On December 14, the USCCB (most accurately known as the United States Conference of Conciliar Bishops) issued a wide-ranging statement on COVID vaccines.
The statement is cosigned by Bishop Kevin Rhoades, Chairman of the Committee on Doctrine, and Archbishop Joseph Naumann, Chairman of the Committee on Pro-Life Activities. Curiously missing from the list of signatories, however, are representatives of the Society of St. Pius X.
Be that as it may, insofar as COVID hysteria is concerned, the USCCB and SSPX are singing from the same song sheet, even if the latter pretends to be doing so in plainchant.
On the authority of Modernist Rome
Readers may recall that the Society issued the first of two statements on COVID vaccines on November 19 in which readers were assured:
The Church has provided steadfast, prudent guidance on this issue. As a result, Catholics have a firm foundation on which to stand in the morality of vaccines. [Emphasis in original]
When and how, according to the SSPX, has Holy Mother Church so nurtured the Catholic faithful?
In 2005, readers were told, by way of the “Pontifical Academy for Life, in a document approved by the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith.”
That’s right, the Society of St. Pius X is encouraging the faithful to place their trust in the same Conciliar Congregation that insists upon the Vatican II version of religious liberty, relations with the Jews, ecumenism, episcopal collegiality, liturgical reform, etc.
The Society’s initial foray into the COVID vaccine discussion was deleted from their website on November 24, one day after it was critiqued in this space (coincidentally or not) along with an announcement saying it had “convened a panel of priests, moral theologians, and medical experts to further study issue, under the guidance of the General House in Menzingen.”
The SSPX published the fruits of the panel’s efforts on December 4, and while this particular article does not contain any specific reference to documents produced by the Captains of Newchurch, their thinking still permeates the text.
As such, one will not be surprised to discover that the recent USCCB statement on COVID vaccines, although more aggressively pro-vaccine, is so similar to the articles published by the SSPX that one wonders if it was a collaborative effort.
Do it for others
For example, both treatments present issues surrounding the rubella vaccine as comparable to those related to COVID. The SSPX states:
A young woman who is to get married can thus receive the rubella vaccine, although such a vaccine is almost always prepared on fetal cells obtained by abortion. The reason is the danger for the child: if a woman contracts rubella during pregnancy, especially during the first trimester, the risk of birth defects – eye, hearing or heart – are significant. These malformations are permanent.
The USCCB approaches the COVID vaccine from the same angle, stating:
The most important danger posed by spread of rubella is that of congenital rubella syndrome, which affects unborn children when their mothers become infected while pregnant. Congenital rubella syndrome can cause miscarriages and a wide range of severe birth defects.
One notes that both statements present the rubella vaccine as a means of protecting the health of others. In their application to COVID, the Conciliar Bishops go a step further than the SSPX in stating that “it may be an act of charity” to receive the COVID vaccine for this reason. They even go so far as to say:
In this way, being vaccinated safely against COVID-19 should be considered an act of love of our neighbor and part of our moral responsibility for the common good.
Get that? The Conciliar Bishops (aka wolves) are instructing their poor sheep that they have a moral responsibility to get vaccinated!
In any case, in their effort to present the issues surrounding the rubella vaccine as precedent-setting for faithful Catholics, both the USCCB and SSPX have relied upon the same source; namely, the instructions given in the 2005 Pontifical Academy for Life document that was approved by the CDF.
Pass the Remote
As expected, therefore, the USCCB and SSPX treatments draw the same conclusions concerning acceptance of the COVID vaccine vis-à-vis cooperation with the evil of abortion. The former declares:
In this case the connection is very remote from the initial evil of the abortion … [there is a] remote connection to morally compromised cell lines … the connection between an abortion that occurred decades ago and receiving a [COVID] vaccine produced today is remote.
In similar fashion the SSPX concluded:
The doctor who vaccinates a patient, or the patient who is vaccinated, has only distant cooperation, for these acts only encourage and promote the sin of abortion in a very remote and very slight way … cooperation is only distant … it is possible in these cases to use such a [COVID] vaccine.
There is disagreement, even in Novus Ordoland, over whether or not this represents a faithful application of Catholic moral principles. Bishop Athanasius Schneider, along with a handful of other conciliar bishops, for example, have been outspoken in declaring that it is not.
Are they willing to lay blame where it belongs; namely, with the so-called “Holy See” that produced the document that states otherwise and upon which the USCCB and SSPX are relying?
One doubts it.
SSPX at odds with itself
On an undated FAQ webpage that remains on the SSPX website, Fr. Peter Scott addresses questions specifically concerning the rubella vaccine. While he also relied upon the 2005 Pontifical Academy for Life document, ultimately concluding that it is permissible to accept the vaccine, his emphasis is rather different.
For example, he plainly states that the rubella vaccine, given its remote connection with abortion, is “an immoral vaccination, and consequently only permissible in cases of real need.”
He also points out that rubella, unlike certain life-threatening diseases, “is in itself a minor and harmless disease” and natural immunity to it “is much more effective than the artificial immunity created by vaccination.”
The same can most certainly be said of COVID-19 for the overwhelming majority of persons. Had the SSPX applied the same reasoning in the present case, it would have repeated Fr. Scott’s concluding statement:
If it [the vaccine] is considered to be obligatory by public health authorities … it is perfectly licit in such a case to insist on an exemption of conscience on the grounds of religion.
You say “sufficiently serious” we say “serious enough”
In any case, what all can agree upon is that both parties have drunk the COVID Kool-Aid. For instance, the USCCB declared:
The risk to public health is very serious, as evidenced by the millions of infections worldwide and hundreds of thousands of deaths in the United States of America alone.
As any moderately well-informed individual knows, the COVID death tally is grossly and deliberately inflated. It is also widely known (see the NY Times, for example) that COVID tests generate false positives at a stunningly high rate.
And yet, the USCCB is pleased to cite “the gravity of the current pandemic,” alarming the faithful as to “the urgency of the crisis.” They even saw fit to stoke the flames of fear concerning the “additional burden on the health care systems, which in certain cities, states, and nations have been in danger of being overwhelmed,” another ruse.
It is based upon these lies that the USCCB has concluded that “the reasons to accept the new COVID-19 vaccines from Pfizer and Moderna are sufficiently serious.”
The SSPX, in its first stab at the topic, postured as if it is simply a given that exposure to COVID-19 presents “significant risks” and “considerable dangers” to one’s health.
In its follow-up piece, the Society alludes to the situation surrounding COVID as one that creates a “serious necessity,” whereby inoculation with a vaccination that is connected, albeit remotely, with abortion may be “required.” At the very least, the SSPX concedes that there are “compelling, grave, sufficient health reasons,” that are “serious enough” to warrant as much.
Meet the composers
The song sheet from which both the USCCB and SSPX are singing has obviously been composed by none other than the United Nations and the same globalists cabal that has been laboring to portray COVID-19 as a highly contagious, eminently deadly, worldwide pandemic that demands a drastic international response.
Despite copious evidence plainly demonstrating that the official narrative is a monumental act of deception crafted specifically for the purpose of establishing a New World Order apart from the Kingship of Christ, the USCCB and SSPX are perfectly pleased not only to give it their imprimatur; they are willing to use their resources to spread it and, worse, to encourage the naïve to accept it.
If Archbishop Lefebvre were alive today to hear their duet, he’d likely repeat what he declared so long ago: They have uncrowned Him.
