Schism begets Schism

"I am the Vine and you are the branches." 

If you follow news about religion long enough or read enough church history, one of the patterns you will recognize is that schisms beget schisms. When Martin Luther protested against the excesses of the Catholic Church, he ended up in schism. When groups of Luther's followers refused to go along with his teaching, another split occurred and so on and so forth.

You don’t have to look far into the dark mists of history to find this pattern. As a matter of fact, it exists in the United States in the world of traditionalist Catholicism. Traditional Catholicism is renowned for its devotion to the Latin Mass and the Roman Catholic Church as it was before Vatican II. There are various stripes of traditional Catholics from those who work within the Church and accept the Pope to those who do not wish to have anything with it and believe the current occupant of the Chair of St. Peter to be a heretic.

In the 1980s, a schism occurred between a group of nine priests and the Society of St. Pius X (SSPX). The Nine went against Archbishop Lefevbre, the founder of the largest traditional group in the world, because of various issues that they could not reconcile with their own beliefs. For example, they thought that the Roman Missal that should be used at Mass was the one printed immediately before 1955 and the restoration of Holy Week. Another issues was the acceptance by the SSPX of priests ordained in the institutional Roman Catholic Church. Since these clerics were ordained by bishops who had been consecrated after 1968 when a new form of episcopal consecration was introduced, the hard liners believed that they should have been re-ordained rather than just accepted and sent off to work in the mission fields. Finally, there was the issue of the Papacy. The hard liners believed that the Chair of St. Peter was empty, while the SSPX is loyal to the Pope despite giving itself the right to sift through his teaching and use only those that they find relevant.

The hard liners, after a series of law suits, managed to form their group and called it the Society of St. Pius V (SSPV). The group was very much centralized by Bishop Clarence Kelly and headquartered in Oyster Bay Cove, New York. Within a few years, half of the original nine priests were to leave the SSPV. Some of them went onto independent work in various chapels and missions, while a few formed their own organization called “Catholic Restoration” and were by Fathers (later Bishops) Donald Sanborn and Daniel Dolan.

The main point of chronicling these splits is to show that schism is a fact of life in the world of traditional Catholicism. The SSPX had issues with the Vatican, the Nine had problems with the SSPX, Dolan and Sanborn left the SSPV and did their own thing. Split after split after split. These seem to indicate that there is something wrong with these groups that claim to be Roman Catholic and yet do not recognize the Pope as Christ’s Vicar on earth.

You see, the problem with schism is that the schismatic group is essentially on its own. There are some people out there who will argue that the fruits of the sedevacantists and the SSPX are better than those of the Church herself. While there is some truth to this, one should also examine the fruits of these groups as well. Schism after schism and scandal after scandal have been a part of the life of the sedevacanist movement since it was first founded. While some sedevacantist groups are better than others, sooner or later one hears of yet another split. Father So and So was kicked out by Bishop So and So because he refused to toe the party line or decided to defend defenseless children against an abusive school principal.

These things are not accidental. As the saying goes, there is no salvation of outside of the Church. The Holy Spirit does not reside among schismatics and others who believe that they are better than the Church they left behind. Charity does not live here nor will it. Look around at the fruits of the sedevacantists and tell me if there is any good coming out of their groups that is not scandal or schism or a priest who guilt trips his congregation on a routine basis for money so that he can go on expensive junkets to Mexico and Australia.

The Guilt Trip

A common experience most people have to deal with is guilt tripping. No, it’s not tripping out on a drug called guilt. It’s when somebody says something to you and then makes you feel guilty for doing whatever it is that you’re planning to do. For example, I encountered this kind of guilt tripping in an online conversation with a friend. I told her I was leaving a website that I didn’t like and she wrote me back, “If you leave, my depression might spin out of control.”

Guilt tripping is an emotionally manipulative behavior. Since someone can’t get another person to do what they want them, they guilt them into doing it. My friend threatened me with her mental health problems, so that I would stay on that site. Certain traditionalist Catholic priests do it all the time from the pulpit too – “If you walk out of this parish, you’re going to spend the rest of your eternity in hell.” Of course, they don’t put it quite that bluntly, but the guilt trip is always there.

In his book, Brideshead Revisited, Evelyn Waugh writes about a phenomenon known as Catholic guilt. The is the guilt that you feel when you are told over and over again that you have to make absolute satisfaction for your sins. Not only this, but the guilt is something you feel over every day actions. It’s called scrupulosity, but it’s something that is consistently reinforced by traditionalist Catholic clergy. I say traditionalist clergy because Pope Francis doesn’t do guilt tripping. He might make a snide remark here and there, but he’s not about the guilt.

The only way to deal with a guilt trip is to just let it go and forget about it. I’ve dealt with this phenomenon for so long that I finally learned to put my foot down. If someone tries to guilt trip me into doing something, I ignore them and do what I think is best for myself. I don’t allow myself to be emotionally manipulated into doings that I don’t want to do and which, ultimately, could be harmful to me.

For a long time, however, I was not an assertive person. I suppose you could say that I was a throw rug for other people to walk all over. When I got guilt tripped into doing something, I did it. Full stop. Only years later did I learn that it was okay to say no and to walk away from people who are harmful, but it’s not something is easy to do. Sometimes, there are friendships and other close relationships that are on the line, but it’s what I have to do to stay sane.

If you’re dealing with someone who sends you on a guilt trip, stand up for yourself and walk away. You don’t have to be crude or angry about it. You don’t have to even acknowledge what you’ve heard. Just don’t let it get to you. Continue doing what you’re doing and ignore it. If it gets to a point where you can’t stand it anymore, confront the person and walk away.