No surprise really. Of the four bishop's Lefebvre consecrated (illicitly under Catholic canon law) back in 1988, two have reposed, one after going off into sedevacantism and general nuttery. The two remaining are getting up there in years and the level of work for them has certainly not diminished in the last 38 years. This is going to throw a lot of gasoline (petrol for our overseas readers) on the slow burning debate over the traditional Catholic liturgical rites, and those attached to them, that Francis loathed. (The feelings were mutual.) Leo XIV had initially planned to address the red hot liturgy war at his recent consistory of Cardinals, but there wasn't enough time and so the matter was tabled for future consideration. But it was still there under the surface. Cardinal Roche disseminated an attack on the Old Rite and basically called for its formal and complete suppression, which provoked indignant rebuttals to His Eminence's frankly lame arguments.
Now this is going to become quite possibly the first serious crisis of Leo's pontificate. Under Catholic canon law, the consecration of bishops without the sanction of the Holy See is considered an act of formal schism and carries an automatic excommunication. How will Rome and the new Pope respond?
The formal communique of the Society of St. Pius X.
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