Rorate Caeli

Excommunications lifted before the end of autumn

From the semi-official daily of the French Episcopate, La Croix (October 9, 2007):

[At a conference at Saint-Nicolas-du-Chardonnet, on October 5] The head of the Lefebvrists [Bishop Bernard Fellay, Superior-General of the Priestly Fraternity of Saint Pius X - FSSPX/SSPX] also hopes that the excommunications pronounced in 1988, at the moment of the illicit episcopal ordinations in Écône, will soon be lifted. "Maybe from now to the end of autumn."

Also in Tuesday's edition of La Croix, Isabelle de Gaulmyn reports in the main article:

Due to these difficulties in the application of the text [of the motu proprio Summorum Pontificum], the commission Ecclesia Dei is considering the elaboration of a directive which may detail the forms of application. And the Pope could celebrate the Mass in the Extraordinary, that is pre-Conciliar, Roman Rite soon.

We would add that there is no explicit mention of the use of the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite in any of the public Masses in the Pope's calendar of celebrations up to January 2008, updated this Wednesday.