated its decision against an appeal made by the The Sons of the Most Holy Redeemer (FSSR) in New Zealand, following a shock decision by Gielen to expel the FSSR last summer.
With the Vatican now bolstering his July 2024 move, Gielen wrote that:
therefore the removal of priestly faculties for the members of the Sons of the Most Holy Redeemer in the Diocese and the directive for their departure remain. This also applies to those priests who arrived after the decrees were announced. Any sacraments celebrated by a priest without faculties are illicit.
The Latin Mass community of the FSSR was established on the small Scottish island of Papa Stronsay in 2012, with the New Zealand house dating back to 2014 and a more recent house in Montana being set up in 2020.
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