The SSPX Is Explicitly Developing an Ecclesiology of Substitution Foreign to Catholic Tradition
Interview granted to French website Le Salon Beige
Having lived through the 1988 consecrations at close range, the author offers his perspective on those now being planned. In his view, these consecrations have often been interpreted as the immediate consequence of the failure of negotiations between the SSPX and Rome. That reading is too narrow: the event is in reality part of a longer process, one set in motion as early as the 1970s and marked by an increasingly radical critique of the Second Vatican Council. By retracing the doctrinal and ecclesiological journey of Archbishop Lefebvre, Albert Jacquemin shows that the 1988 consecrations were not a matter of simple disciplinary or liturgical dissent, but touched on more fundamental questions: the nature of Tradition, the authority of the living Magisterium, and the conditions of hierarchical communion in the Church.
As new episcopal consecrations are being contemplated for 2026, this work sheds decisive light on a crisis that raises several essential ecclesiological questions. We interviewed him:
The SSPX justifies the consecration of new bishops by invoking the state of necessity in which the Church finds itself. What is your view? Can a state of necessity permit the consecration of new bishops against the authorization of the Pope?
Within the Church, while a "state of necessity" does exist, it can never be invoked against the explicit will of the Pope. Canon law recognizes this principle, particularly when it comes to ensuring the salvation of the faithful in extraordinary circumstances: wars, persecutions, danger of death, a lasting impossibility of access to the sacraments, or a temporary impossibility of reaching ecclesiastical authority. But a state of necessity requires specific conditions. The danger invoked must threaten an essential good of the Church: it must be grave, objective, actual or imminent. Above all, no other legitimate solution must be available. Finally, the means employed must remain proportionate to the danger and compatible with the hierarchical constitution of the Church. The state of necessity is therefore not a right of exception permitting the unilateral suspension of obedience to the Church.
Furthermore, a state of necessity cannot be proclaimed by a particular group that intends to invoke it for its own benefit. In the Catholic Church, the ultimate assessment of such a situation always belongs to the competent authority — and especially to the Holy See — when the act in question touches upon the ecclesial structure.
The Society of Saint Pius X invoked this state of necessity to justify the episcopal consecrations of 1988. In its view, the doctrinal and liturgical crisis following the Second Vatican Council threatened the transmission of the Catholic faith and priesthood. These consecrations, according to Archbishop Lefebvre, constituted an exceptional act intended to preserve Tradition. In practice, they led to the progressive autonomization of the Society from Roman authority.
Yet even in 1988, this argument was already deprived of its foundation by the fact that the Holy See had accepted the principle of consecrating a bishop from within the Society. It was in fact agreed that such a bishop would be consecrated on August 15, 1988. Rome was thus offering a canonical solution that would ensure continuity of Archbishop Lefebvre's work without rupturing ecclesial communion. The essential condition — the absence of any other legitimate solution — was therefore not met. Archbishop Lefebvre's decision satisfied none of the criteria for a state of necessity. That is why John Paul II, in the Motu Proprio Ecclesia Dei, described these consecrations as "a schismatic act."
Today, the SSPX's argument has hardened still further. It now asserts that the ordinary means of sanctification have practically disappeared from the Catholic Church, and that Tradition subsists in any real sense only within the Society. But apart from the fact that it does not belong to a particular priestly society to render such a diagnosis on the state of the universal Church, this claim directly contradicts the Catholic doctrine of the indefectibility of the Church. To maintain that the hierarchical Church has substantially ceased to ensure the ordinary transmission of faith, sacraments, and grace is tantamount to practically denying that Christ remains present and active in his Church.
We arrive here at the heart of the matter: the SSPX is explicitly developing an ecclesiology of substitution that is foreign to Catholic Tradition. It considers itself to have received the mission — without specifying from what authority — of supplying for the alleged failures of the Church itself. Recognition of the Pope is now merely theoretical, since real authority is in practice transferred to the Society's parallel "jurisdiction," which decides for itself where authentic Tradition resides and when obedience to the Holy See may be suspended.
Schism, let us recall, does not consist in denying the authority of the Roman Pontiff, but concretely in obstinately refusing to submit to it. In practice, this results — despite all protestations of fidelity to the Successor of Peter — in the constitution of an autonomous ecclesial structure and life outside of hierarchical communion. That is why the 1988 consecrations were described as a schismatic act. The ordination of bishops against the explicit will of the Pope gravely damages the visible unity of the Church in a domain that directly touches its divine constitution.
For this reason, new episcopal consecrations without pontifical mandate on July 1, 2026 would not constitute a simple repetition of those of 1988, but a considerable aggravation. In 1988, Archbishop Lefebvre claimed to be performing an exceptional act linked to a transitional situation. Nearly forty years later, the repetition of the same gesture would manifest the permanent settlement of the Society into a logic of separation. After decades of persistent refusal of canonical regularization and progressive autonomization, new consecrations would display the will to perpetuate an episcopal succession independent of Roman authority.
If celebrated, these consecrations would no longer be merely an isolated schismatic act, but — precisely by virtue of their repetition — the culmination of a schism consummated in fact, even if the term continues to be rejected by those who are provoking it.
The broad and generous welcome requested in 1988 by John Paul II, and then Benedict XVI's reminder that the extraordinary form had never been abolished, were called into question by Traditionis Custodes. Do the Roman authorities not bear some share of responsibility for this impasse?
The real issue behind the consecrations contemplated by the SSPX is not liturgical but ecclesiological. The question of celebrating the Tridentine Mass can no longer seriously be invoked, as in 1988, since this liturgy continues to be celebrated in the Catholic Church — including outside the Society, by institutes in communion with Rome, and even, despite the recent restrictions (which can always be eased), in numerous dioceses around the world.
The true point of fracture between the SSPX and the Holy See does not concern the celebration of the ancient liturgy, but the doctrinal authority of the Second Vatican Council, the interpretation of Tradition, and ultimately the very nature of authority in the Church.
In 1988, Archbishop Lefebvre maintained that it was necessary to guarantee the survival of the priesthood and the Tridentine rite. Today, that argument has lost its relevance. The Tridentine liturgy still exists in the Church; priests, seminaries, and communities recognized by Rome ensure its transmission. If the SSPX is now contemplating new consecrations, it is less to preserve a liturgical rite than to perpetuate a doctrinal and ecclesiological position.
It is sometimes argued that if Archbishop Lefebvre had not proceeded with the 1988 consecrations, the traditional institutes now in communion with Rome would never have come into existence. One can respond that if the Holy See long showed strong reluctance regarding the Tridentine Mass, it was precisely because Archbishop Lefebvre had linked the defense of that liturgy to a doctrinal challenge to the Council and to Roman authority. The liturgical question then appeared inseparable from an ecclesiological opposition to Roman authority.
But above all, the institutes that today celebrate the traditional liturgy within the Church benefit from the provisions the Holy See had already granted to the Society in the protocol agreement of May 5, 1988 — the agreement that Archbishop Lefebvre ultimately refused. In other words, the conditions allowing the celebration of the Mass of Saint Pius V within ecclesial communion existed before the consecrations. The consecrations were therefore not a necessary condition for the survival of the Tridentine liturgy in the Church.
The underlying question today is far more serious. For the real reason behind new consecrations is this: the Society considers it must itself ensure, independently of the judgment of the Holy See, the authentic continuity of Catholic Tradition. In other words, it is giving to itself a normative function superior in practice to the Magisterium of the Church. The question is therefore no longer one of a liturgical form insufficiently welcomed, but one of a parallel doctrinal authority.
Perhaps the restrictions introduced by Traditionis Custodes have nourished among the faithful attached to the ancient liturgy a sense of incomprehension or injustice. But they do not suffice to explain — and still less to justify — episcopal consecrations without pontifical mandate. These respond to the logic of a permanent establishment of an episcopal succession designed to guarantee, against the alleged "neo-modernist Rome," what the SSPX considers to be the "true Tradition." This pretension reveals the forthcoming consecrations not as a mere disciplinary conflict, but as the culmination of a logic of doctrinal and hierarchical separation — objectively schismatic.
Do you think the excommunication can be formalized at a time when, simultaneously, there appear to be no sanctions against the German bishops or the members of the Synodal group who justify unions between persons of the same sex?
Canon law (c. 1387) attaches a penalty of latae sententiae (automatic) excommunication, reserved to the Holy See, to the very act of episcopal ordination performed without pontifical mandate. This provision is designed to express the extreme gravity of such an act, because it directly touches the hierarchical constitution of the Church and its visible unity. A bishop acting under these conditions places himself outside ecclesial communion by that very act. The Holy See, at the conclusion of the celebration, therefore does no more than note and declare a penalty already incurred by the fact of the act itself.
On May 13, 2026, the Prefect of the Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith, drawing on the Motu Proprio Ecclesia Dei of John Paul II (1988) and on the Explanatory Note of the Pontifical Council for Legislative Texts (1996), recalled what the canonical situation would be for those who perpetrate such a schismatic act anew.
The comparison with the situation of certain German bishops engaged in the "synodal path" calls for distinctions, since the acts in question are not of the same nature. In the case of episcopal consecrations without pontifical mandate, the law explicitly provides for an automatic penalty determined in advance. The canonical offense is objectively constituted by the act itself. An episcopal consecration without pontifical mandate immediately constitutes a public act of rupture in the order of hierarchical communion. It immediately touches the exercise of the pontifical primacy and the apostolic structure of the Church.
The situation of the German bishops is different. Certain of their positions undoubtedly constitute grave challenges to Catholic doctrine on sexual morality, ecclesial authority, and the very nature of the Church. Rome has recalled this on multiple occasions. But what is involved here is not a single canonical act to which the law would automatically attach a latae sententiae excommunication. With the German bishops, we are confronted with grave doctrinal errors, ecclesiological contestations, or acts of disobedience that could, in time, lead to sanctions — but through different procedures.
It is therefore incorrect to present the situation as if Rome were arbitrarily applying a double standard to identical realities. The canonical offenses are not the same, and neither are the legal mechanisms. In one case, the law explicitly provides for an automatic penalty; in the other, the ecclesiastical authority must progressively establish the exact nature of the doctrinal or disciplinary errors, the imputability of those errors, and the possible obstinacy of those involved.
It should be added that the Holy See has never ruled out recourse to canonical sanctions against certain German leaders if they persist in positions incompatible with Catholic doctrine or concretely commit the Church in Germany to a path contrary to ecclesial communion. Several recent Roman interventions have precisely sought to prevent a national synodal process from claiming to constitute itself as an autonomous doctrinal authority facing the universal Magisterium of the Church.
In both cases, the fundamental question remains that of the unity of the Church and communion with the Successor of Peter. But the forms of rupture, their canonical nature, and the legal consequences that flow from them are not identical.
[Source, in French]
